Why MASH Got Our Hopes too High in Junior High

MASH was a game almost all of us played back in the day when wanted to predict how our futures would pan out. As Julia Roberts once told a heinous sales lady in Pretty Woman, "Big mistake. Big. Huge." When things worked out great, we'd live in the greatest homes with the man of our dreams, have the perfect amount of kids and of course have a bomb ass car that was the color of our choice. I don't know about you, but my favorite category location; where to bang it out with our perfect husbands. Which again, set expectations higher than usual, but at least it gave our pubescent minds something to fantasize about.

Not all MASH players used on this category. Perhaps it was the more perverted of us that thought sharing our wildest sexual fantasy locations with our BFFs would somehow make them come true faster. Yup, so long as I shared this information at a slumber party, I would surely have sex with Backstreet Boy Nick Carter in a fresh McDonald's ball pit in their designated Play Place. Instead, most of us lost it to some guy in a bed or a car and our locations from there on out were as generic as a pair of jeans from the Swap-Meet.

Then there was the idea that we'd have our pick of the best when it came to love. Mmhmm, three or four men who I happened to deem perfection were going to lineup and let me have my pick. Only years later we'd learn this was a possibility if you happened to land on The Bachelor, Bachelorette, and the many other dating shows in which 20 or so single people compete for the heart (and D-list celebrity status) on television. Since we all can't be as lucky as say JoJo, we date normally and have to go through what seems like every loser in the book and if we're lucky enough to find someone, we find one. ONE. Where were my options and why wasn't Nick Carter one of them?

Not to mention that game only taught us to yearn for very few things. Where were my college choices, the locations for my year abroad, the names of potential girl-on-girl action partners on Spring Break? So many details of our lives were left out and made to feel meaningless making us believe that as long as we got a husband, car, house, and kids, we'd have a complete life.

MASH was the epitome of fun when you and your girls needed to sexualize your future and dream about the latest boy band member who'd make you a woman but let's face it, it was all a lie. Except for those handful of women today who did indeed wed a member of New Kids, N'SYNC, 98 Degrees or my beloved Backstreet Boys. I see you Lauren Kitt (Nick's wife and baby mama) and while I am sad my last name is not Carter, I'm cool with you. What I'm not cool with is all the time wasted on the fantasy of a childhood game that left us with nothing but Tinder hookups, used cars and shared apartments because the rents be high and the incomes be low.