The Three-Legged Race

On Saturday we went to an old-school kiddie birthday party in Prospect Park, full of field-day type games and races, including the three-legged race. The children were not familiar with the concept of the three-legged race and it took them a while to catch on, though they had a lark of a time in the process. Primo’s leg was tied to that of his best friend Leigh, the girl who got his first mix tape, and with whom I once heard him comparing the work of Roald Dahl and Walt Disney. They hadn’t figured out yet hoe to move their shared leg at the same time so one or the other was always on the ground while the other one dragged the fallen one around by their ankle.

As we stood there watching this spectacle, David observed: “This, right here, is a metaphor for marriage.”

“Yeah,” I said, “They’ve tied themselves together and as a result, one or the other is constantly falling down, while the other one forcibly drags them against their will forward.”

“Sometimes the falling down is fun and sometimes it painful,” said Leigh’s mother, “And there's no prize at the end except having made it through without serious injury."

Yep. Sounds about right.