Last year my husband and my children were besieging me for an air hockey table. It was all they could think about and talk about. In the weeks following Christmas, many of our local stores had extended Boxing Week sales and many, many items were placed on clearance. One of those items included an air hockey table. My husband immediately snatched it up and rushed it home, absolutely delighted at his find!
The kids danced around while my husband struggled to put the table together - in our front entrance I might add!! They were so eager to get playing they gave no thought to moving the table to a more practical spot. The game was on!
My husband and our son played for hours. Even our little girl who was only about two at the time got in on the action. I'll even admit that I got in on the action for a little while. But as typically happens, within a couple of weeks, the novelty wore off. The air hockey table has been disassembled and is collecting dust down in the basement.
My husband and my kids have moved on to bigger and better dreams. Now they can talk about nothing but the latest and greatest - a ping pong table. It's so ridiculous! My husband's friend has a ping pong table in his basement. I'm sure that anytime my husband and kids would like to play, they'd be welcome to bop that little ball around to their hearts content. But somehow that's just not the same. They've gotta get their hands on a ping pong table of their very own!
And here we are in the early weeks following Christmas. Everything is on sale and reduced to clear. And somehow I know, that one of these days my husband is going to burst through the front door, absolutely delighted with his latest find - a ping pong table! And I'm also equally confident that he will not take the time to find a practical place that the ping pong table can call home - no, he will most definitely set up that ping pong table in our front entrance. He and my son and even our daughter will join in the fun and play for hours. Perhaps I too will join in the fun, at least for a little while. And then, the novelty will wear off, and the latest and greatest ping pong table will be relegated to the basement to gather dust, along with the air hockey table that went before it.
Written By: Mike F. Prince
