CONWAY — About three weeks ago, I wrote about the Hendrix women’s and men’s basketball teams getting stuck in the snow and ice on Interstate 30 coming back from games in Texas.
It was quite a long, detailed article — thanks to the above-and-beyond helpful coaches, athletic director, good ol’ bus driver Wayne and some players who talked to me. (The women’s coach, particularly, whom I called so many times she probably has my number blocked.)
What stuck out when I interviewed them was not that it took 31 hours to get from Dallas to Conway; not that three of the young men jumped out to help a stranded motorist while they were idling; not that one guy admitted he got a little tired of his new girlfriend after that many hours together on the bus; not that the bus driver stayed upbeat and calm through the ordeal, but that they played board games.
Whoa, huh, what? Board games? I mean, my head started spinning when I heard that.
It’s 2011 — college kids are technophiles. They have iPods, iPads, iPhones — well, the i’s have it. Not to mention laptops.
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. The women’s coach said the kids usually come prepared for long trips with movies and board games.
“Board games? Board games?” I asked, sounding like coach Jim Mora when he asked, “Playoffs? Playoffs?”
When I interviewed one of the male players, he told me some of them played Catan.
It’s a strategy game, he said. You build cities and roads, apparently.
The kids on the bus also had all their electronics, but after being stuck that long, batteries started dying.
When I was about 10 or 11 years old, the kids who lived near my Nano’s house and I would get together and play mainly two board games, as I remember: Battleship and Clue.
Clue was my favorite, and I always wanted to be Miss Scarlet.
When I was at my parents’ house over Christmas, my brother suggested that we play a game.
My old Clue game was there, complete with my handwriting inside the box lid, “Tammy loves Donny,” “Tammy -n- Donny.” If you’re asking, “Donny who?” you didn’t grow up in the ’70s. Donny Osmond, of course.
I guess my mind wandered while I was waiting my turn.
With my brother being seven years younger than I am, we didn’t play a lot of games together when we were growing up.
My husband is the one who really got me into board and card games — he has two sisters and a brother. They played lots of games, and you haven’t played Pit until you’ve played it with his entire family. (My nerves will never be the same.)
When my 21-year-old was growing up, he liked the Allowance game, Avalanche and Junior Monopoly.
We’ve spent hours around our kitchen table playing Scattergories and Apples to Apples.
These days, my husband and I usually turn off the TV at night to read, and I play Scrabble on my Kindle and he plays Wurdle on his iPhone. We’re each in our own little world.
It’s just not the same.
I think it’s time to pull out the board and see if Col. Mustard did it with the candlestick in the parlor.
I wonder if any of the Hendrix kids want to come over.