What ever happened to stickball?

Last week I wrote about the state of education in our culture.  This week, I will be talking about the ordered structure children grow up in today.

Where did stickball go?

The game resembled baseball, but it was slightly different.  Instead of a bat, players used a broom handle to hit the ball.  It was challenging, and once upon a time, it was an American pastime.   In the streets, an empty lot or a neighbor’s backyard, stickball was as American as hamburgers and Corvettes.  The rules varied, depending on who was playing and where.  The corner fire hydrant served as home plate, the sidewalks were boundaries for a foul ball, and a rock was first base.  So to where did it disappear?  In all my life, I have never played a game of stickball.  And it wasn’t because I chose to decline an invite to play.  Where is stickball, and other sports like it, hiding?

Organized by adults, kids now play in recreation leagues or on “travel teams” for which they try out.  Stickball has been put to death by organized soccer, basketball, baseball, lacrosse and just about every other sport imaginable.

Let me be clear, I’m not saying organized sports are inherently evil.  Yet, they do take away a child’s opportunity at self-formation and the lost art of make-believe.  Part of being a child is making up rules to your own game, your friends doing the same and then arguing about whose are right!  Now kids do not have to worry about conceiving new ways of entertainment, they hop in the car and go wait in line for hours to sign up.  After paying high fees, buying a new pair of cleats and some shin guards, our children are finally read to play a sport!

Between morning karate lessons and afternoon piano lessons, children these days are not responsible for entertaining themselves. What happened to the summers of running around barefoot in the yard? We are scared that they will be “bored”. So we schedule their lives down to the minute. We have made it easy for them to float from day to day without requiring they learn the “virtue” of self-ingenuity.  Gone are the days of children finding entertainment for themselves, after all, why should they?

This is part three of four on children and imagination.