The Game of Life

Viva la vida.

If only life truly was like the board game.  And all that you needed came in one bright, shrink-wrapped box.  One little pamphlet of instructions was all you needed, in English and Spanish, to start you on your way. One spin and the decision is made and your path decided...all by the caprice of a mini multicolored roulette wheel.  There are no heavy sighs, no pros and cons to weigh....just an eagerness to get on with the game.  There are no arguments in your little plastic car about money, the children, sex, who didn't take out the garbage and who left the toilet seat up.  Even during the mandatory marriage stop it doesn't matter if the front seats are occupied by pink-blue; pink-pink; blue-pink; blue-blue....come on, is anyone REALLY  going to stop the game to protest the coupling of same sex plastic pegs???

And while the stakes are high, someone always wins and someone always loses, they are not serious.  There is always the promise of next time when the game is put away and taken out again, days, weeks, months or even years later.  Perhaps what I've been craving is that intangible ability to hit the reset button and play anew with a different and exciting outcome....the way you can only do in a game or at a sporting event.  Each time a team takes the field, be it soccer, basketball, football, etc., there is that wonderful unknown promise of a possible victory...of possibly pitching a perfect game, or running for a record number of yards.  And while much may be chalked up to luck - being in the right place at the right time - this luck, this fate, it is also ours to make....or break.

And while eternal optimists will drum up slogans to make you feel good about life's incongruities and the mistakes you've made along the way, such as.....

"Life is a cabaret." - Liza Minnelli as Sally Bowles

"Life is like a box of chocolates."  - Forrest Gump

"Life is what you make it." - Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus
"Life is one long menstrual cramp." - Snooki from "MTV The Jersey Shore"

The paradigms are all pretty much bullshit. Life is good. Life is crap.  But in the end, it pretty much is what it is....real life, not a game, full of emotions and tough decisions with countless wonderful moments in between.

And so while I wobble in and out of the blog-o-sphere, I thank you for your continued support and well-wishes, because life of late has thrown me for an unexpected loop and a brand-spankin' new infant seat will be in the minivan come November!  (Yes, baby #4!) But more on that to come.....C'est la vie!