Playful

The inventiveness and playfulness of nature in all its forms are awaiting us every day, every minute, if we are ready to pay attention. Nothing is set in stone. All is in flux, eager to shift, all will change. All is happy to metamorphose: from blossoms to fruit to seed, from desperate for rain to deliriously lush, from egg to larvae to pupae, from tiny seedling to 140-year-old live oak, and on and on. My ferns are unfurling their arms ready to take in the light and breeze. The nasturtium plants are curling and draping themselves luxuriously over stones, steps, into the jade bush. When the flowers are done the caper-like seeds start to form in trios. This year the sweet peas are climbing up into the apple tree, the wisteria decides to show up late with its fragrant bloom. What unfolds is improvisational art, dancing with demands of the bigger forces. This is instrumental. There appears to be an agreement: why not try this? Or maybe that? Early on, this way of existing seems the only possibility for me – being an artist in the big web of life. But I don’t mind forms and rules – in fact we need them, they might invite more playfulness, stretching of boundaries, surprising evolution. Necessity or hardship, like the pandemic or any crisis, force us to be even more flexible and inventive.

Eating my lunch outdoors amidst the fuzzy bumble bees dancing in flight, bouncing on blossom after blossom drinking their nectar, is delightful entertainment. Playfully they forage for the colony, engaging in the serious business of “buzz pollination” that needs to be done, vibrating flowers till they release pollen. Watching this humble spectacle, I contemplate how we humans tend to beat playfulness out of our children early on. Rigid and tight scheduling, pressure and constant demands to conform, achieve, all make for little truly self-guided play and discovery. In childhood taking a bike and disappearing into the nearby woods or fields still live with me as visceral memories. Dangers abound. The utter freedom – my being expands and breathes.

Unfolding: what will it be? 

looking at the puffy perfect sphere of a dandelion

you remember the irresistible impulse to blow

into its perfectness – blow it to the wind

 a hundred tiny celestial parachutes

all around you translucent seeds

floating off to a new destiny

delight – abandon

it’s gone

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