M&M's, rotavirus, conjunctivitis, and a cheapened sense of accomplishment. Who knows what we actually got today from M&M World.
The kids have been working hard since school started to automatize the number pairs adding up to 10 (and the number pairs' relation to 10 in a subtraction problem). After a few different games, and a lot of drilling, today they both hit the goal (completing two worksheets -- addition/subtraction -- each under 30 seconds). Thus our trundling off to Times Square to enter a land of nasty fake chocolate scent swirling around giant, plastic, dressed-up M&M's. I walk into places like that and it becomes very clear why people from other countries -- countries where people work all day pulling a rickshaw through waste-high putrid monsoon water in order to buy enough bananas for their kids -- hate this country. It is gross (and I'm not even addressing those handles that I'm pretty sure aren't sanitized between daytime tourist visits and nighttime cockroach par-tays).
I don't know if incentivizing is a good thing. I don't know if supporting candy-coated consumerism by plunking down a truly bloated amount of money for a cellophane bag of sugar and chemicals is a good idea.
I know it was nice to see the offspring work hard to shave seconds off their time, and then be really, really excited when they reached a specific goal. I know that they were grateful and understood that this was a once in a lifetime experience. I know that we have to build up immune systems somehow... I for sure know that the journey to and from Times Square was more valuable and smelled fresher. We saw:
An independent business man selling munchies from this truck.
An enormous iguana crawling down a building.
A gorgeous wall of books at a publishing house. (We wondered how much longer books will be printed and bound.)
One of the new 100% all-electric, zero-emissions Duane Reade trucks.
Union members calling out a business owner for rat-like actions. (Oh, how we love these inflatable rats! Our blood quickens when one is spotted around town. Our favorite spottings are on breezy days when its creepy fingers blow about in a menacing way.)
Public art that looks like an enormous unicorn horn.
Innovation, creativity, courage, design, beauty, giant rat fingers dancing in the wind... There is so much out there to engage in and be motivated by and feel proud to be a part of. I hope that is what ultimately incentivizes us...
