Passing "GO"

I'm 17 but I'm smart enough to know how to play the game: people change.

They couple, then live together, then change. Then they often leave each other. I know my 17-year-old brain won't be the same as my 25-year-old brain. I throw the dice now, but they won't be the same bones later. Neither will be mine.

This is what makes Romeo and Juliet so tragic; it wasn't that young lovers' misunderstandings killed their puerile, stupid love: they just didn't wait things out. Both fortune and ruin are just a throw of the dice away. Had they played the game a bit longer and gone around the board a few more times, they would have learned that what lies ahead will be the more valuable real estate.

I see myself as the exception, changing bones notwithstanding. I can imagine my game with Alise.

Alise. She's so beautiful (2nd place in the beauty contest!) and so smart and clever. But my love for her is unrecognized, unappreciated, and quite unrequited. She is my life--I know it, but she doesn't. No, she has chosen poorly; I know it--but she doesn't. Chosen Reed.

Reed. Reed the stud. Reed the popular guy. Yet, she will outgrow him; I know it--but she doesn't know it. And for his part, he doesn't even think about it, because she is his. She is Ubering on BALTIC AVENUE instead of having cocktails in a limo riding down BOARDWALK. Will they pass GO? Wouldn't that be a real Shakespearean tragedy!

Everyone is dealt the same thing at the beginning of the game. Intellect--with a little luck--changes our holdings. Some advance with strategies in mind; others just land on the spaces according to how the dice land.

But Alise and Reed aren't the only players. Reed doesn't have a monopoly on her. He may be the race car and she may be the cute Scottie puppy. And although I'm the stupid boot, I'm on the board and I'm using the same pair of dice.

I decide to take a CHANCE and pick my card. ADVANCE TO GO. Thank God, 'cause it's gonna take about $200 to take Alise out--y'know--properly. We arrange to meet on ORIENTAL, and being the boot, we walk to a place I know on VERMONT AVENUE. She likes the place. She laughs at all my jokes. Things are going well. I talk of feelings and injustices. We agree it's obvious that Reed doesn't get it. "But he sure is easy on the eyes," she coos.

Reed zooms by on his way to JAIL, but he's just visiting. He's got some FREE PARKING down the way and heads that way, breezing past ST. CHARLES AVENUE and ST. JAMES PLACE. He's moving fast, but he's a rolling stone who gathers no moss: he's not investing along the way. Investment implies ambition and planning, things Reed was never born to need.

He may have her eye, but I'm no slacker. I'm looking good and rolling doubles. And she's with me her on VERMONT AVENUE. She likes my sense of humor. She engages with my intellectual observations. There is likely a chance for souls to meet here.

But what happens when we all catch up with each other? Hard to compete with a race car when I'm just a boot.

Alise watches me buy TENNESSE AVENUE. She's fascinated and buys the READING RR. There goes my first $25. She smiles. She gets it. We get to FREE PARKING but Reed's there waiting, with his token car and his small mind.

He rolls doubles twice in a row, and she swoons, and then she throws an 11. I throw a 3.

She's way gone and so catches up with him. But he throws his third doubles in a row and all of a sudden the SWAT team descends upon him. He's busted for speeding and he's off to JAIL. He won't be just visiting this time. Yet, Alise remains intrigued.

Why do some young girls like the bad boys? Why do they take a CHANCE on them? It must be because it adds something else to the game; something exciting and dangerous. Notoriety won't pay the rent on someone else's property, but it will make going 'round the board more fun.

Until there's no more money. Anyone with ambition and planning will realize that.

I work hard. I can work my way up. I'll have a house on TENNESSEE one day, then I have two. I'll be able to collect the rent and move up to a place on MARVIN GARDENS. Then, life'll be sweet. How do I get Alise to realize that she'll regret falling for a musclehead instead of me? Regret living on MEDITERRANEAN AVENUE instead of the good life on PARK PLACE with me?

She sees it clearly enough, but the notoriety keeps her attention. He gets out of JAIL and revs up to her. She's not impressed, 'cause now she has three RAILROADs. But she's still interested. Does one need to impress to interest another?

Reed is interesting because of the way he is. It's all the doubles he's throwing; all the fast times. All the times he's been to JAIL and gotten out doing what he does best--throwing more doubles. He's a shaker and a mover. He goes around the board fast and repeatedly.

And then one day he lands on PARK PLACE. Guess who owns it now?

I have three houses there, and there's no way he can come up with the money. Just like his problem with the ELECTRIC COMPANY and WATER WORKS. He mortgages his crappy BALTIC AVENUE, but it ends up mine when he is forced to cash out.

By now, I have the YELLOWs, the GREENs, and the BLUEs; and she has all the RAILROADs. We will likely go round and round until someone wins and the other loses, but either way, Reed will be just another bygone, forgotten player.

Instead of competing with each other, I pay LUXURY TAX and present her with a beautiful ring. I propose.

"All I have can be yours," I offer her. She smiles. She thinks with her brain, which her heart dutifully follows. "Let's put the board up and play the game for real," I tell her.

Today--token-wise--we have several cars, designer boots, and even a pair of Scotties. And we're reaching for the GAME OF LIFE, because you get to add children there. You don't have to beat all the other players to win. You just have to make the best deals.