Tuesday, April 16, 2013

An 8-Year-Old's Views on Magic

Unbeknownst to me, my 8 year old son has been doing a lot of thinking about magic. When he explained his thoughts to me, I was completely blown away by the sophistication and thoroughness of his ideas. This one is quite the deep thinker. 

He has come up with three different kinds of magic. Below are his words that he wrote down for me. The comments in red are my own clarifications and elaborations.

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1. Spell Magic Definition: Things like changing things into other things and making things happen oddly. [Think Harry Potter, witches, flying carpets. What he told me is that this is the kind of magic that isn’t real, but is fun to imagine and write stories about.]


2. Every Day Magic Definition: Every day magic is magic that happens every day in your life like the magic of theater, the magic of community, the magic of animals, the magic of friendship, the magic of family, the magic of music, and so on. [This idea came from the Magic Tree House series of books.]


3. Heart Magic Definition: Magic that only happens in our hearts. Things like Santa and the Easter Bunny are heart magic. Once I thought I ate all my snack at school and at lunch it reappeared! I thought that was heart magic but Katie had sent me two snacks because they were small. [What he told me is that Heart Magic is magic that is real, but only if you believe it with your whole heart. He came up with the idea of heart magic completely on his own after deciding that the other two kinds of magic left something out. He also puts his art teacher at NOA Gallery in this category. He truly believes she can make magic happen through her art and teaching.]


Random Thoughts on the Boston Marathon 2013

1) I've lived in the Boston metro area since 1989. I've always said that Boston is where I happily live, but Phoenix is home. As I lace up and don a race shirt for an easy 4 miles today, I realize that I've been lying to myself. The Valley will always be part of my soul and my First True Home, but Boston is Home now.

2) The explosions have brought together the running community in a powerful way. But let's all remember that, for the most part, it was the spectators who were killed and injured. Not the runners. So if you're a runner, give a special hug to everyone who shows up at races to support you, to the spouse or partner who stays with the kids so you can go on a run or participate in a race, and anyone who enjoys watching races. 

This reminds me a lot of the 1996 bombing during the Atlanta Summer Olympics. My personal opinion is that it's not about the Marathon or Boston or running, but about picking a time and event that would be crowded and draw international attention. We are all innocent bystanders.