Ode to toys

I miss our toys.

Sure, Xbox and Wii systems have endless, exciting game scenarios, but I’ve been reminded, on recently rediscovering an old square Game Boy, that our childhood toys were great even without motion sensors. Heck, most of our early entertainment didn’t even require batteries!

A recent article in TIME helped trigger my nostalgia. In the list of what one reporter considers “the 100 most influential toys from 1923 to present,” we’re encouraged to reflect on the bears and dolls and figurines of our past.

More importantly, we can reminisce on the sheer danger of play.

Today’s video games mimic violence through a television set, but we need to remember the past glory of our actual fights with neighbors and siblings.

So from those 100 toys that TIME selected, I’d like to briefly commemorate a few toys for their peril and relative simplicity.

The Wiffle Ball was created in the early 1950s, the project of a father of a semi-pro baseball pitcher who wanted his young son to have a better ball to play with.

The plastic orb may be easier to throw, but it still has power. Baseballs might give black eyes, but the Wiffle Ball can deliver some pretty mean stings to playmates when aimed properly.

Throwing balls was an easy way to provoke a friend, but even more essential to our backyard battles were our new water toys.

The high-powered water guns affectionately called Super Soakers were 10 years in the making, finally hit shelves in 1993, and more than 250 million units were sold.

Pairing Super Soakers with the treacherous Slip ’n Slide seems to define most hot summers. There’s nothing like running around drenched and barefoot in the fresh cut
grass.

We just had to be careful on the uphill race for the plastic tarp rides. Sliding down the hill is one thing, but wiping out is another.

Finally, the Skip-It. TIME described the toy as “a small ankle hoop with attached ball and chain that kept track of its rotations.” Yet Skip-It was also equipped with what I call ‘sneak attacks.’

The toy, although fun and great for competitions thanks to its skip counter, was potentially painful.

Occasionally, a skipper would make a false step and the Skip-It ball would whack into the skipper’s ankle.

But I’ve been thinking, isn’t the sense of danger what made these outdoor toys so wonderful?

And now that spring is here, it seems like we should all try to take a break from the  computer and from work, find some buddies and enjoy the great outdoors.

Skip, slide and get soaked! Even though we’ve grown up, we can still have fun.

— paihenry@indiana.edu