Hot Wheels, fate, and family

One of the best things about being a parent is seeing my own children playing with the same toys I played with as a child. The day I pulled out of the closet the box of Hot Wheels cars I played with as a boy, my children sat with me as we looked at every car. There were ooohs and aaahs, and woo-woo-woo for every one that resembled an ambulance, fire truck or police car.

Looking at each car I remember the sort of characters each had, which ones my brother and I would choose as a representative of ourselves. It was while playing with these cars as a child that I thought about the person I might become. Sometimes I chose the muscle car or race car, sometimes it was the Mercedes or the tractor-trailer. Doing this I thought about whom I might become, what fate might determine for me, what choices I might make that would lead to such a fate.

To now see my children playing with the same cars, the pick-up truck that I still remember taking out of its packaging, the hot rod painted with Testors model paint, the Cadillac ambulance, it really does something to my heart. I wonder what fate they’ll imagine for themselves, and what their future will deliver.