I grew up in a family of six. Three sons and one daughter – they kept going till they got it right – and of course Mum and Dad. The typical nuclear family of the time. I remember growing up that we had ‘Annuals’ books that had stories in them, but also used to have pages of games, like Snakes and Ladders, Checkers and other ‘board games’. We spent many a happy hour on a rainy winter’s day getting out the annuals and playing games. We also had a game called ‘Easy Money’ which is only slightly less hideous than Monopoly. Monopoly is a game I absolutely hate, in fact I call it ‘the evil game’ for many reasons, but also because people get so serious, and games should be fun. Monopoly also seems to last FOREVER!
As well as those board games we grew up looking over Dad’s shoulder and helping with the crosswords in the local paper. We would play Scrabble regularly as a family. Dad was particularly infuriating because he would sit there for seemingly hours trying to find a seven-letter word. He often did too! Even when he was in a residential facility and maybe his mind wasn’t quite as sharp as previously, we would play a game of Scrabble together. He was still the same old Dad, hanging on to find a seven-letter word, which with age seemed to take an age! He still managed it from time to time though.
I think that playing Scrabble and doing crosswords were the beginning of my love of words. I have written poems and have loved to read all my life.
These days I don’t play Scrabble very much but have become quite hooked on two online games. One of them is ‘Words with Friends 2’ which is very much like Scrabble, and I often have about 8-10 games on the go at one time. I love the challenge of trying to beat unknown challengers online. I can still manage a pretty good run of unbeaten games when things are going well.
The other thing I like to do is ‘Wordle’ where you have six goes at guessing what the five-letter word is. I’m happy to say that I often get the answer within 3-4 goes. I am encouraged by my performance in these word games especially and feel that I am doing myself a lot of good mentally by having to think of words that might fit. I feel as long as I keep doing these things my mind will have had a daily workout and it can only do me good.
My husband and I recently went to Melbourne to stay with my oldest brother and his wife. They got us into a fun game called ‘Sequence’ which is played with cards, a board and tokens. I won’t try to explain it, but I would encourage anyone to have a look if you like board games or card games but want something that is not going to take you hours to play. We were able to play up to four games a night some nights! It sure beats Monopoly that’s for sure!
So, just as I have done all my life, I will make it a goal to continue playing games that challenge me and make me think. Games are not just for kids. They can be fun, but they are also a bit of a mini workout for the brain, that must be doing me a lot of good. Long may that continue.
My journey with Parkinsons 