Children have an amazing innate ability to have fun anywhere (except the doctor, grocery store, post office, or electric company). The simplest things bring them hours of enjoyment. A small child can turn an average cardboard box into a house, a club, a clubhouse, a rocket, a car, a train, jail, a garage, a table, no a garage, but I said I want a TABLE!!!
When did we, as adults, lose the ability to have that kind of fun? When did sidewalk chalk become a mess desperately in need of some spray and wash instead of a wonderful rainbow of expression? Somewhere along the way we lose our way, but a "lucky" few of us have discovered the secret to child-like fun. (Are you ready for this?) Children!
Nothing gets you outside playing (read: cleaning) with bubbles and Play-Doh like children. There are the games of Hide-and-Seek that turn into Hide-and-Why-is-it-so-quiet-oh-crap-Seek. And something seems to go terribly wrong when a frazzled mother (like the ones in comic strips with frizzy hair circa Albert Einstein and crazy eyes) grabs a piece of sidewalk chalk at the end of a very long (long, long, long, long, long) day of (not so) quick errands (or torture).
Rain turns into a pond, with a duck and a fish, oh, a cloud, maybe a thunderstorm complete with lightning bolt and if you call now I'll throw in a badly drawn Zeus in the Parthenon (maybe?) for absolutely free! (But act now because we can't keep these deals around forever.) And it's entitled, "Zeus, Zeus's Wrath, and Uh Oh Duck". (Probably not bound for the Louvre, let's face it.)
Some people will say their children bring out the kid in them. I say Poppycock! Sometimes you just have to laugh so you won't cry.
And you may be right, I may be crazy, (Hey!) but we all may be a little crazy inside.
Dedicated in loving memory to William Homer Haskins, an eternal kid-at-heart.
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