A Kid at Heart

Many of my family and friends tease me that I’m a kid at heart. I still love reading children’s books and watching Disney movies. When my nieces and nephews were younger, we would have grand adventures together. I used to love playing dress-up with them – I had a whole trunk full of costumes they could choose from. They could be swashbuckling pirates, pretty-in-pink princesses, knights in shining armor, fairies…if I didn’t have the costume, we’d find a way to make it (although, as I recall, the knight was a bit of a challenge and we wasted an awful lot of aluminum foil)! I also had a puppet theatre and some puppets – my nieces and nephews still enjoy reminiscing about the elaborate puppet shows we used to put on…pure magic.

I thought those days were gone (now that my nieces and nephews are teenagers) and so I reluctantly put all my toys away a few years ago. But the other day, my friend Susan brought her four-year-old daughter over for a visit. As Susan and I chatted and caught up, her little girl started to get bored – as most children understandably do when adults start having boring grown-up conversations. So I offered to read her one of my favorite books – Robert Munsch’s “The Paper Bag Princess”. She loved the story and asked for more so, in a sudden fit of inspiration, I dug out the puppet theatre and the puppets, and suggested that we act the story out. Talk about excitement (and I’m not only referring to the little girl)! She chose the “princess” puppet, her mother chose the “prince” puppet, I chose the “dragon” one…and off we went on our imaginary journey. We had so much fun – Susan and I got right into it, causing her daughter to dissolve into fits of endearing giggles at our “silly” behavior.

That got me thinking – why can’t we, as adults, just let ourselves go and have fun like that more often? I think we tend to put so much pressure on ourselves to behave in a certain way, to do the “right thing”, to contain our feelings and just “act our age” – whatever that means. We get so caught up with being adults that we forget to nurture that special childlike quality in ourselves.

I hope I never lose my ability to occasionally let go of my adult inhibitions and have good old-fashioned childish fun. I guess it’s true – I just love being a kid at heart.

[tags]kid at heart, inspiration, puppet theatre, Disney movies, adulthood, puppets[/tags]