The Very Serious Business of Being Ridiculous

If you’ve ever run into me at an event, there’s a decent chance you’ve witnessed the transformation happen without even realizing it. I usually start the night like most people do, catching up with friends, figuring out who is there, checking in with people I haven’t seen in a while, and slowly letting go of whatever stress or responsibilities followed me through the door. The outside world has a funny way of attaching itself to us, and no matter how much we try to leave it behind there are always schedules, messages, responsibilities, and a never-ending list of things waiting for our attention.

Then, somewhere along the way, the hood comes out.

I’ve started joking that “the hood has been deployed,” and honestly that is probably the most accurate way I can describe it. It sounds overly dramatic, like there should be some kind of warning siren or countdown before it happens, but anyone who knows Ruff knows there is definitely a shift. It is not becoming someone else or pretending to be something I am not. It is more like giving permission to a part of myself that usually has to patiently wait his turn.

The overthinking gets quieter. The constant planning takes a break. Instead of worrying about all the little details around me, my priorities start to change. I’m looking for my friends, getting lost in the music, noticing who needs a hello, and if someone barks from across the room, obviously there is now a conversation happening that I need to be a part of. Do I know exactly what we are saying to each other? Absolutely not, but it feels important.

People outside of pup spaces sometimes imagine headspace as this incredibly serious and complicated thing. They expect some kind of deep ritual or dramatic transformation, but my experience is usually much sillier. Most nights it means a six-foot-five corgi has taken over the decision-making process and is operating almost entirely on happiness, curiosity, and the occasional questionable idea that somehow makes complete sense at the time.

That curiosity has resulted in some interesting adventures.

It is why at Spring Training, when I saw a giant ball pit, my immediate thought was not just “that looks fun.” My immediate thought was figuring out how quickly I could get inside it, curl up, and get a picture. Somewhere there is probably a very mature adult explanation about nostalgia, reconnecting with childhood joy, and allowing yourself freedom from social expectations.

Those things might even be true.

But the much simpler explanation is that the puppy brain saw a ball pit and the puppy brain won.

And honestly, why shouldn’t it?

At some point in our lives most of us stop jumping into ball pits. We stop running just because we feel like running. We stop doing silly things because we become aware that other people might be watching. We start asking ourselves questions we never asked as kids. What will people think? Will I look ridiculous? Is this something someone my age should be doing?

The funny thing is, the answer to that last question is usually yes.

Maybe we should be doing more of those things.

Maybe we need more moments where joy wins before our brain has time to talk us out of it.

It is also why at the first Bark in the Park, I found a ball that was clearly too large to fit in my mouth and immediately decided I needed to test that theory. There was no reason to believe this would work. All available evidence suggested that it would not work. Anyone observing the situation could have quickly determined the outcome.

Yet somehow there I was, fully committed to discovering whether determination alone could overcome basic physics.

For anyone wondering, physics won.

But the photo exists.

And honestly, that was probably the point.

Years from now, I am probably not going to remember every normal picture where I stood perfectly still, looked at the camera, and smiled. I am going to remember the picture where I committed completely to trying to fit an impossible ball in my mouth because for a few seconds it was funny, everyone was laughing, and there was nowhere else I wanted to be.

Then there are the tiny corgis.

At some point I decided it was completely normal to start carrying around little corgi figurines and hiding them wherever Ruff goes. I don’t remember exactly when this became a thing. I don’t remember sitting down and creating some elaborate plan. It just felt like something Ruff would do, and sometimes that is apparently enough justification.

They have appeared in bars, at events, and even on cruise ships. Somewhere out there are people who have stumbled across a tiny corgi and have absolutely no context for why this little dog has suddenly entered their life.

And honestly, I love that.

I love the idea that there are these tiny pieces of joy scattered around the world for someone else to randomly discover. Someone might pick one up, smile, laugh, take a picture, or just wonder what strange series of events led to a tiny corgi appearing in that exact place.

That little moment of confusion and happiness is enough.

Not everything needs a bigger explanation. Not everything needs to be productive or serious. Sometimes something can exist simply because it made someone smile.

I think that is something a lot of us forget as we get older. We spend so much time learning how to be responsible adults that we slowly start convincing ourselves that playfulness is something we are supposed to leave behind. We learn how to be professional, organized, thoughtful, and prepared, and those are all good things. The problem is when we start believing those qualities require us to pack away every part of ourselves that is silly.

Because those silly moments are usually the ones we remember.

The random laughs outside the bar. The unexpected hugs. The moment someone yells “Ruff!” across a crowded room. The late-night conversations with friends. The absolutely necessary quest for cheese sticks, whether they appear at the bar or require an adventure to Arby’s.

I don’t know when cheese sticks became an important part of Ruff lore, but somehow they did. Nobody warned me when I discovered pup play that one day fried cheese would become a recurring character in my story, but here we are.

And I think that is one of the beautiful things about community. The biggest memories are not always the planned moments. Sometimes they are the traditions that happen accidentally. The inside jokes nobody remembers starting. The little rituals that make a group of people feel like home.

The best memories are rarely perfect.

They are real.

They are messy, unexpected, and sometimes completely ridiculous.

The ball pit was silly. The giant ball was silly. The hidden corgis are silly. Running around with friends, barking, getting zoomies, accepting belly rubs, and becoming ridiculously happy over cheese sticks is silly.

But silly does not mean meaningless.

Actually, I think sometimes the silly moments carry more meaning than we realize.

Because silliness requires trust.

You have to trust the people around you enough to stop performing. You have to believe you are safe enough to be seen without constantly managing how you appear. You have to allow yourself to exist without trying to prove your value every second.

For a long time I thought growth meant becoming more serious. I thought the goal was to become more polished, more controlled, and better at hiding the messy, weird, playful parts of myself.

But life gives us plenty of opportunities to be serious. There will always be responsibilities. There will always be challenges. There will always be moments where we have to show up and handle what needs to be handled.

The silly moments are the ones we have to choose.

Ruff reminds me to keep choosing them.

Somewhere between the barking, belly rubs, ball pits, tiny corgis, cheese sticks, and all the other ridiculous adventures along the way, I found something I didn’t realize I had been missing.

I remembered how to play.

And that is very serious business.