They are physically present, but infant clothes, toys and street games seem to have been subsumed by a rush to adulthood: mini grown-ups rule. The duty of parents and carers to build a metaphorical wall between their offspring and the nastier habits and practices of adult life is proving increasingly difficult, even for the very well-intentioned. It is not just that some parents can't say no or lack the inclination to impose boundaries. It is partly that the world of global internet entertainment appears all-powerful, constantly reinventing itself to outwit the latest parental imposition.
Yes, some kids might be shy and, yes, some children like mine throw hysterical tantrums for the smallest and biggest things. Letting others know, just like a toddler. Maybe we not always putting on the display of a toddler but certainly still doing it, just in more manipulative and grown-up ways.
Still demanding and act like thunder. If they like something, they say it, that childhood innocence follows them around. When we laugh, they laugh; when we dance, they dance and they sure as anything say hello to everyone and everything, constantly striking up random conversations wherever they go. When did we start caring so much, and why? Why have we become so judgmental and critical of everyone and everything around us? Are those things really so important?
If not, why do these things literally steal our joy and our time? We become self-centered, self-conscious and critical. A few years ago, I lived in this tiny town where it was common practice to wave at everyone as you drove past, even if you had no clue who they were. It brought joy to both of our hearts to wave at strangers. It was a special little town because not only did they wave, they said hello too. All day, wherever you went, people would just greet each other and smile.
It was hard to be grumpy with all the joy floating around. I loved it; I loved the innocent, friendly, happy atmosphere everyone would bring. My gran was a very special lady and someone I need to think of often. You never saw her without a smile on her face. She made a decision that no matter the day she was having, she was going to choose to have joy.
She would say hello to everyone and randomly chat to strangers in the line. This too changed her, her decision to be happy made her happy. Her decision to not complain about everything made her happy. I could no longer enter its portal and inhabit its world.
Even now I remember the sting of disappointment. My wife thought I was mad when last year I bought a large painting of Rupert from the artist Mark Manning who has done a series depicting scenes from Nutwood. But I suppose therein lies the explanation. Innocence is also the growth of self-consciousness, perhaps the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" referred to in the story of Adam and Eve.
Perhaps you are thrown out into a world bled of colour and meaning and spend your life trying to regain it. But can you regain it? Not in its original form, certainly. But sometimes, now I am growing older, I feel shadows of my ancient innocence in the night sky, in the song of birds, in the earth's breathing out of white and pink blossoms. I am unlearning all the things I have been taught in life, and perhaps this, as well as the more tragic meaning , is what Shakespeare talked of when he wrote that the final age of man is: "Last scene of all,.
So your parents take you to the park and watch you as you play, and eventually they start trusting you enough to play on your own. And things develop as so indefinitely; as your parents see and trust that you can handle more and more of the world, they open more and more of the world to you.
The crib, house, and yard mark your intellectual grasp of the world. As a newborn, when all you can handle and explore safely is your crib, your parents keep you protected and innocent of the house. When you learn to walk and overgrow the house, they let you play outside, as long as the fence gate is closed. When you grow a bit bigger and bit more knowledgeable, they open the fence gate and say you can play in the neighbourhood.
When you grow even bigger and more knowledgeable they hand you the keys to the car and tell you to just be back by ten. And eventually you find them helping you move out, to play, and to explore the world on your own.
Did you imagine yourself happily crawling from your room, to your house, to your lawn, and onto that black thingy with straight white dashy thingys to play with those big honky colourful thingys that move sooo fast?
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