So Long Thomas, Thanks For Everything!

Our son Grady used to be a complete Thomas the Tank Engine fan. We watched the animated show, the dvds, and we have trains coming out the wazoo. When we went to the park or playground, Grady always wanted to play trains (which was really just the name for a game where Grady and I chased each other making train noises). We also played a lot of trains at home, either with the track set or chasing each other around the house. However, the Thomas effect has steadily declined for about a year now and the other night Grady and I packed his trains, cards and few other things into his Thomas suitcase. It was a pretty sad thing for me but Grady didn’t seem to care too much. Man, I must be one of the most sentimental guys around.

Thomas took his first hit about a year ago when Grady caught onto the Pixar movie “Cars”. There was a period where it was all Cars, and very little Thomas. Playing trains at the playground was replaced with playing cars. In actual fact the game was exactly the same only we made different noises. We would watch the Cars movie over and over, and the Thomas videos didn’t get too many appearances. Then last fall came the arrival of Transformers.

Transformers changed everything. Almost overnight there was nothing else. As a testament to his interest, Grady quickly and accurately memorized a complete book called “Meet The Depecticons.” This was a 20 page book with perhaps 2 sentances on each page. Within a week or so he taught himself to “read” the book word for word. From that point on, Transformers were 24/7 and they are still going strong. We now play Transformers at the playground. Yeah, you guessed it. It’s the same game only now we make shooting and transforming sounds…

I get pretty choked up when I see the kids grow so fast. I spend 1/2 of my time wanting them to be mature and the other 1/2 of the time I want to freeze time and just have them the way they are. I really miss Grady’s excited voice yelling “Thomas!” on a Sunday morning as he heard the whistle blow from the tv, jumping out of bed to see the latest show. I miss reading his Thomas books with him. The two I remember the most are the Thomas catalog (which we would “read”, but more talk about which trains we wanted) and the Thomas flip-up book. Grady had this cute way of leaning forwards and then with both hands he would open the flip-up and proudly recite what was hidden beneath. I’m also kind of sad to see the Cars phase pass as well. I’m a bit less sentimental about that one, but the movie itself is really cool and I still hope to watch it a few more times with my little buddy.