Winning isn't everything...

It's called Candyland. I think every kid in America has it and every adult since 1970 has played it...

...And it's completely a game of chance. Might as well just flip a coin and see who wins. It certainly would be alot quicker.

Only my 4-year old has not figured that out yet. During the Redskins game (the one that I just posted the -- "long and boring," according to my wife -- blow-by-blow account of my misery), Reagan was pitching the mother of all fits. I mean, it was a meltdown. I was too into the Redskins game to notice what it was about. Finally, she comes over to me... still an emotional wreck... and says that "mommy beat me in Candyland three times and won't let me win!"... and then begins some more inconsolable crying. This is not the first time she's had the "Candyland" meltdown.

So, I try to tell her that "winning isn't everything" and bla, bla, bla... Believe me, the hypocrisy wasn't lost on me that I had just yelled at the TV set for something boneheaded the Redskins had just done and the next minute, I'm trying to tell Reagan "winning isn't everything..."

But you know what? I didn't believe a word of what I was saying. I like the motto of Vince Lombardi, who once said: "Winning isn't everything... it's the only thing." Now, she needs to lose gracefully... and that will come with time... but I LOVE that she wants to win. I love the competitiveness.

I just need to do a better job of helping her to corral that competitiveness and "use it for good"...Because I don't want to raise my kids like Ricky Bobby... who raised his 2 kids (Walker and Texas Ranger) to be winners at the expense of civility (remember now that if he wanted his kids to be losers, he would have named them "Dr. Quinn and Medicine Woman" and that they threatened to both "scissor kick" their grandfather AND come at him like a "spider monkey" for being a loser), but I do need to teach her that no kind of strategy or thinking will help her win at the game of Candyland.

So, the takeaway from this story... competiveness... GOOD... whining about losing.... BAD... and, go rent Talladega Nights.