I promise to grow up - someday

July 3, 2007

The Razor's Edge / Greg Johnson

Children are so immature.

Give a kid $100 and what does he do? Buys ice cream, junk food and the latest John Madden football game for his Xbox system. No saving for a rainy day, no helping hand for the homeless, no careful planning for retirement.

Why do we put up with such childish behavior? Kids acting all silly, sipping imaginary tea while munching invisible crumpets, defending their &#8220forts” from marauders with wooden swords and paper hats.

As if.

Like imagination means anything in the real world. Get a job, save your money and take things seriously, dagnabbit! Whoever got anywhere in life hobnobbing with action figures and the jet-setters in Barbie's world? Nobody but a child would be satisfied baking cupcakes with a light bulb the Easy Bake way. Nothing productive is accomplished storming an anthill with a battalion of waxy green army men.

Whatever.

Riding bicycles around everywhere gets most kids nowhere fast. Without jobs to drive to, aimless wheeling around neighborhoods wastes many hours for youths on the road to nowhere. Except for a few enterprising exceptions with paper routes, most children ride their precious bicycles just for fun. Time better spent performing chores and doing homework is wasted on skateboards, with baseball cards and in the nonproductive idle whimsy of dollhouses.

Yeah, right.

Don't the youth of today know it's a serious world out there? Wars are being fought, diseases threaten lives, gas prices continue to climb and politicians scrap it out in Washington, D.C. and here in the Mat-Su Valley. We have enough problems without our children being so immature.

If you think the real world cares you found a John Elway rookie card in the attic, keep cool-looking bugs in a Mason jar or laughed it up all afternoon watching cartoons, you've another thing coming, mister. Living is serious business and the world is a serious place. Parents do their children no favors coddling them like babies as soon as they're born.

Grow up, be responsible and stop daydreaming …

… Or so my parents tell me.

Heck, I'm only 38. There are still battles to be won with those army men (under the command of G.I. Joe) and I'm not ready to give up the fort just yet. There are a few miles left in my skateboard, I don't want to leggo my Legos and I'll stop watching cartoons when they stop cracking me up.

I promise I'll grow up - in another 38 years.