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Kindergarten for Life!
Growing up does not have to mean abandoning play, adventure and your own rules. Perhaps children already understand the most important part of life.
A year ago, I heard that my six-year-old son had a girlfriend at kindergarten. What the hell? A few months later, I heard that he had two girlfriends. No, not a new girlfriend — two girlfriends. What the hell? 😃 By the kindergarten graduation party, apparently there were already three — and all of them were perfectly good friends with one another 😃
Anyway, at my request, my son got one extra year at kindergarten so that he would be the oldest boy in his class rather than the youngest. So, one more year of play and fun! I hoped he would settle into his new group. Well, he certainly settled in — September has barely begun and he already has a new girlfriend 😃 Why am I still surprised? 😃
Kindergarten is magical to me. Not merely seeing a happy child, but looking deep inside that happiness. Feeling again what it was like when we were children... Remember when you were always waiting for summer? When all you wanted was to play all day? And how you still, STILL did not want to leave your friends?
When I finished kindergarten, everyone moved on to school, but... in my head, I stayed in kindergarten. Order and rules? Yuck! Rote learning was never my strength. I was much more drawn to computers and things I could build, test and discover myself. I did what was necessary at school, but put most of my energy where my curiosity truly burned. Like Bart Simpson accidentally discovering programming. Kindergarten for life!
After school, everyone moved on to “work”. But why should work mean ten hours a day spent on something that does not interest you at all? I stuck to my hobby — computers. I spent so much time with them that I even got good at it. And at some point, people started paying me for it. A kindergarten child would not voluntarily choose a game they hate every day. Why should an adult?
Then comes “the relationship”. Let us remember: what is the main thing a child looks forward to about the next day at kindergarten? Their BEST friend! Why could life not work the same way? A partner you WANT to be with every day. And when you are apart, you would run across mountains and valleys if necessary to reach them. Someone you accept exactly as they are. Like a true friend.
I have now reached the age when my hair is beginning to turn a little grey. Time to finally leave childhood behind? HELL NO. Let the other retirees put on their retirement clothes and socialize with other retirees “the way one should”. Not me! Whether I am 75 or 95, I will keep doing the same silly things. Sensible rules protect people, but empty conventions do not have to govern our lives. In my kindergarten, there will always be room for play, curiosity and a little silliness!
Adults consider themselves smarter than children, do they not? How ironic: learning so much miscellaneous nonsense and forgetting the most important thing... Life is for adventure, my friend. Life is for playing. LIVE!