Four new boys and one lone girl moved onto our block in the past month. That brings our total to 27 boys and 15 girls, although some of them are babies and can't contribute to the outdoor noise much.
The weather was beautiful this weekend and for two entire days a posse of boys ran around the neighborhood chasing, screaming, running, jumping and generally having a great time. While relaxing on the front porch, I saw these cherubs with multiple plastic machine guns, rifles, pistols, daggers and, somewhat alarmingly, one bloody chainsaw. The chainsaw, I'm pretty sure, belonged to one of the dads.
I have a thing about guns. I don't like them and don't allow them in the house. I know it makes little sense that I'll allow light sabers, swords, and knives of all sorts but won't allow guns. When my oldest received a red-capped pistol for his birthday, I chose to see it as a sign of maturity that he didn't even ask to bring it into the house, he just put it in the toy box on the porch at the end of the day. Of course, this could just be a sign that he understands my neuroses. Like the time this past spring when friends brought dinner to our house as an generous, supportive gesture. He said "Wow, Mommy. Even your friends know you've flipped out."
Watching the boys this weekend have so much fun with these weapons didn't change my mind about guns in the house. But it did ease my mind about weapons of mass destruction as playthings. These kids clearly knew they were playing, the violence was all imagined and involved many creative and athletic manoeuvres. Scooters, bikes, sticks, skateboards were also part of the mix. No one got hurt, no tears were shed and at least my two boys slept well after all that hard play.
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