A couple weeks ago, my wife picked up a pack of UNO cards for us to play as a family - and I was a little skeptical, since our daughter is only five and I would feel bad kicker her little butt daily, as she learned the rules.
Score from one session
18 - 3
In Smallsteps' favor.
Geez - Pretty soon she is going to be demanding a maxed Splinterlands deck to play in Champions League...
So far though, these games have been a huge amount of fun and there are so many lessons involved, including learning how to lose gracefully. I have taken it upon myself to show her via what not to do, by throwing a tantrum every time I am beaten. Being a parent is hard work.
Really though, she is learning a lot and one of the best bits is that she has no chill and will use her cards to pile on and decimate her dad - all with a squeal of glee. It is demoralizing, but I don't mind, because she is just so damn cute with zero poker face and feigned drama and apology as she mercilessly lays down a +4, changes the color and then drops a +2 on top - before announcing Uno.
Games are fantastic teachers and I am enjoying playing a whole range of them with her, something that I did as a kid, but didn't often have someone to play board or card games with. One I played with my brother a lot was Risk, but I am not sure if anyone plays "conquer the world" games anymore.
We were shopping today and I saw a very crappy chess set, but was thinking I will look around for a nicer one for us for Christmas. My wife doesn't play and I suck, but it is a nice game to learn and I think my daughter will enjoy it. Five might seem a bit young perhaps, but I reckon she will quite like the learning of moves and working out what does what. She doesn't have to be great at it to have fun, as I have fun and I am terrible.
I think that for the most part, these kinds of games are difficult for me for a couple reasons. Firstly, I am a terrible student, so I learn by doing, rather than sitting down and reading rules and strategies. This isn't a bad way to learn some things and especially the physical, but when there are highly complex patterns involved, it is unable to provide a full enough range without an immense amount of trial and error. Then, even if I did read, my memory sucks, so I would have to learn it all until it was available in my muscles for recall.
A lot of people will call me an idiot based on my inability to do well at school, but it just isn't suited to my kind of personality, mentality or temperament. I dislike following orders, I dislike doing what everyone else is doing, I dislike having to meet standards. I am far more on-the-fly in my approach to life, which makes me valuable in other ways, especially in the field when something needs to be thought through and a decision made quickly. It might not be the best decision that could be made, but when time is of the essence, near enough will generally be good enough.
This is why the realization that the stroke has taken away a large portion of this skill is such a worry for me, as I do not seem to have the personal process to "find another way" that isn't just, winging it. But, I am going to have to, because it seems that I my brain isn't going to cooperate and I am always going to carry quite restrictive mental process with me. It is disappointing for sure, but since there is nothing I can do about it, I just have to accept it.
What I do wonder is, how long will it be until my daughter starts recognizing that she is outgrowing the mental ability of her father and, how is that going to feel for the both of us. Fathers are meant to be people that are able to be looked up to, rolemodels and a rock - but I don't see myself being that for very long in regards to my ability to think with her.
I have written for years about how clever she is and how I have been looking forward to being able to have complex conversations with her, and just as she is starting to begin that kind of journey, I have been mentally capped and will unlikely be able to hold my own. I am going to very quickly become her mental inferior and our experience as father and daughter as she matures is going to be very different than what it would have been without the stroke. She will never know me as I was prior.
It tears me up inside.
The best I can really do now is be there for her in other ways, to support her early development where I am able to still operate in the hope that she will learn enough that she can run with it on her own. Then, I will be phased out of this part of her life, a decade or two earlier than I had planned.
I think every parent wants to be a good parent and while that is a spectrum, I feel like that dream has been torn away from me and the parent I was shaping up to be, will no longer be the one my daughter deserves. But, this is the way it goes.
Both she and I, have to play the cards we are dealt.
I hope she never slows down or me.
Taraz
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