Rude awakening: I am not very playful anymore.
I realized this during my Headspace.com guided meditation this week, while working my way through the “Happiness” pack. Having already completed most of the other topic-specific segments in the program, I had put off this 10-day pack because I’m pretty happy most of the time.
But this week the message is not only about being happy, but being playful and light-hearted as well. This really hit close to home, since I’ve been grappling with my resistance to playfulness for a few weeks now.
I’m signed up for my first blogging conference — BlogU15 — in early June (squeezed in between my two photography exhibits on May 31 and June 13, so one more new adventure on the schedule). The truth is, I’m sort of terrified about the conference. For starters, I’m at least twenty years older than many of the participants. One new registrant is literally 30 years younger.
It’s not the age thing that frightens me though. I can generally keep up conversationally with the younger women in my Moms Run This Town running group. I can even keep up with many of them speed- and distance-wise when I’m training regularly.
From what I can glean from the conference’s private Facebook page, the BlogU participants are a collection of vivacious, witty, talented writers — many of whom draw their blog themes from parenting and other chaotic aspects of life.
My material is about what calms us down. It’s not calm energy coming from the Facebook page, but it’s fun, wacky, and smart energy.
This year’s “Middle School to the Max” theme is probably what’s making me feel old, boring, and not very playful. Other attendees have ordered fake braces to wear to the conference’s pep rally and middle school dance events. Haven’t had much free time lately to think about my middle school attire.
I still have a couple of weeks left to become fun again. Maybe I’ll be surprised and meet someone there whose idea of fun is seeing a springy duck playground ride in a twisted vine.
Even though I registered a couple of months ago, I haven’t interacted on the BlogU Facebook page yet. With my new website still under construction, I wanted to wait to go “public” until that’s finished. But now I feel like a stalker, only watching the interactions but not taking part. I’m starting to feel creepy and socially awkward (appropriate for the middle school theme), so I guess it’s time to step out of hiding.
In the meantime, as proof that I am fun and playful (dammit), I’ll leave you with photos of my rapidly-growing puppy Apollo sleeping around.
And if you’ve got any tips for me on how to deck myself out for BlogU’s Middle School to the Max theme, I’d be sooooo appreciative! (FYI, my middle school years were 1976 – 1978.)
Apollo Sleeping Around
