Play Date

Ev's stoked this morning. His friend Cooper is coming over for a few hours to hang out and play.

I remember this quite well from my own childhood. And I'm remembering from probably age 5 or 6. The politics of that era were, "Mom, can I go over to Chris's house?" The answer would usually come without missing a beat, "Have you picked up your toys? Is your room cleaned up? Have you brushed your teeth?" After answering in the affirmative to all of the above the answer would come, "Okay. But I want you home for lunch." Or dinner, depending on the time of departure.

I was lucky because I had quite a few friends who lived within just a few blocks. That, and owing to the fact that child abduction was not foremost on the mind of a parent every time their child left the house, I was able to walk the 2, 3 , or 4 blocks to a friend's house.

Ev will probably do a lot of the same things I was doing back then. Playing with cars and trucks and airplanes-- with the exception that Ev's assembled volume of toys exceeds what I had by an exponential factor.

But Cooper's not not just coming over to Evan's house today. No. Today is a "play date." I may need to check here. Play date may actually be a proper noun by this point in history, as in Evan coming into the bedroom excited this morning and saying, "Today's my Play Date with Cooper!"

I don't know where "play date" comes from but it brings to mind a busy parent, dressed for the office, Franklin Planner in hand, responding to a child's simple question, "Can I go over to Billy's house?" Not a pretty image in my mind. Suddenly the kid's need to play becomes another commitment to be worked into an already too busy schedule.

I'm not fighting this battle. I'll choose not to use the phrase. If Evan wants to have another kid over to play I'll just pick up the phone and call. And hope Evan's request doesn't hit a conflict in the other child's schedule for soccer, basketball, karate, dance, weekend at their dad's house……

On second thought, maybe a play date has some merit. Perhaps I can get Ev's whole circle of friend's to share a common Google calendar.