Did I just see “Where the Wild Things Are”? Yes. Had I been anticipating it with every fiber of my being? More than Harry Potter. Do I get sick to my stomach when someone says they wasted their money on it or they won’t see it because of some clouded cynical judgment? Very.
I’m listening to and reading what my friends have to say about this movie and it hurts. Some of them won’t even give it a chance and some of them completely missed the point.
The relationships are so child-like. I had those fights with kids when I was little. When Max ran away I felt the fear of running and running and if you stop you’re in trouble so you just keep going. It’s scary. Of the huge imagination that literally takes you away.
And for someone to miss it entirely. Are we so “grown up” at this point that we can’t remember anymore what it’s like to have an imagination that isn’t riddled with “clever” dirty jokes? Have our lives truly been that horrible that we are so jaded that we can’t allow ourselves to remember the joy of imagining as a child does?
My life has not been awesome. I’m cynical. I’m bitter, but there are some things I can’t let myself forget about and my child-like imagination is one of them. Friends from high school think this means I’ll just never grow up and be mature.
I think it means exactly the opposite. What good is a parent who stifles a child’s imagination and dreams? What good is a parent who can’t remember what it’s like to travel to grand places in our minds?
Maybe I am too much of a kid still, but I think that’s better than forgetting what it’s like entirely.
The relationships of children are so important. How we interact with our parents, our siblings, our friends they shape how we’ll interact in relationships when they’re even more important. How we’ll interact with each other when all we need are relationships.
How I interacted with Krista Kowatch in elementary school set the course for how we’d interact in high school. And those mistakes, those horrible relational decisions set the course for some of the greatest learning I’ve ever done. And now she’s one of my closest friends.
Learning how to love my mom when I was a kid shaped how very much I love and more over appreciate her now.
Children are important. What they think is important. How they grow is important. And we can’t just discredit that.
You are absolutely right. Adults tend have this haughty “I-have-arrived-and-I-am-better-than-you-because-I-have-more-opporunity-than-you-to-ruin-my-life sort of attitude. Hate it. Ageism? Yes let us call it that.
Oh, Stephen, glad you’re on board!