Fun with Inedible Berries

The neighborhood children, including a few of my own, went on a bike ride. A chance for them to play together amidst our busy lives where neighbors whiz by each other, interactions limited to waving from the car to one another.

I was deemed responsible enough to chaperone the trip.

We voted on where to go and they decided we should head to the park.

We arrived, parking our bikes at the playground area of the park.

I knew my role as a chaperone. I was to leave them alone to play, now that my part of transporting them here was complete.

I sat and took a few deep breaths, wondering if we were now at the age where playgrounds would cease to provide the joyful exploration they had when these kids were younger.

I looked up to see that the children had another idea entirely.

They were huddled next to a tree with inedible berries, spontaneously creating a game in which they would each have 5 lives and would try to hit each other with the berries. Eat hit took away a life. Influenced by video games? Probably. In my mind, it was like paintball without the messiness.

For the next 30 minutes, I watched as the game progressed. Additional rules were proposed. The group figured out how to include many different age and athletic levels to have a fair shot at winning. They grumbled when I said it was time to go home. As a chaperone, ending the fun is one of your core duties.

Even though we shower our children with technology and all sorts of gadgets, their imaginations remain their best tool for play. Give a child dirt, sand, a stick, or some inedible berries and they naturally go to work making play happen.

Adults, here is our mission today, taking the kids’ lead:

1) Get to a park or similarly serene place, leaving your phone and all other technology behind.

2) Find inedible berries or something else that you can enjoy as a kid would – feel its texture, look at its fine details

3) (Optional) Gather random adults within earshot and propose the game of “throw the berries at each other”