Gift No. 6 - Play Daily
Playing Right Where I Am is the Long Game–Especially in the Leftover Moments

Caregiver stress (and its isolation) is poison.
Play Daily is the remedy.
 
Betty’s capacity for all things playful was the secret sauce for her long run—our Secretariat race. Finding that lighter moment with friends accessed the good life--wherever she was. She used her time well—moment to moment. She did what she could with what she found.
 
Playing is respite and recharge. From the perspective of my own (hopefully distant) future hospice bed, all work and too little play looks lame. Take a break—even a small one. Supercharge this antidote with friends.
 
I lived in a no-play zone most of my adult life.
It is a defensive position that did not move me forward enough for the toll it took. Deferring gratification in sprints is part of the entrepreneurial dream (which I get) but at some point in the iron-man/woman marathon you gotta call it and let it go.
 
My older brother was solidly in the opposite camp: all play, all the time, or so it seemed to me.
My mother and he shared that playfulness. She knew how to work hard and shouldered responsibilities but did not omit the exotic vacations.
 
Playing now, right where I am is the long game—especially important is playing in the leftover moments.
Integral play is the (new) common sense for uncertain times. It takes faith and bravery to play, trusting that it will all work out. Betty and I found sweetness in the valleys and the vacations. It is the worthiest of efforts to find fun in the middle of the inappropriate, especially, and before it is too late.

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