I’m Taking the Wins Anywhere I Can Find Them During This Crazy Year

Most of my time these days is spent trying to figure out how to pass the time.

The pandemic has never been worse, so I feel even more compelled to stay home. Taking the kids outside to parks or playgrounds feels like it should be relatively safe, but since at least half of the community where I live has never taken the virus seriously and still doesn’t, I never feel comfortable.

Either I’m worried about exposure to the virus or my social anxiety kicks in because I feel like people are judging me for being the only person wearing a mask and for making my kids wear theirs. It does not make for a fun time, and the more comfortable option is to stay home and just wing it.

I’m completely transparent that in this house we have no screen time limits. Since this summer, my 9- and 6-year-old often spend hours at a time playing Roblox or Minecraft while talking on a video call with one of their friends who is also playing the same games.

All three of my kids also watch lots of movies, Netflix shows, and YouTube videos. I know it’s not ideal, but I also understand that since we’re mostly stuck at home, the alternative is me playing even more Go Fish with my 4-year-old. We already play the classic card game routinely for an hour or more at a time, and let me tell you, it is as invigorating as it sounds.

We don’t play Go Fish every day, but when we do, we play it the way the purists do, one on one. I wipe the floor with my daughter on the regular not least because she likes to give me hints about which cards to ask for. It feels a little like cheating but I’m happy to take the W anyway I can get it. And I figure at least she gets something out of it by learning numbers or at least the names of the Paw Patrol pups on the playing cards. She still calls Everest “Snow Girl” but we’re working on it.

Much like watching people play video games on YouTube, Go Fish is pretty much the perfect activity for this year because it’s super boring, just like everything else. It’s also the ideal 2020 pastime because it requires very little effort and fills the empty space without providing any real fulfillment. It’s like the rice cake of card games.

Speaking of boring and unfulfilling things, my children have become enamored recently with a YouTube family who converts Roblox games into real-life games and films themselves playing them. They are called The Noob Family and they are more or less part of our pandemic pod now. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if they showed up for Christmas dinner.

Of course, the not so hidden danger of my children watching this particular YouTube channel is that it raises the expectations for me. One second, I’m unhappily scrolling through my phone, and the next I’m dejectedly carving large door keys out of a cardboard box trying not to slice off any appendages (I started cutting with a small kitchen knife that wasn’t great and switched to a box cutter that, despite it’s name, was somehow even worse). In the end, I emerged from the hour-long knife fight with the cardboard boxes slightly blood splattered and ready to relax by…morphing into an infected pig that walks on two legs?

My role in the game known as Piggy is a relatively simple one. I don a homemade cardboard mask that fits very poorly and shuffle around slowly like a 90-year-old because I can’t see very well through the tiny eyehole my 9-year-old made. Also, there are toys all over the floor. That’s not part of the game, it’s just our lifestyle. You’re probably thinking this sounds extremely fun and rewarding, and you would be right. Piggy is actually one of my favorite characters to play because I love moving slowly and conserving energy for some yet-to-be-determined future when I might need it. Perhaps to run away from my 4-year-old when she’s hunting me down with a deck of cards.

I would rank the Piggy game second to the one where the kids run around on the couch and I fling pillows at them. That game can be extremely satisfying for obvious reasons.

During a typical round of Piggy, while I’m stumbling around trying to catch them (but not trying too hard because I don’t want to get in trouble), the children scamper about frantically searching for the cardboard keys they hid themselves so they can “unlock” the doors and escape. Sounds foolproof, but it often devolves into chaos.

Let’s just say our version isn’t as crisp as The Noob Family’s. But to be fair, they have much better production value, they don’t have a 4-year-old who doesn’t understand the crystal clear rules of the game, and I’m sure they edit out all the parts where the kids are at each other’s throats like rabid honey badgers.

But just like we can’t judge ourselves against other people based on their highly curated Instagram feeds, it’s best not to compare ourselves to parents on YouTube either.

We’re all just trying our best to get by right now. And while we were prepping for what turned out to be the not-so-perfect Piggy game, the kids laughed and cooperated and were so excited to do something new.

For a moment, it felt like old items. For a moment, things seemed almost normal. Whether it’s Go Fish or Piggy or just life, a win is a win. And I’ll take every win I can get.