My brother recently dropped off this toy from my childhood. It’s part of a set of wooden blocks. Blue squares, green cylinders, orange arches. And a couple of pieces like this one, where a few separate blocks were attached together to make something new.

This is two yellow semi-circles glued to a red rectangle.

But, even 40-odd years later, I vividly remember when it was a picnic table, a spaceship, a hovercraft.

Kids are good imaginers. They can imagine their way into, and out of, situations. They can conjure up whole friendships and companions. They can imagine what it’s like to be someone else, and completely inhabit their world. They are a kittycat. They can go on adventures they barely understand, and tell you about all the wonders they found there.

But many of us adults pack away our imagination after childhood. We store it in a box, and stash it on a high shelf, wedged between scuffed skates and a teddy bear missing an eye. Dust gathers on the lid. Inside the box, the imagination gets pale, fragile, and hesitant. It becomes bounded by the box. It forgets.

But there is nothing childish about imagination. It should never be allowed to grow weak, and if it has, it should be nursed carefully back to health. We ought, I think, to lift it gingerly down from the shelf, remove the lid, and take it for walks in the bright sunshine.

Not out of whimsy, but necessity.

Because a strong imagination is a way in to understanding, to empathy, and to better futures. It lets us put ourselves in the shoes of the other. To imagine their history and better picture their present. To explore the motivations behind cruelty, avarice, or selfishness. To deeply and compassionately consider buried pains and losses, wounds and secret scars.

And then to do imagination’s hardest work — to conjure possible solutions to impossible problems. To build inconceivable bridges. To try and make imagined futures come true.

Because we were never supposed to stop imagining, we were just supposed to do something about it. Because adults are so full of power and potential, we just sometimes forget to imagine ourselves that way.

Have a good one folks ✨