Gye Greene's Thoughts

Gye Greene's Thoughts (w/ apologies to The Smithereens and their similarly-titled album!)

Wednesday, December 30, 2020

Secret to happiness

In my 30s I was somewhat into board games -- inspired, in part, by a friend from high school who finds board games at good prices at garage sales and thrift stores, then sells them at higher prices on "game collector" websites and uses the profits to fund additional game purchases for himself.  (He could totally afford to just buy the games that he wants -- but making the process self-sustaining is far more interesting.)

I e-mailed him to ask if he was sufficiently interested in a semi-collectable board game that I should "suitcase" it back to Seattle for him -- post-pandemic (!!!) -- or whether I should just give it to my (adult) niece, or my wife's co-worker, here in Australia?  He said I should just dispose of it here. 

As part of this conversation, I mentioned that I'm planning on going through my various games and getting rid of most of them:  I've now realized -- self-aware middle-aged guy that I am -- that spending 1-5 hours playing a game is not how I want to spend my time.  So -- I'm only going to keep a few.  And then I proceeded to -- off the top of my head -- list my "keepers".

It turns out that I ended up with twenty-seven (and thought of two more after I'd sent the e-mail).  So that's probably more than "non-game" people would have.

I asked my friend about that -- but he says that he's not a good reference point, as he has over a thousand.  So: clearly he's into games.  ;)


This reminded me of one of my "middle aged guy wisdom" insights:  the secret to happiness is to figure out what you like doing -- and then maximizing your time doing that (as long as it isn't harmful to yourself or others).  So:  I'm glad he's still doing "the game thing".  :)

Related to this:  I'm always charmed and intrigued by people who have interests, and then set up little work-shops or "zones" to accom-modate their interest (e.g. a "jewelry-making station").  I know he has an extensive system of shelves, down in his basement, for game storage:  so I'd like to think that he also has a  secondhand diner booth nearby -- with proper lighting -- so that he can play games at a moment's notice, leave half-finished games set up, and etcetara.

He actually doesn't, as it turns out:  but he likes the idea...  :)

 

--GG

Labels: , , , ,

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home