A daily dose of Sorry!

The title sounds like advice from some relationship book on how to have a healthy relationship. Give a daily dose of "sorry", be willing to say it at least once a day to your spouse or children. But that's not what this post is about.

It's about the game Sorry!, the classic game that I grew up with. I got it for Tobey a couple months ago after seeing that he played it with Mr. Alex at the Y. A board game that doesn't bore me to death like Hi Ho Cherry-O! or Candyland. I'm in!

The last few nights we played Sorry! with Tobey before bedtime, the three of us (we never take board games out when Eli is awake; we won't get past setting up the board before he'll barrel through and wipe out all the pieces). Playing a board game, fun family time, I thought.

"Sorry" to say that, while fun, Sorry! seemed to be a battleground for me and Tom to let out our frustrations of the day. They call Sorry! the game of "revenge" because not only are you just trying to get all your pieces "home", you also have chances to send opponents back to "start". In other words, you can play as offensively as you like and I liken our three-way Sorry! games to me and Tom in a lighthearted war and Tobey is caught in the middle, poor guy.

And all the while when Tom and I are bickering about whether we are playing nice or not, as if scripted, Tobey, with his lack of strategy but adept counting, goes on to win our first 2-night game of Sorry!. Tom and I learned our lesson and promise to play nice from now on.