Play and Appreciation

Playful perception is necessary for playful contemplation: the essence of appreciation. For to perceive perception as work, without caring for the way things appear but concerning oneself only with the things, is to make contemplation work. Then all becomes work and the only way to appreciate anything becomes to appreciate work, which never comes if all is work.

One can only play, just as one can only work. Play, for those who don't appreciate, is work, and work, for those who do, is play.

Example: I enjoy the way in which the cigarette butts rest in the ashtray, stuck together yet protruding in every direction from what seems to be a center, holding them together; and the way in which a sprinkle of ash shows that someone missed the ashtray, light grey specks against the brown leather backdrop of the table.