I was the youngest of three boys. If I didn’t play nice with my brothers, I might get shoved down in the snow. The same thing happens in adulthood, but the shove and the snow look a little different.
Some of my earliest memories at home involve playing games—rummy, Parcheesi, Magic: The Gathering—with my parents or brothers. Turns out that real life, too, involves a little bit of math, strategy, luck, skill, politics, memory, pattern recognition, etc.
In kindergarten, Eric and I built a sick tower out of foam blocks. And then Robert came over with zero hesitation and kicked the tower. Our creation was strewn about the carpeted floor. Our 12 minutes of work turned to rubble.