Why Our Kids Need Long, Boring Summers

By Jami Ingledue — BEHIND DOMESTIC LINES

A few weeks ago, I looked out the kitchen window into our scruffy backyard, littered with toys and bicycles. And I saw my five-year-old son, deeply immersed in his endeavor, taping rectangles of cardboard to his feet with miles and miles of masking tape. (I long ago gave up on keeping him from the tape — and the scissors, despite more than one hair-cutting incident.)

He explained to me that he was making “Ant Smashers.” He had a snack sitting on the patio, and the Ant Smashers™ allowed him to protect his picnic from the encroaching insect population. (Yes, it is rather violent, but anybody who has a boy like mine understands that some level of violence just comes with the territory.)

He had requested that daddy cut these same cardboard rectangles earlier in the day to be wings for his cardboard box airplane. Completely his design and his idea. And it really did look like an airplane, by golly, one just his size.

As he demonstrated the Ant Smashers™ for me, I wondered: if he had been in expensive camps and programs all summer, would he have had the chance to create them?

Because our summer was really pretty boring. We did take a vacation to the beach, which was exciting, but only because somebody else was paying for the lodgings. (Thanks…