Sea of silver light

 Our kids really have it lucky.

It's funny that during something so mundane, you mind can drift to an earlier time and place in your life. I was making dinner for the family (pizza), and realized that my kids basically have almost the dream childhood of an 80s kid- or at least my interpretation of a dream 80s childhood. They play video games* (many of them educational, thankfully) at their discretion thanks to their kindle fires. They can watch cartoons whenever, wherever- not just on Saturday mornings. Pizza, popcorn, chicken nuggets, burgers, fries, and probably a few comfort foods I am forgetting are no strangers to dinner time**. Books galore, both digital and hard copy. A buffet worth of art supplies. And a sea of toys that will likely get culled again when it arrives at our next post.

Almost everything, like I said.

We walk to the local grocery stores, when i'm not feeling lazy. Even though my last two posts have been on the subject, it honestly isn't the only thing we've done while here for training.

But i'm getting ahead of myself.

We walk, a lot. The kids and I. While we are walking, I have a lot of time between incidents of kid minding to take in my surroundings. Both the Safeway and Giant near me are in reasonable walking distance. Safeway is solidly in the outskirts of Falls Church. Giant is near Virginia Square station, which is a mix of commercial and residential. We walk to the local parks that are in walking distance. The parks are mostly in residential areas. Getting to these destinations on foot provides a visual snapshot of what most people*** would consider an example of everyday life in the United States. We see kids coming back from camp. Well worn play sets and playgrounds in yards. Older kids on bikes with no parents! The remnants of some kids chalk art on the sidewalk or pavers. None of these things definitively point to a life built up over time in one place. I know that. But they do remind me of my childhood growing up in South Florida. A childhood under a wide blue sky in the middle of suburbia- where after school activities meant hanging out at your friends houses in the neighborhood, and weekends filled with board games, bike riding, pools and exploring the undeveloped acres filled with scrub nearby.

I see the kids here, on the mall in their summer camp groups. In the museums. The neighborhoods and the shops. Roaming free-range in this urban environment. Part of me sees all this, remembers childhood, and makes me think maybe i'm fucking my kids up with this lifestyle.

Then my daughter will start talking about how she wants to go see a movie on the side of a house again with the other kids- and I realize she's talking about an outdoor movie night at our last post held by another family. Or my son will say something about one of his friends from our last post. In these moments when my kids are telling me about something they remember that is a happy memory, I realize that their childhood is theirs. Not mine.

Sure, they're going to have their bad memories or disappointments, but they are having fun. This is their normal, it is happening in the present.


But I probably am fucking them up somehow.



*For those of you who also grew up in the before time, you can still play Mad Maze (originally offered by Prodigy a looong time ago) online, for free via emulator.
** I cook healthy, too!
***Yes, I know the local neighborhoods are pricey. But i'm not talking about the actual costs to live here, just the image of suburbia/city on view here.

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