Travel Blog - Day 3

Day 3
August 12, 2009
Not too much to report today. It was a vacation day in every sense of the word. Everyone slept in, we spent the morning exploring the lovely town center, had a fantastic lunch, took a quick nap (yeah!), and then headed to the beach. We all had a ton of fun playing in the water and on the sand. Dinner was back at the house, the kids happily playing with the neighboring kids, and the grown-ups sharing stories about cabbage. (you just never know what interesting topics are going to come up!) The glorious day ended with stargazing and a festival of s’mores made over the fire pit on the back patio. It’s wonderful to remember what real relaxing feels like. We all agree that we definitely need to do more of this!

P.S. No new license plates today. Count is holding steady at 34.

Deep thought for the day:
Well, the thing that kept going through my head as the kids played on the beach was a reminder that kids don’t need toys, electronics, TV shows, etc. to have a good time. Sure, these things are fun (not to mention extremely helpful on long car trips) and I wouldn’t want to abandon them, but it was so affirming to watch the kids playing in the sand, jumping waves, giggling and smiling for all they’re worth, without a toy or gadget in sight. Given the chance, they will make up their own games, where each person has a role and no one is arguing over whose turn it is with whatever toy is the favored one at the moment.

And even though kids will say, “I want this latest thing,” or “So-and-so has this toy,” etc., they don’t need them. They do however, need time and space to cultivate their creativity, exercise their imaginations, and figure out solutions to problems. Who wouldn’t rather spend an afternoon slaying dragons or searching for buried treasure than upping a score on a meaningless videogame? In our society today it gets harder and harder to get kids away from the screens and into unstructured play time. But when we’re all grown up, with responsibilities and deadlines and mandatory obligations, isn’t that what we miss the most?