That's Impossible

For our current theme of That's Impossible

Imagine That

By Robin van Eck

She races around the house, on hands and knees, barking. She sits, she stays (most of the time), she rolls over and plays dead. Throw a ball for her and she’ll crawl and get it, panting the whole way, then carefully gets the ball into her mouth and brings it back, plopping it beside you and waiting in anticipation for you to throw it again. She’s not a dog, or a cat, or bunny rabbit. She’s my three-year-old daughter.

The first time this happened, I encouraged her. Kept throwing the ball for her to get, pet her, rubbed her belly, scratched behind her ear.

My husband freaked. She’s not a dog. That’s not normal. She’s a girl. Get up off the floor. Stop acting like that. I don’t like it.

Thrown into stunned silence, I tried to comprehend these words coming out of his mouth.

I saw it as an active imagination and in no way was he—or anyone else—going to be allowed to suppress something so precious. As we age, we forget the things that keep us young. The days of imaginative play are gone. We don’t roll in the mud because, OMG, we might get dirty. We don’t climb on the back of the couch and launch ourselves off just to see if we can fly because we might break an arm.

But why can’t we be the Queen of England for the day, or a magician or a witch? Why can’t we have a tea party and invite the Mad Hatter, White Rabbit and Cheshire Cat (or Dora the Explorer and Handy Manny and his talking tools)? Because as adults we would be stuffed into a straightjacket and locked in a padded room. That’s probably why many of us write.

Albert Einstein said, “Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world.” Where would we be if we didn’t have active imaginations? Would airplanes fly? Would we have cars, or electricity or ice cream? Someone dreamed it, imagined it, so we could live it.

We live inside our minds most of the time. We dream with our eyes open. We see things no one else can. Some may call us neurotic or delusional. I call us creative, inspiring.

Today, if she wants to be puppy, I will encourage it. Tomorrow it may be an airplane or a frog or…

A writer.




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