As longstanding readers of my blogs know, I don't get out much. Between writing books and minding my iffy health, my usual commute is from bed to desk and back again. I'm not supposed to drink alcohol, or eat outside of my very limited medically recommended diet because I'm a bundle of allergies. I'm not the most fun at parties these days. This weekend, though, I was invited along to play Escape the Room: Minimum walking, maximum entertainment.
Escape the Room is a game-type thing best explained by the venue, but the gist is, you get locked in a room with a bunch of your friends and have to solve puzzles to escape before the clock runs out. I can't tell you what the puzzles were (out of respect and appreciation for the venue), but I can say that I earned some high fives for solving a word/number combo riddle. Escape the Room says that only 20% of groups win the game. We unlocked the final door and were on our way across town for ice cream before our time would have run out. The gamemaster congratulated us on several points.
All of which got me thinking about how adults have fun. I think there's this widespread but ridiculous idea that as people get older, fun falls off the hierarchy of needs. It just isn't true. Yes, we spend a lot more time on work and making grocery lists and taking care of other living creatures, but the need to play doesn't disappear just because we're too big for tire swings.
So how do adults have fun?
The reason my brain wandered off down this road is that most of the usual things people do for fun are now things I can't do. I can't barhop, I can't dance, I can't run marathons. With my particular quirky set of body problems, I can barely go out to eat. (Geez, it's a good thing I'm not active in the dating scene. Can you imagine?) Eating and drinking are the two default behaviors for adults seeking excuses to leave the house.
Considering my recent experience at Escape the Room, which served as a reminder that fun matters and adults need it, too, I'm taking this blog-time to encourage you to have fun. Don't settle for the socially approved fun that only people over twenty-one have. Go bowling. Climb a tree, if you can. Go to a bar for karaoke or trivia instead of just drinking alcohol you could have had at home. Don't just seek out good company, make the most of your time with them. Keep tabletop games and coloring books in your house.
Fun is important. If you're disabled like me, it's not less so, it's more. If you're too busy, then it's time to be just slightly less of a responsible adult, because everything you do with benefit from a positive state of mind...and keeping a positive state of mind requires experiencing joy once in a while.
And you don't want to get to the end of the ride, only to find out you missed it.
Go have some fun.
