Lessons from a Christmas toystore
To enter Smyths toystore is to lose faith in the future of humanity. It is a temple to the Gods of Plastic Crap.
And this is a problem because, though Christmas is a beautiful time of a year, it is also a time filled with repeated themes. And no theme is more repeated in our home than the desire to limit the number of purchases made and to make those purchases useful.
It might be an annual desire because we fail at it every year. As such, the Universe keeps putting it in our path like a level on Mario Brothers. You won’t progress till you clear this level.
I was disappointed to find that Erin’s Advent calendar is filled again this year. Erin believes it is filled with forty gifts carefully packaged and curated by elves.
This is not true, though I find myself unable to speak authoritatively on precisely who is filling it; It could be Mary. That is the only logical explanation but, as I know nothing about it, my conclusion is based on circumstantial evidence alone.
What I do know is the gifts are cheap and interspersed between them now are sweets — one day a toy, the next a sweet. One look at our Advent calendar would send a vegan hippie on a non-sustainable flight off a cliff.
‘Should we be buying this much non-recyclable stuff?’ I think, with my rights, duties, and privileges as father and husband foolishly lodged in my mind. Note, I don’t say, I think. Mary is currently cutting paper with sharpened scissors and, in marriage, timing is everything.
Mary walks me through the programme. This is how it will unfold. We have downscaled considerably, let it be said. It was worse last year. By sliding a small bar of chocolate or lollipop in every second present, we are mitigating the rising tide of long-life hard-plastic pinks and purples that we now sweep into Erin’s corner with an industrial size broom.
So Erin believes the elves are delivering the gifts and she loves the idea, as do we. This elusive band of Yuletide creatures has gifted her parents some bargaining power.
‘Eat your supper, Erin. Those elves are big on kids eating.’
‘Erin! If you don’t go to bed, the elves won’t come!’
‘Erin, if those elves hear you crying about getting a chocolate instead of a toy they’ll haul all of this off to a child in…’ (insert destination of choice based on a stereotype from your childhood).
It is not fair, but we don’t care; Parenthood is about survival, not fairness. Still, Erin is smart enough to make us cautious in leveraging this kind of power. If HRH senses the elves are more burden than blessing, she will deal decisively with them.
‘Mary, why is that toy elf stuffed upside down in the toilet?’
‘They’ve become a liability. She sent him as a lesson to the other elves.’
An Advent calendar should contain enough for Christmas, but apparently not. That’s what lands me in Smyths. I’m seeking out a small Lego set and a karaoke machine. I find them both but not without first experiencing that peculiar parental confusion: When did the modern toy scene become so technical and complex? When did Lego get so complicated?
There are so many variations now — it is a swirl of differing themes — subsets within sets — a fractal explosion of unending choice. There is Minecraft Lego, Architecture Lego, Brickheadz Lego, Ninjango Lego, Disney Lego, Disney PRINCESS Lego.
‘Andrew we’re looking for Lego’ Friends’ 41421 ‘, Mary says. I nod, a cold sweat building. ‘I’ll send a picture.’
Years ago, as a child, a cousin gave me a blue drawstring sack filled with Lego pieces. I thought it would be the coolest gift to pass on to my child. Now though, a mere thirty years later, it just looks lame.
These were simple pieces for a simpler time — multi-purpose pieces, that could build different things. Look! a police station AND a castle! Forget the fact that the one mostly looked like the other, it was your inventive variation that counted.
Now, Lego pieces are inscribed with a singularity of purpose so intrinsic, they can’t possibly build anything else. This Bedouin tent, filled with Lego girl scouts will never be anything else but a Bedouin tent filled with girl scouts.
I’m disoriented though by a lingering attraction I still feel to some of this stuff. You’re a grown adult, Andrew! Stop staring at those hoverboards! They don’t hover anyway, they have wheels. Still wouldn’t it be good just to try it? Actually, it’s relatively quiet up here now. Would anyone even notice? Surely it is okay for a grown man to play with Lego?
I buy the Lego for Erin, and the karaoke machine, which hauntingly references something about not coming with something else. That’s a chilling proviso right there. What exactly does it not come with?
If it comes with a microphone, a ‘Play’ feature, but no singable songs, somebody will be called to account, and that person is me. Toy manufacturers rely on parents too harried to pay proper attention. As such a parent, I’ve bought the toy, and I’m hoping for the best.
I also buy a bust of Frozen’s Elsa. Yes, there is an oddly ominous wall of busts in Smyths. It reminds me of the ‘Hall of Faces’ in Game of Thrones, only more pink and smiley. I stand alone against these polite-looking faces of Anna and Elsa. They stare ahead, uniform, and locked in formation — a phalanx of Frozen-faced assassins.
I sense the whole shelf could advance in unison with a single click of the fingers, daring you not to buy. You have a four-year-old daughter, and you’re NOT going to touch on Frozen for Christmas? You foolish, foolish man!
I buy one. Just one. I do this partly out of fear but also because of a stunning act of lateral thought. You see, Erin loves Dr Seuss. One story, I BEG her to read, just to escape ‘The Cat in the Hat’ and ‘The Cat in the Hat Comes Back’, is ‘Red Fish Blue Fish’. In that book resides a nameless creature with a small face and huge hair.
‘Brush! Brush! Brush! Brush! Comb! Comb! Comb! Comb!
Blue hair is fun to brush and comb.
All girls who like to brush and comb
Should have a pet like this at home.’
‘Dad, I want one.’ Erin declares Every Single Time I read it. So I got her one, in the form of Elsa. I am hugely excited, let me tell you! Christmas morning can’t come soon enough! Mary too is impressed. With suspicion, she looks at me. Is he finally getting it?
Please know, we are not committed to consuming plastic. Mary, in fairness, bought more sustainable toys of wood and string and glue — toys that need to be constructed, built and sewn. Mary did this with two decorative angels.
They are beautiful but come in minute size, with instructions that make anything from IKEA look like Duplo. I don’t know where on the scale DIY toy experiences move from ‘fun’ to ‘work’, but needle and thread seem to be a reasonable tipping point. If you’re reaching for granny’s thimble, it can’t possibly be fun anymore.
The piecing together of these angels takes Mary most of the morning, and there is a rising tide of emotion and frustration, let me tell you. Impatient words are exchanged.
‘Erin please stop playing with that!’ ‘
Erin, put that down!’
‘Erin where is the…? Urrrgh!’
A fun, shared DIY Christmas project now has the pressured feel of a behind-schedule Chinese sweatshop. The Christmas music playing in the background is beginning to sound ironic. I skip ‘Grandma got run over by a reindeer’. We don’t need that kind of inspiration right now.
I, for one, knew little about this angel kit till I saw it being constructed. Was this the Advent gift on the first or second day of Advent? Is it, in short, Thing One or Thing Two? I watch the battle of these two strong-willed women unfold.
I almost suggest that the presents should be simple toys — things like sweets, chocolates, and small plasticky items. I almost recommend this, but Mary is armed with a needle and thread, and I have watched the Silence of the Lambs. To repeat, in marriage, timing is everything. Instead, I quietly head off to the lounge to play with Erin’s Lego.
