For the last 100 years most of the people on earth have been born in a monetary system akin to a huge and complex Monopoly game, and with little say in the matter. We never seem to give it a second thought nor have we considered other options. This is quite understandable because as early at in the 7th grade they are programming kids to start thinking career.
I was just 11 when the teacher asked our class to outline our career plans. I remember being quite taken aback by the insistence of the teacher that by now I should know my future. I had hardly given up my teddy bear and now I had to start worrying about some job choice. And then it finally happens, they give you a token and you have to start moving around the board. It was a game we had to play, the only game and we bought into that paradigm. Since, we have been moving our tokens around the board, passing 'GO' and hopefully 'Just visiting' jail, most of us, trying to make the best of the game, a game so real we never thought to equate it to that famous Parker Brothers creation; Monopoly. Ta tah!
We bought and sold and mortgaged and no matter what luck or skill we thought we had that produced houses and or hotels in front of us, luck was part of the equation. We managed it within the rigid rules and with a little help from that lovely $200 every time we made it around the board; just enough to keep us consuming and in the game earning properties so someone, the winner, could take them from us - and they did.
The board game is infamous for running a long time, sometimes all afternoon - yawn, but ye dare not leave the table for fear of some kind of reprisal from the other players because you have become an integral part of their lives, those who think they are going to win the game, if not you. The real life game takes so long that today we are playing where great grandfather left off. We inherit tokens and properties and move along best as can, eventually looking forward to quitting or retiring as some call it. The game is hard to get out of early; kinda like disconnecting from the Mafia.
The stressing thing about Monopoly is, there is only one winner in the end, and the winner cannot win anything unless you are playing and have something to lose. It is an insidious game in that way, kind of like real life these days. Time will tell and reveal the winner, but the odds of winning are very odd indeed.
In this comparison, we have to face the fact that there are going to be an awful lot of losers along the way, for all Monopoly games end sooner or later. The signs are evident by the number of players falling out and abandoning their out of work tokens. This is the way the game is really played, players fall off and who knows where they go.
The question was: how do you tell when the game is over? The answer is, you have to wait until you have nothing left and the winner has it all. The winner and the bank, they will have everything, all the property, mortgages and even your token... DUH, the game is over when you feel your first hunger pang.
THERE IS A BETTER WAY TO PLAY and to manage the game with a little secret that not many know about. You can actually leave the charade and slip out the back. The best way to do that is to tell everyone you are just going to the washroom and then bolt out the back door and head for the beach. That is where real life is being experienced, where living is free and the monetary system is not a necessity, just a dubious luxury. So bring some Monopoly money with you, if you have any left. A little goes a long way in Paradise at 'Cocomo Village', Vava’u-Hunga Island, Vavau, Tonga!
Check it out.
Robert Bryce
