things we forget

It's funny how we can spend hours (okay, maybe it's more like minutes) of our childhood doing or playing something, but then totally forget about it as an adult.

I had another one of those "oh yeah!" moments today. Sunday we had about 1/3 of Bobby's family over for lunch, meaning all three leaves went into the dining room table. I decided to leave them in, and left the chairs around the table as well (I often put them against the wall when the table is being used as a cutting table). Of course, Bobby's spot is left open.

Today I had some visitors, who were quite excited to find the dining room had grown a "tunnel". I was quite puzzled, into I walked in and saw what they meant:
I had totally forgotten that as a child we used Mom's dining room table for all sorts of wonderful adventures until she'd make us get out. We could be spies in a submarine, Barbies in a van, or fish beneath the pier with a fisherman outside the chairs, and when Mom had a tablecloth on, stretching out on the chairs shoved up under the table was a GREAT place to hide.

So where along the line did I lose my imagination and these four-legged monstrous piece of wood simply become a table?