The reasons for this are both simple and complex.  The simple reasons are easily expressed in mathematical terms.  How this situation could come to be converted and examined in mere mathematical terms are more complex.  The result, which is really the only important thing I suppose, is that on Friday, February 25th, I left a job at a location where I had served for a bit over 17 years.  I left that job because it was no longer needed there.  I have not referred to myself as a statistic although I know this has happened to a number of people in recent years.  There is not a direct correlation between the economy and my circumstance.  There is probably an indirect connection between the economy and my circumstance.  No matter how one views it, the reality is still the same.

So how does one take the next step into the future?  There are probably a number of ways.   They are probably as varied as each of the people who populate the earth today.  I believe they all involve a matter of choice.  One may not be able to choose if one can continue one’s job or not, but one can choose how to deal with the resulting unemployment, and all of the excitement, fear, frustration, and possible anger or resentment which may come with it.  I am not in the least bit angry.  I am not in the least bit resentful.  I am, at the moment, a teeny bit fearful.  The Future is by its nature mysterious and unknown.  But I must confess to a little bit of excitement as well.  Our world is so full of possibilities, and I believe in possibilities. 

I hope to share some of my explorations of those possibilities with you, playful followers.  This will mean I need to be more intentional about my writing here.  I hope you come along with me, so we can see what the Future holds.  If you are on a similar exploration, let me know.  As with everything which happens in this world, we get through it together.  No doubt it will have its challenges, but I am expecting it to also be a great deal of fun, too.  Fun, after all, is what life should be about.

Much of February I spent listening to my left knee complain. We know this experience more commonly as pain, and I was having my share of it. An important joint, already afflicted with the arthritis which comes with age, was assaulted by other forces beyond my knowledge and control, including the ravages of a winter gone mad with its unrelenting sub-normal temperatures and serial snow storms so uncommon in our state poised between the Deep South and the Mid-Atlantic . I did take my share of ibuprofen, but not without concerns for the side-effects possible. I am not one given to the popping of a pill for every ailment, or even every ache and pain. Here’s why.

I am a person who believes in Body Conversations. When we are having a pain, it is our body’s way of trying to tell us something. Something is not right, or something needs attention, or it is just giving us an update: Remember, you are not as young as you used to be! I have always been concerned with everyone taking an aspirin or other analgesic for every little ache and pain they have. It is almost like saying to the body, “I do not want to listen to you. I do not value what you have to tell me, especially because you are telling me something I do not want to hear.” It is so easy to accept when the body is feeling a good sensation, but to close our ears to the critical voice which pain conveys to our perception. Yet, those messages are just as important, perhaps more important at times, and really need to have our attention. 

The path to Body Wisdom begins with body knowledge. As with all things in life, we can never have true knowledge unless we are willing to listen to our bodies, to ourselves, or to others. I am pleased to say my knee is much better, and I like to think I am a little bit wiser for having paid attention to it.

This movie does not have any “new” themes in it. I am of the opinion there are not any “new” stories in the world anyway; only new ways of telling them. Although I have not seen these other films, some friends of mine have compared this movie to Fern Gulley and Pocahontas. In many ways, it reminded me of Dune…with a sort of Pagan flair. It is, I observed, visually stunning, and the acting and story are very moving. At times the mere memory of it is enough to cause my eyes to mist over.

In fact, it is the cause of a phenomenon described in some places as “the AVATAR blues.” People who go to this movie are so taken with the setting, a distant planet-like moon called Pandora, with its noble inhabitants the Na’vi, and its unspoiled lack of technology – they become depressed later because it is not a real place for us to visit. On some level, I can appreciate this. Who of us has not had that “mountain-top” experience which must be followed by the return to “the valley?” The Na’vi see Pandora as the true expression of the name, the source of “all gifts.” They live in communion with Nature and not at war with it. They do not want to strip mine it to extinction, or bludgeon it into submission with guns and tanks, or study it by taking endless samples of everything.

Playful follower, if these folks spent more time in communion with Nature here on Earth, playing and creating the joyfulness we felt as kids, we would have less reason to be depressed. It is no mistake we call play “recreation.” Just being with the Earth and being grateful for all the gifts She has bestowed on us, dancing and singing with all the creatures of planet, has often been a cure for this man when he found himself in a funk. Maybe some of us do spend too much time in dark theaters watching movies…and we forget that despite the challenge and heartbreak life presents us, when we look closer we can see a bit of Pandora right here on Earth.

About the same time, I discovered the existence of a venue in New York where there is a regular celebration of personal stories.  Known as The Moth, it is a place where people share their stories, without scripts or props.  The tellers are chosen by the organizers/managers, and are asked to keep the stories to a certain length and often are solicited around a certain topic.  From time to time, notable persons are invited to tell stories, as part of a focused topic.  You, playful follower, can get CD’s and podcasts of these events from their website.  For many of you who are lucky enough to live in a city where your local stations air The Moth Radio Hour, you can hear these stories broadcast to your very own ears.  Should you think such a program would not be entertaining, let me assure you of the contrary.

You see, in my experience of improvisational theater and through my practice of InterPlay, I have experienced the power of the personal story first-hand.  We have several forms of story-telling…side-by-side stories, big-body stories, DT3′s (a mixture of dance and story)…which involve the use of ideas proposed by individuals or an audience-at-large.  They can be allowed to run any length, or limited to a certain number of minutes, often three minutes.  I have been both a listener, and a teller.  Never have I been disappointed by a story, and what never ceases to amaze me is how powerful personal stories are.  So I encourage you, playful follower, to take advantage of a personal story every chance you get.  Get someone to share a story with you, or share your story with them – or do both.  Personal stories are a way to a deeper appreciation of life all around.

Living in the State of North Carolina, I have become quite aware of the myriad of tax breaks and incentives which the government grants to businesses and industries to encourage them to locate facilities here.  The purpose of course is to benefit the state as a whole, but as a whole the honest, god-fearing, hard-working, tax-paying citizens of this state have to shoulder the burden of these incentives in order to lure these businesses to our state.  One such corporation was DELL (yes, the computer company) which opened a facility in the central part of our state around Winston-Salem. 

Tough economic times have befallen the computer giant, so a couple of weeks ago DELL announced it would be closing this facility.  This will put about 1000 North Carolinians out of work.  North Carolina already has an unemployment rate of 10.8%.  And of course, the key to economic recovery in the USA is secure employment for our citizens to restore consumer confidence and encourage them to continue to purchase our goods and services and help our economy to function.  This news, as you may imagine, was hard enough to take.

Then, to add insult to injury, it was reported last week the jobs of the Winston-Salem facility are being moved “off shore,” to places such as Mexico and the like.  Now, playful followers, I ask you…where is the patriotism of companies like DELL at a time such as this?  Who do they think they are, and why should they expect any consumer loyalty from Americans when this is how they act?  I, for one, will never let DELL have access to one dime of my hard-earned money.  I have secured the commitment of my family across 4 states to back me up on this.  I would also encourage every resident of the State of North Carolina to cast off their DELL products and replace them.  When IBM sold their PC division to China-based Lenovo, which has also down-sized its facilities in the RTP area, I was disappointed and discouraged.  However, the company was sold to Lenovo well before the financial melt-down and it was always well known the company was a foreign company.  But DELL is headquartered in Round Rock, Texas (a State known in recent months for its own governor’s threats to abandon the Union!), so to abandon US workers in times like these is, to my mind, unconscionable.  So I hope, playful followers, you are not reading these words on DELL hardware.  And if you are, I hope you will consider carefully next time you make a hardware purchase.  Now, I will get down off the chair.

Today, we have some of these same folks in our culture.  We call them by many names, but most often they come in the costume of the stand-up comic or the talk-show host.  The Jay Leno’s, David Letterman-types, and the likes of Jimmy Kimmel and Jimmy Fallon allow us to reflect on ourselves with humor.  And even the likes of Jon Stewart show how the most serious of our current events break down in the face of the humorous humanity of our life.  I would submit to you, playful followers, that in a world filled with so much political correctness, we need such members of our society to point this out to us, even if it forces us to explore the deeper meaning of our lives through discussion and debate.

One such incident which is still getting exposure in our media is the recent attempt at extortion suffered by David Letterman himself.  This is a man who has played host to past Presidents, sitting Presidents, and wannabe Presidents.  Through his humor, he has pointed fingers at any number of our foibles.  So, I have to admit I was incredibly proud of him when, taking a great deal of power from the extortionist, and cheating the media and press of a chance at a scoop, David used his own show to announce the event.  He even went so far as to declare the “creepy” thing he had done and for which the extortionist planned to embarrass him. 

Now, say about me what you will, I would affirm that David is worthy of recognition as the Chief Jester of the USA.  We have given him license to be entertaining and humorous, and give him great criticism when he fails to do so.  Should he be allowed to break laws?  No.  Should he have had “affairs” with his staff interns?  Well, that probably was not the best thing he had ever done in his life.  No one, however, involved in the affairs was coming forward to complain…remember, this was some network producer hoping to get money to cover his own debts.  These events took place before the marriage of Mr. Letterman to his wife (although long-time girlfriend) who is mother of his five-year-old son.  And he has also made public the price he will have to pay for the damage to that relationship.  But this is no greater price than any of us would have to pay should we find ourselves in a similar situation.  Having been cheated of their “scoop,” most of the news outlets will now fight over the fallout peripheral related news items.  And because he was bold enough to bring the issues out into the public, women’s rights groups will use the occasion to criticise Mr. Letterman and others who have done and do these “creepy” things.  But I will continue to watch Mr. Letterman’s show, because of all the people we have willing to act foolish and look foolishly at how we ourselves can look and be foolish, he has proven to me he has the guts and the talent to handle the job.

Of course, we have translated these images into characters more suited to our modern times.  Everybody knows the character that The Incredible Hulk resembles.  Popular fiction is rife with vampires and werewolves of all kinds.  The mummies have invaded movie theaters at least three times in recent memory.  No one can go anywhere near a movie theater or television without finding some presentation of teenage vampire angst there for public consumption…and we do tend to eat this stuff up.

The interesting thing to me is that while these are the “monsters” of our collective psychic consciousness, we have projected them outside and made them objects of fascination and allure.  They are sexy, and the people who portray these characters are cast for their physical charisma.  And our heroes and heroines no longer fear these monsters, or seek their destruction (in the style of Van Helsing), but seek to engage these beasts in romantic and often intimate relationship.  Sure, this was a sub-theme in the historic presentation of these stories, but such relationships were always doomed.  In the end, the mob burns down Frankenstein’s castle, Dracula gets the stake, the silver bullet goes to the werewolf, and the mummy is cursed to once again lie beneath the desert sands.  So what does it say to us when we would prefer romance with these creatures over their demise?  Is it our hope that even we, when we are most monstrous, still want to see ourselves as loveable and desirable?  Do we want to be embraced despite our misunderstood dark nature?  It does give one pause for thought…so pass the popcorn, will ya?

I would venture to say that most of these kids do not know each other – never met before and are not likely to meet again unless they were friends to begin with.  They are also very young; from ages which are measured in months to ages measured in years of no more than single digits.  But – and here is the magic – the minute they hit that patch of “fake” grass, they know how to play together…and they do!  Oh for sure, most of the play is simple.  You guessed it; walking, running, and stopping.  There is some follow-the-leader, with no major processing to decide who the leader will be, or for how long.  And when more structure is desired, most of them know some basic games which they are all willing to play, such as freeze tag, duck-duck-goose, Mother-may-I, and so forth.  No playground equipment is required.  No XBox’s or Gameboys or PlayStations are demanded.   The sounds from the little park are choruses of giggles and laughter.  These kids have the best time just being children, doing what children were meant to do…play…with each other. 

Now, I will tell you a mystery.  Deep down inside of all of us, hidden so far away we ourselves have almost forgotten where we put it, is one of those playful little children.  And this hidden child is holding a treasured secret to share if you are willing to listen.  And the treasured secret is this – what we are all meant to do each day of our lives, no matter how long we live…is play…with each other.

How did we get here?  I cannot help but think that on some level, we’ve “sold our souls to the Devil.”  Wall Street bankers have sold their souls for the chance to make huge profits.  Cunning and wily business tycoons have used connections and positions of power to coerce others into warfare in order for them to reap the profits in war’s aftermath.  And there are those who would squeeze the last ounce of fossil fuel out of the planet to feed our insatiable hunger for more and more and more of…what, exactly?  Does the endless acquisition of things bring us peace?  Does the ability to flaunt and parade our success in the face of others give us peaceful sleep and pleasant dreams at night?  No…now the Devil has come to collect on the bargain, and we stand ready to lose it all.  

Maybe there is hope.  When we can stop and take a deep breath, and realize right now in this present moment we have all we need, and find that peace from moment to moment, moving through each of those moments with ease and freedom.  Then, perhaps we could have compassion on ourselves and on our fellow playful followers.  Perhaps we would then discover the real magic which is within our arm’s reach.  It always was, and always has been.  Somehow, we just never noticed.

It is probably more important to say that what InterPlay is about is about having fun.  It is about being at ease.  There are really no wrong ways to do anything, unless the way you do it hurts yourself or hurts another.  But when you do it, you will begin to notice things.  Noticing is a very important part of this practice.  It is also another reason that I decided start this blog…to share some of my own noticings with you, Playful Follower.  (We emphasize following and leading, too, but more about that later.)  So, hopefully, if you start to notice things in the world around you, you will get some of the points I am trying to make in these pages.  Please don’t hesitate to share your noticings.  There is, after all, a great big universe to dance in, sing to, and share stories about.