PAC-MAN THERAPY

When I was a kid, back in the 80’s, my brother Jay received an Atari gaming system for Christmas.  One of the games that came along with it was Pac-Man.  I would annoy my brother daily to play.  Most of the time he would give in; sometimes just to get me to stop pestering him. Pac-Man became my obsession and I would play for hours.

Well here we are in 2021 and I am still playing.

During the Covid-19 Pandemic I didn’t have much to do.  I needed something to occupy my time as well as stimulate my brain, so guess what I did? Yes, I purchased a Pac-Man video arcade system and I love it! Playing this game makes me feel like a child and brings back great memories.

Talk about entertaining, I’ve been having a blast! When I first started playing, my score was 500 to 1600. I was terrible. For those of you who don’t know, the objective to the Pac-Man game is to eat all the dots on the board without Blinky, Pinky, Inky, and Clyde eating you.  They are the four ghosts that try to stop you from achieving your goal.

Pac-Man entails a lot of eye hand coordination. I have good eyes but hand, not so much.

Every day I would play, all while breaking out in a sweat and grunting at the machine. My dog Tiny even knew every time I said the word Pac-Man, it was time to play. My big girl would lay at my feet as I went into battle.

When my favorite guy would return from work, he’d ask me “how did you do on Pac-Man today”? I would just look at him with defeat in my eyes, but he kept encouraging me to play for he knew if I continued playing, I would eventually get better.

Although disgusted at times, I kept playing and my guy turned out to be right. Each day I was better than the day before. Every dot I managed to chomp became a great accomplishment and before I knew it, I had cleared the board. Talk about a proud moment, I was overjoyed and so was my favorite guy and Tiny.

To date, I’ve cleared the first and second board so many times, I can’t even count. I’m on what looks like to be the grapefruit board and the level moves fast. But I’m determined to take that board down too.

Pac-Man is also making me do something else. I get so excited when playing, I find myself standing. I often laugh thinking, “girl, your so into this game, it has you standing”! Turns out this game is providing me entertainment and therapy as well.

There’s a saying that goes, “When life gives you lemons, make lemonade”. In my case, when life gave me lemons, I played Pac-Man and I’m putting a whopping on it! My best score as of now is 19,665 but I foresee a higher score in my future!