When we reflect on our son’s childhood, an overarching memory we both have is the absolute, incandescent joy we observed on his face when he played, or engaged in something he loved to do. It was so pure and genuine, as if he became one with his elation at that moment in time. These images remain etched in my mind, hopefully forever. Simply recalling them brings a smile to my face. However, should my cognitive abilities decline and my memories fade, the emotions have been immortalized in photographs and videos we captured during his formative childhood years. Of these, just a few somehow, miraculously, managed to capture “the look”; a 10,000-watt grin so huge and uninhibited, it almost seems a force of nature, still shining on with a life of its own to remind us: it was real.

Neither of us can recall experiencing such intense, unadulterated joy as children. We both are able to recall happy childhood events, and have our own photographs of those and other fun times. However, both our photographs and memories fail to capture the luminescent emotion present on our son’s face. We wondered if this was simply the effects of Father Time, or whether we could attribute it to the different era and circumstances we both experienced as youth. We concluded that while both of these factors may be at play, neither of us recall experiencing our own youth with quite the bursts of technicolor intensity that are still on such vivid display in our photos of our child.

So, what was so different between our son’s childhood and our own? What prompted such exhilarated expressions on our son’s face? My methodical, yet unscientific review and conclusion, is that the images of our son that we so treasure were captured during moments when he felt free to play (or behave) exactly the way he wanted to, void of the constraints of preconceived, age-appropriate developmental standards. At those precise moments in time, he was not the square peg being forced into the socially appropriate round hole. He was him, being exactly who he wanted to be, free of pretense, with no concern over who was judging or assessing him.

Perhaps we grown-ups need to take a lesson from our kids. Play is understood to be essential for growth and development. There is no magical age by which we are expected to have learned all we possibly could learn in our lifetime. Rather, it is accepted that learning is a continuum during which we cultivate the skills required to successfully navigate life’s journey. Given that learning, and our growth and development as individuals is lifelong, should we not be able to say the same for one’s ability to play?