News of the Wii came to me quite unexpectedly before Christmas 2007. “Had I heard of it?” my ex, and grandfather of my grandchildren, asked. And the answer was “No”. Supposedly the biggest news was “… if I didn't have one already purchased I would NOT likely be able to find one”. Fortunately, my son had purchased one about three months prior to this personal introduction to Me about Wii.
My resources indicated that it was the 2007 Christmas gift-giving-rage of the season and preschoolers and retirees alike could use the Wii to every benefit; facilitate early learning skills, to thwart boredom and encourage movement and exercise and mental stimulation and respiration and heartbeat. An electronic device to delight the span of ages from young to old, what a novel invention! Now what I am not telling anyone but you, Reader, is that some of us Grandmothers get as much enjoyment from text messaging as some teenagers! I won't tell further. But my next comment about the possibilities of the Wii for me reveals more about WE than decorum allows in public. I wondered silently if the Wii had a “Making Love” program!
I turned sixty in June. How many others are with me now into the next decade or just right behind me to follow along soon? A lot! Some Americans and Baby Boomers are arriving on the scene soon, to what I refer to as the “Sexty Generation”. We, some of us anyway, enjoyed liberties from the “Free Love” promos of the “Sixties”. Those of us who didn't are entitled to “catch up”, I think.
I, for one, missed it all, way back when. I was “preppy” then; or at least as preppy as I could try to be with my North Side/Cowtown/ Ft. Worth heritage from Texas, where the West begins! I had never been much into cowgirls, boots and jeans and riding horses except for costuming annually at the Fort Worth Fat Stock Show, which is what you can't call it now and have to merely refer to as THE Rodeo.
At least I thought I was preppy and that thwarted any tendencies to wear frayed bottom jeans and love beads and smoke pot! I knew others who did, but we didn't speak. They were in another zone and couldn't even see me through the haze. I married shortly after high school and two years of college so I could start a family and be a young mother growing up with two sons. Now in addition to being a Preppy I was also a Prissy.
Pink bows and frilly dresses and playing with dolls “would be Me”, to define my style of growing up. NOT a Tomboy in any way form or fashion. Except that I LOVED tennis…probably because I could legally get away with wearing a little, short, sexy, tennis skirt and show my ruffled tennis panties with a good forehand smash cross court! First Feminist Aggressions in my memory bank! Competition and wanting to WIN! And a precursor to what was to come in later years. Tennis after ALL…is a LOVE game!
So back to the Wii. It met Me last night, on New Year's Eve. I babysat my grandsons. How is that for a good granny task on New Year's Eve? Quite age appropriate, I think, except….before my kids left for the movie…they BUILT a Meme Mii on the Wii screen, straight from my own design orders of choice in self- image from a selection range to include: hair color (blonde of course, not silver!), eye color (brown), choice of dress (purple passion of course!), tall, skinny, long hair, oval face, makeup. That should fill the bill of the Meme Wii! Then we played tennis!
It wasn't as easy as it looked! I kept trying to play my REAL tennis moves in realtime form and fashion. It took a while to get the timing and sense of virtual reality to even hit the ball back. I was quite a clumsy Meme Wii and I think it is disrespectful that you have to endure the immediate insult of instant replay over and over. But I will give it its due in purpose to teach and re-teach the skills. Suffice to say, it did encourage me to get better instead of watching my virtual self stumbling again and again. The worst part of the game is seeing the last words…”You Lose”!
Isn't that the worst fear of all WE Baby Boomers? None of wants to LOSE! We have always wanted it ALL! From Free Love to Clean Environment and World Peace…we just WANT IT ALL! And now I for one want to see an intimate version of Wii come out on the market so We all can safely continue into oblivion making LOVE ..not war…for the ages! Good job Nintendo! Bring on the next generation Wii!
