Only Children Allowed

My cellphone rang. I let it ring for a bit. My hands were full at that time, so I wasn't able to take the call. The ringing stopped. Then it rang again. I dropped what I was doing.

"Hello?"

"Ate! I've been trying to reach you all day! No one is answering your landline! I tried your cell and I couldn't reach you! You're not even on yahoo! Are you ok???" My sister's mildly panicked (and this is a stretch considering my deadma sister) voice sharply went through the ear piece.

"I've been playing." As I gave that answer quite distractedly, I was navigating my way through the intricacies of Jojo's Fashion Show working towards the expert level.

"What????"

"Uh huh," I answered back, pausing my game. (And even as the pc speakers quieted down, in the background one can hear: pata pata pata pon! -- btw, not a game for the musically challenged -- from the PSP.)

A resigned pause. Maybe even a sigh. Then she continued "so anyway...."

Playing is a favorite past time here. And I think it's grossly unfair that I am forever hearing, "para kayong mga bata." It's as if saying that grown ups (or at least people my age, pretending to be grown ups) have no right to play anymore, and must content themselves to the depressing routine of working, paying the bills, and sleeping. Why are children the only ones allowed to play?

The truth is, where I live, there are really no grown ups even though we're all way past the age of majority. Take our refrigerator for example. It has the usual: milk, eggs, vegetables, butter, etc, but there's also chocolate pudding snack packs, caramel apples, a jar of Fluff (the BEST marshmallow spread in the wurld), chocolate, cupcakes, and even lollipops. If people were to assess the inhabitants of the house based on the content of our refrigerator, they'd assume that there are children here feasting on all those sweets.

Our shelves too. There is a huge chunk of the shelf devoted to finance books, photography books, cookbooks, novels, but there is also the coveted part that has various children's books (including sesame street), comic books (aka graphic novels) that range from Calvin & Hobbes to The Sandman series. I also must mention that part of the shelf that contains small toys like bottles of bubbles (in the shapes of Snoopy and one of the Powerpuff girls), origami paper and origami booklets, toy cameras, stuffed animals who have names (and feelings mind you), a kite, clay, and if you consider a small foldable bike a toy, then it's as good as part of that shelf.

So who says, only children are allowed to play? I have this feeling that when Nards and I start our own family, the children will definitely get the boring educational toys, while the two of us get away with the really cool ones.

Anyone game for a round of water guns? I am. I got myself one of those huge ones that can spray literally a bucketful of water with just one pull.

Calling, calling Loreen. :) What's your newest toy?