After high school and college, however, it seems that for many people, this competitive attitude is focused toward other areas. Some can be good, such as competing for customers at work or giving a certain task your best efforts. Sometimes, however, this competitive spirit can be overwhelming and a bit out of the ordinary, as I'm sure many of you are aware.
Everybody has that friend. The "I'm going to play this game of cribbage like it's the Super Bowl," friend, who takes friendly competition to a completely different level.
I'm not going to say I'm not one for friendly competition. I try my best, I talk trash to friends, and I joke around with my good friends when I win a game we're playing, when the situation calls for it.
But, what is running through the heads of these win-at-all-costs people who take a friendly competition and try to bring it to a whole new level?
That one cousin that takes a backyard game of football on Thanksgiving to a whole new level, trying to run a no-huddle offense with 30 audibles that they try to get everyone to memorize five minutes before the game starts. I mean, nothing is going to confuse Uncle Bill more than calling an audible for a double reverse because you notice your 7-year-old nephew is looking to blitz, right?
That guy that challenges you and your friend to a game of pool at the bar, and then proceeds to argue with you on the specific rules of the game and gets loud and obviously upset anytime he misses a shot. I wasn't aware they were filming a sequel to "Poolhall Junkies," here tonight...I didn't see the cameras. I was just playing pool with a buddy to kill time until the game came on television. Simmer down.
The friend that, while playing a board game with a group of buddies, reads the entire 5-page rule packet that accompanies the game and comes up with a completely different interpretation of a game that everybody already knows the rules to.
"Well, according to this, you have to go in right-to-left order when you build houses. So, you should give me back that $100 I gave you a few turns ago, plus interest, so $125 should cover it."
Come on now, people. There are times to be competitive, and there are times you should ease up on your competitive side a little bit. Playing a game of poker with friends does not warrant a baseball cap pulled down low on your face, dark sunglasses, and not talking.
I'm here to have a couple of beers with friends and catch up on their lives, not try and read your subtle body language to determine whether you caught your straight or not. I'm not sure if you noticed, but I went all in with an eight-three off-suit 20 minutes ago...I really don't care about my $5.
This competitive attitude usually destroys a game, as people end up either not caring about the outcome and despising the person who turned a card game into a high-rollers affair, or turning competitive themselves, in an effort to beat the person who is going overboard.
In either outcome, the game is ruined.
Case in point, I started going bowling about once a week with some friends from work. I use the term "bowling" in the most liberal interpretation, however, as for me it means flinging a ball in the manliest color I can find (Dark blue, because it's not neon. I just learned last week that the different colors signify different weights, but whatever) down the lane at a huddle of pins, hoping that it makes contact with one of them.
One of the guys I bowl with brings his own shoes and ball, but for the most part, we're all there just to hang out, shoot the breeze, and have a few drinks.
What I love, though, are the people that show up to the lanes just ready to rock. They have their own shoes, own ball, that goofy thing you hook to your belt to shine the ball, and a wrist brace that goes up their entire arm, making them look like the Robocop of bowling.
This, my friends, is taking a leisurely activity to a level it probably shouldn't be taken to.
They eye challengers as they walk up and down the lanes, looking for someone to compete with. They block out everything else that's going on as they take careful, calculated steps. They have perfect bowling form. And they look at a missed pin as a signal to yell in pain.
This astounds me.
I always looked at bowling as a casual sport. And by sport, I mean carnival game. Throwing a ball to knock down some pins always seemed very carnival-esque to me, and I was a little disappointed to see the lanes weren't lined with stuffed animals with a guy in a top hat yelling, "Step right up!"
Bowling is a social sport, and something to do in-between hanging out with friends, and I was completely unaware that the sport had people that would cruise through the lanes on non-league nights and try and hustle people.
What needs to be done is we need to get all of these ultra-competitive people together, put them in a room, toss in a deck of cards, and shut the door. Let them see how annoying it is to take an activity as simple as a card game and turn it into World War III.
By showing them people that are acting in the exact same manner that they are, maybe they will realize that some casual sports and activities should be taken without a massive dose of seriousness, and that by losing, we end up gaining humility, which helps each of us in our daily lives.
Or, maybe we'll open up that door hours later, and there will only be a handful of people left standing, breathing heavily, as they argue with each other over who exactly won the game.
In this scenario, we'll take them and give them jobs as the Harlem Globetrotter's foes, the Washington Generals. Maybe that will teach them some humility. Or, maybe it will deal the Globetrotters their first loss. Really it doesn't matter to me...at least I won't be playing Scrabble with them.
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