The Weird, Whimsical Things I Do in a Regular Day

Living the playful way on a random Wednesday

Earlier this week I wrote about the importance of play in adulthood, but then I thought, hey, it might help to show what playfulness looks like in action during a regular day in my life. So I made this diary to illustrate.

Nothing exciting happened on paper this Wednesday: I got my daughter off to school, did Zoom calls, worked, picked my daughter up, made dinner, put her to bed. Not exactly a day that makes you say “I gotta tell the world about this one!” Yet, my day still sang: I transformed odious tasks, laughed, and found moments of whimsical connection, thanks to approaching things playfully.

In my upcoming book, I give this definition: To be playful is to be curiously and creatively engaged with life.

It’s the spirit that can transform a “boring” day like this into one that’s kinda magical…

Play Chronicles — Wednesday, June 18th

6:30 am — “Wake up mama, it’s light outside!” my daughter Viva calls. It’s too early but she wants to get up because she’s excited to be the type of girl who takes a shower in the morning before school. I try to negotiate for more sleepytime but her new morning-shower-girl identity prevails.

7:00 am — When we’re showered and dressed, I pack up the 174th lunch of this school year (who’s counting?!) and make my daughter and I some breakfast. I have a little moment of reverie arranging the strawberries in an arc on our plates. It’s not Pinterest-worthy but I take small satisfaction in the presentation.

8:00 am — As I walk out of my building, I sing to our doorman Sammy operatically, “Happy Wednesdayyyyyyyy!” I sweep my arms upwards dramatically. It’s our silly tradition to greet each other daily in song.

8:01 am — My daughter and I walk to school and sing the Wonder Wander song. I’m working on some new NoomaLooma branding and thinking of playing with the Os. So I set Viva and I a challenge to look for interesting circles and Os as we walk. Our best find is two Os in the word “pool” that are filled in with water.

8:25 am — After my daughter has run through the schoolyard, I check in with my writing group: my friend Lydia, Liz, and I are in a book writing support group / cheer squad where we share daily voice notes back and forth on writing and life. I accidentally send a 7-minute stream of consciousness note narrating my walk and musing on book conclusions. When I realize it’s 7-minutes I say, “my college roommate told me that being in love means never having to say you’re sorry but I don’t really believe that. So, sorry not sorry.”

8:30 am — As I’m recording the voice note I see a family walking towards me and mistake them for close friends, I beam and wave enthusiastically at them only to realize they are actually a group of strangers. I need to wear glasses.

9:30 am — I end my first Zoom meeting of the day by holding my palms up to the screen and doing a virtual high five. This is a go-to move to make Zoom a bit less dull. The other people on the call wiggle their palms back at me and we chuckle.

10 am — I have to look at some legal paperwork which is the kind of work that I procrastinate at all costs because it makes me feel anxious and uninformed. But it has to get done so I put on the soundtrack to the animated film Luca and imagine I’m on a hero’s journey, I’m Luca diving into the depths of contracts. It’s not as bad as I thought and I feel heroic.

11 am — I do some creative direction work for my partner’s new coffee company Esspo. I’m making a mood board for the campaign shoot and I know it’s the kind of thing I get hyperfixated on and carried away down an endless image research rabbit hole. So I set an egg timer for 30 minutes and pull myself away when it buzzes.

12 pm — I put on an energetic focus playlist and work on my latest Substack article, doing final edits, formatting, and riffing on headlines. Once the writing is done, I dig into the box of magazine pages and paper scraps under my desk and make the collage artwork. It needs… something so I top it off with some googly eyes that are laying out on my desktop. I’m not sure I totally love it, but I gotta get it done so I give it points for being colorful and silly and call it good enough.

2:30 pm — After I publish my piece, I reward myself by filling in my star chart. Putting work into the world is nerve-wracking so I’m in the habit of rewarding the effort over the outcome. I like to make visual charts of my goals to track my effort. I color a star yellow with marker (my 18th “idea release” star this month!).

2:32 pm — I scrabble together lunch from what’s in the fridge. An open-faced hummus sandwich with cucumbers and tomatoes. I get a little fancy drizzling olive oil and harissa on top with flair.

2:50 pm — My partner Philippe is on a work call and looks very serious so I do a silly little dance across the room to try to amuse him. I fail to make him smile but at least I’ve amused myself.

3 pm — I have a call with a PR firm about my book and have fun discussing the different play personas and how different kinds of players can find things they enjoy together.

3:30 pm — I work on a 5-day creative challenge I’m planning and take some weird selfies through a water glass to test one of the prompts.

4:30 pm — I’m looking to pick up one more brand consulting client, and feel shy asking for referrals, so I use my effort-over-outcome method and draw 5 empty stars on an index card. As I send out my ask emails, I fill in my stars.

5:30 pm — I pick my daughter up from after-school and we stop on the walk home to wonder at a beautiful tree shadow on a mural wall and we deliberate on whether the shadow or the wall are more beautiful. We agree to disagree (I am team shadow, she is team wall).

6 pm — Our 5-year-old neighbor comes over to play and have dinner with us. She and my daughter have a running game where I am their aunt who adopted them after their parents died tragically in a boating accident. I don’t love this game but I humor them and play along.

6:30 pm — Philippe has been making fun of me for weeks for buying sweet potatoes (he claims I have a track record of overly optimistic vegetable purchases that die slow deaths in our crisper drawer), so I take TREMENDOUS pleasure in proving him wrong and whipping up a spiced sweet potato side dish to go with the dinner he’s making. Over dinner I repeatedly ask him how he’s enjoying the sweet potatoes.

7 pm — After dinner I am feeling momentarily bored so I announce to the children “Let’s play Healthy Food Runway Show!” I announce a healthy food and they must imitate that food as they walk/dance across the room (a la The Devon Maid). I provide commentary as they sashay “It’s giving, it’s giving, it’s Vitamin C, so colorful, so sweet, so Orange Juicy!” I’m having so much fun that they come for my job and decide they want to be the announcers which is fine with me because I’ve been wanting to do the interpretive dance anyway. I get to impersonate asparagus, strawberries, and blood orange while they commentate.

8:30 pm — Time to return our neighbor to her home and the kids want to play museum guard on the way. I carry a flashlight and they pretend to be statues that freeze when I point my flashlight at them but then move and make noise whenever I look away.

9 pm — After her dad has read to her, my daughter calls me in for my world famous snuggles. She’s a very high energy kiddo so I have her get the wiggles out by doing jumping jacks in bed. Then I do a visualization for her of two frogs in a magical bog with colorful butterflies flitting around. The mama frog blows a big bubble that protects the bog and keeps all creepy animals, people, and thoughts away. Eventually she drifts into dreamland and I creep out of her bed.

10:30 pm — I’m tired so I get in bed and write about the day in my 5 year journal and do a little doodle of the Healthy Food Runway Show in the margin.

11 pm — I lay in bed musing about writing this piece and fall asleep.