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When Children were Children
The difference
between play and reality
By Sharon Hopper
Guns? Not allowed. How in the world could we have played our cowboy and
Indian games, and good guy, bad guy made up adventures without toy
guns? Does anyone remember Roy Rogers, Dale Evans, Hop a Long Cassidy,
The Lone Ranger, and others? My goodness this country was protected,
settled, and explored, and taken from the Indians by men carrying guns.
Wagon trains, Settlers, and Mountain Men, Plainsmen and Women, all knew
how to shoot. When I was growing up I would act out many imagined
situations involving a horse and a toy gun. I even had a toy saddle
rifle. Now picture this:
Take a couple old saw hoses, some old blankets to create a saddle, a
huge spike nail to hang a rope on and a hobby horse head attached to
the saw horse by some twine, and you have my horse. That horse and I
traveled this entire country and my holster always had two cap guns in
it. Most of the time I had real caps to make the shooting noise but if
I did not have those I just holler “Bang Bang”! And if I was playing
with other kids someone would holler “You got me” and they would fall
down. You remember those days don’t you?
I am appalled at the reaction people have to play these days. Heck if
you chew a pastry into the shape of a gun you are expelled. And if you
have a toy gun in your hand you are apt to get shot. Even if you are a
five year old.
What the heck happened to reality? And how in the world did the Rifle
Man toy rifle come to look like a real gun. It was absolutely much
smaller. And a silver cap gun never looked like the real thing. I guess
the GI Joe days changed all that. Somehow this whole country has lost
sight of one thing. Children see war and they play war. Children see
crime on TV and they play criminals. Children see police on TV chasing
the bad guys and they play Cops. That is the way that it has always
been and will always be because children mimic what they see and what
they hear.
I remember being on my horse riding through my pretend mountains,
chasing some bad guy off my land and hollering at my horse to go
faster, and shooting at the intruder. It was all imaginary and I laugh
now at the sight that must have been. But you know I spent hours with
my pretend horse. His name was Iodine. We have not only taken away the
imagination of a child, but the opportunity to teach when and how to
use the situations they observe. We need to revitalize the difference
between play and reality and use the playtime to teach responsible
behavior.
Expelled for making a pop tart into gun. Ridiculous. What a good waste
of a very teachable moment. Guns are here to stay. It is about time we
teach our young to respect the weapon, and when or how to use it. Hi O
Silver! And it is high time that we allow our children to be children
and recognize play and help them to use playtime as learning time. In
schools and in the home. I was not video game kid, but a real outdoors
kid. Wait till I tell you about playing in the marsh in a leaky boat…
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