Play

I had been out most of the afternoon visiting family care homes and was writing up my findings for a client when I noticed the time. 6:30. The report was due in the morning. My neighborhood women’s group was due to start in fifteen minutes at Marie’s.

It had been a long day. I was struggling with the report, not because it was difficult, but because I had simply run out of steam. (I had been running out of steam a lot recently.)

Did I have enough steam to make it to Marie’s house?

In my head, I started to say no. But then I paused.

Have you ever tried that before? Pausing, before—the key is before—you do the thing you always do (which, in my case, is often to retreat to bed and a book)?

But then I considered what happens each time this group of seven, ranging in age from 30 to 60, gets together each month.

What happens is I’m always surprised. There may be tears, but there is also often laughter. I always walk back into my home with far more life in me than when I left.

And so, after the long day and not feeling my best (in fact, feeling more like the opposite of my best), I closed my laptop, got my keys and left for Marie’s. I told myself I would leave early.

Instead, I stayed late.

I’m glad I did. I hadn’t done shrinky dinks in years. And there at Marie’s dining room table, while using sharpies and scissors to shape abstract earrings, necklaces, a guitar pick, and fridge magnets, I was reminded of just why quilting bees and other gatherings around handiwork, at one time, were so popular.

And so I got home late. If I’m honest, I probably fell asleep earlier than I would have had I not gone, because, you see, I am a ruminator. Many nights, when the lights go out, my brain turns its high beams on all the things that can wake you up, but that’s another story.

I guess what I’m trying to tell you is play. It’s important. Very important. (It's something I've learned from personal experience.)