My brother Daniel and I sometimes would ask for toys specifically for building our spaceship (all pre-Star Wars) in the basement. The subterranean level of a house is an odd choice for a space craft, but we could do whatever we wished in the basement (flamethrowers! inventing rubber!) and did not have access to the attic.
An old vacuum cleaner, metal with a tube shape, makes an excellent engine. We had no real computers then (that was a legendary Christmas yet to come) so we used a Batman communicator console. By removing as much of the Batman stuff as possible, we had a plausible (Star Trek era) computer. All this was powered by the Narva birds, later featured in this novel, constructed from some plastic-yet-looking-like crystal decorations my mother had used in a party. The sprawling furnace (this was long ago in a basement far away) provided most of the walls and a microphone from our record player (!), the communications.
We boldly went no place really, but such larks in our imagination.
So it is with our best toys: Lincoln Logs, blocks, egg cartons (we had a huge collection of colorful foam egg cartoons that we used to construct sets for theater!), and a chemistry set. As Saint Constantine’s expert on play, Megan Mueller, would say, our best toys gave us many paths to play. They did not say: build just this or do a few things. Instead, our best toys were open ended. The castle Dad constructed for me became many castles and there was much building of civilizations over the hours of play.
A very bright student at The College pointed out how much of the “technology” of our childhood television, film, and play spurs the way the world becomes when people try to realize childhood dreams. This is true. Watching all that Star Trek as a child made me an early adopter of technology, less to use it as my job always has kept me busy, but to marvel that it worked. Mobiles gradually became better than Kirk’s communicator. (I still own a toy version!) I am told that actual inventors were inspired by fantasy and science fiction to make real what they played, imagined, loved as children.
In all our childhood play, Daniel (my brother and lifelong pal), would think of Narnia and school. We loved our school, but also the Holidays. What if the two could be combined? When I got old enough to read That Hideous Strength, that School would be like Saint Anne’s, the House and community in the book. When we got really old, with much help and God’s good grace, we built it and have kept building it.
Childhood play become reality. Give your children the gift of uninterrupted play time. Shun the screen. Choose simple toys that have many play paths. Observe what your younglings are creating and add to the collection. I still cherish a little box given to me by an Indian missionary over fifty years ago. It fired my imagination.
So as you finish jolly Christmas giving, recollecting the gifts of the Magi long ago, consider this: the gifts of the Magi foreshadowed the life of the infant king. Immediately they had the effect of paying for an exile in Egypt so the Christ-child could be safe from the tyrant Herod. Mystically, they had a deeper meaning and wise men have been finding that meaning ever since. These are gifts that give scope for the imagination, as Anne of Green Gables might say, creating the future in child’s play.
Give gifts that a child can use immediately, but will have special or even sacred meaning for a lifetime. The telescope my parents gave me showed me the moon in detail, but also was part of our space ship, of course. They showed me the stars with a toy and the love behind the gift moved my imagination to the Heavens and the furthest stars.
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