One evening a month ten women friends take time out of our complicated lives to gather together – not to discuss the latest Toni Morrison novel or to pick an eco-friendly company in which to invest or to discuss how to make our streets safer – but to play the game of our childhood, dominoes. Many of us have health conditions (chronic pain, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, cancer) that would make more vigorous play difficult. Dominoes is a great fit! It has low athletic requirements, but demands some attention, and can satisfy competitive urges.

A typical domino set has twenty-eight pieces (or tiles), each one divided in half with zero to twelve dots on a side. The official rules vary, but in our version each person picks fifteen tiles to begin and starts her own “train,” or connected string of tiles. In addition, there is one more train that is started and is open for the whole group. The goal of the game is to rid yourself of all tiles. You do this by matching the number of dots on one side of your tile to a correspondingly numbered tile that is already out on the table. If you can’t match, you must pick up a new tile from the batch left on the table. There are a total of twelve “hands” that you play. A full game of dominoes can easily take three to four hours. The web site http://www.domino-games.com/ is a good central resource for everything you’d ever want to know about dominoes.
On our dominoes night, the women, of course, don’t arrive empty-handed. We each bring one incredibly delicious, low carb, pot luck dinner dish. I usually opt for making the salad. Pre-washed lettuce makes this a very easy contribution. Food and play are the agenda for the evening. But another hook is the conversation. Unlike bridge or Scrabble, which can be more cutthroat, dominoes leaves room for chat.
When the play begins, we exchange basic catch-up information. “How is your kid doing with his math teacher this year?” “Did your boss ever agree to your request to job share?” “What did your doctor say about switching to Cymbalta for anxiety?” By the fourth hand, we move on to politics, recent dating experiences, and light gossip. “Hillary or Barack?” “My date was six inches shorter than me. Am I being too petty if I acknowledge that it really bothers me?” After dinner the play heats up and the conversation dips into sex and scandals and trivia, accompanied by the kind of belly laughter we all need after another long month of health and family issues.
Dominoes is not just for kids. Dominoes has become serious business. Its popularity has risen to the point where domino tournaments are featured on ESPN, and there are world domino tournaments (http://worlddominotournaments.com/). If you Google dominoes and game, you’ll get over 3,500,000 hits. For those of us who are more house-bound at times, there are online versions of the game (http://www.boardgamecentral.com/games/dominoes_online.html).
So call your girlfriends and invite them over for a wild evening of dominoes.
Article written by: Barbara Kivowitz, © 2007 butyoudontlooksick.com
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In November, 1999 I was whacked with a mysterious, debilitating chronic pain syndrome that took me out of my life. Doctors could not figure out a specific diagnosis and were therefore unable to determine a course of action. Eventually, with the help of my husband, my dog, a pain specialist, and alternative approaches, I am mostly recovered with occasional spikes of pain brought on by stress. I am now working as a business consultant and writer. I am currently writing a book about illness and the couple relationship and blog about this topic at www.insicknessinhealth.blogspot.com