This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Ciara Jones. It has been edited for length and clarity.
My daughter recently turned 13, and there were so many ideas we had about how to celebrate. It’s a huge birthday — a big deal for a kid, and we wanted to make it special for her.
In the end, we decided to take her and a few friends to a popular Mexican restaurant, go for snow cones, and then have them all sleep over at our house.
Once we got back home from food, I could hear the girls giggling, and for some reason, a thought popped into my head.
We should go toilet papering.
Maybe it was nostalgia, remembering what I was doing at 13. Maybe I just wanted to introduce her to the type of fun we used to have when I was a kid. Or maybe I just wanted her to experience the utter joy of being a kid while it lasts.
I called friends and family ahead of time to let them know it was us
I came out of my bedroom and told the girls and my husband.”Are you serious?” my daughter asked. “Won’t we get in trouble?” I said to her we might, but it’s a risk I think we should take.
Unbeknownst to her, I had called friends and family and asked if they’d be OK with it. They all agreed, saying to let the kids have fun.
I stuffed every roll of toilet paper we had in the house into a trash bag and hauled it off in the car. The girls were giddy and nervous in the backseat, pumped with adrenaline.
Once we arrived at my aunt’s house, we all went for it. The laughs coming out of those girls were unlike any I have ever heard before.
I felt like a kid again
I was transported back in time, feeling like I had left my millennial body and become 13 again. As adults, we don’t experience carefree fun like kids. I’m not sure when it happens, but at some point, adult fun becomes going out for a drink or a meal. It can’t compare to the joy we experienced as kids.
High on adrenaline, we jumped back into the car, Backstreet Boys and ‘Nsync blasting through the speakers.
“Girls, we are going to do a fire drill,” I said. They had no idea what I was talking about.
“When we get to a red light, everyone is going to get out of the car, run around the car, and get back in the car before the light turns green,” I continued. “You’ve got to be quick, because if you don’t get back before the light turns green, we might leave you.”
Of course, we weren’t going to leave them, but it made it feel riskier.
They couldn’t stop laughing
I wonder if this generation of kids has become risk-averse. I don’t know if it has to do with the pandemic or with them being glued to screens and social media. They are in little, electronic bubbles, afraid of what’s out there in the real world. I want my kids to learn that measured risks are OK to take, as long as no one gets hurt.
We practiced the fire drill at a quiet intersection, then at a busy one.
The world felt like it was healing as I listened to them and watched people on the street and in their cars react. Everyone thought it was great; no one shouted or scowled at them. The world isn’t all bad, even though it sometimes feels it is.
Finally, we played “ding dong ditch,” ringing doorbells of people I knew wouldn’t mind, and then running away.
That night, we introduced those girls to millennial fun. Fun that didn’t revolve around a phone. Fun that makes you feel alive. Everything else in the world disappeared for those few hours, and they lived in the moment, absorbed in joy.
We got home, and I am already planning the next adventures — forking a garden and Saran-wrapping or Post-it-noting a car. This has got to be at least a monthly thing.
