Kids Games

What is it about kids and the games they play these days?  When I was a kid I was actively involved with playing GI Joe, army, cowboys and Indians, basketball, kick the can and stuff like that.  During the summer months we would be outside all day long and late into the evening playing games.  We would have all of the neighborhood kids playing baseball in the street with a tennis ball.  When it got dark we would play kick the can or ding-dong ditch.  Somewhere between there and here the whole gaming culture has changed. 

Let me illustrate what I am talking about.  When I was a kid I would call up my best friend and ask if he wanted to get together at the neighborhood park and shoot some hoops.  So I would grab my basketball, walk to the park and shoot baskets for hours with my buddy.  In the not too distant past, when modems were our primary connection to the online community, my son would call up his friend and ask him if he wanted to get together and play the computer game Age of Empires.  He would go downstairs on the computer, dial up his friends’ phone number and play computer games over the modem with his buddy.  What kind of interaction is that?  He didn’t even see the kid.  I have to give them some credit though; sometimes they actually would get together and play computer games in the same room.  One sits down at the computer and plays while the other sits and looks over the others’ shoulder, dozing off, spouting off strategy and occasionally reminding the other that it is time to switch.

Here is another one.  When I was in elementary and Jr. High School I lived in Southern California.  My friends and I would get together and ride bikes.  We would go into the hills and go off jumps, ride to each others house to play, or even ride several miles to the mall to hang out and buy candy.  Today it is still bikes or inline skates, but there has been a drastic change.  There is not a chance I would let my kids, with one or two friends ride their bikes to the mall.  I am more inclined to tell them, “If you can get a group of no smaller that 35 kids together and you all promise to stick together then I will let you go anywhere within a 500 yard radius of the house.  Otherwise you stay within sight or shouting distance.  And don’t forget to take your pepper spray.  And don’t forget your Global Positioning System sport watch and your Video Mounted Helmet Cam so I can keep track of where you are and who you’re with.”

Then there was my daughter when she was 5 years old who invented her own game.  I am not sure she had a name for this game, but for the sake of this discussion I will call it Black and Blue.  She would begin this game with a blanket or a towel.  Anything that you can place over your head for the purpose of taking away sight would do.  Once the towel had sufficiently rendered her sightless she would proceed to walk, or run, around the house.  Now common sense would dictate that in such a game you would hold your arms out in front of you so as to feel your way around.  Not in her game, I think it was against the rules.  I would just sit and watch in amazement as she proceeded to walk into the corner of the wall or the open door, headfirst.  Often the obstacle was low and caused her to trip and fall on her face.  She will take a time-out to pull the towel off and groan about the pain that was inflicted.  One time she uncovered her head crying and then within a few seconds had recovered enough to start up again.  What’s up with that?  Get a clue kid, the game sucks, the walls are harder than your head and they are going to give you additional brain damage.  My thinking is, if you are going to get injured playing a game, at least make it worth it.  Diving for the ball, colliding with an opponent at full speed, landing on someone’s foot and wrenching your ankle while coming down from shooting the winning basket.  At least make the injury count for something!

Come to think of it when I was growing up we weren’t always the smartest in the games we played.  We used to live next to an area we called the sandpits.  I think we gave it that name because there was a lot of sand there.  Anyway these sand pits had hills of sand and flats of sand.  I haven’t a clue why, but my Dad let us elementary school aged kids have our own bow and arrow sets.  I think maybe secretly he was thinking “Five kids are expensive to raise and it is just going to get worse as they get older.  If I arm them each with deadly weapons, maybe one of them will take the other out, thus reducing the financial strain.  If I remember correctly he did give us some words of council as he turned the weapons, I mean toys, over to us very intelligent and responsible kids.  It was something like “Now kids, I don’t want you shooting animals with these things”.  “Ok, no problem Dad, we will be responsible; after all some of us are almost 10 years old.”  One time I remember a bunch of us being at the sand pits with our bow and arrow sets.  Practicing good bow and arrow safety we would shoot our arrows all over in the wide-open spaces.  One time we were all gathered together and all of a sudden my oldest, and wisest, brother loads up an arrow and points it straight up in the air and lets it fly.  All of us, with a combination of hysterical laugher and shear panic, scattered in all directions trying to avoid being skewered.  After all no one wanted to be the one walking around with an arrow poking out of the top of their head.  Now this is a game that I have chosen not to hand down to the next generation in my family.  How stupid were we?  Makes walking into walls while playing blind seem a bit intelligent doesn’t it?

Oh and of course I can’t forget the tennis ball cannons we used to make.  We would spend hours outside launching a tennis ball several hundred feet into the air with our pop-can tennis ball cannons.  It was a good thing all the fathers on the block were at work and the mothers were just glad to have the kids out of the house.  As a Father myself now, somehow I can’t picture myself saying to my son “here are some cans, duct tape, tennis balls, lighter fluid and some matches.  Go have some fun and see how high you can make that baby fly.  Don’t forget to be careful though.”  I think I am more inclined to say “Gee son, I think the computer is open, why don’t you call up your friend and see if he wants play a lively multi-player game of Age of Empires.  But make sure you are careful.”