Backgammon

Once the carcass is ready, it’s placed in a circle and then the fun starts.

Note the above excerpt is about the Afghan game called Buzkashi. The excerpt is from a children’s sport and game website sponsored by Frosted Flakes. Frosted Flakes, that’s a cereal I could do without.

This frosted sport website was a stepping stone on my journey toward becoming the first woman ever to master backgammon. Confessing I spent an entire weekend learning how to play backgammon saves me from explaining virtually every aspect of my personality. Confessing that I still do not know how to play, answers any lingering questions. I still don’t entirely know what happened. I chose backgammon because my sister and I used to have a magnetic board game set for long car rides. We would play Chinese checkers, Non-Asian descendant Checkers, and all the rest.

Time and time again we would stumble across the Backgammon board with mixed emotions of fear and loathing. Over the years, I realized we weren’t alone. No one knows how to play Backgammon. That is why the directions are so fantastically confusing. The most logical conclusion I can muster is that there are world dominating secrets in Backgammon. The secrets to world domination are rarely easy to reveal (except in screenplays where several characters articulate the secret to world domination numerous times until the villain unveils he has, in fact, capitalized on this widely known secret to the dismay of the general population). So, I began my quest to learn backgammon and simultaneously become the most powerful person in the world. Quest hint: don’t get slightly drunk before attempting a quest for the first time.

I will share with you what I have garnered after many long hours. I know if we were playing backgammon: you would have a home part of the board and so would I. We would move our pieces according to rolls on the dice in a counter-clockwise flow. The points are the things you move the pieces on. The doubling cube is a mystical die (that I think I’ve misplaced) which let’s you roll to move many spaces. The goal is to move all your pieces into your home space before the other player moves in their pieces. Or not. Will anyone ever really know? Not if they are playing me and I’m slightly drunk– that’s for sure.

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