Winter Games

Trust me when I say this but lawyers trump doctors. Or at least it seems that way in this game we call Life.

The board game that is.

After all, it's Christmas - and what better way to while away the time with family at home than to dust off the old board games from the attic? Living with my brother in a suburban home far away from the rest of our schoolmates, we learned to rely on each other - and our various board games - during our times of boredom. Risk. Cluedo. Monopoly. Careers. You name it, we've probably played it sometime in our adolescent years.

So my sister-in-law had to rack her head to find the one game we haven't played. Somehow, despite going through the board game route my brother and I never stumbled across this particular game.


Going on a ride with Life!
So once my brother had been given the game of Life, we figured there wouldn't be a better time to test it out. As soon as my niece and nephew were tucked up safely in bed, we started setting up the board game. Turns out the game's far more complex than I had first expected - with various mountains, bridges and houses to be placed on the board. Not to mention the lil plastic cars full of blue and pink pegs.

Understood the gist of the endless rules after the first read so I picked up a snazzy red sportscar and placed my blue peg in the driver's seat - safely buckled as recommended. Rather than opt for the obvious career choice medicine, this time I grabbed the law degree and prepared to run the rest of my opponents off the road.

Or failing that, sue their pants off.

Turns out my sister-in-law picked medicine instead ( supposedly taking night classes whlie working as a beat cop in the day ) and bought that million dollar mansion she always wanted after winning an idol contest. Not everyone fared as well of course. Capricious life had Charming Calvin losing his plush job as a computer designer after the dot-com bubble burst to hock second-grade antique fakes at a weekend market.

But lawyers trump doctors as I said. After crazed ambulance-chasing for my entire working life, me ( also my partner and my peg child ) retired to the tune of 2.4 mil at the end of the game. Sounds pretty good, huh?

Maybe it's time to seriously think of changing careers!

And if I had any doubt that my brother knows that I'm gay, he actually turned to me when I got married early on - at least in the game - and asked me whether I should reconsider placing a woman beside me as a life partner. Practically shoved the blue peg at me.

Well, Christmas is for coming out, isn't it?