Last week was the first in person Leaders’ Gathering for the InterPlay organization I have been a member of for over 30 years. Nearly 50 people from across the country, and a few from across the world, (Africa and Australia) met in a conference center in Greensboro North Carolina. We were surrounded by tall trees and a rain-soaked forest floor. We could leave the windows to our rooms open, when wrapped in white puffy bed comforters, we’d fall asleep to the rhythms of the dripping rain. We knew the risks of igniting allergies to mildew and mold, but for many, the opportunity seemed irresistible.
We knew too that gathering in person to play unmasked in proximity to one another was a risk, but after everyone pre-testing, one worth taking. After playing together online since March of 2020, the adrenaline high was immediate, the difference between watching a televised sporting contest from your living room couch and being in the stadium to hear and join the roar of the crowd. For some it was too much, the sounds ricocheting off the high ceilings meant having to hold ones’ ears or to step out into the hallway for one’s own selfcare.
InterPlay could be considered a kind of multidimensional play therapy for adults with games and forms that involve holding hands, touching palms, moving together, and taking turns telling stories side by side. One group form specifically stands out as one we could not do against a flat computer screen. Four or five people stand together in a small circle and each person puts one hand into its center. Hands begin moving in and around other hands while someone plays a musical instrument. I’m transported back a decade to the Sara Heinz House in Pittsburgh, one of the first boys’ and girls’ clubs in America. My InterPlay troupe and I visited it annually to InterPlay with the kids. Turns out, moving together, in the spaces between our bodies ignites chemicals in our brain that result in feelings of wellbeing and joy. We know these kinds of activities as a part of our birthrights as human beings.
The rain did create a barrier to our being outside, but on the 4th day, the weather had cleared, and our emerging leaders took us to a meadow and a forested area to do InterPlay outside. Again, the brain is changed by the stimulation of the natural environment, the sky above, the tree limbs and shrubs below.
One of the women was stung by a bee, and as a person familiar with the outdoors, she pulled the stinger out, and when on as before. But, returning to the lodge we noted that her lips were beginning to swell, so we took her to the emergent care facility. All turned out well, but we all learned the lesson that though she was an elder who had had many bee stings in her life without a reaction, her immune system had become hypersensitive to bee stings. Perhaps this was due to the chemotherapy she was treated with last year.
Monday morning after most people had arrived home, we begin getting texts and emails that roommates and playmates had tested positive for Covid. And some like me, had something with flu-like symptoms, but it was not registering as Covid. I’m filled with sorrow, that the piper must be paid in this way, and I begin grieving that we might not get a chance to meet again for a long time, if ever.
So, though many want to believe it’s over, Covid is not over. It may have changed its tune, lost some of its moves, but it may have developed new ones, while we may have lost some of our own. Covid’s definitely not over. And that confirmation causes me to look for needed encouragement, not to give up on playing together in person. And that reminds me of a song.
“It’s not over till it’s over” a song performed first in 1987 by the Jefferson Starship, is from their album “No Protection.” Lyrics that stand out –
We don’t call the shots here
We don’t make the rules
We take what we get, get what we can.
And it’s learning the hard way,
Here on the streets
You can’t build a dream, without a plan.
My heart goes out to the staff and volunteers who did all the work of putting our event together, my fellow players who traveled from near and far, most now exhausted and many ill. I dance a meditative prayer dance on behalf of their recovery and my own.
The odds are against us,
But we know we still stand a chance.
You got to fight for what you love,
You do what you must, do what you can.
Covid isn’t over and pretending that that isn’t so is not the way to go. Remembering is one of the most important skills of the art of grieving well. Staying in touch with the losses and what was lost we bow to the dangers and our own overwhelm. Yet we dedicate ourselves to finding a way.
They play to win; we play for keeps.
It’s not over till it’s over, it’s not over till
We get it right.
