A Bit Of Trouble Practicing What I Preach

Those of you who read last week's blog know that I wrote about the life-enhancing importance of being able to play. Playing like a child, free from worry or care and not getting our knickers in a twist over making a mistake or losing.

I mean if you want to play your game-- whatever it is-- for blood and thunder and maybe get your name on a sliver cup, do so. Go for it! But what the doctors and life study people are saying is that we need to have times of giddy, possibly even nonsensical, free play as well.

I wrote about my sandbox beginner’s bridge game where we don’t keep score and we cheer each other on and it’s all for fun. Remember?

Fine. And true. Except, that this week I played just one hand and,  near the end of playing that hand, I had completely forgotten that there was an important card still out—in the opponent’s hand—against me. With confidence I laid down my last three cards and announced, ”We have the rest of the tricks,” at which point my friendly opponent said, “I don’t think so” and produced the powerful winning card I had completely forgotten. We did not make our contract.

I was gobsmacked! How could I have forgotten that card? This is not something I usually do. What is the matter with me?

I think I handled the situation all right at the table, apologizing to my partner and laughing, albeit somewhat feebly. I didn’t fall on the floor or foam at the mouth, but on the way home, in the car, I tore myself to pieces.

What were you thinking? You forgot that trump card! Where were you?

Here’s the thing: At my age, forgetting anything of any significance we can instantly self-diagnose as "short term memory loss." Then that can easily be taken to a 5, which, in the imagination, can become "incipient dementia." Taken to a 10, we are looking at possible early Alzheimer’s? We seniors have trouble allowing ourselves just to forget the way we used to. Forgetting is freighted heavily now, and all the way home I was loading my forgetfulness and then desperately trying to unload it.

It’s nothing, Cecily. You just forgot the damn card. Get over it. You know this is supposed to be fun. You wrote about it being fun and you are doing this? Punishing yourself? Can you manage to practice what you preach and free yourself up here?

I began to focus on my breath. Breathing in and breathing out. Stopping at the STOP sign. Breathing in and breathing out. My mind carries on: “They thought you were a pretty good player. Now what will they think?” Oh, yes. The whole, merciless, ego-busting nine yards.

 Driving along Bronson Road, breathing in and breathing out. Some words from Anna Black’s lovely book, Living In The Moment, came to mind. She reminds us to congratulate ourselves whenever we notice our minds going berserk. “Noticing is a moment of wakefulness and clear seeing,” she tells us. Black reminds us to smile and come back to rest in our breath as often as we need to in order to calm the mind.

OK. All the way down the hill of Bronson Road, I am breathing and hoping to calm my crazy mind.

I congratulate myself for noticing my torturous, ego-driven mental excursion and I breathe consciously all the way home. By the time I have parked my car I am not “cured” but I am definitely calmer, my fears of disintegration, diminished. Sitting for a few moments in the car, I am humbled; I have to say, by an intense awareness of how challenging it can be to be a human person.

A game. Just a game I was playing. That’s all it was.