Part One: Karate Chopping Waves at the Beach 🏖️
Having fun without a screen… A new Story Whale bedtime story! 😴
The battle against total screen addiction is a battle that no age group is truly immune to.
It’s something I personally struggle with.
The present moment is showing us that it’s something a lot of kids struggle with too.
At the end of the day, heavy screen usage and reliance is something that they are especially vulnerable to.
So here’s a story about two boys and how they manage to make a screen-free day at the beach the best day ever.
Part two finale next week!
Know someone who might enjoy today’s story?
After waking up, George rolled out of bed and let out a mighty lion-like yawn.
He made his way across his room, walking briskly across the city streets that were imprinted on his bedroom carpet, stepping across buildings like a mega monster from one of his cartoons.
Once upon a time, he had played out legendary battles on that city carpet. He would set up traffic using Hot Wheels and use shoeboxes to make some of the buildings stick up and feel more real. Then he would use his toys to create epic scenes of bravery and courage. It was silly but it was fun. There was one battle between Batman and a T-Rex that went on for an entire week! That was all a long time ago now, or at least it seemed that way to George. Those shoeboxes had now been recycled and those toys now sat in a cupboard in darkness.
Anyway. On that morning, none of that was on George’s mind.
He left his room and continued down the hallway to the kitchen. Out in the backyard he could see his parents watering the garden and taking down clothes from the clothes line.
Following his usual morning routine, George grabbed his IPad from the kitchen counter to play some games. When he tried to switch it on, the screen just stayed black. His eyes followed the snaking charging cable to the wall where it was plugged in. Except it wasn’t plugged in!
George’s dad was just walking back into the house. “We will get going for the beach in ten minutes, ok, George?” he said.
“My IPad!” said George. “It wasn’t plugged in.”
“Oh, sorry, I must have swapped it out and forgot to plug it back in. Ten minutes, ok?”
“But what am I going to do for the drive?” asked George.
“I’m sure you will work something out,” said his dad. “Now go get ready.”
Grumpy as the Grinch, George went to get ready for the beach.
*
George and his parents got into the car and started the drive. Before going to the beach, they were set to pick up George’s cousin, Ben.
When they got to Ben’s house, Ben was already standing out front on the footpath, waving as they parked, a massive smile on his face.
George and Ben were both ten. They didn’t see each other very often and their personalities were quite different. Ben got into the car and was instantly telling everyone how excited he was for the beach.
They were properly on their way to the beach now. The car ride would be about an hour. It certainly didn’t take that long for George to start feeling bored though. That only took a few minutes.
George had the face of a half-asleep zombie as he gazed blankly out of the car window. Every minute felt like an eternity. He was instantly starting to feel car sick.
Next to him, Ben was chatting away with George’s parents about school and family and anything else that came to mind. It seemed very strange to George. He could never imagine talking to anyone’s parents like that.
George then realised that Ben was now actually talking to him.
“Are you excited for the beach, George?” he was asking. “It should be a great day for it.”
“Not really,” said George flatly. “I’m bored already.”
“I’ll show you a game,” said Ben. “Watch this.”
Ben made a peace symbol with his two fingers and then flipped it upside down.
“Imagine these two fingers are the two legs of a runner,” said Ben.
He put the runner on the little ledge at the bottom of the window and made it look like the runner’s legs were moving.
“Imagine your runner is out there running on the side of the road. When you get to a light post you need to make sure you jump up high to dodge it.”
Ben showed an example, making his runner leap up into the air to avoid a light post at the side of the road.
“Seems kind of silly,” said George.
“Just give it a try,” said Ben.
George sighed and set up his own finger runner on the ledge of his window. He started his runner at a light jog, feeling slightly ridiculous.
His runner got a little bit quicker, jumping light posts like hurdles.
“You can also have your runner surf on top of overtaking cars,” said Ben. “Like this.”
Ben’s runner hopped on top of an overtaking car and surfed it like a wave.
Next chance he had, George gave it a go as well.
“Now put it all together and see how long you can keep your runner going without hitting anything,” said Ben.
George’s runner sprung into action, jumping over light posts, dodging and ducking obstacles, and surfing on car rooftops. Without realising it straight away, he sure wasn’t bored anymore.
“This is sort of like Subway Surfer but real life,” said George excitedly.
“What’s Subway Surfer?” Ben asked.
“Oh, nothing,” said George. “It doesn’t matter.”
They carried on with their runners until they eventually reached the beach and parked.
“Here we are,” said George’s mum.
“Can’t we just keep driving,” said George. “The beach is boring.”
Ben was already out of the car.
“The beach is incredible!” said Ben. “Trust me. I’ll teach you.”
Part two finale next week!
Don’t miss it!