I was recently at a playground. Sun shining. Kids playing.  

Friends made.  

I hear a little girl say, “Mom. I made a friend and we played on the slide.” 

Followed by, “Oh, she went home.” 

My thoughts: She lost her friend.  

                    Will she see them again? 

                    Were they really friends?  

Were they really friends?  

Let’s sit with that for a sec. Even though they knew each other for just a little while, were they actually friends…….YES. 

Playground Rules.  

The concept is easy. You make momentary friendships to enjoy an experience together. Kids get it and keep it simple. 

Sometimes as adults, we get caught up with needing a history of experiences with someone to equal friendship. With the current transient nature of everything that can be a challenge.  

And even as adults, we need friends and small kindnesses.  

In a timely somewhat contextual manner, Instagram fed me Helena Bonham Carter (in all her magical glory) reading a poem by Danusha Lameris: 

Small Kindnesses 

I’ve been thinking about the way, when you walk
down a crowded aisle, people pull in their legs
to let you by. Or how strangers still say “bless you”
when someone sneezes, a leftover
from the Bubonic plague. “Don’t die,” we are saying. 

And sometimes, when you spill lemons
from your grocery bag, someone else will help you
pick them up. Mostly, we don’t want to harm each other. 

We want to be handed our cup of coffee hot,
and to say thank you to the person handing it. To smile
at them and for them to smile back. For the waitress
to call us honey when she sets down the bowl of clam chowder,
and for the driver in the red pick-up truck to let us pass. 

We have so little of each other, now. So far
from tribe and fire. Only these brief moments of exchange.
What if they are the true dwelling of the holy, these
fleeting temples we make together when we say, “Here,
have my seat,” “Go ahead — you first,” “I like your hat.” 

In my mind these two concepts correlate. Simple friendships and small kindnesses are intertwined and the foundation of a community. They’re the easy introductory transactions that make everyone feel welcome and like they belong.  

And when you enter CoWork Kingston, I will greet you with both.  

These are the reasons that our local coffee shops, music venues, bars, coworking spaces and playgrounds are so important. They bring us together and help us be friends……if just for a little while.  

 

 Much love 

~Melanie, Community Manager