Toys

Don’t blame it on The Barbie Movie. Well. OK blame it on the Barbie Movie, but that’s not what started it. “It” is toy promotion that used to start right after Halloween—then in October—then, well, earlier than we can recall. Now, mid-summer walk into almost any store, and you’ll find Christmas toy promotions popping up.Shopping season is now almost nonexistent—it is virtually ubiquitous.

This tome is not a treatise trashing early Christmas promotions, nor against toys. I simply call to mind a focus on play. Toys are things. By any meaningful definition, they are for play. Toys are available that do almost any human activity; a truck? a self-driving truck. A playhouse: a three-story mansion complete with hot tube that actually works. Toys have become, not a stimulus for imagination, but actual tiny life replicas. Play excites imagination which, especially, a child, needs—the self-created hum of a motor, feel the texture of hand-made crude toys—-it is the joy of imaginary toys.

If you are thinking these are simply cynical comments from a crusty old curmudgeon. they are not. Well not entirely. There is a growing gathering of concerned children’s cognoscenti speaking out about how controlled (manufactured?) play has become. The list is long; —maybe beginning with the lack of or time for school recess, the full calendar of sports, arts, and other tightly curated activities. Nearly all driven by too many helicopter parents hoping their offspring will be “The Best”— the highest achiever in their realm.

The landscape is sprinkled with human disappointment derived from children being pushed into a role or dream their parents had. I am not a scholar. Maybe our current milieu is a byproduct of the Beat Generation of decades ago. For whatever the cause, the opportunity arises now for letting in some sunshine and fresh air. I think I see that happening.

It seems to me that the rising generation sees opportunity for building a better world; a more hopeful world. For many, it comes from having lived through some difficult, if not mean passageways in their growing years. I stand in awe of the insight that many have. They see a place for work, a place for play, a place for caring for each other. Their toys are not manufactured plastic, self-animated toys. My daughter, Melanie’s friends back home asked her, when she was home from college, what they did for fun, in that isolated, small, collage? She replied, “We make our own fun,”

There is a magnificent piece of art work in the United Methodist Children’s curriculum. It has endured for a long time. It’s endurance, I am convinced, is due to the simple truth if portrays; It portrays a young-adult-Jesus, dressed casually (for his day) running, laughing, through a meadow, a child on his back and followed by laughing children. Joy exudes from the faces of the children. You can almost hear their musical laughter.

The Gospel of Mark has a marvelous verbal description of what I consider Jesus playing with children; He took them in his arms and blessed them. In my mind’s eye I see him chatting with them, asking about their pets at home—maybe even joyfully teasing them. No toys are mentioned, but play is present.