The Magic Window

Posted December 15th, 2008 by Jen in family life, features, holidays

The blacktop road swirled in wisps of powdery snow as I drove home this mid-December evening. The biting chill of the arctic wind was numbing, but not piercing enough to cut off the beauty of the glacial billows hovering above the road, suspended for a moment in a wintry waltz.

I was immediately transported back to a long-ago Christmas, the Christmas of the Magic Window. It’s one of just a few childhood gifts I remember. This simple, hard plastic paned oval window encased blue and white sands that would swirl in amazing designs with just a turn of the hand, the colors never mixing, an ever-changing landscape of ocean waves, sand dunes, mountains, clouds.

Magic Window

The Magic Window is now considered a “vintage 70s toy” and I pondered how the simplicity of this object kept me mesmerized for hours in childhood wonder, and how the Magic Window earned such an esteemed place in my memory.

What was so magical about this double-paned case of shifting sand? For a little girl in a rather impoverished and remote desert region of the southwest, I could dream, carried away to nowhere in particular but someplace beautiful on every twist and flow of those magical grains. I longed to touch the sand that surely was silky smooth and would flow through my fingers like fairy dust.

Thirty years later, as I drove home enshrouded in the real-life Magic Window that was the road before me, I realized I was in someplace beautiful, the ever-changing landscape of my life cresting in new loveliness upon loveliness. Here a drop, there a rise, but always an intelligent design.

I wonder, do you hold a special Christmas gift or childhood toy in your memory?

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12 Responses

  1. Becky December 16th, 2008 at 5:08 am

    When I was small, I played with dolls because that was all I had. One Christmas I got a doll that walked. I was absolutely amazed.

  2. Heather December 16th, 2008 at 7:04 am

    Oh my goodness! My dad had the blue and white one and I was so excited the year I got a pink and purple glow in the dark one! I played with that thing for YEARS! I had a pile of glow in the dark toys that I would play with at bedtime–it was the only way I would go without a nightlight. And then my kids played with it. I wonder which move we lost it in. Sigh.

  3. tipper December 16th, 2008 at 7:58 am

    What a beautiful post! I guess my favorite gifts would have been my dolls. I loved loved my baby dolls.

  4. Mrs darling December 16th, 2008 at 10:59 am

    Love this post. What a beautiful story!

  5. Sarah at SmallWorld December 16th, 2008 at 2:52 pm

    What a beautiful post! I have never heard of the Magic Window!!

  6. Jen December 16th, 2008 at 5:04 pm

    Becky, I would have been amazed at a doll that walked, too! I remember just one doll, one that had hair that you could pull out of her head to make it longer, and sadly, my sister cut the hair, thinking it would grow back.

    Heather, I never knew there was any other colors than blue and white. How fun. I echo your *sigh* because I don’t have mine anymore either; I wish I did.

    Tipper, thank you. I don’t know why I wasn’t a big doll person. Maybe because I had so few? But I had a stuffed animal, a dog, that I LOVED more than any doll.

    Mrs. Darling thank you!

    Sarah, hey, you’re a 70s child, I’m surprised! But I don’t know how widespread this thing was. My aunt in Michigan sent it to me, and but for her I wouldn’t have ever heard of it either.

  7. e-Mom December 16th, 2008 at 9:31 pm

    A beautiful post! :~D

  8. Jaci December 26th, 2008 at 9:46 pm

    My mom has had one of these ever since I was born. She just gave it to me today, but the sand is all stuck! I’m so upset! Does anyone know if the sand can be loosened again? The magic window toy is awesome!

  9. Anne May 14th, 2009 at 7:22 am

    Just found your posting…and I, too, had a magic window toy (tho it was much more than a toy). I wish I had one again…

  10. Joanne May 18th, 2010 at 10:49 am

    I found your post while looking up the Magic Window in a sentimental moment of childhood reflection. It was also my favorite toy, and your entry captured its fascination wonderfully. I wanted to find one for my son – I think he shares the sensibility to get “lost” in its magic like I did!

  11. Jen August 2nd, 2010 at 12:37 am

    I found it, and it’s now sitting in my bedroom on the windowsill. My kids love to play with it!

  12. sharon January 6th, 2011 at 1:47 pm

    Wow! I was just talking about this with a friend and he looked it up and found it online. I had searched a few years ago online with no luck and started thinking I’d imagined it!!! I had a blue and white one and it was one of my favorite toys, that YES, I could play with for hours and hours! Thank you for sharing :)

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