May. 08, 2007 - 20:40 MDT

IMAGINEERING

There was a time in my very young life that the song that starts out,

Those were the days my friend,

I thought they'd never end.

Seemed to be the gospel truth, time without end, everything staying the same.

And there were tools to bolster my imagination to a great extent.

Tinker Toys (the big set)was one of my loves, windmills and things with strings, the constructions and erections were open to my flights of fancy. I remember one time laboring over a project with my Tinker Toys for quite some time, quite happily and absorbed in my endeavor. Dad came by and asked me, "What is that there son ?" Just off handed, faking it you might say I said, "Gee, I don't know Dad, but ain't it purty ?" I had lots of fun with Tinker Toys.

Lincoln Logs to build all sorts of Pioneer buildings and things. I had a cabin, a corral and other things, sometimes I would borrow some Lincoln Logs from a friend to complete a project of mine.

A Tinker Toys windmill made a fitting contribution to my Lincoln Log ranch, they did.

And as the railroads moved west, they reached my ranch area and I had a train with tracks and a wind up engine. With engineuity I fit them in the scene.

Then came the cast pot metal (don't think they were lead alloy but who knows ?) called Tootsie toys. Little cars that were identifiable as to make and model. The wheels would roll and I'd have much fun on the rug in the evening with my Tootsie toy cars, doing all sorts of "let's pretend things." I had all sorts of little cardboard boxes as houses, warehouses and garages, one fancy wooden cigar box as the courthouse and jail. It was hard for the big folks to gain my attention when I was at play.

Somewhere about that time I began to be able to run fast enough and last long enough to get a kite up in the air and keep it there for as long as the vagaries of Denver, Colorado wind would allow. Most of the time the wind varied, gusted then died down, so it was a matter of pride to get on up for a time.

These were all boughten toys that stirred my creative imagination, and then there were the things that came from other folks trash barrels that with a little hammering, nailing and filing could be turned into the neatest things. Almost as good as my Buck Rogers 25th Century Disintegrator Gun.

So, many of us grew up to build in our adulthood, slot car tracks, model railroad systems that took up whole basements, radio controlled aircraft, and in later years building and lofting rockets high into the atmosphere. That's what some of us old folks do, yet. With great joy for sure.

It must still be being done by the young crowd I guess, as there are plenty of Hobby Shops around which don't seem to go out of business like other shops do.

I do so hope that the spirit hasn't died and lives in kids of today, hard to think of the loss from our society of IMAGINEERING . . . . . . . . . . . .

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