Life with Liz: The lure of the arcade

By LIz PINKEY

We just got back from our annual weekend trip to the indoor water park. My friend K has been organizing this trip for years and we all look forward to it.

There are approximately 60 other families that go along for the ride, so my kids are guaranteed to have playmates from dawn til dusk and beyond.

Since there are a host of other adults that all the kids know and love, we take the village approach to parenting for two days and allow ourselves to relax a little, confident that in a real emergency, our kids will find someone who knows them and can deal with them. I know my kids will always find their way back to me when they get hungry.

The only drawback to this trip is the arcade.

The water park entrance has been cleverly buried in the middle of the arcade, with all its lights and whistles and grand prize jackpots.

I miss the early days when I could whisk my kids through there and tell them that was for grown-ups. They’ve caught on and now I’ve accepted it as the necessary evil that goes along with the rest of the bliss of the trip.

We have a few ground rules, though. First of all, they get what they get, and they don’t get upset. They are free to spend as much of their own money as they want, but I will only dole out a reasonable amount. Oddly enough, they seem more than happy to accept my gift and reluctant to dip into their own wallets. Second, when it’s gone, it’s gone, and that’s the end of it.

I hold all the tickets that they’ve collected and if they want to cash them in, they need to not whine about anything, or at the end of the day, the tickets get trashed.

As they’ve gotten older, they’ve gotten more strategic and selective when playing games, looking for longer playing times, or bigger payouts. They’ve learned that sometimes it’s better to pool their meager ticket winnings and claim one large prize to share, or even save their tickets from one year to the next. Last year, when A managed to hit a “jackpot” and won an unheard-of amount of tickets, his first major decision was to give his brother and sister a share of his winnings. I was so proud of him at that moment, and I managed to retain that feeling for a few months until I heard him blackmailing them with a “remember that time I gave you tickets?”

Even so, I can guarantee that someone will always end up in tears. This year, it was G’s turn. He had not exactly understood how a game worked and kept swiping his card to try to make it work. Then, he gave up and walked away, and some other kid came along and cashed on a whole bunch of free spins.

G was understandably upset, since he had used almost all of his credits and not even gotten to play. While he tried to contain himself, he was just too brokenhearted, and the tears flowed. While I genuinely felt badly for him, I stuck firmly to Rule No. 1 and 2.

After a few minutes of letting him wallow, I suggested to him that perhaps if he went to one of the service desks and explained what had happened that he might be able to get a partial refund of some of his credits. He firmly refused. While I doubted that he would make much progress in the first place, I still thought it would be a good experience for him to own up to his own mistake and deal with customer service. My normally outgoing, “roll with the punches” kid wouldn’t even consider going up to the counter and explaining the situation. I was surprised.

When I asked him why he wouldn’t do it, he said because he didn’t want them to think he was dumb. I couldn’t help it; my eyebrows went up a little. Which led to a further crying jag. While I hastened to explain to him that I didn’t think he was dumb, but I did think that not reading or following the directions showed a little bit of not thinking on his part.

I told him that I was sure that the bored teenager who was manning the desk had a pretty low opinion of everyone in the room already, including me. He still refused to do it. At that point, I left him to consider his options.

A few minutes later, he came over and asked me if I would go to the desk for him. He got the eyebrows again and was left alone to consider options again. Finally, almost a half-hour later, he came and asked me if I would go with him to the desk. I relented and went along with him, but was careful to stand in the background, and let him do the talking.

Ultimately, he was able to get about half of his credits back, and while he didn’t hit any jackpots, he was happy enough to play the game. He also confessed that he had really hated asking for help.

On the drive home, we had a discussion about needing to be able to speak up for yourself and advocate for yourself. I was glad this opportunity presented itself in a situation where the outcome wasn’t critical, especially since G, and eventually A and E, all agreed that they hated to speak up, especially in a situation where it might seem like they’ve made a mistake.

I provided quite a few scenarios of my own where I did something pretty stupid, and sometimes spoke up for myself, and other times I didn’t. And, where I usually kicked myself later for not speaking up.

All in all, I thought it was a pretty great learning opportunity for all of us. However, a little while later, I overheard A whispering to G that next time G should just ask him for help, so that they don’t have to get another lecture. I guess there was more than one lesson learned that day!

Liz Pinkey is a contributing writer to the Times News. Her column appears weekly in our Saturday feature section.