Dominoes
It is Spring of 2023, and our friends Wendy and Danny invite us over for game night. They teach us their latest game obsession, “Mexican Train” dominoes. I vaguely recall having played it many years before, but did not recall any of the particulars. We had a blast! There was a lot of laughing at the many sudden turns of fortune, seemingly deliberate sabotage, and “rules” they seemed to be making up on the spot.
This game is played with a set of dominoes that go from blank (zero) up to twelve. It takes a couple of hours to play, because you play a round for each double domino, thirteen rounds in all. There is a piece with every combination of numbers, but each tile is unique, so there are 91 tiles in all. Each number also has its own color to make it easier to recognize. Still, that’s a lot of colored dots on each side of each domino. When we bought our own set, we chose one that has numerals rather than dots. “6” is distinguished from “9” by an underline. They came in a cool looking aluminum case, suitable for carrying drug paraphernalia or nuclear codes.
We started playing a lot of dominoes at home, and decided to take them on a couples trip to Arizona. When we flew from Ontario to Phoenix on Southwest Airlines, we checked both of our carry-on size bags. Doing so incurred no extra charge and left room in the overhead bins for other passengers. When we went to baggage claim, one of the two pieces was missing. We had checked them at the same time and they were the same size. Southwest has a nice office at the Sky Harbor Airport for dealing with such events. Our bag had not been lost, it had been flagged for inspection and separated. We were concerned because we were driving to a bed-and-breakfast in Cottonwood, two hours away. Southwest assured us they would send the missing bag, including the domino set, by personal courier to our destination. True to their word, it arrived the same evening. As it turned out, our group had so many other fun activities and games that we never got around to playing dominoes on that trip.
A few weeks later, Kim and Ron brought Genevieve and Gianluca over for a belated Mother’s Day celebration. We thought it would be fun to teach them our new favorite game. The kids were skeptical, but acquiesced. We played in teams for this instructional match. They picked it up quickly, and there was a lot friendly trash talk and banter. All of the newcomers were surprisingly competitive, eager to show each other up, despite not having played the game before. A good time was enjoyed by us all.
They decided to get their own domino set, for a trip they were about to make to Jamaica as a family. We took in the three smallest of their five dogs while they were away, in reciprocation for them caring for our dogs when we travel. They had a good time at the all-inclusive resort, but because of a few mishaps, the dominoes were put to good use. Weather led to some indoor days. Genevieve inadvertently stepped on some kind of sea creature that stung her foot badly, leaving fine stingers that make her foot swell up and made it painful to walk. Dominoes time.
In the airport lounge waiting for the first leg of the return flight, they got the dominoes out and once again had a boisterous family game. At one point, another waiting passenger approached, a woman they did not know. She just couldn’t help but tell them how pleased she was to see a family playing together, unlike everyone else in the lounge, who were all just staring at their own phones. Perhaps she will get a set for her own family. People fall for this game like, well, you know.
