I had blocked out most external chatter to concentrate on seven little tiles in front of me, but I caught this comment. She was right. Most of the kids forget we have interests outside of entertaining them, but if the odd student or two hoped we led lives of clandestine glamour, they were dead wrong.
Here we were in a fellow resident's flat, wine glasses and fine cheeses forgotten in order that we might focus on the task at hand: a Scrabble board. Across the room, four more of our fellow nerds whittled down the possibilities in a game of Cluedo (identical to American Clue, but with the inexplicable extra syllable).
Backstory: One of the lads had, at long last, acknowledged the reality that beer and a game of pool in the staff bar leave something to be desired if repeated too often as an evening's entertainment. He had thus generously arranged for an evening of which my mother would be proud, not to mention a little envious: Saturday night board games, and we were absorbed.
Even better was how competitive it got. Imagine sulking and caprice of the highest order; if it didn't happen during Scrabble, it had certainly happened three hours later, either during Charades or Guess Who I Am (that game where someone sticks a name on your forehead and you have to ask yes or no questions to figure out your own identity). Abu the Monkey from Disney's Aladdin, if you're wondering.
Scoff if you will. I was in heaven.
Back at UVa, I would occasionally hear khaki-clad fraternity boys remark on their own lives as they sat in front of a lawn room, sipping a beer and skipping afternoon classes to play bocce. This was commonly referred to as "Livin' the Dream." Now, I've done the libations-and-bocce-whilst-playing-hooky-to-a-setting-sun thing, and it is indeed a sweet transgression.
But let's never assume that all good times have to follow this formula. Consider Scrabble on the carpet, warmed by the crackling coal fire, knowing one is in England... for a words-and-literature junkie, that's the good stuff.
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