Do You Play the "Would You Still Love Me If…" Game?

My wife and I cannot be the only ones.

“Would you still love me if I looked like this?” **Wife lifts up the tip of her nose with her finger, distorting its normally attractive shape.**

We have played this dumb game so many times over the last two decades that I really don’t recall for sure who did it first, or what variant happened first. But my wife, and her nose, is as good a guess as any.

Recently, some Substack shenanigator (

The Starfire Codes by Demi Pietchell

, IIRC) mentioned this game, and I was surprised to learn that it wasn’t exclusive to my wife and me. I shouldn’t have been surprised, of course—there is very little new under the sun—but I was nonetheless.

In the course of the discussion, I learned that for some who play this game, it is a plea for affirmation of love. In some cases, even a needy, manipulative plea.

That’s not the reason my wife and I do it. Our relationship is more than solid. For us, it’s about seeing how bizarre, obscure, or ridiculous we can get.

Would you still love me if I occasionally emitted a high-pitched whirring sound?

Would you still love me if my name were Aloysius Crapburger?

Would you still love me if, once per day, no matter where we were, I had to sing show-tunes for five minutes straight or I would die?

Would you still love me if I were a koala bear?

Likely answers:

Mayyyyyyybe.
Yes, but I am keeping my own name.
That would be tough.
Yes…but in a different way.

For us, it’s really just an excuse to laugh.

Sometimes, the gag is subtlety:

Would you still love me if I looked like this? (Wife barely changes the shape of her nose.)
Yes.

How about this? (Nose moved a little more.)
Yep.

This? (A little more.)
Sure.

What about this? (A little more.)
No freaking way.

**Insert wife’s feigned outrage here.**

As I say, we’re just passing the time when we do it. But it does appear to be a natural and normal thing that people do, so I would love to hear if you do it, or have done it in the past. (Or if you have been subjected to it by a spouse or girl/boyfriend and hated it!) I bet we could collect a pretty funny list of examples.

Finally, it did recently occur to me that a better title for this game might be,

Would there have been a second date if…

The reason is simple: There are lots of things you might overlook or accept after you’ve already fallen in love, but might have been a dealbreaker on that first date.

(No matter what the title or variant, I suppose this game might be dangerous for relationships that aren’t fully solid, so I certainly am not recommending that anyone start playing it. I don’t want to cause trouble!)

Anyway, please share stories if you’ve got ‘em.

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PS: My apologies to those who were expecting a Distributed Nation installment this week. I am on a quasi-vacation, and my writing time is more limited. I was working on one, but there was no way I was going to finish it in time. We still have to go to a cider tasting, and then see manatees.

Would you still love me if I had to turn back into a manatee for one week out of every month, and in order for us to be together, you had to become one too, and we had to eat kelp all day…?