Well, sort of.
The first cruise I ever went on was in July of 2006. I still remember it was the Crown Princess. It was great, and I highly recommend cruises. Value wise I don’t understand why people don’t go on more cruises as opposed to most other vacations.
Cruises fill their agendas with a long list of activities from dance parties to basketball games to, (my favorite) games and gameshows. Today on the cruise itinerary, the game show “Family Feud.” A buddy and I walked into the lounge and sat down as the game started.
Often cruise activities will randomly select participants from out of the audience. If 100 people show up and the game is a few teams of two, some get chosen and most watch. Often times, people just want to watch. They don’t want to stand up and take the stage, or dance to music or make funny faces or have to answer trivia questions, rather they prefer the entertainment of watching others. I’ve experienced and enjoyed both, but most of the time I want play.
My buddy had to skip out for a minute and as the game started with him still out of the room, I figured he wouldn’t be back in time for teams to be chosen. As the music started the host asked for players who had a full team of five. A few raised their hands and went up. Finally he needed one more. I looked over at a group of four older women, maybe in their 70’s. They looked to me the perfect solution to my current team missing four players. I ran over, “hey let’s play, do you need a fifth?” I got the typical, “oh no I’m not sure,” but after some pushing and a couple of them encouraging the holdouts, we were a team. We did brief introductions, and walked toward the stage.
The host gave me a good laugh when it was our team’s turn to introduce ourselves. “Now I’m going to assume you’re the team captain, so tell me your name and who these individuals are
“My name is Steve and these four lovely young ladies I’m lucky enough to gave just met are Dorothy, Rose, Blanche and Sophia.” This got a good laugh out of the host and of the four women. To this day I still remember pointing at each woman as I went down the line and said her name… Dorothy, Rose, Blanche and Sophia… I have no idea how I remembered the names so quickly, especially the right name with the right person since they had all basically just whispered to me when we were a group walking up on stage. I’m using examples here, I don’t remember now what their actual names were, but I remember getting it correct at the time and the women looking impressed.
Anyway that was our Family Feud adventure. I even still remember our question. “Name a reason someone would say they have a headache. I answered something to the effect of the proverbial, “Not tonight honey” exchange between spouses. This got a real good laugh from people. But the joke was on them as the answer was there. Four points!
Moral of the story? I very easily could have just sat back and watched. Some may feel a bit awkward going up to any stranger, much less a group of 70 year old women. But I wanted to play and I wasn’t going to be able to otherwise. So what’s the worse thing that could happen? I lost nothing by being outgoing and I gained a great story that I’ll be able to tell forever. I think Dorothy, Rose, Blanche and Sophia would be proud. (I’m almost certain at least one of them was named Rose.)
