Was it after our first heartbreak? Our first tax return? The moment we decided swings were “embarrassing” and seesaws were “unsafe for the lower back”?

Because somewhere between learning how to spell “mortgage” and forgetting how to skip without pulling a hamstring, we lost something. Something soft. Something simple.

We traded jungle gyms for gyms.

Trampolines for treadmills.

Sandboxes for deadlines.

We started amping up our dopamine instead of just feeling joy.

“More, faster, better,” became the new fun.

Amusement parks on steroids. Screaming rollercoasters and overpriced food. All engineered thrills.

But joy? Real, no-filter joy? That’s harder to come by.

Sometimes, when the city’s asleep, I go to the children’s park to swing.

Just me and the stars. Sometimes with my girlfriends. Grown women, hip pain and all, giggling like we’re six and school just let out. That kind of joy is raw. Untouched. Uncomplicated.

One time, on a mountain trail, we found this giant wooden seesaw, made for four people. We took turns like kids at recess. It wasn’t fancy. It wasn’t “Instagrammable.” It was just fun. The kind of fun that forgets to check the time. That reminds you your soul still has a playground inside, even if your knees say otherwise.

Then there was that time I told a local guy (during one of my travels) that I love visiting the zoo and petting the wild goats. He smiled like he had just remembered a long-forgotten memory.

“Isn’t that for kids? We’ve done that before, so we don’t think of doing it again.”

Why does something only count if it’s new, impressive, and expensive?

Why can’t naming a wild goat Sao-Feng and imagining you’re soul-bonded be enough?

I think it is enough.

In fact, I think it’s everything.

We’ve overcomplicated joy. We turned it into a performance instead of a feeling.

Maybe if we let our inner children run barefoot again, pick daisies, jump in puddles, and squeal when we see a sleepy bear nibbling on grass mid-hibernation, we’d actually feel alive again.

Because maybe, just maybe, growing up doesn’t mean growing out of the things that made our hearts light up.

Maybe it means protecting them even harder.