Family Competition

  Competitiveness. I believe we all have at least a little bit in us, don’t we? I will be the first to admit that I am competitive beyond belief. Throughout the years I have tried to mellow out. Just when I think I am doing better it sneaks up and bites me. At times I even feel bad for being so…spirited. Yea, that’s a good way to put it, spirited!

  I will use my nephew as an example. When he was younger I made sure to beat him at every game we played. I beat him at cards, board games, sports, and even go cart racing. We took him to Clifton Hill in Canada one time. Clifton Hill is right on Niagara Falls, and is a huge tourist trap. Needless to say it caters to families so there are all sorts of games everywhere. I do believe that my nephew did not beat me at one game that day. I even think my mom pulled me aside and asked me to let him win. To this I raised an eyebrow. I never recall that being said to any of my brothers growing up for I never beat them at anything. So WHY would I let up on my nephew? I am so nice, aren’t I? Of course, later on that day I felt bad for my actions. I would try to get him to play cards with me with full intentions of letting him win, I swear. Unfortunately he didn’t know this and wanted to watch a movie instead. Bad Aunt. Bad Aunt.

I'll never tell if that is really him or not!

  I thought for many years that maybe I had a problem with this outrageous behavior. What if it was just me, or my family, that acted like this? What kind of ludicrous people were we? Would we ever be forgiven by those we acted so ridiculously upon?

  Never fear, my worries were put to rest this past April. My two families vacationed together in the Smoky Mountains of Tennessee. Our days were filled with touristy things such as Dollywood, and Pigeon Forge. (I of course kept an eye out for Reba everywhere we went. Hey, you never know!)  Our nights were filled with hanging out in the cabin. That cabin was furnished with a foosball table, air hockey table, and pool table. And if that wasn’t enough we brought our own games like Apples to Apples, and Bananagrams. It was during a game of Bananagrams that I realized I was not the only one to display a horrendous competitive streak.

  Bananagrams is a game kind of like scrabble, but with no board. You get x amount of tiles and have to use them to form a grid of connected words. The first one to use all the tiles yells ‘Split’ and everyone takes another tile. This continues until all the tiles have been used. The winner is the first one to successfully use all the tiles. All words must be legal, real words. After very little explanation on how to play from the Griswold’s we began our first game. As we went along I started to grasp the object and of course-ole reliable competitive snuck up on me. Suddenly, my little buddy, (my twelve year old fan) announced she was done, declaring herself the winner. Her parents, Mr. and Mrs. Griswold, looked over her words. Mother Griswold announced one of her words was not a real word and made everyone continue on. The look on twelve year old fans face was priceless, as was the look on mine. I was ecstatic to learn that I was not the only one!

Are you competitive to the point of losing family? Has there ever been a time when that competitiveness made you feel guilty? Want to tell me about it? Come on…spill!