I used to know how
Dec. 30th, 2014 06:54 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
marnanelA few years ago, someone said to me that they thought life was a bit like playing chess-- you know the rules, and you have to think a few moves ahead. I replied that I'd often thought life was rather more like Mao. In case you don't know Mao, it's a card game where nobody's allowed to explain the rules, so the first few times you play you'll lose spectacularly; after you begin to work out the rules, you may discover that there's a standard way for people to create new rules, but because of the prohibition on explaining the rules, the other players will have not only to notice that a new rule has been introduced, but also to work out what it is by induction. This somewhat parallels my experience of life-- everyone seems to have seen the rulebook except me.
Well, the other night I had a dream. I was at a party where everyone else was playing a game a bit like Mao, but instead of using playing cards, everything was on index cards: when you introduced a new rule, you had to create new cards to go along with it. And I was confused and disorientated and disheartened, just as in my metaphor for life.
But then a card turned up in my hand which had clearly been circulating for a while. It was in a familiar handwriting, and after a moment I recognised it as the stumbling form of my own handwriting I'd used when I was about eight or nine.
And this was the most encouraging dream I've had in a long while. I used to know how to play this game. I knew once. I can learn again.
Well, the other night I had a dream. I was at a party where everyone else was playing a game a bit like Mao, but instead of using playing cards, everything was on index cards: when you introduced a new rule, you had to create new cards to go along with it. And I was confused and disorientated and disheartened, just as in my metaphor for life.
But then a card turned up in my hand which had clearly been circulating for a while. It was in a familiar handwriting, and after a moment I recognised it as the stumbling form of my own handwriting I'd used when I was about eight or nine.
And this was the most encouraging dream I've had in a long while. I used to know how to play this game. I knew once. I can learn again.
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Date: 2014-12-30 07:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-12-30 08:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-12-30 07:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-12-30 08:11 pm (UTC)(And did I tell you I had an actual agent ask to see my MS?)
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Date: 2014-12-30 08:32 pm (UTC)I often compare life to games like agricola or dominion, where you have to split your time between levelling up, and using your hardbought skills to actually do useful things. And that, there are some rules everyone else knows, but there are other rules, like "when to shift from buying actions to buying victory points" which no-one knows, they just happen, and EVERYONE has to just figure them out...
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Date: 2014-12-30 10:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2014-12-30 10:19 pm (UTC)