This article was about how serious child's play was. Not that I didn't believe it already, but it was astounding the extent to which play can be a rehearsal to survival, in the direst of circumstances.
Looking back on my childhood, it seems to have been replete with imaginative play, the resource-poor kind that is harder to find nowadays. But despite the abundance of fond memories, the play itself never seemed to have been sanctioned really - it was just how we made do while the grown-ups were preoccupied elsewhere. Because otherwise we were put to task on the kind of "actually educational" pursuits my father deemed worthy of our time.
Part of me feels like I never really got to be a child, because to me, being a child implies not only being ignorant (which we were often reminded we were) but also carefree.
Like other things I regret, I haven't been content to let it just rest, so reclaiming has been in order. Though, as an adult, it can be difficult to incorporate childishness into one's life. Difficult - not in individualized pursuits such as singing, dancing, or other kinds of uninhibited expression, but difficult in relation to other adults because there's only so much playfulness that's tolerated before things are misconstrued (as flirtation, unprofessionalism, etc.). And even more difficult is finding or creating an arena where play is not only tolerated but encouraged.
I think part of the drive for intimate relationships is to have that sanctioned arena for play - where joking, flirtation, and sex (more physical play) are enshrined. For me, that drive seems to have become all-consuming now, not so much because I lack playfulness in my interactions with fellow adults, but because my last relationship was overwrought and so disabled playing that I'm starved in that way.
And it's not dire in that I need rehearsing for physical survival, but there's emotional deadweight from not having felt safe ever. And so I crave play, not to forget - because play is never an exclusion of reality - but to transcend, as a rehearsal for emotional survival.
Except as I've said, it's difficult to find or create that arena. To have a playmate to whom I can belong.