It's happening again, right now.
A week ago I found an old VHS of Chitty-Chitty Bang Bang in a thrift store, remembered enjoying it as a child, and brought it home to show to my children.
They still haven't seen it. Each afternoon or evening that would have been just right for a movie night - it was cold and grey, or we'd been home for "x" days in a row - I've thought of hauling out the TV (which we keep on a high shelf) and VCR (which we keep in a closet) and lining up the children on the sofa to watch a slice of my childhood ... but I don't do it.
I hate to disturb them.
It's dark outside; we've eaten our supper and are planted in the living room where the fire burns hottest. Spice is curled up on the sofa reading a Dr. Seuss biography from the library. Sugar plays Colorku, a beautiful wooden version of Sudoku using colored balls. Lil' Snip is building Lego tractors under the direction of Nice (who is living up to her name instead of plaguing her brother for the pleasure of hearing him squeal).
And I just can't make myself break up all the coziness, an almost palpable sense of "we are us; we are family; we belong here together."
So the videos I bring home gather dust on the shelf, and the children ask from time to time when we're going to watch them, but they never seem to remember to ask when we could watch them .... so we don't.
And no one seems to mind.
And Sugar learns new songs on the piano,
and Lil' Snip builds a million Lego towers,
and Spice makes music on her recorder,
and Nice sings songs she made up in her head,
and Sugar teaches herself new crochet stitches from a library book,
and Nice reads the Little House series,
and Spice teaches "school" to her siblings,
and Lil' Snip drives his trucks
and the girls dress up in ballet leotards and dance "The Waking of the Spring Flowers"
and it's all too lovely to interrupt for a mere movie ...
[for more thoughts on the TV-less life, check out this blog]
Showing posts with label boredom. Show all posts
Showing posts with label boredom. Show all posts
Sunday, January 19, 2014
Monday, February 13, 2012
masquerading as opportunity
My Farmer and I decided last night to opt out of an "opportunity" for our children.
I know, I know, what indifferent parents that makes us!! Children need opportunities; we shouldn't let them miss out on an opportunity to visit the elderly / sing with a choir / help out with a church project / make new friends / etc., etc., !!!
[insert guilt]
Actually, we see it as a positive move.
We've seen how opportunity-ridden our immediate cultural circle is, and how the opportunities, despite being perfectly good ones in and of themselves, quickly pile up like so many annoying battery-operated toys. For our family, more opportunity has not been better than less. In our experience, more opportunity often equals ill-rested, bickering, ungrateful, restless children who don't get enough "normal" to remember how "normal" feels.
We are opting instead for the opportunity to give our children the gift of free time. That's right, time when they get to decide how to fill the luscious minutes:
They might play outside (yes, even in the cold!), working on their elaborate (and sometimes slightly disgusting) recipes for their "cat hotel", riding bikes, jumping on the trampoline, or just poking around, seeing what's coming up looking for spring.
They might play inside, creating a cozy space in a little-used closet.
They might rummage through their crafts supplies, bored, until something sparks their interest and they begin to create.
They might play with their little brother, building block towers for him knock down, reading stories to him (well, pieces of them, as he rapidly turns the pages), or setting up sofa cushion forts for him to hide in.
They might read.
They might write stories several pages long, complete with illustrations.
They might write letters to friends.
They might get out puzzles or play games with each other.
They might ask to cook something. (And I, on a good day, might let them!)
They might offer to clean (it has happened, to my great astonishment and joy!!)
: : :
It's hard to be a radical: I started this post feeling a tad defensive about our choice to say "no." But writing this has reminded me that although our children might not have flashy resumes, they are discovering inner resources of creativity and I will always be happy that we gave them the chance to do it.
We can do hard things!
And so, believe it or not, can our children.
I know, I know, what indifferent parents that makes us!! Children need opportunities; we shouldn't let them miss out on an opportunity to visit the elderly / sing with a choir / help out with a church project / make new friends / etc., etc., !!!
[insert guilt]
Actually, we see it as a positive move.
We've seen how opportunity-ridden our immediate cultural circle is, and how the opportunities, despite being perfectly good ones in and of themselves, quickly pile up like so many annoying battery-operated toys. For our family, more opportunity has not been better than less. In our experience, more opportunity often equals ill-rested, bickering, ungrateful, restless children who don't get enough "normal" to remember how "normal" feels.
We are opting instead for the opportunity to give our children the gift of free time. That's right, time when they get to decide how to fill the luscious minutes:
They might play outside (yes, even in the cold!), working on their elaborate (and sometimes slightly disgusting) recipes for their "cat hotel", riding bikes, jumping on the trampoline, or just poking around, seeing what's coming up looking for spring.
They might play inside, creating a cozy space in a little-used closet.
They might rummage through their crafts supplies, bored, until something sparks their interest and they begin to create.
They might play with their little brother, building block towers for him knock down, reading stories to him (well, pieces of them, as he rapidly turns the pages), or setting up sofa cushion forts for him to hide in.
They might read.
They might write stories several pages long, complete with illustrations.
They might write letters to friends.
They might get out puzzles or play games with each other.
They might ask to cook something. (And I, on a good day, might let them!)
They might offer to clean (it has happened, to my great astonishment and joy!!)
: : :
It's hard to be a radical: I started this post feeling a tad defensive about our choice to say "no." But writing this has reminded me that although our children might not have flashy resumes, they are discovering inner resources of creativity and I will always be happy that we gave them the chance to do it.
We can do hard things!
And so, believe it or not, can our children.
Friday, June 24, 2011
in praise of boredom
Ahhh, boredom! That delicious restlessness that comes upon a body and mind so fully rested as to absolutely demand fresh activity!!
(To this mother of four, such a sensation has been entirely novel for years).
A child who is privileged to experience boredom (and who has learned through experience that nothing interesting happens when she whines about it), is ushered into that most exciting and satisfying realm of childhood: invention.
The world lies at her feet. What shall she do?
Read a book? Lie in the sunshine with a kitten? Ride her bike? Look for flowers? Pick raspberries for extra spending money? Rummage through the recycling bin for "building" materials? Swing on a hammock? Shoot baskets? Draw with chalk wherever chalk will "stick"?
Or make something inside .... a Lego house, say, or a fort with sofa cushions? Maybe write a letter, or sew something from her own personal stash of fabrics? Bead a necklace? Set up a tea party with her sister?
Or, hmmmm .... swing? Do a little imaginary "cooking" with grasses, leaves, and dried flower bits in her recycling-bin pots and pans? Explore the barn? Lie in the cool shade and invent kinder worlds than this one? Maybe make a "treehouse" in the Japanese maple tree, or fashion crosses from sticks tied with grass, or build a village of wigwams with whatever nature can supply. Or make "gardens" in the dirt between the ancient roots of the pecan tree.
How could I ever deprive my children of the opportunity to create such intriguing play? How could I ever come up with such interesting things on my own for them to do? And even if I could, how dull it would seem to them to do "Mommy's play."
No, the TV will remain high up out of reach. The videos will be limited to rainy days in such succession as to exhaust the supply of indoor play. The computer? It has not yet occurred to them to find it interesting (I can only accept blame for this, as I must appear pitiable to them as I sit slouched in front of it).
And the only ideas I will have when mine are requested will be for patios swept, little brother watched, beds made up, trash taken out, laundry folded, flowerbeds weeded, sinks scrubbed, rugs shaken out........
I think that will be sufficient to keep from being asked too often, don't you?
(To this mother of four, such a sensation has been entirely novel for years).
A child who is privileged to experience boredom (and who has learned through experience that nothing interesting happens when she whines about it), is ushered into that most exciting and satisfying realm of childhood: invention.
The world lies at her feet. What shall she do?
Read a book? Lie in the sunshine with a kitten? Ride her bike? Look for flowers? Pick raspberries for extra spending money? Rummage through the recycling bin for "building" materials? Swing on a hammock? Shoot baskets? Draw with chalk wherever chalk will "stick"?
Or make something inside .... a Lego house, say, or a fort with sofa cushions? Maybe write a letter, or sew something from her own personal stash of fabrics? Bead a necklace? Set up a tea party with her sister?
Or, hmmmm .... swing? Do a little imaginary "cooking" with grasses, leaves, and dried flower bits in her recycling-bin pots and pans? Explore the barn? Lie in the cool shade and invent kinder worlds than this one? Maybe make a "treehouse" in the Japanese maple tree, or fashion crosses from sticks tied with grass, or build a village of wigwams with whatever nature can supply. Or make "gardens" in the dirt between the ancient roots of the pecan tree.
How could I ever deprive my children of the opportunity to create such intriguing play? How could I ever come up with such interesting things on my own for them to do? And even if I could, how dull it would seem to them to do "Mommy's play."
No, the TV will remain high up out of reach. The videos will be limited to rainy days in such succession as to exhaust the supply of indoor play. The computer? It has not yet occurred to them to find it interesting (I can only accept blame for this, as I must appear pitiable to them as I sit slouched in front of it).
And the only ideas I will have when mine are requested will be for patios swept, little brother watched, beds made up, trash taken out, laundry folded, flowerbeds weeded, sinks scrubbed, rugs shaken out........
I think that will be sufficient to keep from being asked too often, don't you?
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