Saturday, February 5, 2011

FunkyFuzzMan11: On Sleeping and the Construct of Play

Let's make this as informal as possible. I'm Sandy and my 360 Gamertag is FunkyFuzzMan11. I play Call of Duty Black Ops and Fifa 10 as much as possible, although my current schedule doesn't allow me to play as much as I'd like. I do, however, sport a pretty impressive KDR so when I'm on its pretty serious( 2.58 for those wondering). But I think I want to introduce myself as someone who's almost done with college, and wanted a more respectable approach to the study of a past-time I have come to hold quite dearly.



Our first reading was titled "Nature and Significance of Play as a Cultural Phenomenon" by Johan Huizinga. The overall direction was to define the act of Play and to give it not only characteristics, but also a certain place in our society. As our class discussion oscillated between the differences between work and play, I began thinking, when we sleep and ultimately dream, are our minds at play?

It makes sense according to Huizinga's criteria. First and foremost, it is a voluntary activity. We are never forced to dream. If anything, the very fact that we rarely remember our dreams points to our subconscious' ephemeral temperament and our inability to be forced to dream. Huizinga also goes on to state that a sacred element of the construct of play is its secludedness, and I cannot find a more private place than the inner workings of our mind. There are limits of time and place in our dream state, and with it comes its own course and meaning. Is it possible, that when we are most vulnerable, we unleash the flighty temptress that is our soul to manipulate the law and order of the real world to aspire to the highest characteristic of play, to be "pointless but significant?" Disregarding any relation to the realm of the religious, is it possible that the moment we cannot tell where reality and a mere illusion of it begins to falter is the exact moment where we are truly at play?

While we are fully cognizant we know when we are at play simply when its magic no longer takes hold of us. When our final moments of being awake slip away, does our true playful selves come out? No pretense, no judgements from others, simply a meta biological meta chemical meta physical construct where you are the master of your domain. The only question we have left is, what are we dream- i mean playing today?



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