Poke

I hate playing games. It all started when I was a kid and my brothers and sister and I got together on Sunday afternoons to play board games. This was quite illegal as we were supposed to be resting quietly in our own rooms. Somehow that never stopped us.

Being one of the oldest, my game playing skills were a little more advanced than my younger brother and sister, and I easily beat them every game. This made them furious. They would throw game pieces and upturn the board and stomp around and generally throw temper tantrums, disrupting the game and ending anything like fun.

One particular Sunday afternoon, my youngest brother got so mad that he drove a pencil down through my younger sister's head. The blood spurted everywhere and of course, brought my parents running.

We were shuffled off to our rooms, thinking that poor sister was dead for sure. It was quite traumatic. From that day on, I absolutely refused to play board games with anyone. There was no way I was taking any chances on someone getting injured by bad sportsmanship and hard feelings over little pieces of paper and plastic. Competition is not my thing.

Even in school, spelling bees tied my stomach in knots, even though I generally did quite well. Math bees the same. I simply cannot abide seeing someone lose at a game. Just because we are not all equally gifted at the same things is no reason to make someone feel badly.

But I finally found a game I can play with the kids where there are no winners and no losers. It all starts innocently enough. I poke one of the kids with my pointer finger, then run. They chase after me, vying for a poke at me. I can call no poke backs, and then they have to get someone else to poke me.

We have an uproariously fun time racing about poking each other, laughing, and falling over each other in my tiny apartment. What a hoot. And in less than five minutes, its all done. Everyone is laughing, no one is angry, and we go on about our business of washing dishes or doing laundry or whatever as if nothing happened.

Except we are all smiling and the weight is lifted. Go ahead and try it out.

POKE. (no poke backs).