I've cut the cord.
I have amassed a large, varied, and frankly, fabulous, Lego collection over the years. I've played with them from the age of 7 or so on, and never stopped.
Last month I bequeathed them to the girls. It wasn't easy. I've been holding out, because I didn't want them lost, broken, or scattered all over the house to be painfully stepped on at 2 a.m. whilst making your way to the bathroom. But they're old enough now. I made them take blood oaths to put all the Legos in the box when they're done, and put away the box, and they're been faithfully following my instructions. I've held a few of my best creations back: my space lobster, my submarine, my underwater mining tractor. Because they're just too damn cool. But the rest of them belong to the girls now.
The nature of Lego has changed over the years. You used to only be able to get sets of blocks with no specific purpose. You built whatever you wanted. Most of the Legos these days are kits with a specific thing in mind--a Stars Wars spaceship, a pirate ship--and included in the kit are step-by-step instructions on how to build it. It'd be easy to rail against the lack of creativity involved with including instructions in Legos. But disingenuous. Because a kid might build it according to the instructions the first time, but then they're going to rip it apart and build whatever they want. Because that is the nature of kids.
And that is the nature of Lego.
