Red Light, Green Light

Isn't Red Light, Green Light the greatest game in the world?

It's really every woman's fantasy...

You're the goal, the prize, the ultimate destination. People compete for just one chance to touch you. When you say go, they go. When you say stop, they stop. They hang on your every word, react to the tiniest twitch in your body, try to guess what you'll do next and when you'll do it. If they mess up, even a little, you shake them off like a bad habit. Only the strongest, the smartest, the most committed make it within arm's reach of you. Only the best have a chance.

What's more, you can play it anywhere...with anyone...at any time. No equipment necessary. The only thing you really need is a ruthless sense of detachment, a willingness to cut people loose for stupid reasons...like a toe-wiggle, or an eye-twitch.

Now, I've been a fan of this game for a long time, and over a couple decades of dedicated play in every kind of situation imagineable, I must say that the best place for a rousing game of Red Light, Green Light...is with your boyfriend. I have several friends who agree.

Take Bethany, for instance.

Bethany used to be an RLGL fiend. And man, was she good. In college, she used to make me play for weekend plans with her.

"Yes, I'll go," she'd say. "Wait, maybe I won't," the next day. "Okay, sure," the next. "Weelllll, who's gonna be there?" the day of.

Red Light...

Green Light...

Red Light...

Green Light...

Talk about road rage...I about went insane.

But as bad as it ever got for Bethany's friends...it was much worse for her men. One in particular.

I remember a long Friday night spent sprawled across a futon, listening to her gushings and musings about the man who was after her heart. Max was his name, and apparently he was the funniest, sweetest, smartest, kindest male roaming the planet. She read me the love e-mails he wrote, brought out the trinkets he left on her car, showed the pictures they took of themselves hugging and kissing and making monkey faces. She was smitten.

Max had a bright, shimmering, sparkling, able-to-be-seen-from-space green light on Friday.

The very next night, unable to kick the habit, Bethany flipped the green light to a bold, frightening, stop-sign shade of red.

It was nothing he said. Nothing he did. She hadn't even seen the guy that day. Still, by that evening, they were "on a break." It wasn't the first time; not even close. And Max had grown tired of the stop-and-go. He didn't wait for the light to change again. He walked off the field with his pride and a broken heart.

Luckily, Bethany has a few friends (myself included) who'd been through her RLGL ringer, and weren't afraid to tell her that playtime was over. After a long, hard conversation with us, she retired from the sport she'd dominated for so long. She finally took herself out of the game. Max was kind enough to give her a seventeenth chance, and if you ask me, they'll be playing a different playground game before long.

The one where, if you swing side-by-side, it means you're married.

Bethany's Red Light, Green Light rehab taught me a valuable lesson. It's all fun and games... until people quit playing. And they will. Eventually, we all get tired of games. They're fun at first, but what's the point in playing them if no one ever wins? Then they're just a waste of time.

And there's a reason that real traffic signals don't switch from green straight to red. That's how people get hurt. The next time I feel the urge the change colors, I'm gonna shoot for yellow.