had a dream i was hanging out with the guy who plays the oldest brother in bridgerton. we were stuck in the waiting room at a pediatrics office for some reason. we sort of knew each other but only in passing so we were doing chitchat when a mom walked in and was like “oh you two look bored. you’re in luck! i have a bunch of toys to donate and some of them need assembled.” she was replacing all the old ancient yucky waiting room toys from like 2001. so she left us with this overly complicated playskool kitchen set to put together but it was made of wood and required allen wrenches.
we were both sitting there attaching different shelves to each other at maddening angles with impossibly small wrenches that made the whole process deliriously tedious when he said “we never had toys like this where I come from.”
He said, with a soft sadness, “yeah.”
I said, “what kind of toys didn’t you have? kitchens? wooden?”
“Good quality. Nice toys. Almost no one had toys at all.”
I’ve been to England and seen toys, you understand. But I thought maybe he came from a background I didn’t know. I said, “Yeah, I grew up in a place where a lot of toys kids used were old and broken."
He said, "No, you don't understand; toys were illegal in the EU when I was a child."
I stopped screwing the stupid wrench.
"Yes, they absolutely were, really. It's true."
I said, "You're like, what? 4 years older than me?"
I said, "My friends in the EU have all played with toys."
He nodded, "Black market."
I had no idea what to say. I knew he was lying, but I couldn't imagine the ends.
I said, "Ok. Well, sorry that happened to you."
We both started fitting more pieces together in silence, when I looked to the right and saw another donation box full of wooden building-blocks.
I said, "Oh! Blocks are so fun!"
He looked at the blocks sadly and said, "Is that what they're called? We called them turf. Because we used small cuts of turf. I've never seen real blocks."
I put down the stupid shelf and said, "WHAT are you TALKING about?"
"I already told you, toys were-"
"That's not true! That's patently not true! Toys were not illegal in England—in the EU—in the nineties!"
I realized I was being very loud and the receptionist was looking at us, so I stopped.
He said, softly, "We didn't play, either."
I rolled my eyes and said, "Oh, what did you do then?"
He kept working and said with a total casualness that enraged me, "Toiled, mostly."
Then a nurse interrupted us both. He said, "Excuse me. Your child's appointment is done."
It was at this moment I remembered I had a child, which shocked me so terribly that I woke up.
