Parents don’t hear that plaintive question at their front doors very much anymore, because kids are too busy glued to their computer screens to go outside. I can’t remember the last time I saw a kid riding a bike or I had to slow down to drive right through the center of a stick ball game in the street. You never hear about baseballs crashing through plate glass windows anymore. These things annoyed me at the time, but now I miss them.
And even if you grew up in an era when you did get to ask that question quite a bit, you learned quickly that after the age of about 21, it becomes increasingly harder to get your friends to come out and play. The older you are, the more you become bogged down with responsibilities. “I can’t come out and play today because I have to earn a living.” “I can’t come out and play because then who will watch the kids?” “I’m just so tired. Maybe next week.”
Trust me people, if you die tomorrow, your last thought isn’t going to be, “Damn, I forgot to wash the dishes.” If you have regrets, they’ll be about the things you didn’t get around to doing with friends and family.
I’ve reached a point in my life where I want to play again, but there’s really no one to play with. No one fits my whacky schedule. Everyone is busy, broke, exhausted, content, lethargic, or overwhelmed. And that’s probably the loneliest paragraph I have ever written in my life.
[Image credit: quickmeme.com]
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