It’s child’s play

AS children, a group of us would spend the odd Saturday afternoon at the house of a family friend.

Our parents knew each other through our local primary school, and some of them would play social tennis together. There were about 10 children.

While they played tennis, we played chasey and hide and seek.

We played made-up ball games and British bulldog and five-on-five rugby games. Choosing what games we played required negotiation.

The rules that would govern the game, given the game itself had been made up, also required negotiation.

We had to determine how the scoring would work and how to balance the teams as between the high-value players (older siblings) with the often whining low-value players (the younger siblings).

We had to interact, compromise, articulate, make teams and sort stuff out.

At the end of Saturday afternoon, when the last set had been won and the last cucumber sandwich and Coon cheese and kabana-laden toothpick had been eaten, we went home.

We were always tired when we left. A good tired — one that comes from little legs running hard and from laughter and competition and friendship.

We were covered in grass stains and dirt. We were starving, and that was always cured with a ham-and-pineapple pizza picked up on the way home.

The simplicity of the early Eighties was glorious.

Thirty-odd years later, and this time we are the grown-ups attending a friend’s house with our children. Much has changed in how the afternoon proceeds.

We are in Melbourne where the block sizes have been subdivided and then subdivided again over the last 30 years.

There is no room (or money) for a tennis court on a suburban block. In fact, most people are lucky to have a suburban block the size of a tennis court.

The grown-ups stand around and talk in the kitchen. A few of the children head outside to play backyard cricket on the rear deck. Many more disappear into the rear of the house where the kids’ bedrooms and the family room are.

After about an hour, lunch is ready and the children are rounded up to eat. Myself and another parent are dispatched to the rear of the house.

Entering this area of the house is eerie. We find seven children on seven different tech devices. There is silence where there would normally be the sound of arguing, laughter, yelling, talking and fighting. All have headphones on; all are totally engrossed in their game.

The parent with me says that we have to give them time to finish the round, otherwise they will lose all their points and let down others playing in the game.

The children on the back deck are told to go wash their hands as lunch is about to be served. There are no cucumber sandwiches or kabana. Instead we have all brought a plate — there are superfood salads and gluten-free options and roasted cauliflower drizzled with maple syrup and crushed walnuts. Delicious but certainly not simple.

The children who have been gaming come out in dribs and drabs over the next 20 minutes. Lunch is not served until the children are ready. Once the children have eaten, most return to the rear of the house.

The experience did get me wondering whether our children will be better or worse for their experience of childhood.

They will certainly have less grazed knees and bruises from Saturday afternoon catch-ups than our generation.

They are certainly many times better than us at navigating the digital world. Their hand-eye coordination is more often honed with technology than with a bat and ball.

Will they be able to negotiate in their daily lives face-to-face rather than email-to-email? Will they have to? Will they have sufficient resilience to navigate the ups and downs of life, given that their experience of the world is often filtered through a screen?

Will they have the patience to persevere, given that they can shop, order dinner and communicate instantly?

The questions continue to percolate in my head.

I don’t know the answers. I do know, however, that whatever the answers, their world is anything but simple … and there is not a cucumber sandwich or kabana-laden toothpick in sight. Rachel Schutze is a principal lawyer at Gordon Legal, wife and mother of three. [Ed’s note: Ms Schutze is married to Corio MP Richard Marles.]