BENGALURU: Do you play games with your loved one?
I am not talking about psychological “games” that are patterns of connecting with each other with an ulterior motive that almost always has something to do with control or a more personal agenda. I am also not talking about sports, and certainly not the rigorous, competitive ones like squash or badminton or even table tennis, but just good old games that we would play for fun – regular games like Ludo or Catan. Games that we learned to play with friends and others to pass time over long periods of summer holidays where there was nothing much to do. Of course, anything can be made competitive to the point where it becomes a serious high-stakes matter like how Bridge or Poker, or even Scrabble, has become, but it is hard to imagine something like snakes and ladders, or Checkers, becoming much more than just a fun game to play to pass time.
The point of games like this is not so much about winning as much as it is about all the emotions that the game’s positions bring up, the joys and tragedies of the ups and downs of chance, and through that, all the conversation that comes up. We would not necessarily remember who won what game after a while, but how we played, how we acted when we had a great turn in fortune, and how we expressed our feelings – all those become stories to tell each other and others.
More than all that, there is a sense of closeness and belonging that playing such games seem to bring up that few other things other than sharing major life events seem to bring up. Think of your own childhood - chances are that the people you played such games with are the ones you count as being your closest, whether it is friends, siblings or cousins. The more you have played with each other, the closer you are likely to hold them in your life .
Somehow, we end up thinking of being in a relationship as a very “adult” thing and even when we have time to spare and want to have some fun with each other, we think of doing very adult-like activities with each other such as going out dancing or cooking together and throwing a get-together with friends. Even if we think of games, they end up being elaborate game nights for groups of friends – not something one does for just ourselves. It becomes a performance rather than just a fun, intimate thing to do with each other.
We do not have to wait to have a quorum. We do not have to wait till we are old and retired, and have nothing to do except play a game or two. We do not have to play just sports, not games.
Loving each other is being playful with each other. Next time you have some free time with your loved one, maybe play some games? It might just help you get much closer than an OTT show can!
(The writers’ views are their own)