Regular readers will know how important my Gameboy version of Scrabble is to me. When I have no-one else in the world to be my friend, there is always a cartoon old, bald man with a furrowing forehead who will play me at Scrabble and whom I can beat three out of every four times, but who unlike most human opponents can give me a decent game.
A few weeks ago a friend revealed he was going into hospital for a pretty serious operation. The prognosis was good, but there was a chance things might not work out. He asked if he could borrow my Gameboy Scrabble cartridge for the fortnight that he anticipated being in hospital.
What could I say? His need was certainly greater than mine. But would I survive without the game for that long? There was a part of me thinking, "Buy your own game, you ailing tight wad." After all there was a chance that this was his last few days on earth so surely he could afford to splash out. He might have much more money than he actually needed. However, I knew that the decent version (the Gameboy Colour Scrabble is ironically vastly superior to the supposed "Advanced" travesty) is very hard to come by these days. And you know, could I refuse a man his probably not, but potentially final wish?
Leaving strict instruction for him not to play under my name and thus mess up all my statistics (though the computer seems to wipe these automatically every six months or so anyway, so it's not all that important), I reluctantly posted him the cartridge. I felt a bit like Frodo and the ring and in a sense spending hours of my life playing Scrabble against someone who isn't even real makes me to all intents and purposes invisible as well. I had a sense of unease. What would become of my precious? Something was bound to go wrong. And I am afraid I am human and thus unpleasant and part of me was trying to work out the ramifications of how I'd get my game back if he died. Hopefully I'd have been mainly upset over the demise of a friend who is much too young to be gone. But I'd also worry that in all the kerfuffle something as trivial (to some people) as a Gameboy game might be forgotten. I hoped he would leave written instruction to his wife about what to do in the event. And I hoped that returning my Scrabble game - you know after a sufficient mourning process of around two or three days - would top that list.
I mean I suppose I could always buy another game - but that wouldn't have my statistics on it. And what's more they cost over £25 on ebay. What price a man's life?
The operation went fine and it looked like my Scrabble game was going to be safe. But then things went quiet and I began hearing stories of complications. I was praying my friend would pull through this, but was preparing myself for the worst. I mean what point in the funeral would it be proper to bring up the matter with his wife? "I am so sorry about your husband. It's a terrible loss for you. If there's anything I can do to help...... um, he didn't leave a gameboy game lying around did he? Scrabble? He did. Oh you wouldn't mind getting it for me? No, no, not straight away. Any time this afternoon will be fine.... He was a good man."
And, you know, it would have been sad as well.
Today, thank God, I got an email from my friend telling the whole sorry story of his complications and of his brave and miraculous recovery. Apparently it had been a close thing. But he was home and fine and on the road to recovery. I let out two sighs of relief. Only I know which was the greater one.
I emailed him to let him know about my Scrabble worries and to remind him that now he was home he could return my precious to me (he has Scrabble on his home computer). He replied to let me know that all was fine (even pointing out that the statistics were still in tact - as if that was important to me, when he, my friend, had been so ill) and that the game was coming back to me by recorded delivery.
Which is great, because if he takes a turn for the worse then my game will be safe and I won't have to go through that whole embarrassing funereal scenario. Meaning that I can act in the appropriate manner and use the time to try and exploit the grief of his grieving, young and attractive widow and try and get off with her. Maybe I could invite her back to mine for a two player game of Gameboy Scrabble. Under the pretence of sympathy. But once she's seen me get an eight letter word across two triple word scores (my best to date, sadly deleted from my stats was "equators". Nice!), then she's bound to fall in love with me.
No-one can say that my heart is dead.
