I was excessively imaginative as a child. I didn't have just 1 or 2 imaginary friends, I had hundreds. I was making up stories about them when I was 3... and even recited new ones aloud each night before going to sleep (drove my brother nuts!). I was always making up "things" outside - the wall of the upper lawn was a road for my Tootsie cars, the front steps were a raceway, the backyard was a deep forest, and the tunnels in the blackberries transported me to magical lands (and then to bathroom for mom to pull out the thorns). When I went to first grade, I created "roads" and tunnels in the ball field using existing things like stumps, rocks and bare spots in the grass (you don't move or touch them, you just imagine). As I grew, I saw and learned more and more... which only served to feed my already fertile imagination; causing it to mushroom well beyond its once limitless boundaries. The more my imagination is fed, the bigger it grows and the deeper its roots go.