After her talk, a 40-ish year old man asked a question from the balcony of the Camden Opera House. He also praised the power of play, but worried about her suggestion that those virtual playgrounds truly meet the needs of children. He spoke of what it was like in the winter of his childhood New Brunswick when the weather was just right. Kids would fill the frozen ponds, playing hockey and skating until all hours, lighted by bonfires ringing the shore, not leaving until parents arrived to drag them home, or threats of frostbite sent them scurrying for a warm bed. He has been living back in New Brunswick for the last three years, he said, and the weather has been just right.
Nobody is there.
He described a desolate paradise, where an opportunity for active play of an exhilarating variety has gone begging, where the children are instead sitting in front of computer games and televisions, and he asked the speaker to respond. The speaker paused, obviously flustered. Then she awkwardly explained that many parents today are scared for their children s safety, and that no doubt that is why the ice was empty. Perhaps where she lived that is the case, but that is simply not so in the rural New Brunswick he was describing. The culprit is the seductive nature of the very high tech playgrounds she had spoken of.