Maybe they could’ve been friends, best friends even, drawn to one another out of the purity found independently in each, the simple necessity of both. But instead, one chased and scared the other into hiding. They ran in opposing directions, screaming at one another from alternate hemispheres, as if the distance could make the divorce easier. They believed themselves to be birthed from the bellies of opposing mothers, holding counter ideas of life and how to live it. As if the stillness of rest bashed heads with the desire to live. The amount of simplicity within the stillness couldn’t possibly breathe the same air as the play that demands so much of life, craves it, requires of it to the point that it is defeated by the very thing it was searching for.

The mere matter that rest and play are not opposing forces—neither trying to win over the other—feels silly, yet revolutionary. Neither is bad, while both are essential. So maybe rest and play must be friends in order for them to be healthy independently and co-dependently of the other. For them to exist in harmony, maybe they must love and cherish, appreciate and value the essence found in each. Perhaps they could exist inside and outside of one another; building and strengthening the other up to reach their full potential found in the union of a mind.