Choose (Pretend) Life...

Almost exactly like this
but without the cat.

About a year ago, I turned up to a family get together at my parents' place, to be greeted by my then three-year-old nephew in a gendered-nurses' costume with shiny pink Disney heels. (Proper cute tbh.) He asked me if I had anything wrong with me that he could fix. I said, 'Ooh yes! I have period pain. My tummy is sore.' This was the wrong answer. He replied, 'Nooo. Not in real life, in pretend life!' I explained that in pretend life I was in tip top condition and training for an Iron Woman competition*. He moved on to find other people to pretend to be ill, so he could pretend to be a nurse.

I loved the exchange at the time and jotted it down for now. Pretend Life. It was so clear to that three year old, and all part of his game. Using his imagination, dressing up, role play – he was having a blast. And, looking at it from an educational point of view, it was character building. Learning about the world, putting yourself in someone else’s (Disney) shoes, acting? It’s an essential part of development, whatever form it takes. And knowing there's a difference between fact and fiction is part of the game; part of emotional development.

No we don't, Tan. We can pretend!

It’s why I get so squeamish around the enforced belief of Father Christmas. Santa is a great character to think about in Pretend Life. At the appropriate time of year, the ritual of writing him a letter, or leaving out a mince pie is lovely. It’s also really good, education wise – letter writing for fun! An English teacher’s dream! But the squeamishness comes when adults shout down any question of Santa’s existence. Lying to kids feels wrong. Santa, like lots of other stories, can be fully loved by exploring Pretend World. Suspending disbelief is something kids do easily. But being told something is absolutely true until some random time in the future when you’re told it's not, makes me squirm.

 

The characters here were
first imagined in 2012.
Next year, the follow-on
book will be out. That's 
nine years of Pretend Life
existence for Tilda.

In my own Pretend Life, I have thought about the characters in my new book since 2012. They feel real to me even though I know they're not. I know what they'll say in any given situation; I know what they sound like, look like, and what they dream of. They're not real but I can imagine them easily. Pretend Life doesn’t stop when you put away the dressing up clothes. It’s there in other ways.

 

Here's another nephew-related anecdote. In February my sister’s birthday meal took place at a pizza restaurant. There was an open kitchen in one corner with a pizza oven, visible to the diners. Fast forward weeks later. A WhatsApp arrives with a sweet snippet of reported convo between the Neph and his dad. ‘Dad, was that pizza oven made of snow?’ This was shared with the group where we all laughed or ahhhhed. (Not to the kid’s face. We’re not monsters.) But then someone pointed out how igloo-esque it looked. It was sort of domed and (I think) a pale colour. From his developing imagination and real-life experiences, it ‘might’ have been made from snow. His dad explained that it wasn’t and that snow would melt in the heat. But still. It was all learning. He'd wanted to check about the igloo-looking pizza oven. The igloo oven that none of us adults had considered for a second because we weren’t regularly engaging in playful imagery or Pretend Life.

 

I've just found this photo on Trip
Advisor, and it's bloody obvious.
Of COURSE it looks like an igloo.

Last week in Aberystwyth, where – if you read my post you'll know I was enjoying a mini break in the same place my new book is set - I moved between Pretend Life and Real Life, repeatedly. I ate a meal in a restaurant where my characters eat. I was seated in the window, overlooking the sea, just as my characters do. I looked out onto the prom as I ate my tagliatelle, and pictured the events that I had imagined happen there. It was joyous. The seamless switch between my real evening, and the evening I had created in the book, where a load of action and drama happens, was marvellous. My evening was enriched by my inner world.

 

How do adults – the ones who are not writing novels – use their imaginations? Is this where sport comes in? Does dreaming of your lower-league team lifting the FA Cup to rapturous crowds, occupy your designated day-dreaming time? Maybe it's box sets. Sinking into the lives of others every night for a week, takes you out of your own existence and drops you into another world. Or perhaps it's old-skool hallucinogenic drugs. That's the thrill that gets you through whatever real life throws at you. The late education-guru, Sir Ken Robinson said 'We are educating people out of their creative capacities...we don't grow into creativity, we grow out of it, or rather, we get educated out of it.' This seems a terrible thing to do. I'd say adults need as an enriching mental world as children. The imagination doesn't get boarded up and covered with dust sheets, just because the childhood years are over. The mental thrill I've had this week - from visiting places I've imagined for the past twelve months, from picturing what happens to some fictional people I created a few years ago - has been such fun. It shouldn’t be necessary to write a novel in order to access it. Of course, there's always the old standby. Sexy role play! I'm sure there are lots of adults who manage this perfectly well. Their mundane routines are utterly enlivened by unleashing an alter-ego in the bedroom. For me, the scene from Modern Family, where Claire and Phil have a bash at it means this can only ever be comedic. Soz.

Well, we have to start somewhere.

Perhaps this is why many adults hold onto the idea of Father Christmas so vehemently. The only access back into Pretend Life after all the creativity was drained out of them, is through kids, and for one night a year. Perhaps the person who created the NORAD Santa Tracker was simply bored shitless with their dry routine and needed an escape. Fair play to them, then. Who can argue with upping the fun. I think the point I'm trying to make is that it shouldn't be reduced to so small a window. So next time I'm asked by a small, unqualified nurse in comedy shoes what's wrong with me, I will dig deep and think of something far more exotic than the reality of the moment. It's the quickest way into Pretend Life, after all.

Have a lovely week, folks.

*I didn't actually make the Iron Woman comment. That was a joke for now. You're welcome. The reality was more likely that I walked past him, flopped onto the settee, and shovelled some codeine into my mouth.