I was Playing with my Dog. I was mistaken for a Dog-Keeper?

Musings on what it means to let loose within the bounds of capitalistic societies.

A few days ago, my roommate was asked if I was his dog-keeper. During a zoom call, his co-worker had spied me and my dog playing outside in the yard and immediately assumed that I was a dog keeper, whatever that may be. To the corporate-washed working mind, the concept of a person enjoying a snow day and slinging around sticks and toys for their dog to catch is a foreign one. I realized that the thought of a person enjoying and having fun during the day is fairly incomprehensible. If one is playing with a dog, they must be doing so for money. 

I was both shocked and amused by the question. Why is it so hard for adults to recognize and be okay with play? 

The obvious answer is that we continue to live with the discipline and structure forced upon human society since the age of industrialization (in the west) and colonization (in the east). Our lives follow a common trajectory, our collective imaginations hinge upon a narrative centered on boosting productivity and unilateral thinking. Children are meant to play, adults are meant to work. It’s all very black and white. If you err from the norm, then there must be something wrong with you, not the way we live. 

Tetsuya Ishida*, Exercise Equipment, 1997.

The other not so obvious but terrifying answer is how easily we have bought into the story. How we stopped questioning reality in favor of stability. How most of us have given up trying.

In this age of hyper-scheduled lives and trajectory-oriented growth, we forget to feed our current selves and - as cliche as it sounds - to live in the moment. All of our living has been pushed away into the far future for our post-retirement selves. Images of sunny tropical coasts, pickleball tourneys, and book clubs fill our minds. But that future is accessible only to a select few. The rest of us have to keep mucking about in the same fashion and we may even have to end up working for a longer number of years. Don’t forget how politicians - in several countries - are lobbying hard to increase the working age to 70!

Americans already work more than other western nations. And obviously, Indians and other Asians work even harder. At the same time, job satisfaction is at an all time low. People are highly stressed, disenchanted with their employers and anxious about the next layoff. In this climate, you have to take actions to secure our own well being, because your employers certainly aren't going to. For most of us, work is a necessity, but it needn’t be our entire identity. 

Several studies claim that it is good for adults to engage in activities that constitute “play”, but again you don’t need scientists to tell you that.

You know that already.

Every time you take a few moments to throw a ball around, to run around wildly without any purpose, to draw or fill in adult coloring books, you may feel a thrill of joy signaling that what you are doing feels good. It’s good for adults to take pleasure in the same activities that one did as a child. It reconnects us with our inner selves and opens us up to experiences that can both delight and soothe the soul. 

“Where is the time?” You might rightfully ask.

Time has simultaneously become the biggest commodity and the one we squander the most. I know it’s going to be hard, but with effort any of us can pencil in some fun. Every time you engage in passive activities in order to relax, consider switching to an active one instead. Instead of watching TV, play a video game with your buddies. Instead of scrolling for hours to choose which restaurant to order from, try out a new recipe with your loved ones. Bake! Draw! Take out a forgotten board game! Volunteer! Just look away from your screens! 

Nowadays, the unfortunate side-effect of the war on playtime has even reached the rainbow-hued halls of playschools. Children are being forced into increasingly strict regimes. Wake up, school, homework, study, sleep. They get a tiny window of time for play, if that, and during that session they are heavily monitored. A few anxious parents are even cutting sleepovers short.

Tetsuya Ishida, Seedlings, 1998.

Children are being denied the space to explore and learn about the world for themselves. Though the world is much safer now than when I was growing up, parents are more paranoid than ever. I used to run around my neighborhood for hours when I was a child, making new friends and inventing an array of made-up games to entertain ourselves with. I truly believe that all those hours of play helped my social skills, my creativity and my ability to find wonder and joy in everyday activities, then and now.

Scientists agree.

While it’s important for adults to play, it's even more important that we allow our children to do so. After all, adulthood is not going to be the utopia our society makes it out to be. Take it from a nearly 30 year old who went through all the steps only to discover that there is no Eden waiting for the post-graduate employee. 

Let us all learn to pause, breathe and revel in the small moments. Turn your focus from your future self to your present self. Do what makes you happy now. Spend quality time with your family, pets and neighbors. Look away from your phone. Do yoga for fun. Listen to your body. For, your body knows what it wants, even if you don’t. 

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*Found these wonderful paintings by the late Japanese Artist Tetsuya Ishida last week via the CNN. His work is just as relevant now as it was nearly 3 decades ago.

As always, thank you for reading my words. I apologize for the slight delay in posting as I was busy slipping and sliding through the mountains of Virginia. No permanent damage recorded, thankfully. I shall see you again in ten days!