There are games and then there is Scrabble. Scrabble is more than a game. Scrabble is serious business, as I�ve recently re-discovered. Scrabble is war�marital war. If you ever want to see spousal competitiveness unleashed, come watch us play Scrabble.

When Mr. Philately and I first began playing Scrabble together, I beat him regularly and soundly. I had a bigger vocabulary. I had grown up in a top-notch-Scrabble-playing family that not only knew how to maximize point values but also knew lots and lots of weird but useful small words such as xi and qat. By the time I met Mr. Philately, I had left home and learned that I was not a bad Scrabble player. I just had grown up in a home of A-level players and I was strictly B-league (or maybe B+ on a good day.)

But twenty years changes a lot of things. Back in those days when I was winning, I told Mr. Philately, quite honestly, that when I watched him play, I knew my days of winning were going to be numbered. He took that pronouncement exactly as one would expect. He thought I was patronizing him. I wasn�t. I saw how he approached the game and also noted that he did not suffer from my tendency toward impulsiveness. He approached the game so methodically that, for a time, I wanted to put time limits on his play.

Then he began to win more often and having small children decreased my available patience for methodical play. Okay, if I�m honest, I would have mustered the patience if winning were not becoming increasingly difficult. It�s hard, though, to stay awake when you�re tired at the end of the day only so that you can lose. So we stopped playing.

Well, the children are older. Kat can play on her own. She�s now the one I�m telling that she has more potential than she realizes. Day-Hay plays in a team with either Mr. Philately or me and she�s a real asset. She�s started adding beginnings to words and figuring out that sometimes more common words are better to play. Her ability to spot pattern will serve her well as her vocabulary develops (and Scrabble teaches such interesting words.)

So we�re playing again and I�m having fun. I still don�t like to lose (and I usually do) but I�m bound to win from time to time---I hope. If not, I figure I�m functioning as a sparring partner. I�m preparing Mr. Philately for the real match. I�ll bestow some favor�a hanky or hair ribbon�and send him into battle in the spring against the big guys: my parents.

And when that big game is over, I�ll be there to pick up the pieces�whoever�s little squares they are.

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