
Let Children Get Bored Again - paulpauper
https://mobile.nytimes.com/2019/02/02/opinion/sunday/children-bored.html
======
spaginal
We do quiet time in my home where my kids go to their rooms with a small
activity box for acouple hours. They hated it at first because they were
“bored”, now they love it.

The amazing things they come up with when I come back to the room to let them
know it’s over. I’ve never seen them play the same way twice. They get bored
at first, and then get creative, which turns into a ton of fun for them as
they imagine new ways to use a toy.

It’s common now for them to hang out for another 30-40 minutes to finish their
play scenario they built over that two hours.

It’s an investment in creativity, making more with less, there is no
technology involved, just wood blocks, a few figures maybe, puzzles, or books,
and I’m constantly impressed now with what they are doing with their time.

The constant feeling that parents need to have non stop activity, education,
and entertainment for their kids I think is one of the biggest detriments to
their development.

Let kids be kids, let them play, let them screw up, and let them figure it out
themselves.

We are raising future adults, not just biologically older children.

~~~
Harimwakairi
Parent of a toddler here, and always looking for best practices.

Can you give any more detail about how this works? At what age did you start
doing it, what's in the boxes, and how did you introduce the idea to your
kids?

~~~
spaginal
2 and 4 year old.

The activity boxes can be whatever you wish honestly. I have 6 I rotate
currently.

My two year old is sensory and loves tactile things to play with. My 4 year
old is highly imaginative and I can give him sticks and he builds a hockey
rink and plays the game out in his mind with sound effects and everything.

I don’t think there is a wrong way to do it, I just avoid technology and
putting too much in them.

A nice side effect is I buy them less toys because by the time they get to the
last box, it feels brand new to them even if they played with those toys 20
times prior.

That bit of it shocked me, we spoil kids too much with new stuff, just make
them use what they have in a way that feels new.

~~~
bcrosby95
How much do you monitor them? If I tried to leave my twin 2 year olds alone
for an hour, one would probably strip naked and play with whatever is in his
diaper, and the other would do her best to destroy whatever she could find in
the room. She especially loves to dismantle books.

~~~
edoceo
The first couple times are tough, like toilet training. Sometimes to learn you
gotta pee on the rug. And when you (the parent) aren't there to react, the
novelty of their disaster-play goes away - surprisingly fast. Little brains
work faster than I think we give them credit for. Their bodies are not strong
but that brain is some kind of magic sponge.

~~~
bcrosby95
He's never done this while we're there. Only in the middle of the night. He
wakes up, doesn't cry, and plays. Sometimes when we come in in the morning
it's a literal shit show.

------
dnprock
Since I've raised my children, I find many problems with children are rooted
in adults. So when I hear children parenting advice, I switch it to adult.
That yields a lot of interesting insights.

"Let Adults Get Bored Again"

Parenting is also about adult self-discipline.

~~~
hutzlibu
Best parenting is simply being a good example.

So if you want your kids to be truthful, disciplined and respectful .. try to
start with yourself.

I know too many parents, who sneak out to smoke their bad habit cigarette or
joint, while preaching their children to never smoke .. and I suspect all
their children find out about that at some point.

~~~
winchling
Yes. And the parents who sneak out to smoke aren't just teaching their kids to
smoke: they're _teaching them to be sneaky._ It would be better to smoke
openly and say, 'Please don't follow my example. I regret having started.'

~~~
fastball
On the other hand, my parents never snuck around at all, and I was very sneaky
as a child/teen.

~~~
winchling
Yet authority figures set a standard, whether one is able to meet it or not.
If they _had_ been sneaky, then I might sneak around sociopathically for the
rest of my life, without a twinge of guilt. This could easily mar both my life
and others.

------
dpcan
We have this thing at our house called "no screens" or "turn off your
screens". I yell it out, and my kids from ages 10-18 turn it off. (The 18 year
old is off to college, but he used to as well).

There IS an exception. If the thing they choose to do with their time has
online instructions or they will be learning from a tutorial, etc, then the
screen can be used to a degree.

They start off bored. They may get ahead on some homework. The littlest one
takes the longest to figure out what to do. Often times I ask if they want to
play a board game, or go somewhere with me, walk the dog, etc. But if I'm in
the middle of something else, it's up to them.

It takes a few minutes, but, before you know it, they're on the floor in their
bedroom drawing, or building something elaborate out of cardboard, the LEGOs
come out, or nerf darts start flying through the house.

And for the older kids, they will get out of the house, reach out to a friend,
read a book, or study a new topic.

Being bored doesn't last long when you don't have a choice. The hardest part
is getting started with that "something new".

~~~
valine
As someone who grew up with the internet and rules like this I can tell you
that the only thing it taught me was how to game the system and use
electronics without getting caught. It gives me anxiety just to think about it
honestly.

If you didn’t grow up with it you can’t understand how stressful it is to
maintain friendships when your parents will randomly take away your phone. Its
like being randomly grounded over and over for years.

~~~
toomuchtodo
As a parent, I’m still going to try to instill good habits and behavior even
if my kids attempt to subvert them (similar to financial responsibility,
manners, or safe sex). Once you’re an adult, how you behave is up to you, but
before then it’s still my job to help them understand how to be decent,
functioning humans.

Being a parent is hard, and mistakes are going to be made. Positive intent is
important.

~~~
ramphastidae
The point of the comment you are replying to is that plenty of parents, under
the guise of "instilling good habits," simply issue a blanket ban and the
threat of further punishment to discourage the use of whatever they are trying
to teach their children to avoid rather than teaching their children
responsible use, and that this is counter-productive, extremely damaging, and
basically the opposite of good parenting.

In my experience my parents issued blanket bans and the threat of punishment
for eating sugary foods, using the internet and watching TV. All this did was
cause me to binge on all three whenever I had the opportunity at a friend's
house, and that behavior extended into my adulthood until I was able to break
free of my parents and seek the advice of reasonable adults to help curb my
addictive behaviors.

When I discussed this with my parents they doubled down on their behavior,
washed their hands of responsibility and blamed me. They used the same tired
"how you behave when you are an adult is up to you" line. I hope you aren't
doing the same to your children.

~~~
semi-extrinsic
> simply issue a blanket ban and the threat of further punishment to
> discourage the use of whatever they are trying to teach their children to
> avoid rather than teaching their children responsible use

I take the somewhat contrarian view: kids (at some age) need to learn to cope
with absolute limits that are strictly enforced. How else will they cope with
living in real society? Not paying your rent will get you kicked out. Driving
over the speed limit will get you a ticket, or worse. Not showing up to an
exam in college means you fail the class.

Not saying you should have draconian rules on everything. But some rules need
to be enforced with (reasonable) consequences. Otherwise you are doing your
children a disservice, IMHO.

~~~
lazyasciiart
Driving over the speed limit will usually get you nothing. Failing to show up
to an exam in college got me an opportunity to retake it with no penalty.
Failing to pay your rent - maybe, but if you just paid it late, or if you were
moving out anyway and make things enough of a pain for the landlord...

------
datapunk
I hate screens, constant connectivity, but could not live in today's world
without them.

So much of the world is fixated on our addictive devices and trying to find
ways to live without them are difficult, even damaging in some ways.

I really do miss those days I could leave the house with just keys and wallet,
and had the world around me to provide my entertainment. Today, I am
constantly pulling out my phone at the first inkling of boredom.

Finding balance is crucial for all aspects in life, our devices are the same,
and developing enough discipline to shed our serotonin inducing toys for a few
hours a day is a challenge we will all have to face. Otherwise we will be
hollow and hunched over glowing screens for the rest of our lives.

~~~
Daishiman
> I really do miss those days I could leave the house with just keys and
> wallet, and had the world around me to provide my entertainment. Today, I am
> constantly pulling out my phone at the first inkling of boredom.

This is such an idyllic revisionist take.

I remember having to take wallet, keys, extra cash and coins for things you
couldn't pay with card or with the phone, street guide (cause there's no way
I'm remembering the dozens of bus lines that run in my city), pocket calendar,
pencil, random paper scribbles, and a book or two.

For the things you needs keys and wallet things are exactly the same. For
everything else, the amount of crap I need to lug around has dropped
dramatically. Hell nowadays I can travel to foreign countries and not even go
through the hassle of going to an exchange rate, getting maps, asking for
directions and getting lost going the wrong way, etc.

~~~
Stiju
> I remember having to take wallet, keys, extra cash and coins for things you
> couldn't pay with card or with the phone

Today you take your extra cash and coins and throw it away because nobody
accepts it anymore. Digital payments only. That’s how it works in Sweden.

~~~
liability
Sweden is atypical in that regard, most places are not nearly so cash-hostile.

I never stopped carrying and using cash. I'm even a bit perplexed that
carrying cash is seen as a a hassle... it goes into my wallet, which I carry
around anyway for my ID,etc. It's just a bit of paper, it takes up virtually
no space and weighs virtually nothing.

~~~
IggleSniggle
My ideal wallet would be no wallet. Cash makes my wallet too thick. I keep
some non-daily cards in there (like debit card, Rx card) because I’m too
forgetful to manage continually adding and removing cards. There are phone
based solutions but I don’t want to be reliant on a charged battery for
absolute essentials. Cash is funny because I am super hesitant to break a
large bill, and then very eager to get rid of the smaller ones, and where I
live, it’s generally a good idea to carry one larger bill as a fallback.

~~~
Stiju
That’s exactly how I do it. Small plastic sleeve as a wallet for grouping
cards together and a single larger bill as a fallback.

------
fraXis
I heard an interview with Steven Spielberg years ago. I wish I could find it
for reference.

He said in the interview that anytime he drives in his car, he would not talk
on his phone or listen to the radio. It was complete silence for the duration
of the drive. And most of his best work and ideas came from these "silent
drives" because he was forced to be creative and use his imagination to keep
himself entertained.

~~~
gist
> ideas came from these "silent drives" because he was forced to be creative
> and use his imagination to keep himself entertained.

Driving is the classic 'zone' activity. As such I question if it's even a good
idea to attempt to think and be creative when driving or if that's (if what
Spielberg is saying is true even 'best worked because forced to'). Not that
having a phone call isn't distracting from driving either. It is. But when you
drive I just am not sure it's when you want to go back and forth in your head
with some heavy thoughts which might make you less alert (and by less alert I
mean even less than with a phone call).

The reason for taking phone calls in the car is because it's typically very
time effective and a great (and effortless) way to pass the time.

There could also be other reasons why he didn't take phone calls. For example
I don't like to take business calls because I can't take notes or note things
I need to do. Talking to a relative that's another story. In that case it's
great a way to pass the time and let's say fulfill an obligation. Or he might
have almost gotten into an accident once and swore off any future calls. Or
the main reason is 'I want down time but I need a way to explain to others why
I don't talk in the car and this sounds better'. After all Spielberg is a
creative person so why not a creative spin to something he does.

The story and the reason people say what they do often differs from the real
reason (which would sound less impressive). Possible this is just a spin he
put on it.

------
softwaredoug
The challenge is everything that was analog in the 90s (music, phones, etc)
now requires a screen. “Screentime” is treated as this black and white thing,
but when the iPhone becomes the uber-tool-that-does-everything you have to
focus on how it’s being used, not screetime writ large.

~~~
ASpring
Do measurements of 'screentime' normally include talking on the phone or
passively listening to music? Or are you implying something different?

~~~
GuiA
Screen time might encompass video chatting with a relative, reading a book on
the Kindle app, watching a 2 hour long documentary, watching a 10 minute long
tutorial on YouTube, writing an email, editing pictures of one’s vacation,
managing one’s finances through a webpage or spreadsheet, etc etc etc.

~~~
fastball
Sure, there are always things you can do on a screen that are productive. But
you need to way the difficulty of managing these activities with the potential
upsides that only a screen can provide.

------
chiefalchemist
> "Boredom teaches us that life isn’t a parade of amusements. More important,
> it spawns creativity and self-sufficiency."

Realistically, children aren't the only ones with an aversion to boredom
problem. Adults - especially those dependent on creativity to solve problems -
would benefit for generous doses to boredom as well.

------
zemnmez
a classic of pious parenting is making the lives of your own children
especially difficult to teach them some kind of life lesson. this one
especially gets to me.

though I didn't know it at the time, I grew up with adhd and depression. an
interesting facet of that is that people with adhd get to skip on some of the
most important effects of the frontal lobe development that happens between
the ages of 18 and 22 as a human matures. this gets interpreted as being
'lazy' 'energetic', 'childish' and -- easily bored.

This kind of parent has a conviction that the reverse hallmarks of adulthood
-- being quiet, controlled and focused are not something as neurological as we
know it to be, but something that has to be instilled by force, and as someone
who feels the same boredom every day a kid does, that lack of knowledge and
empathy makes me deeply, deeply sad on a personal level.

It's absolutely correct that kids not given something to do will find
themselves something to do. Kids are natural explorers and learners. But is
that boredom and thirst for new things something that has to be learned out of
a child? I'd like to think that at least some of us embrace that stage of a
child's neurology and help them find things that they find exciting, new and
interesting instead of trying to teach them to stop complaining and sate
themselves with busywork.

------
viburnum
The moment you suggest an activity, you’ve taken all the fun out of it. True
for adults as well as children.

~~~
hutzlibu
Only if you do it in a pushing way, or suggest something boring.

Today with my nephew: hey lets fight with larp swords ... "yeah!!"

------
simonebrunozzi
Such an interesting topic.

The famed Andrea Camilleri [0], one of the most prolific and well-known
Italian contemporary writer (also author of "Commissario Montalbano", known
worldwide in both print and TV form), in a TV interview recounted how
"boredom" was so important in his youth.

He specifically remembered how he and his teenager friends would sit in a
field or on the beach, take a metal coin, spit on it, and just wait, in
circle, until a fly would get entangled by the spit. Whomever owned that coin
would be the winner, and this "game" would usually take several hours, during
which they would chat, sit in silence, fall asleep, etc. - "bored", you might
say.

I found this story fascinating.

I can't point you to the actual documentary describing this, as it's in
Italian and it's also not freely available online. Please believe me, there
would be no reason for me to have invented this.

[0]:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrea_Camilleri](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrea_Camilleri)

~~~
ddingus
YES!! In our family, we call these "stupid little games" and we made up a ton
of them.

You look at where you are, what you got, and you play. Those memories are some
of my very best.

Ok, we got this can. Who can kick it the farthest! Awesome.

------
nonibs
This intersects well with another NYT post from a few years back about
unstructured play [https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/23/magazine/the-anti-
helicop...](https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/23/magazine/the-anti-helicopter-
parents-plea-let-kids-play.html). Would be fascinating if we're seeing the
beginning of a larger cultural trend back towards kids being allowed to
experience more disorganized, self-directed activity.

------
canjobear
Sometimes I go to events that I know will be boring just so I can let my mind
wander and be creative

~~~
ajmurmann
This sounds really interesting! Do you mind sharing examples of such events?
Thank you!

~~~
canjobear
I'm an academic so I go to boring talks :)

------
mattupstate
It's not just about screens. It's about the societal pressure to keep kids
engaged in some activity at all times.

------
Wowfunhappy
Whenever I have a child, I will not allow him or her to have internet access
at home, until they're teenagers.

I don't like the idea of setting time limits—I feel like I spent too much of
my childhood waiting for the next opportunity to use a computer. _Tools_ are
not inherently good or bad, and my child should have the opportunity to
explore them as he or she sees fit. However, I very much want to keep my child
away from exploitative media, and I don't know how to control that other than
just cutting off the internet.

If they play games, I want them to be games that teach _something_. Zelda
teaches you problem solving skills, and Celeste at least teaches something
about humanity. Neither attempts to suck you in for infinite lengths of time.

~~~
shantly
Good luck. Even schools are pushing that crap now. They'll need to be online
to do homework not later than middle school—and that's the state of things
now, may well be worse in a few years.

------
wimagguc
Putting this here for the argument's sake: I think children do get bored with
all the distractions from internet, screens and what not. If you've ever seen
a teenager mindlessly scroll Instagram on their iPhone, that look is pure
boredom.

Notice that for an activity such as looking at your friends' photos online,
allocating your last 15 minutes before hitting the pillow and allocating
what's seemingly every hour of every day won't have the same effect.

------
bureaucrat
No, New York Times. If you don’t allow private mode browsing, I won’t consume
your contents.

Maybe respect others privacy before using the ‘democracy and freedom is at
stake’ rhetoric.

------
killjoywashere
I broke my leg a few weeks ago, tibial plateau fracture due to skateboarding
if you want the details, but I have been laid up. I also have fairly major
research projects underway (yes, you can skateboard and lead multi-million-
dollar research projects).

I have found that when I first sit down, I dread starting the work. Whether
I'm working through an algorithm, a project proposal, a hiring process,
reading a paper reviewing a grant application, whatever. But I just sit there,
because my knee has made all other options even worse. Give it about 30
seconds, maybe a couple minutes, and I've gotten over the dread and just start
doing. That's _the only_ thing left to do.

This is the same experience I had as a child, on that long road trip, in the
back seat, that far back, rear-facing seat in the Buick station wagon, with
the red vinyl seats. On I70, on the way from Omaha to Denver. You're just
stuck there. You have to do so _something_. You start staring out the window,
imagining what must be happening in the corn fields, the streams that must be
in the veins of trees that occasionally interrupt the fields. The fish in the
stream. The dirt at the bottom of the stream. How come that dirt hasn't all
been washed away? How does that work? what's this little bit of dirt right
here on the floor? It looks like the dirt in my shoe. I wonder if I play with
this dirt maybe I'll understand dirt.

Dirt. Miles of dirt out here. How much of life is dirt? Ow. There's a rock in
this dirt. Is the rock part of the dirt? How much of dirt is just rocks? How
small is a rock before it's dirt? What else is in dirt?

Dirt.

Nothing, not even boredom, can suppress the mind. Not as long as there is
dirt.

------
ddingus
In the sense of nurturing that, "start something fun" part of childhood, yes!

But, if one does that, it requires also being empowering and participatory to
a large degree.

The latter is a LOT OF FUN. If you do it, for a time, that old spark of
childhood comes back, and you just play. Playing with them, leaving a little
of the adult behind, is worth it for everyone.

I get to do it again as I am raising a granddaughter now, due to a son getting
involved with the wrong people, hard fall. It's ugly, but she's great.

Know what? I have a much harder time returning there. I can, and each time
it's easier, but damn! We do get old when we are not playing as much. Don't do
it.

Play.

Participation was the best medicine. Yes, it takes your time, but only for a
while. Soon, they will be acting on their own, and will invite you (best
accept some of those to remain relevant), and will learn to play, explore,
build, do more on their own, not just placating themselves in front of a
screen.

------
JJMcJ
Visited relatives, their kids watched PBS kids in the morning, I was appalled
with how frantic the majority of the shows were.

The idea seems to be if it's not non-stop yelling kids will tune out. Lso the
voice actors were mostly pitching their voices much higher than actual
childrens' voices.

~~~
shantly
A handful of gems exist, though I'm not aware of any being produced now.
Mister Rogers' Neighborhood was really something special. Still is. Long
(incredibly long, sometimes) takes, slow tracking, few cuts, lots of Mister
Rogers talking directly to the viewing kids in his special, amazing way. So
was pre-Elmoization Sesame Street, for that matter.

I really miss good nonfiction channels. The History Channel, Discovery,
National Geographic. TLC (it wasn't always house shows!). All gone to hell.
It's a shame. I picked up a ton from those as a kid, even though I rarely got
to watch them (we didn't have cable except for a couple years) but now they're
all reality shows and ancient aliens and other sensationalized junk.

Incidentally, I'm kinda worried about what all the auto-tune's gonna do to
kids' sense of what good singing is. Check out Daniel Tiger for what I'm
talking about, but it's _everywhere_ in kids' programming (among other places,
obviously). I suppose it saves money, but it sucks.

------
Funes-
I remember really well being bored as a kid, and as a teen. It always
resulted, without fail, in a sudden and deep drive to explore--our home, our
school, our town; wherever we were at the time--, in creative spurts--
painting, drawing, doing something with play dough--, and in an urge to engage
in physical activities, such as going for a walk or practicing some sport.
Great conversations with our parents and other relatives or friends also took
place; we got into some sort of inquisitive, proactive mindset.

We should get used to get bored again, indeed, but I'd call it something else:
not "getting bored", but "escaping our own lives at any chance we have".

------
tasty_freeze
If you fully adopt this attitude, the funny thing is that the kids don't see
it as boredom most of the time. They don't expect a constant stream of
novelty.

My daughter attended a Waldorf school (in Europe called a Steiner school),
K-12. There are some great things about it and some drawbacks too, and I'm
sure the experience depends widely on which particular Waldorf school you
attend.

When we signed up our daughter we had to sign a pledge: no TV, no radio, no
movies, and no computer (until high school). We were strongly encouraged to
eschew typical toys for a certain kind of toy: one with heft and texture, and
one that left room for creativity.

The rational behind it was multi-fold. Most media is tailored for and fosters
a very short attention span and conditions children to expect constant
stimulation. When you grow up hearing polished songs where the top 0.01% of
singers take dozens of takes, then are autotuned, then spliced into perfection
by highly skilled producers, when a child raises their voice to sing they
think their own singing is terrible instead of joyful. By having a set of
wooden blocks, a bored child will use them to create dozens of things, whereas
if you give them a plastic fire truck with flashing lights it can only be a
firetruck.

By and large I think their goals work in that regard, but it also ends up
isolating the families to interact with only other Waldorf families. If your
child plays with non-Waldorf kids, they get dazzled by the neighbors x-box and
resent that they can't have one.

The biggest downside, though, is the type of parent drawn to Waldorf also
tends towards homeopathic hoo-hah and anti-vax tendencies. In our case we kept
our rationality and politely accepted but ignored other parents' referrals to
"energy workers" and offers of homeopathic tinctures.

~~~
tofflos
I went to such a school and, while I don't believe we had to sign a pledge, no
TV was certainly ingrained into our culture. Plastic toys, clothes with large
prints, and the color black was to be avoided.

I always felt it was unfortunate because these schools were on the forefront
in other areas such as lesson scheduling, teaching methodology and a
curriculum that contained a good mix of art, language and science.

Growing up I had access to cable TV and because of that I was always light-
years ahead of my class in English.

~~~
buckminster
I went to a normal school. We didn't have TV but everyone else did. Like you I
was top of my class. I thought it was all the reading I did but it seems we're
both wrong.

------
quickthrower2
My kids love to play with things like the left over cardboard from deliveries
that became a 'cubby house'. I used to love playing with some left over carpet
strips that became roads. I think children naturally like 'toys' where you
imagine them into existence, although I am not sure how they'd like only to
have those toys and nothing modern.

------
ping_pong
What exactly is "bored" though. I read the article and it wasn't clear. Are
they just referring to digital devices, video games, etc? Or books and doing
crafts etc? Because those probably have the same level of stimulation as
digital devices, in the absence of digital devices.

Or do they mean we should force our kids to do mundane work?

~~~
spaginal
Don’t force your kids to do anything for a time. Don’t provide the work or
entertainment.

You can give them a few limited options to work with if they choose, but it
will surprise you to see the level of play they come up with a bit of time to
think on it and limited resources to do it with.

------
sandGorgon
Is this comparable to accelerated learning through apps/media ?

I mean is their a validated study that new age learning tablets/apps are
detrimental versus letting someone get bored ?

Would a daily session of yoga+breathing exercises for an hour achieve the same
thing as in this article...but without eliminating the value that modern tech
might bring ?

------
merricksb
Discussed at the time:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19069312](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19069312)

------
amriksohata
Doing nothing sparks creativity in kids. It makes them think rather than be
told what they need to do to keep their mind occupied

~~~
Filligree
But then what if they think the wrong things?

~~~
snazz
I sure hope you’re kidding, but it’s hard to tell. Time and space to think
might as well be a human right.

~~~
watwut
Like for example, pick on younger sibling to amuse oneself out of boredom. And
again and again and again.

~~~
zbentley
I think "let kids think for themselves" and "encourage good/discourage bad
behavior" are correlated in a way that is opposite what you implied: being
able to come to your own conclusions means that whatever behaviors you end up
practicing (in a healthy environment, good ones, encouraged by parents/others)
are _your own choices_ , rather than things you'll slavishly repeat for fear
of punishment/desire for praise later on in your life.

Tl;dr parents can encourage/punish their kids and let them think for
themselves. This is healthy and good.

Also, to loop back to the larger discussion, using screens _definitely_
doesn't discourage bullying behavior. For evidence I present . . . the
internet, give or take.

------
whiddershins
Let adults get bored again!

------
green_ape_taiga
I grew up with a bonafide, diagnosed sociopath running my family. This didn't
happen till I was 10 so prior to that I was your average spoiled upper-middle-
class kid.

Being 10 and moving in with said sociopath coincided with my family being
poor. This was 91, so off-hand I don't know what 12K a year would be in today
money, but it was below the 13.1K poverty line I last remember seeing for 91.

The result? Well, said sociopath threw away 75% of the toys my sister and I
accumulated over our brief lifetimes ("children don't need that many toys"),
so we learned to make our own fun.

I retained one of those Lego-brand briefcases of, well, Legos. Buying my
sister and I a set of that clay (I don't remember the name, so I appreciate
any help on this) that came in different colors and you could bake to hardness
in the oven was a staple of our Christmases; prior to us being poor, we'd make
one or two things and ignore the rest of the set. Post the family debacle, we
made anything we could.

Without the promise of eternal external stimuli, I designed scores of video
games, and for my favorite series I made action figures out of the
aforementioned clay along with entire Lego worlds for them to do things in. I
measured the difference between the volume of some of my figures before being
baked versus the volume after, and used the average to make their magically-
powered hats or suits or whatnot, so that such could be put on or removed as
the story I (and occasionally my sister) were creating demanded.

I don't at all miss the rampant abuse from that period. There were constant
room searches. "Popular music" was utterly verboten; my sister bought a Mariah
Carey album at 11 and the amount of horrifying verbal abuse leveled at my
mother was legendary. Trying to avoid that, I wound up storing Pretty Hate
Machine in a cabinet within a box within a Dungeons and Dragons box, as the
latter was in a moral grey area as per said sociopath. Buying that tape
(which, yes, dates me...) was a 16-mile bike ride.

All that said... sometimes even today I try to impose arbitrary constraints on
myself to recreate the creativity and just overall fun of that period. There
was abject misery then. There was also a lot of fun.

Children should be allowed to be bored, but as others have said, so should
adults. "If you're bored, you're boring!!!!" is commonly leveled at adults,
but.. perhaps not? Perhaps it's simply a result of our "if you're not
producing anything RIGHT NOW you are an abject failure of a human" culture.

It's not good to make your life revolve around anything, really. That seems
obvious in terms of drugs or alcohol or video games or internet addiction in
general. But I worry about people who make even supposedly-benign things like
exercise or veganism or activism or even the much-vaunted "family" thing their
sole reason for being. Sometimes we need to not be 100% fulfilled.

