Mohawk (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
mohawkpony) wrote2012-01-14 10:38 pm
mohawkpony) wrote2012-01-14 10:38 pm
Entry tags:
Adults with childhood toys
My box arrived today, woohoo! Three are drying off after their trip to the sink; the others didn't need it. Photos coming when the weather breaks... if it ever freaking does. *shakes fist at cloudy sky*
Also today I saw Toy Story 3 for the first time. Everyone was right: it is really sad, and really extraordinarily good. I mean, the first movie was fun, and the second so forgettable that I can't recall a single thing about the plot, but this one made me cry.
It also made me feel a little awkward about customizing. :/
I have slightly mixed feelings about the movie's themes, though. (I'm only going to talk about the more literal interpretation of these themes, bypassing the movie's metaphorical explorations of abandonment, friendship, loyalty, giving your loved ones room to change and grow, etc.)
On the one hand, it presents a beautiful picture of the way people can feel about our old toys, and the memories and love we spend years forging with them. It's also an extensive example of the way we, as children, convinced ourselves that our toys somehow loved us back, so thoroughly that this notion can and sometimes does continue, to some extent, into adulthood.
On the other hand, it's about letting go of all that.
While I certainly agree this must be a good thing and is most natural for most people, the implication (in society, not so much in the movie) is that it's a mandatory part of growing up... and that moving on necessitates leaving behind. That I'm not sure I can agree with.
It's probably easier to do it that way — and trickier to keep relics without praying over them, so to speak. But just because an adult still cares for some of his or her old toys doesn't always mean that he or she is in some capacity developmentally stuck.
Adults tend to catch flak for keeping, displaying, or just taking care of their childhood toys, but this just isn't fair. It's damn near impossible to have spent so many hours of your life pretending that an object is real without developing some kind of real emotion for it.
I still regret allowing my childhood Moondancer to get so beat up that she's now custom bait. I still regret donating my Rattlin' Wrestler (if you don't remember these, and most people don't, they were huge four-foot-long plush snakes with rattles in their tails, and yes, they were big enough for a kid to wrestle with... he looked exactly like this but I don't have $75).
But I still have my stuffed tiger, who has been at various times named Tigger, Hobbes, Raja, and eventually just Tiger... and I'd sell all my ponies, all my books, my ukulele, my computer, my college degree, my passport, and my bike before giving him up.
We're talking about an inanimate object that has no practical, ethical, or even financial value. My books, uke, computer, degree, passport, and bike collectively have immense practical value, from communication to work and travel opportunities to invaluable stress relief to basic transportation, and losing them would hurt my life a great deal... but losing my tiger would hurt my soul. It would hurt me in a way from which there would perhaps be no true recovery, with no possibility of replacement. This is, of course, not even remotely rational.
And yet, there it is. Human beings are not rational.
My toys are not real, but my feelings about them are. I logged so much time in my childhood getting joy and comfort from these objects that the objects are now permanently seared into my brain, a direct and immediate pavlovian link to brief feelings of happiness.
Adulthood is not exactly associated with happiness, is it. You know what I mean. Why the hell would I give up something that can instantly, albeit briefly, remind me how to be happy? Just so visitors wouldn't snicker when they see my stuff? Who gives a shit?
I'm an adult man who collects these little girl toys because they made me happy when I was a kid and they still kinda make me happy, at a time in my life when not many things can. That's all, really.
I... wasn't expecting that to turn so... uh, personal. I'd planned to wax nostalgic, lightly and lovingly, about the role of childhood toys in adulthood. Must've taken a wrong turn somewhere, heh.
Also today I saw Toy Story 3 for the first time. Everyone was right: it is really sad, and really extraordinarily good. I mean, the first movie was fun, and the second so forgettable that I can't recall a single thing about the plot, but this one made me cry.
It also made me feel a little awkward about customizing. :/
I have slightly mixed feelings about the movie's themes, though. (I'm only going to talk about the more literal interpretation of these themes, bypassing the movie's metaphorical explorations of abandonment, friendship, loyalty, giving your loved ones room to change and grow, etc.)
On the one hand, it presents a beautiful picture of the way people can feel about our old toys, and the memories and love we spend years forging with them. It's also an extensive example of the way we, as children, convinced ourselves that our toys somehow loved us back, so thoroughly that this notion can and sometimes does continue, to some extent, into adulthood.
On the other hand, it's about letting go of all that.
While I certainly agree this must be a good thing and is most natural for most people, the implication (in society, not so much in the movie) is that it's a mandatory part of growing up... and that moving on necessitates leaving behind. That I'm not sure I can agree with.
It's probably easier to do it that way — and trickier to keep relics without praying over them, so to speak. But just because an adult still cares for some of his or her old toys doesn't always mean that he or she is in some capacity developmentally stuck.
Adults tend to catch flak for keeping, displaying, or just taking care of their childhood toys, but this just isn't fair. It's damn near impossible to have spent so many hours of your life pretending that an object is real without developing some kind of real emotion for it.
I still regret allowing my childhood Moondancer to get so beat up that she's now custom bait. I still regret donating my Rattlin' Wrestler (if you don't remember these, and most people don't, they were huge four-foot-long plush snakes with rattles in their tails, and yes, they were big enough for a kid to wrestle with... he looked exactly like this but I don't have $75).
But I still have my stuffed tiger, who has been at various times named Tigger, Hobbes, Raja, and eventually just Tiger... and I'd sell all my ponies, all my books, my ukulele, my computer, my college degree, my passport, and my bike before giving him up.
We're talking about an inanimate object that has no practical, ethical, or even financial value. My books, uke, computer, degree, passport, and bike collectively have immense practical value, from communication to work and travel opportunities to invaluable stress relief to basic transportation, and losing them would hurt my life a great deal... but losing my tiger would hurt my soul. It would hurt me in a way from which there would perhaps be no true recovery, with no possibility of replacement. This is, of course, not even remotely rational.
And yet, there it is. Human beings are not rational.
My toys are not real, but my feelings about them are. I logged so much time in my childhood getting joy and comfort from these objects that the objects are now permanently seared into my brain, a direct and immediate pavlovian link to brief feelings of happiness.
Adulthood is not exactly associated with happiness, is it. You know what I mean. Why the hell would I give up something that can instantly, albeit briefly, remind me how to be happy? Just so visitors wouldn't snicker when they see my stuff? Who gives a shit?
I'm an adult man who collects these little girl toys because they made me happy when I was a kid and they still kinda make me happy, at a time in my life when not many things can. That's all, really.
I... wasn't expecting that to turn so... uh, personal. I'd planned to wax nostalgic, lightly and lovingly, about the role of childhood toys in adulthood. Must've taken a wrong turn somewhere, heh.
Should'a taken that right turn
One day I will rent Toy Story 3. And Up. And Megamind, and Spirited Away (I missed the end) and Despicable Me...
Re: Should'a taken that right turn
I haven't seen Despicable Me, but of all the others, I definitely recommend you start with Spirited Away. It's about as close to perfection as a film can get, animated or otherwise. Plus, the score has been stuck in my head for two days, but it's so pretty I don't mind.
Re: Should'a taken that right turn