The Dartboard From My Childhood

When I was a kid, my parents bought me a dart board for my birthday. Nowadays however, if I bought my son a dartboard for his birthday, he would think I am punishing him. The closest he would probably get to playing darts is if there was a Nintendo Dartboard game…There probably is!

Anyways, move forward to about thirty years… My parents, getting on in age, decided to sell the old house and move into an apartment as the bathroom and bedrooms were all on the second floor which made it difficult for my mother. I was over there the day they moved and, on a whim, decided to head down to the basement to make sure that nothing was left. Fortunately for me, I came across a few things that belonged to me during my childhood. I had actually forgotten about these items and would never have even thought of them ever again had I not scoured the basement one last time. Knowing I would feel guilty about abandoning these “treasured items”; I decided to scoop them up and return them to their rightful heir … me!

A few days ago, I couldn’t help but notice that the price tag never made it off the dart board. I couldn’t help but laugh when I saw the price my parents paid for this birthday gift… $2.75 (Canadian dollars.) Now for you who are not familiar with Canadian Currency, that would equate to £1.20, US$2.37, 8.37 Malaysia Ringgits and 1.80 Euro. Today, if I was to purchase a dartboard, I would have to end up paying CAN$38.00!! Now that’s an increase of approximately 1381%! What’s with that??

“Inflation” they say… Yah well you can say that again! It amazes me that prices have gone “sky high” in basically everything and yet wages stay the same. The money must be going somewhere but it sure isn’t coming to me!

Now I suppose that since I have had this dart board for about thirty five years, I must have got my money’s worth out of it but if you were to count the dart holes in the board (please don’t!) you would conclude that I hardly used it. So, for my new year’s resolution, I am going to play the heck out of the dart board so that I become satisfied that I have squeezed every penny out of it! On the other hand, maybe I should just let bygones be bygones and make my son play the game… after all, if it was good enough for his “old man,” it should be good enough for him!

By the way, those darts that are stuck in my board … Don’t let the photo fool you … the bull’s eyes were shoved into it by hand to make me look good (did it?) … the closest I really ever got to the centre is where the bottom dart is. Maybe I should have stuck to playing cards!