In the 1990s, my mother, like many women across America at the time, was a regular user of Cindy Crawford’s Shape Your Body, the VHS workout video. My mom is a lovely woman and very pretty, but she went into the workouts thinking that was all she needed to do to look like Cindy Crawford.

One Saturday morning, my sister and I heard the music of the VHS workout starting from our rooms. Five minutes in, we heard the VHS pause, followed immediately by the sounds of our mother panting loudly. My sister and I both wander into the room to see Mom sitting on the floor in front of the TV, covered in sweat.

Me: “Five minutes? That was fast.”

Sister: “Mom, you okay? You’re panting like a dog.”

Mom: *Between panting.* “It’s… a hard workout! You… haven’t tried it… so you don’t know.”

Me: “Well, good luck!”

Mom goes two weeks before trying the VHS again. This time she makes it to seven minutes.

Me: “Well done, Mom! New record!”

Sister: “We’re proud of you!”

Mom: “Shut up.”

A whole month passes, and Mom is back to five minutes again.

Mom: “That’s it, I’m returning this. It’s defective.”

Sister: “I don’t think you can. It’s been too long.”

Me: “What makes you think it’s defective?”

Mom: “It’s not working!”

Me: “But you’ve barely been trying.”

Mom: “I have!”

Me: “You’ve had it for almost two months, and you’ve done three five-minute workouts.”

Mom: “That’s how you know it’s defective! It should make you want to work out more! Not less!”

Sister: “What if the workout video had Kevin Costner instead?”

Mom: “Hmm… let’s just say your momma wouldn’t be working out to that video in the living room.”

Both Of Us: “Ewwww, Mom!”

I am having a discussion with my four-year-old kid. Please note that we are not Christians.

Four-Year-Old: “Mom? What is paradise?”

Me: “Paradise? Oh. That’s the world’s best place, the best place you can imagine.”

My kid sits quietly and thinks for a few moments.

Four-Year-Old: “Mom. You are paradise!”

I’m the author of this story and was reminded of another experience with my parents.

I am very much an introverted, stay-indoors nerdy type. Half the reason I was fine with just my bedroom being a temperature I enjoy growing up is that I’m spending most of my time in there anyways, reading books and playing games on my handheld consoles. That’s not to say I don’t enjoy the home consoles, but my parents did their best to limit my gaming time on the TV to an hour at most. I’m not sure whether they were disapproving of my gaming tendencies or if they just had other stuff they wanted to use the TV for.

There is an annual week-long break at my school, smack in the middle of February. I would love nothing more than to spend all day playing games, especially if I happened to have Christmas presents that I hadn’t finished yet.

My parents eventually came up with an idea: as much time as I spend outside, I will get to play video games. They start a stopwatch when I leave the house, and when I come back, they mark a tally. Whether they were trying to get me to be more physically active or just trying to limit how much gaming the introverted nerdy me could do, I had no idea.

The thing is, they forgot I’m the abominable snowgirl.

So, I’d march out into the snow… with a bag full of books. I’d stomp a snowdrift into a shape I can read in with my back to the sun, sit down, and open up my first book. The next thing I know, my mom’s calling me inside because it’s dinnertime. And the next day, I’d sit in front of the TV and game my heart out until I’d spent the accumulated time.

They’d wised up by middle school and told me I could just spend the week gaming, but why would I ruin a good thing?

For context, my husband has been learning the acoustic guitar for the last year and frequently plays at home when he has a few minutes. This conversation occurred when he and our six-year-old were play wrestling.

Husband: “Ouch! Watch out for my nose, okay? You could break it.”

Son: “Why? ‘Cause you’ll die?”

Husband: “Well, while unlikely, it is possible to die from a broken nose. But if that happened, then you wouldn’t have a dad! How would you feel about that? Wouldn’t you be sad?”

Son: “Oh. Yeah. But then I wouldn’t have to listen to your bad music.”

A few years ago, I (let’s say my name is Cara for this story) was staying with a dear friend when her parents came to visit for the weekend. That night, the three of us cracked open a box of wine, started playing cards, and talked and kept going until almost 0100. I finally staggered off to bed thinking: “Wow, I hope I have that kind of energy when I’m their age!”

The next morning at 0830 in the kitchen with a much-needed coffee, I told my friend:

Me: “Your parents are fantastic, but they have way more energy than I do.”

She burst out laughing and filled me in on the morning’s confessions:

At 0730, her dad came down for coffee and said:

Friend’s Dad: “I finally had to get some sleep last night; your mother and Cara were chatting up a storm, and I couldn’t stay awake for another second!”

At 0800, it was her mom who came in and reported:

Friend’s Mom: “I was completely exhausted, but your dad and Cara were having such an intense conversation I didn’t want to be rude and leave!”

It turns out that probably none of us wanted to still be awake at 0100! We had spent the entire night trapped in a polite game of chicken, each waiting for someone else to surrender first.