Playing in the sandbox

Country Notebook

By Rogene "Jeannie" McPherson

The Super Bowl was played weeks ago, but I am still disgusted about aspects of the halftime performance. Please let me ramble just a little longer and trust me to offer a story that goes well beyond the Super Bowl.

One of the internet sites ran an interview before the Super Bowl asking shoppers in San Francisco who they would watch during half-time, Bad Bunny or the alternative half-time show featuring Kid Rock.  I couldn’t identify either artists’ music if they walked into my living room playing their recent album.

Bad Bunny’s commercials showed young women flashing their rear end to the cadence of the music. No Bad Bunny for me.

Granted I am an old woman and if I tried to dance like these young women, I would fall forward onto the ground. Getting into one of their costumes would require a custom-made skirt or shorts or whatever one calls what the women were wearing. In my opinion, it’s about how much skin needs to be showing to make the program entertaining.  For some performers, I could sew their costume with 1/8^th of a yard of fabric. I don’t think it is about keeping the costs down.

In the 1950s the dress code was quite different. Wearing slacks to school was only allowed when it was about minus-10 degrees outside and only if we also wore a dress.

We had alternative ways to play back then, too, like “playing in the sandbox.” I think my Dad may have even played in this sandbox long before I started kindergarten 70-plus years ago. If it was dirty, and it probably was, as students in a one-room schoolhouse, we did not notice anything unusual. The expectation was that everyone had an opportunity to play together. In other words, it was just one way we were taught to share.

The old schoolhouse was moved to the site of the museum many years ago or sometime after it closed in the early 1960’s. I visit this historical building every few years in my hometown and the sandbox is still there. It was about 4 feet long, 3 feet wide and built as a wooden box on 2 by 4s about 3 feet off the floor. Sand was cheap, so it was filled very full and was positioned inside for special use during rainy days. Likely, the teacher’s contract included sweeping up the sand.

My kids played in the green plastic turtle sandbox still sold at discount stores. Like most parents, I wasn’t a big fan as the sand was often carried into the house. Sweeping sand off the floor is not fun, but if asked, “Was it worth it?" I’d say "Yes.”

If playing in the sandbox also makes one sassy, then I learned that skill, too, in a sandbox.

More than once in my adult life, I’ve said to someone who would not compromise, “You didn’t play in a sandbox when you were a child, did you?” Most don’t have a clue what I am talking about. At a minimum the other person looks confused and it somehow redirects the argument. 

 Maybe I should have a few sandboxes custom-made and then sent to the United States Capitol and the White House in an effort to help teach political leadership and negotiation skills. Probably not a good idea as it would require security to analyze the sand to make sure there was no deadly anthrax, for example, mixed into the sand.

It would probably cost millions of dollars in media coverage and scientific efforts to make the determination that it was only an old woman from Kansas trying to find a cheap way to solve our inability to live like Jesus.

Why do I care if a young woman wants to flaunt her body?  The Super Bowl is intended to be a family program as illustrated by it beginning at 5:30 p.m. long before children are tucked into bed and having sandman dreams, at least that is what they were called in our family.  One of the artists from the alternative half-time program sang a song about how Jesus models good behavior. Children need a few more good role models. Is our definition of a good role model, a measure of skin?