Keep it simple silly!

I grew up as a stereotypical, "nerdy" child in the 90s - I would finish my homework and pack my bag on Friday evenings, look forward to visits to the library, and prefer spending time indoors pouring over books than sweating and playing a sport. P.T. classes during school were great to spend time with friends and we were always looking for excuses to skip any physical activity (On your period? Caught a cold? Great. No need to play). Was some part of it also due to the gendered nature of sports clothes and how they could sometimes be exclusionary for girls with more conservative dressing styles? Probably, since that is what I felt when I was on the throw ball team during high school and was extremely cautious about what I had to wear while playing. Dance was the one thing I always enjoyed - locking my bedroom door to play fast numbers and dance along to them was the one form of "exercise" I indulged in, though not periodically. So when I started reading up more and m...

 Privilege. Money, resources, and comforts - is that all privilege is?  Privilege takes many forms. Yesterday, it took the form of a play area.  A 3-year-old (or is she 4?) flitted around happily inside a gated community in a metropolitan city. Running around here and there, oblivious of the sun, just enjoying being able to walk around without worrying about vehicles. Her mother and grandfather, meanwhile, were setting up their machine, ready to pour out glasses of refreshing sugarcane juice for the residents of that community.  This girl then discovered something that probably made her day - the play area nearby. A play area filled with different kinds of amusing things - slides of varying sizes and heights, a huge swing (always a crowd favourite), a merry-go-round, ropes, a see-saw, a sliding tunnel, and a climbing wall.  Yesterday, privilege for her looked like a play area. Privilege for her was a space where she could happily while away time and burn her abu...