Fun and Games

Fun and games

No one ever fondly remembers the times when they were bored out of their minds .

During my years as an exterminator I used to take an unofficial poll of the board games homeowners most had in their closets.  It didn’t surprise me that Monopoly, Scrabble, and Yahtzee seemed to be in almost every game closet I opened.

Ironically, none of those three are on my personal list of indoor games, best played in air conditioning, I am about to share with you.   Without further adieu here is my list….  

Wii Bowling.  I never thought there would ever be a video game that virtually simulates the bowling experience so well.  And you don’t even have to rent a pair of shoes.  Yet, Wii Bowling is so much fun and so many can play at once.  It’s a great bonding experience as we  all look goofy together flinging our arms up in the air, as we  taunt one another .  My favorite moments however are not when someone throws a strike, but when someone inadvertently throw the ball backwards and almost kills someone in the peanut gallery.

Hangman. This is a classic game that Lia, my youngest daughter loves to play.  It’s simple and is a great boredom buster in our house.  Hangman forces you to think, all the while keeping yourself from hanging high.  Again, another game great for taunting your opponent and you can play it anywhere you have paper or a white board.  No wonder the Wheel of Fortune does so well.

Stratego.  This is a game my middle daughter, Sianna and I love to play from time to time. The game’s premise is a lot like chess in that it requires strategy and much thought, however the goal in Stratego is to capture your opponent’s flag. Normally, my daughter could not figure out my strategy and I beat her.  However in the last month she has beaten me twice.  I could see the joy in her smile as she captured her dad’s flag and finally reached the elusive milestone of beating me in Stratego. 

 

Can’t Stop.  A friend bought this board game for me on my 13th birthday, which happens to be in the shape of a red stop sign.   I’ve been playing Can’t Stop ever since.   This is a highly addictive dice rolling game that requires just the right amount of luck, nerve, and knowing when to quit. The object is to be the first player to reach the top of any three columns, numbering from 2 to 12.  Be warned that in  every game, without exception, there is always someone who always yells, “Ugggghhhh,  why didn’t I stop.”

El Dorado.  This is my dad’s favorite board game from when he was a kid.  Invented in 1941, on the original box lid Parker Brothers describes it as “Game of the World’s Hidden Treasures.” A fascinating aspect of  El Dorado is all the destinations are real sunken treasures or hidden fortunes from Bogota in South America to Ulan Bator Koto in China to Kumasi in West Africa, plus almost a hundred more. My favorite feature of the game is rolling the dice and then moving the metal lanterns (markers) around the board in search of treasure. The object is to get to your location, pay the digging fee in bars and then roll the red dice to determine if you win treasure or not.  Playing El Dorado is just something we always do in my family.

APBA Baseball.  This is a board game I used to play every summer with my childhood friend Joel.  Then starting playing it again as adult with friend, Rob and have since passed on to my son, Jordan.  It includes every Major League Player from the previous year.  For instance, last year it would have include players from Chase Utley to Derek Jeter to Justin Verlander.  One of its best features is it allows you to pick the best of the best and make your own team.  Each player comes with a playing card and correlating numbers which believe it or not make for realistic play.  APBA Baseball allows you to make the same decisions real-life big league managers face every day.  You can choose to hit and run, give the starting pitcher the hook or just swing for the fences.  APBA is a game that takes me back in time to when my biggest care was whether Cal Ripken, Jr. was batting third or cleanup.  Just for the record, definitely without a question, always bat Cal third.

Paydirt ( also known as Sports Illustrated Football).  During my days as a limousine driver this was a NFL themed board game I played religiously with my boss, Steve, who was around my same age.  Sadly, I haven’t played it in years, however I still love it.  At first, we played it to unwind in-between trips and then it became an obsession.  Paydirt is a two player game where you both have charts with corresponding numbers and then you pick a play and roll the dice.  Amazingly, when played with a worthy opponent like my friend, Steve, it quite nicely simulates a real professional football game.  Too bad, unlike Paydirt, real life doesn’t include the razzle dazzle play.

Settlers of Catan.   Some friends introduced us to this board game several years ago and it has become something we teach all our other friends.  This is a game of discovery, settlement and trade that is one of two games our family gathers around the table to play during holidays.  Settlers of Catan is never the same game twice since the board is comprised of puzzle pieces comprised of elements such as brick, lumber, ore, wheat and sheep which you shuffle each game creating a fresh board each time.  If you are feeling cordial you can trade with you opponent, however if your opponent is unwilling to trade you can rob and pillage from them.  The object of Settlers of Catan is to be the first player to record ten victory points and then be heralded Lord of Catan.  That is at least until the next game starts. 

 

Nintendo Baseball Stars.  What I love about this game is there is only 2 buttons on the controller, it’s a baseball game and it is so simple. There was a time when my son was much younger and I could always beat him at this classic video game.  However, currently he is a college student and the opposite is now true.  There is nothing quite like  competing head to head with your son and yelling and hollering at the screen and him.  Especially, when you know it was your fault anyway.   By the way, just this past week he beat me again in Baseball Stars, twice to be precise.  I guess some things never change and why should they.

Ticket to Ride.  The name Ticket To Ride is not only a  Beatles’ song, but in this case is an exhilarating  board game thirty to sixty minutes long worth of fun, cross country train adventure and crushing other people’s dreams. I bought this for my wife about three years ago and now is the other game we love playing at all the family get togethers and when we have friends over.  It’s a very addicting game of intrigue that comes with a really cool, colorful map of North America circa 1910, during when it was fashionable to travel via the railroad.  It also comes with forty five brightly colored box cars per player, which are your makers for the game.  Another awesome feature is the board’s six sections fold into one making it easy to carry.  The object of the game is for players to collect cards of various types of train cars that enable them to claim railway routes connecting cities throughout North America such as Duluth to El Paso , New York to Seattle and Atlanta to San Francisco, just to name a few.  Ticket to Ride is a rare game that win or lose it’s just fun to get your ticket punched and enjoy the ride.

When it comes to playing games everyone wins when you do things together with the ones you love. 

Swavel

Unwanted

Right behind "I love you," the second most powerful phrase one can utter is “I want you.” 

 

Anyone who has ever viewed a Western has seen one of these dubious posters with a notorious outlaw’s mug gracing the tattered and worn declaration.  Although few would choose to have their face attached to such a terrible headline I believe we as human beings fear the alternative even more, which is to be unwanted. 

Especially now with the economic downturn no one wants to hear, “your services are no longer required.”  How awful to feel like you are no longer an asset or no longer needed. Perhaps, no fault of their own, it still doesn’t replace the hurt of losing a job and feeling unwanted.  No one wants to hear those dreaded words you’re fired, that Donald Trump has become so synonymous for using.

The fear of being unwanted knows no social boundaries.  For example, Tom Brady once stated how deeply he had been hurt when it took the New England Patriots six rounds to draft him in 2000. During an interview, he once mentioned that no one wants to feel like, “ maybe nobody wants you.”  If a three time Super Bowl champion felt that way one time in his life it leaves us all susceptible. 

Who in their right mind likes to be the guy or girl who hears, “it’s not you it’s me.”  Although a polite way break up, the message is clear that someone no longer wants to be exclusive.  People in general hate to be moved on from or left in the dust.

My daughter, Sianna found further evidence of this need to be wanted just the other week.  While she was surfing the web she discovered a survey on a fictional book she was reading about dragons.  The survey was trying help you decipher what kind you would be according to the book.   The question that grabbed my attention was this one, “do you ever feel unwanted or not part of the group?”  Interesting how the author found the need to ask this question.  Leading me to believe how universal the struggle to be wanted truly has become.

On a personal note, there were times in my childhood when I felt like I didn’t belong either.   Whether it was my own annoying adolescent tendencies or just the way life can be sometimes, I still hated that feeling like I wasn’t good enough.  On more than one occasion I can remember sitting downstairs with my grandmother or sitting by myself in a room listening in on the adult conversations while the other kids played in another room.  I felt like I was on the outside looking in and felt left out.

Now, as an adult I believe this can be a powerful tool if used properly.  Within reason it is good to belong and to go out of our way to make others feel wanted as well.  God put the need to be wanted deep inside us because if we stay to ourselves, it seldom is good.  He even said in Genesis, “It is not good for man to be alone.”

I speak only for myself, but I know I need to take more time for people who seem lonely.  For example, what I have learned about not feeling wanted helps me as a parent be more willing to make time to play and do more things with my kids.  It helps me want to do more around the house and also try to listen better and not grunt at my wife.

Mother Teresa once said, "Being unwanted, unloved, uncared for, forgotten by everybody; I think that is a much greater hunger, a much greater poverty than the person who has nothing to eat."

Swavel

Love Well

“If you want to show someone you love them simply hold their hand.”

(Right click to hear companion song:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHZZyNGvOVY&feature=player_detailpage then click on blue link)

                                                                                  

An old hymn writer once used this phrase, “emptied himself of all but love” to describe Jesus love for us.  It is my sincere hope and desire to love my wife that well.

There are several instances that best remind me of true love in my relationship with my wife, Amy, and they all involve holding hands.

It was July 1^st, 1985 and I asked Amy to go with me to see the Orioles play baseball in Baltimore as a part of my high school graduation gift.  During the game I asked her to be my girlfriend.

The only two other things I remember about that evening were the Orioles getting killed by the Detroit Tigers and the ride home.  During the two hour ride home from Baltimore I took a chance and I slid my hand into hers.  To this day, it was one of the best moments of my life.  Up to that point in my seventeen year existence most girls didn’t seem to notice me and the others just plain weren’t interested.  She seemed to find something of value in me no one else could see, including me.  In summary, my baseball team lost, but I won.

On another night, my then girlfriend, Amy and I were watching the Pittsburgh Steelers play football together when I learned a most memorable lesson.  On that particular evening, I made the mistake of holding her hand during a football play.  A player from the Steelers made a big play and Amy squeezed my hand tightly like a vise grip.  Then if my memory serves me correctly she jumped up and started cheering and yelling at her “boys’.  Initially I was unprepared for all of this but I believe by halftime I decided just to lay my hand on her shoulder, so I could get out of the way when necessary.  

On that particular day I quickly learned that not all situations would allow me to hold this girl’s hand and that I must select the right moments.  Amy showed me that sometimes you have to pick and choose the right situation to be affectionate.  That night I learned to hold hands from a distance.

On March 24^th, 1989 I married my best friend, Amy.   To this day I can still recall standing at the front of the church where we got married.  As the music played I remember my wife coming down the aisle and the elation I felt as if I had won the lottery that this girl would chose to be my wife.  And she could not have looked more beautiful to me.  Funny thing, Amy told me later, she couldn’t see me because she was not wearing her glasses.   

To me at that very moment all was right in my world.  Then, she came up to me and her dad gave her to me and we held hands.  Can’t say I remember much else after that moment.  We were facing the pastor and holding hands saying nothing. Amy showed me she was all in.  I learned on that rainy day in March to enjoy those moments when you are deeply and madly in love, as a reminder for times when you are not.

In our nearly twenty four years of marriage, my wife and I have seen a lot together. In those years we have known both good and bad, happy and sad, and everything else in between.   We experienced the birth of two of our children and the adoption of two others.  We have even flown half way around the world twice together to bring two of our kids into our family.  We have been to our share of doctor’s offices, hospitals, ball games, church meetings, school activities, playing board games, vacations, birthdays, holidays and other stuff families do together.  We did all we could together throughout the years and when the moment permitted, I would hold her hand. 

 

Anyone can love and be loved when times are good, but even when it hurt we stayed together.   We even held hands when we buried our daughter together. In the aftermath, my wife and I suffered through this painful tragedy together the best we knew how, the kind that often ends in divorce, and hung on for dear life.  Yet, even though times when I didn’t always love well, we stayed together till the feeling of love came back again. 

Although we must pick and choose when to hold hands I believe it is critical to hold hands as much as possible or just cuddle up together, because with love silence speaks louder than words.  Try it, hold hands for about five to ten minutes a day while you have a cup of coffee on the sofa or the porch and you’ll find your spouse is someone you want to be with not avoid.

Granted, I concede that love is much more complex than just holding hands, but I am convinced that if we as married couples spent more time holding hands and less arguing we would grow closer together in love, than growing further apart. Love just wants to be near the person they love, they don’t want to nitpick, but just be with them. 

So, does holding hands solve all our problems, definitely not because sometimes, we don’t hold hands at the time because well we have had enough of each other.  But, if my wife, Amy and I were both to search our hearts and you asked us how we would like to end our day, it would be next to each other, more times than not holding hands, watching a movie or doing something together. 

“Holding hands conveys what mere words were never designed to do.”

 Swavel