time and games
We play a lot of games in our house. We always have - we’ve been playing Uno with the kids since they were 3 and 4 years old. We played Trouble, Sorry, and Parcheesi when they were little and grew into card games (gin, rummy, hearts) and eventually board games like Ticket to Ride (European edition is better) and Settlers of Catan. B and TG used to play Strategy and Risk. I refuse to play Monopoly but have running tournaments with each kid in Sequence. Sometimes for dinner we have hors d’oeuvres instead of a main meal and play while we eat. We have games packed to go and don’t hesitate to bring them to restaurants (backgammon, Uno, Phase 10, Set, Quiddler, 5 Crowns). During our long weekend in Newport when B had cancer but before he was really sick, we played Ticket to Ride in the hotel lobby over drinks and also had a hearts game running all weekend, picked up at each meal in whichever restaurant we ate.
When our kids are adults and talk about their childhoods, they will say that we played a lot of games.
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A few people asked me about being “time rich” from my last post so I thought I’d share a little bit of what I learned by reading Super Better by Jane McGonigal (sent to me by the great Cheryl Strachan shortly after B’s diagnosis). Super Better is a book that advocates for the use of games and gaming to improve the quality of our lives. McGonigal has a PhD from UC Berkeley and is a researcher at the Institute for the Future, so she brings scientific evidence rather than intuition to the role that games could and do play in our lives. In Super Better and her other book, Reality is Broken: Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can Change the World, (yes, I’ve read, actually listened, to both 🤓) McGonigal breaks down the components of effective games to learn about what makes them fun, engaging, and powerful. She applies these game traits of boosts, power-ups, allies, and goals to real life.
In Super Better McGonigal introduces a game to increase the feeling of being time rich, or to combat “time poverty.” Time poverty is the notion that we are so busy that we will never have the time to do all that we want or need to do. Time poverty can be a reality for poor families where parents need to work multiple jobs to make ends meet. It is also a burden felt by middle-income and wealthy families, where expectations of involvement, volunteerism, participation, kids activities, and work demands soak up more time than is available. Of course there are exceptions, but in general, as a society, we still have more leisure time than past generations, yet we feel more burdened. Even stranger, the wealthier you are, the more time poor you are likely to feel. (See this Economist article - fascinating). I’m sure it comes as no surprise that there is gender imbalance in the feeling of time poverty as (of course, again, there are exceptions, but en masse), women have more responsibility for unpaid and always-present work than men.
But it turns out that the feeling of being time rich has little relation to how busy you are or how much free time you actually have. It has more to do with your feeling of agency over your time and whether you choose to or are able to pursue activities and priorities that you value. Research shows that the feeling of being time rich increases with choices, with feeling more powerful, with volunteering or giving away your time, and in experiencing awe. Increasing experiences of these time-rich triggers are ‘quests’ that McGonigal offers to game-your-way to felling more time rich. I like the idea but haven’t really quested it myself.
I do know, though, that when we play games as a family, we have fun, we are together, and we stop worrying about where else we could be or what else we could be doing.
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I have reflected on why I’ve been feeling more time rich recently, even as I am just as busy with now managing the kids’ lives, running my own business, and all aspects of our house and cars. For sure, part of it is that I don’t have a spouse to spend time with, so I have more time to myself - like every single evening. But I do also think it is a gift from the cancer…. and I don’t mean because I finally learned how precious life is. That cliche has never worked for me.
I think it is because living with cancer in our lives catapulted me into the present in a way that I had never been able to achieve before. At first it was because the future was so uncertain and also dangerous / terrifying. But later it was because the demands of the moment were so all-encompassing that there was no room for anything outside of the present. Now it’s just a better habit. I wish you this gift without the health crisis.
If I could wish something for the people I love it would not be to remember to cherish the moment because you never know when it is going to go away. I feel like that’s just another way to chastise ourselves. Instead my wish would for you would be to be in the moment, just because. Just because this is now and now is this moment, and damn, here we are. I’m not saying I do this most of the time, just more than I used to.
So, let’s make a game of it! Here’s a wishful-gift-challenge of four things for today for all of us:
lingering of the first (or last or middle) sip of coffee (or tea or water or…) a little longer than usual
sitting in the car for a moment to breathe before jumping out to run an errand or make dinner
texting a friend a positive vibe or even silly emoji that you wouldn’t have otherwise done today
taking a moment to let in the beautiful sky and clouds and remember how small we are
I will do these things and also wish them for you for no other reason than just because, and together we will be a little bit time-richer.
Tag - you’re it!