In Matters of Play

In Matters of Play

Do children realize they're playing?

As the world unfolds before them and the horizon meets their eye

Do they ever reach for the hand of God, and find there's only sky?

Do they ever stop to wonder, wander as they may

Where all the the elves and fairies go, when they're not there to play?

Are our colors half as vivid, our worlds so bleak and bare?

Do we not see the shimmering deep? Are we so unaware?

For I've seen the light in a child's smile, as bright and clear as day...

Do children ever realize...do they know when they're at play?

— David Kennedy

Only the Naïve

There's something deeply sacred about the light in a child's eye. The way you look at them and know that they don't see you the way you see them—that they don't see you the way you see yourself.

I think there's something deeply healing about that gaze. As grown-ups, we think that only the naïve could be so in love, so in awe of the world and everything it has to offer. But when a child looks at you, they don't see the knotted, twisted remains of the child you were before. They don't see the broken dreams and forgotten heroes that dot your landscape today.

They don't reduce you to the sum of your most practical parts—you're not just a job title, a race, a gender, an age group, a financial & social status, a nice body or a pretty face...

You are everything you are before you are useful.

You are whole, in their eyes. And to "be-held" as the whole of your being is to be loved. We forgive the naïvety of our youth. For they forgive all of the things we are instead.

It is no coincidence that many of those who would self-proclaim to not like children, pay good money to be in the company of animals—pets that they love so dearly.

How does the quote go?

If only I were the man my dog thinks I am...

I've learned that we all crave to be seen in that light; to be loved in that way. We will go to great ends to be seen for who we are. We will climb mountains. We'll build empires. We'll break records.

We'll lose friends and burn bridges. We'll keep friends and get burnt instead.

No price is too high for a chance to be seen, and seen whole.

An Offer

I've found that we often withhold from the world the very things that we seek to attain from it. In search of abundance, we will cling to our coins. In search of love, we can become bitter, and vengeful.

But might I offer you a different road?

You're older now. Wiser maybe. But you've not lost all that you were before. Perhaps the children see the world that they do, because they are in fact so naïve. But naïvety is often a consequence of believing the right things for the wrong reasons. Today you have a chance to believe the right things for the right reasons.

It's not truly the way they see the world, but the world they see.

And you can choose to live there too. You can find space in your life, if you are willing, to find that child's gaze within. For a moment, you can strive to see people as might the child that you were.

For a moment, you can offer the world every benefit of the doubt, that you might now only offer yourself.

For a moment, the world can be bright again, and you can be young once more.

And after all, you might find that you've been playing all along. And the world you've been creating is just less fun than the one before.

You might wake up with a strange feeling that you're in the presence of an old friend.

You might find yourself with a smile, in a place you'd normally sigh.

And as you reach for the hand of God, you might find that there's only sky.

Well wishes, my friend.

— David Kennedy