I had been locked inside of a big, dark room. I managed to get out and walk through an equally dark hallway to the top of a stairwell where across the room was a light, curly-haired woman holding a gun. I held up my arm, extended my forefinger forward, thumb up in the air and three fingers pointing back at me. I proceeded to make all of the right noises "chew chew chew." but even Ridiculous Dream Me knew that my 5 year old style hand gun with "chew chew chew" noises was no match for a real weapon. And then I woke up.
And as I lay there, still shaken even half an hour later, I realized that this is the epitome of adult worry: holding up a pretend gun made out of your hand when everyone else has real weapons. Powerlessness because in spite of seeing what's coming at you, you have all the wrong tools for the job. And my adult worries, similarly to my childhood fears, still feel a size too big. Especially in the middle of the night after one too many hamentaschen.
The topic of weapon play has been at the forefront of my mind as S and several of his classmates explore it on the playground. It's an area that has peaked my curiosity long before S first came home from school in the fall with all new vocabulary and dramatization around it. I've read research, engaged in conversations with other educators and early childhood specialists, listened to podcasts and lectures and even reflected on it myself. What is it that draws in the level of curiosity and exploration our young children have with weapon play? So many are quick to say it's the internet or television or video games. And yet, long before there were PJ Masks and Ninja Turtles on the playground, there were Cowboys and Indians, Cops and Robbers. Weapon play is nothing new.
Our adult ears are so sensitive to those "chew chew chew" sounds. We cringe at hearing a five year old child use words like "kill" and "shoot" and "smash their head in." We either redirect, disallow, ignore or a combination of all three. And our children intuit one way or the other that, for some reason, this is something we do not play... We would not "play-shame" a child for pretending to be a teacher or a wizard or a turtle...but for pretending to be a soldier or a ninja or, heaven forbid, a "bad guy?" We are justified in this because bad guys are, well, bad. And when we say "we don't play..." it becomes essentially that red button on the playground that says "Don't Push Me." Or, they get more creative than that and begin to play in private. Either way, that play happens. It has to. It's almost compulsive. They may mask that gun as a fire hose or a squirt toy, but it's still shooting.
"Ask a child what they are shooting and they will almost never say a bullet." said one educator in a group discussion on this topic. So I tried it. I asked S on numerous different occasions in the Fall when he came home with an interest in weapon play what he was shooting. Sure enough, every time it was something different. Fire. Poison. Ice cream. Bubbles. Never bullets. I fought the urge in those months to redirect, sometimes less successfully than others, but most of the time I realized this play had to run its course. And it did, at home, at least. More recently it's crept its way into his classroom and school playground with many peers. And the issue has been of concern to many parents. I feel slightly less concerned having the "evidence based knowledge" that this is normal and developmentally typical. I do, however, still have a discomfort with it.
S and I were playing together on Friday night after the Shabbos meal. The game morphed into S using a toy bottle as a "poison shooter." I grabbed the closest thing to me, a Mitzvah Machine (which looks curiously like a toy Keurig coffee maker). Every time his poison shooter shot poison at one thing or another, the Mitzvah Machine shot bubbles of good deeds or slime of kind acts or even glitter powder of helpfulness. Eventually, the Poison Shooter relented and decided to enter the Mitzvah Machine and repent for his unkind acts with plenty of more altruistic ones. But this didn't happen until Saturday afternoon! So maybe that ridiculous nightmare was also triggered (pun intended) by the game being yet unresolved when we went to bed...
And here I was, in that dark balcony of a place I've never been staring at this woman I've never seen, holding up my pretend gun shouting "chew, chew, chew," but I can't remember how to play. And that's when it hits me:
We can't remember how to play. For our youngest children, much of their lives are beyond their grasp--whether literally or cognitively. So much is out of their control, but when they play, they can control everything. They can be anything, become anything, overcome anything. And we can't remember. We can't remember what it's like to have all of the power to change in your hands and none of the hopelessness of defeat. And we've forgotten how to change; we've met defeat so many times it's often easier just to stay the same. To still be holding up that pretend gun made out of your hand even though The Enemy has real weapons. But what is this elusive enemy? With her slight figure and light curly hair? Across a balcony in a dark room in a place we've never been? It's worry.
Worry that our children will become what they play. But let me tell you something about children and play. Children embody their play. Completely. Get a group of five year olds with cats on their mind and you're going to have meowing, purring, licking, clawing--the full feline experience. There's no just talking about a cat--they must be the cat and completely commit to the cat until that cat is done. And let me tell you something else. I have known children who have pretended to be cats since I was a child pretending to be a cat and not one of them, not one has become a cat. Some still talk about cats. Some even have cats. One actually had a separate Facebook profile for her cat, but I digress...
Play is the experience of a child. It is the ability to hold the whole world in your hands when 85% of it still requires a step stool to reach. Play is for fun. It is for learning. It is for release. It is for control. It is for power. It is for conflict and resolution. It is for experimenting and trying on for size. Play is for wonder and for curiosity and for questions and for answers. Play is a lot of things and I firmly believe it has to happen. It has to run its course. It has a purpose and when the purpose is fulfilled, the play changes. The cat gives way to a dog that gives way to a dragon that gives way to a wizard that gives way to a Bad Guy that gives way to Batman...
When the hand is a magic wand, we don't worry. Even if that magic wand can obliterate the world in one fell swoop, it's whimsical, mystical and pretend. But when the same is a gun, it hits too close to home. It epitomizes to us that world that for adults is 85% still out of our reach and there is no step stool. The difference between the child and the adult, however, is that their hand being a gun is not equivalent to the loss of innocence. That we can't remember this--that is the loss of innocence. The fact that at one point we learned the difference between a magic wand and a gun--that's when innocence was lost. And likely, it was a realization that came from an adult. And it's important in life to know the difference between a magic wand and a gun, but does it have to be on the playground when you're five years old shouting "chew chew chew" and an adult comes to tell you "we don't play..."
We don't play. We don't remember how and even when we try, it's tailored by an adult mind that can't recall the playground anymore. I have to have this Mitzvah Machine because what else do I do when someone is shooting poison at me? The only thing I know how. I toss out the only tools I have, good deeds, kindness and helpfulness. And maybe that's exactly what I need. Maybe those are the right tools. Maybe Ridiculous Dream Me had nothing but a pretend gun made out of my own hand because play is enough.
Happy Playing!
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