Virtual Reality

Sometimes I wonder (seriously) what kids did without televisions, iPods and video game consoles. How did they spend their down time? How did their parents survive without the electronic anesthetic? I guess they used their imaginations, which is apparently what kids are still doing, but it's more like imagination on steroids. They can not only pretend that they're driving a car, they can grab the Wii steering wheel and have a wheel to hold onto, a race track and interactive results.

Call me old-fashioned but I like my kids' race tracks to be in their minds. That's the creative side of me wanting my kids to discover the power of their minds and the power of books and the power of imagination. So I held out a long time without getting any video games. Yesterday, I was given a Wii for my birthday. Yea! Now we're not the boring house anymore!

Joseph spent all day playing on the Wii. Thomas looked at it, watched Joseph play and then came downstairs to me. As we sat side-by-side munching our lunch, he said in a high squeaky voice, "Hi! I'm Thomii! I'm in the Wii! Are you in the Wii, too?" I replied, "Yep. I'm in the Wii, too. I'm Julesii!" All throughout lunch, Thomii and I imagined that we were in the Wii.

Then it dawned on me. We were pretending to be in the virtual world. That seems a few too many layers away from reality, doesn't it? Then something else dawned on me: instead of Thomii being upstairs in virtual reality, he was downstairs using his imagination. It doesn't matter that the Wii was fodder for his imagination. I hugged him and felt proud of his creativity.

Then I told him to hurry up, finish his lunch already and go upstairs with his brothers.