When does that realization come, that not everything is something to play with? That things have uses outside of their capacity for our enjoyment? Only recently have I realized it, though it must have happened years ago: I look around, and very few things are toys any more. And the most toy-like things, like my computer — even these have their main uses other than as playthings. When do these purposes occur to us, when a box is merely something to hold other things, to be stored or shipped, and no longer a piece of a fortress of solitude? I guess it comes down to it that childhood really does end, however we may feel that we have never really grown up. But it is not a sad thing, because so much more can be done with a world that is no longer filled merely with toys. With a world where things have function other than just to amuse us for a little while, and then be forgotten.