Last night, I spent time with two of my dear friends who will be heading off to Wisconsin and start a new chapter of their lives. I will miss Ellen and Gabe, because just as much as their my friends, they are also my playmates! In fact, Ellen was the one who drew me into board games, and I have thoroughly enjoyed our game nights. Ellen and I also played a lot in Taekwondo - while many would think of Taekwondo as martial arts and serious - the fact that I enjoy it and simply love it seems more like play than work.
This brings me to the second part of my post - being serious. I'm not comfortable with terms like serious games, or serious play, mainly because if one adopts the perspective that play allows us to engage in flow - in all likelihood, that state of flow is very much real and serious. By attaching terms like serious to play and games, it detracts from what play actually is and even makes it less powerful. The strength in a definition of play is precisely because it isn't easily bounded (even as I do try to define it - yes, yes - humans do like to bound the world). I fear that by making claims of serious play/games, we signal to others that play was all along not serious and does not involve high stakes. This is not at all true in a lot of cases! There is a lot of risk-taking in play, and most players take it seriously.
But I digress ... I am mourning the loss of my playmates - BUT with technology, we are able to still play together online and I am very much looking forward to my play dates!
And shouldn't all play be considered or at least taken seriously? Consider the little boy making his net to catch 'baddies.' What if he'd been made fun of? Mocked? He was engaged in very serious work/play. Hmmm.
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