Rejuvenile by Christopher Noxon  
 
Amantula: Philadelphia

Favorite childhood toy?

Cabbage Patch doll (which I still have 23 years later!)

Favorite childhood game?

Hungry Hungry Hippo!

Favorite childhood candy/cereal/treat?

E.T. Breakfast Cereal

What of your interests, preferences, obsessions (movies, TV, toys, food, clothing, etc.) might be considered childlike or childish? Why do you love this stuff?

I teach kindergarten and I love it because it reminds me so much of my own childhood. I used to play with Strawberry Shortcake, and now the girls in my class play with her, too. The same cartoon icons my brothers loved (Spiderman, Incredible Hulk, Transformers) are the very same ones the boy students love. I love teaching not just for those cliche moments (i.e. the look in a child’s eyes when they “get it”); but, more importantly, I love seeing “my kids” (aka, my students) being kids.

Did you have these interests as a kid? Were they developed as an adult, were they denied to you as a kid?

I had a very happy childhood; although my siblings and I were raised in the so-called “inner city,” and didn’t have much (my two younger brothers and I shared a room until I was 11, when we moved to the suburbs) we lived in a home that was very loving. My neighborhood “friends” were actually my cousins, who lived literally “up the street” and “around the corner” (My grandmom lived next door). Growing up in the city (Philadelphia, to be exact), my mom thought nothing of us walking to the main branch of the library, museums, or the park. Unfortunately, the neighborhood I grew up in has been “re-developed”, and I couldn’t afford to live there if I wanted to!

Ever feel any stigma from colleagues/parents/friends about childlike tastes or mindsets?

Even though I’m the oldest, my brothers are both married with children. I’m 30 years old, with a son, but no husband! My youngest brother was actually the first to get married; ironically, he’s the most “grown up” out of his siblings, I think. He has a mortgage, life insurance policies, stocks and bonds… He always teases me that I stay in the past, that I’m still a kid. I try not to get offended, but sometimes I can’t help it.