The Thread #6, Play, The Person Builder

Who gets to decide how the child spends his or her play time? In the education of children, there is probably no single factor that is more important to who that child will become as an adult. Why does that message not sink into the skulls of more young parents? You tell me for I have no idea. There are more than enough experts out there telling parents to "back off" for the good of the child.

For the first eight years of my life, playing occupied most of my waking hours. Even when we worked, picking cotton for Mr. Deese, in Weddington, we really played. Our world was not very big, but it did not have to be. The area that was our playground in Weddington probably covered 20 acres or so, but withing that area was plenty to keep active little minds occupied.

In the first installment of The Thread, I told about early school and how the play time was such a big part of every day. I told about how we decided what we would play and the games that we played. Play was interaction with others; learning to build and strengthen relationships and solve differences.

Play in and around the house was no less a teaching experience. I sat up in the poplar tree next to the road and watched as the road workers first paved Matthews Weddington Road. For reference, that was about 1951. Until then it was a gravel road. By the time they had finished the work, I knew what you had to do to pave a road.

Sitting in that same tree, we kept a lookout for the iceman, who delivered blocks of ice that kept the food chilled in the ice box that preceded the refrigerator. We ran in and watched him use those giant tongs to grab the ice block and carry it into the house. One of our chores was to empty the water from below. The process of cooling food and which foods have to have that cooling was learned early.

But, we also learned that a ground spring could keep milk fresh, for it was in a spring that we kept our extra milk. Water from beneath the ground was cooler than water in the creek and could be used as a refrigerator. it was also safer and cooler to drink that creek water.

The broom straw field between our house and the Deese house was a great place to hide and play Cowboys and Indians. The straw was so thick that you could stay hidden for a long time. But, it was not the place to play with matches, as we learned one day when we set the field on fire and watched it burn in only a few minutes. It was my oldest brother who got the matches, I swear.

The eroded gullies behind the house and field were not just gullies, they were canyons where young children could invent all sorts of games that involved wall climbing and butt sliding or war games that involved using the high ground as a place from which to attack your enemy.

And in the house, sitting beside the radio that gave you no clue as to what pictures went with the stories, you created your own pictures and pictured the Lone Ranger riding through the canyons behind your house, Sky King flying his airplane over the field in front of your house, and Gene Autry riding across your broom straw field where outlaws hid deep within the grass.

On Satruday morings, you listened to Big John and Sparkie as they looked under your bed to see if there was dust, which you had cleaned out waiting for them to come on the air. You promised them that you had not talked back to your mom and dad that week and had done everything that they told you to do. Then, you waited on that special week when they sang the birthday song just for you.

"Today is a birthday, We wonder for whom.
We know that its for someone whose right in this room.
So look all around you for somebody who.
Is smiling and happy. My goodness its you.
Happy birthday friend, from all of us to you.
Happy birthday friend, from daddy and mommy too.
We congratulate you and pray good luck follows you.
Happy birthday friend. May all your good dreams come true."

There was reality during those years and sometimes the reality burned like a branding iron on your heart. I remember the day that the letter came back that mom had sent her brother in Korea. I knew that she was up there in her bedroom crying and I wanted her to be alright. I remembered Roy, the brother, before he went off to the Marines. He played with us kids like he was one of us.

I remember holding on to the post of the funeral tent as the soldier yelled, "Cock! Aim! Fire! I remember being scared so badly that I jumped up off the ground when the first shots were fired. I remember the taps they played and seeing them fold the flag that they gave to my grandma.

But, I also remember that even as the funeral day was coming to a close, we were playing games with our cousins behind our grandparents house while the grownups talked about their lost brother in the house. I remember, if not that day, mocking those soldiers using sticks, and folding pieces of cloth into the cocked hat like the real soldiers had folded the flag.

When I was eight years old, my family moved to the new house that my dad and some other guys had built on the land that he had bought with his dad, sister, and brother. Our part was 44.9 acres and our lives changed significantly with that move. Work became a bigger part of our lives than play. But, when play time came, what a wonderland of a playground we had.

I would never hold up my childhood as some sort of model for the raising of children. My parents, like all parents, were a product of their times and their own training. There is so much about my childhood that I would wish on no child. Much of what happened during those years just happened as a natural consequence of our lives.

But, I have no problem telling anyone that the freedom to invent my own play, and have plenty of time to do that without the planning or intercession of adults, was a great experience that I would recommend to all parents. There is no life that my parents could have given me that would have been nearly so rewarding.

Hovering parents who see it as their duty and prerogative to plan and oversee every moment of their child's play have become the norm in much of our present day society. There are pressures on parents today that we and my parents did not have. Society has built up an unfortunate checklist of things that "good" parents do. I have seen this in my own family and in many others. The unfortunate losers in this rush for safety and early excelling is the very people who all this is about, the children.

And of course, when a child loses the ability to discover for himself or herself, a grownup with frustrations has been molded using nothing but the best of intentions.