THE GAME OF LIFE

I recently played the game of life, a game most of us know and love. However, for those who have never been fortunate enough to play the game of life, allow me to explain. You start off as a little colored peg, blue or pink, in a car all by your self. No partner, no children, no additions that could be an expense, no religious ideas, no education or career. You begin as the earliest and most innocent stage of life, a child. With no experience or abilities you are forced to move forward with the game. You see, the map of the game represents linear time. To begin you spin the wheel and the number the wheel lands on determines how far you go through 'life' in one turn. The closer to the end of the board you get, the closer you get to death. This essentially summarizes every important moment throughout life into around thirty small rectangular spaces. 

Before you even get the opportunity to spin the wheel however, you are obligated to choose one of two paths, either college or career.I started to think about the real game of life, the one that every single person reading this plays each and every day. The board game-Game of Life, although fictional, has many aspects that are similar to the real game of life. For instance you may pay taxes, you may get married and have children, you may retire rich or poor, you may... 

the list goes on and on. 

I am a child. I live under my parents roof, where they pay for and provide me with everything that is necessary for my survival. I do not have a say in political matters of the world, I do not pay taxes, I do not even have the ability to buy a fish from PetSmart. Objectively speaking, to society and my parents, I am an expense simply until I am no longer when I can be a functioning member of society, carry my own weight, and make a positive or negative impact on the world. This cycle continues until I perish and leave the world with whatever I have graced it with during my time on earth. 

When you think about it from this perspective you just begin to scratch the surface of comprehension to the thought that the only thing truly guaranteed in life is death. 

You could read the previously stated sentence and respond in a plethora of ways. You could think about how morbid and terrifying the sound and guarantee of death are. OR you could think about how you will inevitably, 100%, without the shadow of a doubt, die one day. So why would you not live every day like it's your last, because to be quite frank it really could be.  

I think we don't live life to the fullest because we are in denial of death. If we truly comprehended the idea and reality of death we would never have a 'down' day, we would appreciate our earth more, treat people with more kindness than we ever have before, and we would be more appreciative of what we have and how and what we delegate our time to. 

The board game- Game of Life leaves a few inches at the beginning of the board which is the distance from when you begin playing to when you choose the path you will follow for the remainder of the game. I began to realize that these few inches is the time in which I am currently living, and surviving. Every hardship, celebration, and emotion I have felt in the entirety of my life are represented by two spaces on this cheap, painted, cardboard palette. 

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How come I feel like I have lived so much when in reality I have lived so little? 

I have the rest of my life ahead of me.  I have goals, very, very, big slightly unattainable goals. Goals that my friends and family call me crazy for setting. I want to travel the world, experience different cultures and humans. I want to know what it's like to not live in a little Northshore bubble. I want to know the good and the bad, the pretty and the ugly, the sad and the happy. I want to meet new people who have different views, backgrounds, traditions, and traumas. I want to understand why people think and act the way they do, and what makes the world turn. I want to go to places of extreme poverty and places of extreme wealth, and appreciate the beauty and hardships of both. I want to appreciate different religions and how people who are made from the exact same substance as me can have such different beliefs as to what will happen to the both of us once we are no longer alive. I want to be able to recognize patterns in economics, social classes, and history. I want to have a family and raise my children to have ambitions and goals, no matter how unattainable or absurd they seem. I want to love someone with my whole being, and have the exact same in return. I want to be able to look the ones that will surround me when I take my last breaths and confidently say that I lived my life to the fullest, without regrets or self induced restraints. I want to be able to comprehend how small I am on this massive earth, but yet how much of a difference I can leave behind. 

I want to know more. 

And yet, I'm not even past the first two spaces in my Game of Life. 

Fallon