I'm convinced that our play connects us with our true selves -- both whatever passes for our souls and our animal selves, our valiant and base instincts at once, our pride and our despair.

When I was little, I played pretend, mostly with my sister.  We were, in play, exotic and strong, full of power to save the universe.  Wonder twin power!  We did puzzles on our bellies on the floor of the church while the grownups chatted, and we ran around howling like banshees through the "woods".  Two trees standing kinda close together could be woods.  We played word games, spelling games, school work games, shoot-em-up games, and we were freed by our play.

The forty-year-old me plays, a lot.  Word games, of course, like Scrabble and Boggle, and -- yes, pretend games!  Pretend games when you are forty can be writing stories, if you are lucky enough to be a writer.  They can also be role-playing games like Diablo or WoW, and I do so love those games.  (Note to 14-year-old boys:  that "guy" that just pwned you might be somebody's mom.  Ha ha ha!)

So part of my quest to be whole includes stuff that is the very opposite of wasting time.  It's digging deep into the things that thrill me and feed me, and somehow I end up doing better "work" in the time that is left over.  And THAT stuff is the authentic me, all of it, playing working truly Marsh.