Slightly Off the Grid

When I was a kid, back in the 1900’s, before there were cellphones or laptops, before microwaves and VCR’s, before even cassette tapes, back when there were three tv channels that we watched at regularly scheduled hours in black and white, back then before scheduled playdates and organized activities for children, there was a thing called “play.”

Play could involve the entire neighborhood in a summer evening game of Kick the Can. Or another, a group game commonly known as Spud, although for some reason our neighborhood called it Baby In The Air, maybe because it took longer to spell and would keep the game going longer when parents wanted us to come in for the night.

Play could involve a girl taking her plastic Barbie carrying case (complete with several outfits hanging on little hangers) to a friend’s house to create imaginary Barbie drama. Or maybe it involved a collection of Trolls. But never Barbie and Trolls together. They were different genres of pretend. When the drama grew boring, jump-roping developed coordination skills that I still use today when I merge my car onto a highway.

Going out to play could be a simple as sitting in a crabapple tree watching the ants climb along a branch. It could be as involved as planning and practicing a fairytale drama that our parents would be forced to watch.

Now that I am retired, I have time to play again. But what does that mean anymore?

One friend loves playing pickleball and golf. I am happy for her. I am into neither. Another enjoys getting together with friends to play cards. I am happy for her too. Another has fun playing in the kitchen crafting edible works of art. Then there are—God bless them—the quilters. To me, that would be a form of extreme torture, but they derive such well-earned joy from their endeavors.

So what is play?

I think it is anything you enjoying doing because you choose to do it and it makes you happy. Once it becomes an obligation, it is no longer play.

I can play in the garden. And it is fun until I have the pressure of getting it presentable for company. The gardens would probably be in better shape if I spent more time just playing in them.

Sometimes, I play with beeswax. That almost always makes me happy. I derive as much pleasure taking a mound of dirty hive wax and melting it into a golden disk of clean wax for candles as any quilter hunched over her sewing machine.

My husband increasingly plays in the kitchen, trying out recipes for no reason other than wanting to make them (and eat them, of course). By playing in the kitchen, he has developed a repertoire to pull from when company comes over.

A musician told my golfer sister that in order to play well, she needed to practice. She replied that playing golf is practicing. That is probably why she enjoys golf.

I have a kitchen magnet that exhorts me to “do more of what makes you happy.” That’s what playing looks like for me these days. Today, it made me happy to write a blog post.

No obligation. Just playing.