video games<\/a>,\u00a0they were confident that I would be little challenge.<\/p>\nThey were in for something of a surprise. Actual physical games are significantly different than electronic ones, and while I may not be\u00a0very good at ping pong, I have been playing (off and on) since\u00a0I was barely old enough to see over the table.<\/p>\n
After just a few passes, my wife announced that there was no spinning allowed, and definitely no slamming.<\/p>\n
“It’s okay,” my oldest son said. “He can spin. I want to spin.”<\/p>\n
I’m not much of a “let the kids win” sort of person, but I do keep games close, often\u00a0letting\u00a0them get the advantage before mounting a comeback. In ping pong, however, I found\u00a0no graceful way to miss. I could return\u00a0their big looping shots all day, but there wasn’t much fun in that for either of us. So\u00a0I\u00a0switched to playing with left-handed. Nobody noticed, but the games were still ridiculously overmatched. I discreetly took off my glasses.<\/p>\n
For weeks I played that way against all comers: left-handed with no glasses. Nobody noticed. I honestly don’t know how they couldn’t. I understand not realizing I was playing left-handed, but not seeing me take my glasses off? It was weird.<\/p>\n
In any case, during that time, both kids were getting better fast. Their shots were lower, and they were controlling the ball.<\/p>\n
Finally, my oldest son played me to a 19-19 draw (the games are to 21).\u00a0He slammed the ball over the net with a triumphant “Ha!” and pumped his fist.<\/p>\n
It was 20-19: my serve, and decision time.<\/p>\n
I picked up the ball, then reached out slowly for my glasses and put them on.<\/p>\n
“What?” he said. “No way! You’ve been\u00a0wearing those the whole time! There’s no way!”<\/p>\n
I beat him 21 – 19.<\/p>\n
“Okay, Dad,” he said. “No more playing without glasses.”<\/p>\n
I gave him a wink, and switched to playing with glasses.<\/p>\n
A few days later, I found myself losing a very serious game with his little brother (19-15), despite having my glasses on.\u00a0I picked up the ball and started to laugh. It was just a chuckle at first, but it built into a full-on belly laugh.<\/p>\n
“Why are you laughing?” he asked, annoyed.<\/p>\n
“Because I know something you don’t know,” I said, suddenly serious. “I am not left-handed.”\u00a0I tossed the paddle from my left hand to my right.<\/p>\n
His\u00a0mouth dropped open. “Really, Dad? Really?!?”<\/p>\n
I won that game 21-19.<\/p>\n
Since then, the ping pong games have become more intense. The boys practice against the wall and against each other. Beating\u00a0me has become something of a focus.<\/p>\n
Yesterday, my oldest son\u00a0and I split a pair of games. I won the\u00a0third one 23 – 21 (you have to win by two), but\u00a0he’s definitely getting closer.<\/p>\n
Every once in a while, though, I still switch hands – just so I can switch back at a dramatically appropriate moment.<\/p>\n
It’s not too often that you get to be Inigo Montoya.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
What happens when Inigo Montoya settles down, has kids, and takes up Ping Pong? I think I know.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[118,122,119],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2714","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-daddytales-c","category-daddytales-n","category-daddytales-funny"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6DpYi-HM","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pat-matthews.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2714","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pat-matthews.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pat-matthews.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pat-matthews.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pat-matthews.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2714"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.pat-matthews.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2714\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pat-matthews.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2714"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pat-matthews.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2714"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pat-matthews.com\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2714"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}