08 July, 2016

Life

Life. I loved it as a kid. This is not me being a depressed woman on hormones. I'm talking about the game of Life. It was one of my favorite games. We did not own it until I was a bit older (at least I am pretty sure we owned it for a brief stint). When I was young, I can recall going over to a friend's house to play it. It was the best kind of friend's house because I was between two of their girls in age. That automatically gave me two friends.
One of my favorite games they owned was Life. I always had the same habits while I played the game: 1. Get a college degree. 2. Get married. 3. Buy the coolest house I could afford. 4. Rake in as many kids as possible. Try to exceed car slots to require second car.


Number four was crucial. If I could have skipped the first three steps and gone straight to four, I probably would have. Big secret: Sometimes I cheated. I hardly ever cheated in games as a child, but I would cheat as often as possible in the game of Life. Not to get more money. Not to get a better career. I cheated by trying to change the number I received on the spinner to land on more baby squares. At the end of the game when the total was calculated, I was perfectly happy losing as long as I had a decent number of peg children. I considered myself the winner if I had the most kids.
I haven't played the board game of Life in years. Now I'm in the middle of the real deal. Numbers one and two on my list for success are checked off. Number three will come someday. I just need to land on the baby squares and start filling up my plastic car with peg babies.

I have been pretty lucky in terms of insensitive people asking unintelligent questions. My students and nieces/nephews occasionally ask when I will start having kids. I usually give them a little hug and tell them I don't know. Then they run off and forget they ever asked.
I do not get offended if someone asks if I have children unless there is a follow-up question. I'm sure that I have had a few questions of those types, but I usually put them out of my mind. Two of the worst stories remain. One is kept private because it happened at school with one of my student's moms. The other one is your regular run of the mill insensitivity story.
I was visiting a lady in my neighborhood with another woman. Small talk ensued. The kid question came up. Nope. No kids.
"Oh, you just don't want them yet?" Punch to the gut. I'd just had my first miscarriage. I was still bleeding from my first miscarriage. I always think of many answers to the dimwitted questions. I consistently answer with the one that gets me in the least amount of trouble.

No matter how long or short someone has been married (or in a relationship), never follow the kid question with anything else.
You don't know their story.

1 comment:

  1. Excellent post. You teach us all a lot by sharing your journey.

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