Life: My Mom and Monopoly

Apart from a few blemishes, my childhood was pleasant. My memories are of seemingly endless baseball and football games, adventurous bike rides to the card shop, three-night-long sleepovers, unfinished board games, uncontrollable smiles, and yearly trips to cedar point. I had fun.

But only because my mother is a parenting genius.

Understand this, beneath all the smiles and great memories there was a national-spelling-bee childhood desperately trying to emerge. Besides sports, nearly all my doings were academically stimulating.

My favorite activity was building with K’nex. I had more books than I can presently count and I never played video games. My mother and I wrestled with board games religiously, but only ones with strategy or money transaction (Risk, Chess, Boggle, Scrabble, Careers, Life, and Monopoly).

At the time I did not realize that my house was a disguised boot camp for school. Only recently have I truly asked my mother about my childhood. She plainly admits to regularly introducing me to games and activities that would force me to think critically or learn (experience) mature concepts and ideas. Without rendering me socially inept by a constant bombardment of forced work books and flashcards, my mom still got what she wanted, an academically minded son who is socially capable. Bravo.

Even so, I have no hard feelings because my younger years were amazing. I’m positive that when I introduce my preschool aged son to Monopoly, I will invariably say, “now son, why don’t you be the banker.” And why not, at least he’ll have a heads up.