My Lego Obsession

The author hard at work.

I’ve had this post in my mind for over a year now, but it seems like a perfect time to post it. After all, everyone seems to be in the love with The Lego Movie at the moment. I am what is known as an Adult Fan Of Lego, or an AFOL, and I have a story to tell.

Most AFOL’s go through the “Dark Ages.” That’s usually during the teenage years when they think they’ve outgrow their hobby or simply lose interest. Then they re-discover Legos years later as an adult and reignite the passion for the wonderful little blocks.

I never had a Dark Age. I’ve been creating, devising, and just plain playing with Legos ever since my brother gave me my first batch at about 4 or 5. Sure, there’ve been years when I used them less, but never once did I imagine that I’d outgrown them, and never once did I lose interest in them.

But why Legos? That seems to be a popular question that people ask AFOLs. Why do we keep ‘playing’ with a so-called children’s toy? Every AFOL’s answer to this question is different and here’s mine.

It’s about imagination and freedom. When you buy an action figure of Iron Man, for instance, it will always be an action figure of Iron Man. Nothing wrong with that if that’s what you want. For me, however, when I buy a Lego Iron Man set it’s different. The little minifigure will always be Iron Man, of course, but the rest of the set can be turned into anything I want at any time. I’ve turned pirate ships into castle workshops, helicopters into submarine repair vessels, castles into evil super villain lairs, and the list goes on.

Legos are like toy stories, if you’ll pardon the blatant Pixar rip-off. Legos can become anything you want at any time. They foster creativity and engineering, always thinking about ‘how can I turn this pile of colorful bricks into a structure that fits my needs?’ That’s no different from being an author. ‘How can I turn this pile of colorful words into a story?’ I’m convinced that my lifelong obsession with Lego is partially responsible for my wanting to be an author. I always loved telling little stories with bricks.

So here’s to Lego. Never think you’re too old or too cool to enjoy them. In closing, this is one of my favorite sayings:

“There’s nothing more immature than an adult who refuses to play.”