Beautiful Moments

Over the past couple decades, I've asked thousands of adults to recall a "beautiful moment" from their childhood, then asked them to describe the moment.

Only once did someone's beautiful memory involve being indoors. And in her case she was in her apartment building in New York City where the kids had run of the building and "everyone" had their doors open. So while it was technically indoors, it still had the savor of the freedom that comes from being outside.

And speaking of freedom, it's rare for anyone's beautiful moment to involve adults in any sort of meaningful way. No one's beautiful moment involves school or church or sports teams. Most recall being outdoors, unsupervised, or at least lightly supervised, which probably explains why so often these moments involve an element of risk taking. "Thank god, mom didn't know about it!" is a common refrain.

Their stories are most often told in the first person plural because there are other children -- best friends, siblings, neighbors. "We would ride our bikes to . . ." "We would all met in the woods . . ." "We pretended we were pioneers . . ."

Other than bikes, balls, and dolls, toys are just not a part of most people's beautiful moments. If there are playthings, they are objects from either the natural world, like mud, sticks or flowers, or from the "real world" like tools, abandoned objects, or other junk.

But perhaps the most universal aspect of these beautiful moments is the sense of time, or rather timelessness, that runs through them. No one's memories involve being hurried or scheduled. They share their memories like epic tales, full of details, and a vast sweep of time in which to fully engage with the world. "We didn't have to be home until the street lights came on." 

There are variations -- infinite variations -- on these themes. And, of course, there are exceptions that prove the rule. But at the end of the day, the common threads that seem to make our most beautiful childhood moments are being outside, unsupervised, with other children, few toys, and lots of time.

In all honesty, that's all I've ever wanted to offer the children in my life. That is education enough. That is life itself.

Every time I ask adults for their beautiful childhood moments I worry that this will be the time when someone will talk about playing video games or getting the highest test score or going to the museum with their parents. So far, even when there are adults in their 20's, it hasn't happened. Even children raised in the 90's still seem to have memories of being outside, unsupervised, with other children, few toys, and lots of time. I worry, however, that the day is coming when no one but us doddering old-timers will have first-hand memory of the beauty of an authentic childhood.

As a person who has spent most of his adult life working with and for young children, I see it as my responsibility to open the doors, to step into the background, to create real world environments full of other children, and to give them the time they need to forget about time. This is the natural habitat for childhood, the place for beautiful moments, but only if we can preserve it.

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"Teacher Tom, our caped hero of all things righteous in the early childhood world, inspires us to be heroic in our own work with young children, and reminds us that it is the children who are the heroes of the story as they embark on adventures of discovery, wonder, democracy, and play." ~Rusty Keeler

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