… so my little one and I decided to play Kid’s Monopoly. It was one of those special Mummy and Child moment. We are both competitive, so equally fired up to win. We both did the ‘battle talk’ at the beginning. All the ‘I will so beat you today, you wouldn’t know what hit you’ kind of talk. Any way game started and we were both doing our thing and willing to win. The energy was electric. The game went on and on and on and neither of us was giving ground. It looks like one was going bankrupt then the fortune changes and we bounce back again. These happened a number of times. Slowly but surely we were getting tired. The fighting talk was getting less aggressive and loosing some of its tenacity. It got to a point, there was no more battle talk, the fighting spirit had waned. We were both tired, at this stage we just wanted the game to end. We were both sleepy but at the same time we were both finishers, so we needed it to end. More than ready to concede and help the other person to win. Happy to lend or give money, it didn’t matter who won. Finishing was now the goal, we began bending the rules of the game to achieve this end. The game did end, I can’t remember how, not sure if one of us tipped the board out of frustration or cheated to allow the other to win. Who ever heard of cheating to loose? The most important thing was that one way or another the non-ending game ended.
“See you after the match!” Says the friend, depending on what match, it could be in a few seconds or days as the case maybe. It is not easy to determine when you will see your friend or not. Some match have straight forwardish calculation of how long the game is likely to take, allowing for the worse case scenario, some do not lend themselves to easy prediction. Tennis can be like that, it could be a short game or long one, it is not easy to tell. The longest tennis match is recorded to have taken 11 hours, 5 minutes of play over a 3 days period in Wimbledon due to all kind of issues not limited to but including lighting. And it seems the shortest tennis match was 9 minutes in 1926.
Boxing is another very interesting sport. According to some records, the longest boxing match was 110 rounds long in 1893 in New Orleans and the fought went on for 7 hours and 19 minutes. Whereas the fastest knock out was 4 seconds in 1947. The game was over when the opponent was knocked out with the first punch. Whichever way, the game ended.
Chess can be similar, the longest chess tournament was in 1989 and lasted for 269 moves and took 20 hours and 15 minutes, in the same vein, there are very short chess games if you are lucky enough to pull the fool’s mate. But whatever the case, long or short the game always end one way or another!
Life and life situations are similar, we find ourselves sometimes in some very difficult, trying and dragging situations, and it looks like it will never end, it’s being going on for years unending, it could be anything, a terrible marriage where one partner is sadly abusive to another, the craftiness of the abuser has weakened the victim, the interjection of pleasant behaviour with abusive one has confused the prey, the lack of support makes it impossible to make a move and it looks like their will be no end, but a day always come when the yoke is broken off from the neck and the burden is lifted. The game always come to an end one way or another, the day of reckoning always come.
Some have a long standing debilitating illness, consuming their bodies and taking over their life. A hard one to bear and difficult to comprehend, from one threshold of pain to another with little or no relief. This to finds its end and sometimes the end comes only sadly in death, when the pain ceases and the soul rest. But the game still always comes to an end.
Seasoned business people sometimes have nine lives, they go from one business calamities to another, failed project after failed project. Some just have one mammoth of a project, proving impossible to navigate. They have thrown everything they have and don’t have. Money, time, energy, people, resources etc and somehow one way or another, the game always comes to an end. They either sail through and finish the project by the skin of their teeth, or the project is abandoned and they become bankrupt but the game always come to an end.
One race dominates another for years and mercilessly abuse and use the supposedly weaker race, enslaving them and discriminating against them for years or centuries. Roughshodding and tormenting, but it is just a matter of time, the table turns, the season changes, the arrogant and ignorant does not always rule. The game always comes to an end.
One family runs politics, a certain business line, music and art, religion, ministry etc and the batton is passed on from generation to generation and it looks like they will reign forever, but the game always end and a new family will take over the hem, there is always a new lad on the block, the game will always end.
The drought will come to an end, the abundance will come to an end, the wisdom will come to an end, the folly will come to an end, all is here to pass and it will start all over again. There is a time and season to all things.
Be assured, the game will surely come to an end! When it reaches breaking point, it breaks, when it reaches snapping stage, it snaps, when water reaches boiling point, it boils, at freezing point, ot freezes. We can’t end it before it’s natural ending, it will come to its end. Divorce or separation was never the bringing ot to the end, it is just the burial, the announcement of that which had already ended.
Hold tight, the game will come to an end. To all things, there is an end, don’t force it!
Beautiful Ivory 