Lessons in Universal Design

I'm beginning to run out of host/ess gift ideas -- not because I am invited so many places, but because I have had these friends for a long time.  I try to mix it up: go for the unexpected when I can, especially at holiday gatherings, when there is festivity in being a little creative.

In the last bookstore for 40 miles, I browsed through the Games.  This is not a typical Game Night Couple, though they do enjoy their couple-friend nights, and their board games, so why not consider the boxed Newlywed Game Set?

It's kitschy right?  It's like Therapy meets Truth or Dare with the gin-soaked aura of Funny Bones!  What made me hesitate was that this couple are not, in fact, married, in the eyes of.... anyone, including themselves.  And if this had been "Know Your Mate," or some less loaded title, I might not have hesitated at all.  It is a statement of our times and my own circles that I didn't hesitate a minute over the fact that they are a couple of the same sex.

I thought instead that this might amuse them, and their couple-friends.  And since I don't have a horse in the couple-night race, they could play or not-play to their hearts' contents without being concerned for my feelings.

It did not occur to me there was anything else to hesitate over.  I really thought, Dear Readers, I completely assumed that the questions would be written using the word "mate," or even "spouse."  That in the New Millenium, the questions might still be about household chores, and in-laws, and Making Whoopie, but in a unisex kind of way.

     Right?

     But no one has changed the Newlywed Game.

     As I was driving home, once again forgetting a gift bag or a card   (why don't I just keep those things in the house?)  I began realizing that it would say Husband and Wife.  And you can work around it, sure, but doesn't a same-sex couple have to rewrite enough forms in the course of their day?

I was surprised a second time when I discovered that the questions DO use the word "partner," and at the same time divide into "Questions for Men" and "Questions for Women."  Why?  So they can read like this: "Will your partner say that things 'go over her head,' or 'in one ear and out the other?'"  Gosh, Barbie, math class sure is hard.  "What will your partner say is his favorite food to really put him in the mood?"

Well, now I don't want this thing in my house.  This doesn't even fit my heterosexual couple-friends, where the Man handles the child rearing and the Woman travels for business, where she is in a sports league and he teaches Sunday School, and either one of them would rather watch a Patirots Game than go to the Car Show.

So now I've got this...Newlywed Game, which is the oddest thing to be in my home after sippy cups and ipecac, both of which I do have.

I still don't have gift bags.