Small Pleasures

I've been resting a lot. My body literally won't allow me to do the things I want to do right now and it's immensely frustrating. Having been through an entire therapy journey around guilt and productivity, I'm very reluctant to go backwards.

As my children get older, they're starting to deal with more complicated problems. I keep telling them something I wish I'd heard back in the day. 'Think about the kind of person you want to be, and act like that.' Take a moment. Don't react immediately. Identify your feelings. Think about how you want to move through the world. Blah blah blah blah blah. Now that I write it down I'm boring myself.

But I do keep thinking about that. What kind of person do I want to be? I want to be the kind of person that still appreciates the little things. I want to be grounded enough to be realistic, but open enough to life to enjoy the small pleasures.

I've picked up Animal Crossing: New Horizons again since the latest update. My son (who plays Minecraft and Geometry Dash almost exclusively) watched me for a moment as I spent a bit of time chatting to the villagers.

'Why is this game so popular?' he said. (Shocking. Obviously I will have to convert him.)

The thing is, Animal Crossing is packed with small pleasures. I'd forgotten. There are so many little things that make me feel happy: the stupid little puns when I catch fish or bugs. Opening my front door to see a random visitor standing outside. When Merry runs over to give me a gift (twice she gave me tiny sunglasses). When Flick comes to visit and gets mega excited about insects. Going on Kap'n's boat and listening to him sing. It's not dramatic or combative. It's not snarky. It's not fast-paced. It's just ... nice.

Sometimes I need nice things.

My brain is full of other people's conflicts. Quite often I am needlessly tense. I absorb bad news like a sponge. I'm pessimistic more than I am optimistic. Sometimes it makes me physically tired. The thought of getting up and doing things feels pointless.

I went to my parent's house over half term and had a nose through their old photographs. Decades jumbled up in a big box, pictures and newspaper articles and birthday cards all knocking around together. Mixed emotions. The older I get in the photos, the more I read into the exasperated smiles. My preteen and teen years were difficult in many ways.

But the younger pictures are pure joy.

You know when you were a child and you couldn't understand why adults won't just, like, loosen up a bit? That's the feeling that I got from looking at myself as a kid. Children have an internal drive to look for things that make them happy, even if those things are otherwise completely pointless. What I'm trying to say is that I think I forget how to have fun sometimes.

That's why I'm enjoying Animal Crossing so much, I think. Some part of me, despite all the shit that's going on in the world (or maybe because of it) is craving something nice and happy and harmless. What other game allows me to dance around with a flamboyant peacock first thing in the morning? None, as far as I know.

So, for the sake of it, some small pleasures life has given me recently, despite most of my days being marked by pain:

Going on a dark, twisty side with my son on my lap in the soft play, both of us shooting out of the other end, squealing. Putting on a big, soft t-shirt before bed. The feeling of taking my make-up off. Listening to an album really loudly in the middle of the day. Lying on the floor in my living room and looking up at the ceiling. Buying a painting from a charity shop and fighting through gusts of wind to get it home in one piece, my scarf blowing across my eyes, laughing at my own stupidness. The second coffee of the day going down particularly nicely. The sound of Chris's car door closing in the drive. Pulling open the blinds and watching the sun rise in the mornings. A cat loafing next to my laptop while I type this. My daughter sending me a random text to tell me she loves me. There are lots of things.

Sometimes I can hold it all in balance. The pleasure and the heaviness of being a human being.

Anyway, I think you should all play Animal Crossing (and maybe visit my slumber island which is looking pretty good). And have fun whenever you can.