Dear LPG, 

I read the recent post about this month being National Share a Story Month and I have one to tell.  I would guess it might be wasted on little ones although there is a moral in there somewhere, but despite that fact I thought it might make some of the more mature amongst us smile…

I need to start by setting the scene.  During the pandemic with not a lot to do when not working from home my son decided to get involved in a ‘sport’ or perhaps more of an outdoor pursuit that one could take part in while socially distanced.  His friend introduced him to the world of remote-controlled cars.  When you decide to get involved as an older boy though the little cars are often not so little and they also are quite costly to maintain, but he tells me that fixing them is part of the ‘fun’.   There are special tracks and most of them are not just mini racing tracks.  These somewhat expensive, fast little cars are often driven through mud, and over hills and ramps which will cause them to project high into the air and land quite violently, especially when you take the scale into consideration.  My son tells me that they are hardy but fixing them is one of the ‘highlights’ of the sport.

We are talking about paying in excess of £400 for a medium-priced car and don’t ask about the cost of the parts.  I understand that one car is not enough for the half serious enthusiast.  My son tells me that he has six at the moment.

My son bought a ’cheap’ £250.00 one for his son’s 5th birthday and telephoned me recently to tell me that he was a little put out because the youngster, having been dared to by his cousin, drove it into the sea so that it was fully submerged when they were racing on the beach recently.  Predictably, it stopped working after the drenching and he was a bit put out because of the little one’s low regard for the car even though with a bit of fixing and TLC, it works again now. 

I then told him a story about two watches I bought in the mid-1980s. They were part of the Christmas present package for my then 8 and 9-year-old children one year.  Do you remember when you could buy a digital watch for £1.00, and it came in a little presentation box with instructions on the side?  One claimed to be waterproof and the other shock proof and my two children each showed great interest in them even though they had other toys on the day.  My daughter became so attached that she took a bath in her waterproof one which did not survive the cleaning process, but that same son who has now turned into a somewhat disgruntled father, proudly took his to school and told everyone about it.  He mentioned that it was shockproof to one school friend who said that he would prove it was not.  The story goes that that proof involved getting my son to put it on the floor while he stamped on it.  Predictably it broke but the teacher wrote a letter to me telling me that a letter had been sent to the father of the boy with the destructive heel so that a reimbursement could be made to me.  

Back then, I don’t think that I could have afforded anything like £250.00 for a present for a child and, though my son was some three years older than his son when he got his present, I cannot help but compare the reaction that each boy showed when dared to compromise their regard for their respective presents, and I had to smile when I thought about how my son’s regard for his son’s sense of values had taken a full 180-degree U-turn… 

AN, Selhurst