This Week in Joyful Practice: Can We Play?

(after my nap)

This week, I met this critter hanging out on Mt. Rainier National Park, trying to steal snacks. Pushy chipmunks are a problem. They’ve gotten used to being fed by hikers. This little guy was persistent. I didn’t set out to take such a close range photo, but apparently my phone looked potentially edible, and this chipmunk went in for a sniff. Those cheeks are very persuasive, but I didn’t share my sandwich!

Last week, I wrote about wanting solitude, needing to cocoon. This week, there’s a tension between my desire to write and paint and sink into creative exploration and the urge to go play with friends. The PNW summer is pulling me into the world. A friend texted this morning Where are you and why aren’t we wading in an abandoned blueberry bog together?! (Miss you). Another friend texted to see when we were gonna go swim in a lake. I now have two swimming dates for next week, plus another one this weekend. It turns out I can’t resist an offer to go play outside.

On Tuesday, I hiked a six-ish mile loop on Mt. Rainier with Yme and two of our retired colleagues (I fantasize about how much play time there could be in retirement! I know. I know. I have enough retired friends to know that their lives are full of projects and busier than ever, but also–they definitely have more time to play!) In almost thirty years of living in the PNW, I’ve never hiked around Mt. Rainier. I guess it's because most of my outdoor experiences have focused on the sea and the Olympic Mountains. Rainier is not near the sea. It's smack in the middle of the Cascade mountain range.

One of our hiking buddies, who is 81, told us that he’d been hiking Mt Rainier for seventy years, and he’d never seen the wildflowers so rampant. Alpine lilies, beargrass, phlox, paintbrushes, lupines, asters (fields and fields of asters!), heather, hellebore, buttercups, and lousewort. The mountain was bursting. I wanted to cry from the beauty of it all.

This is my favorite of the subalpine wildflowers. They’re called Pasqueflower Seedheads, but we called them Thing One and Thing Two. Dr. Seuss must have taken inspiration from a summer walk on Mt. Rainier.

On Wednesday, I spent the afternoon playing with a new watercolor set I bought at the toy store last week with my nephew. On the front of the case is a drawing of a bear–different but not unlike the bear that was on the case of the watercolor set I had as a child. I was trying out the prompt Jenn and I offered to the folks in the personal oracle deck workshop: play with iterations. I started with iterations of technique (which is hilarious because I have no technique besides getting my fingers and table as messy as a toddler). As I experimented with layering colors, I was thinking about this post–this week in joyful practice and how it was all about being outside, playing, exploring (and then retreating to the cocoon of my studio).

In the next round of iterations, I collaged images from the walk on Mt. Rainier. Topographical maps of the trails. Pictures of the subalpine wildflowers we’d seen that I cut from a brochure found at a national park rest area. I layered colors and images with no purpose or goal other than enjoying the process.

Personal oracle deck card experiments using leftover card stock from a zine I made with friends years ago. I played with layering watercolors and images cut from a brochure about subalpine flowers growing on Mt. Rainier.

Wednesday evening, during our personal oracle deck workshop session, I felt like a tired sponge soaking up all the energy and ideas of the group. Everyone’s process for creating a deck is unique. I’d made three cards with no purpose, no direction, trusting that their meaning will unfold the more I engage with the process. Other folks started with a clear direction and an end goal. I found myself feeling a titch envious, except it wasn’t really envy, it was admiration and inspiration. The cross-pollination has begun. This is the magic of playing in community. I’m learning new ways of thinking and experimenting.

Personal oracle deck card in progress. Iteration two.

Summer wants company, and my body wants to be outside as much as it can while the summer lasts. It doesn’t want to sit in front of a computer and write. It wants to sit in Jenn’s pasture with a journal and watercolors and take a dip in the horse trough next to her tiny-house-studio whenever it needs a break from the heat. It wants to plan creative projects while laying on a blanket near a body of water. It wants collaboration and mind melds and mosquito bites from sitting outside at dusk (okay, it doesn’t want the mosquito bites, but it does want to sit outside at dusk, which means hello mosquitos.).

Addendum: As I was writing the previous paragraph, Yme texted and invited me to join him at a pub for a beer and a burger with a friend. They were sitting outside. My will power faded, and I decided to miss the deadline Jenn and I agreed on for our weekly posts. Summertime rolls. I’m finishing up this post before heading out to meet Jenn at a park on Budd Inlet for a swim and some Joyful Practice play. Afterwards, I’ll come back to my studio and take a nap, play with the cards I started on Wednesday and see what they want to become.

Last night, at the pub, a young mama arrived on the patio with a dog and a toddler. The toddler needed the bathroom, so we watched the dog. Then she needed to go find two chairs for her table, and Yme offered to keep an eye on the toddler, which meant chasing a child who was chasing a mama. It takes a village, the mama said when she finally sat down. We all laughed at the cliche.

But also. This week reminded me that our creative process needs a village, too. I need cocoon time. I need deadlines, but I also need time to blow things off (I’m thinking of you, Ross Gay and your awesome essayette, “Blowing It Off,” from The Book of Delights.). My body wants to play as much as it wants to rest. My body wants people and solitude. That tension isn’t going away.

Yesterday, while running errands downtown, I ran into the friend who wondered why we weren’t in an abandoned blueberry bog together. You're in your cocoon time. Mine lasted two years, she told me. Yeah, I’m cocooning, but sometimes I gotta let the world in a little bit, so I can glean new ideas and gather new experiences.

PS: One more photo from our hike. I like how this picture of Mt Rainier is blurry, like I was looking at it with tears in my eyes.