Ender's Beginning
The frost on my window made it hard to see on the way home
It is 4:47 AM as I start typing this. I just got back from Earl's. I had a wonderful time. It was interesting because I sometimes wondered if what keeps our little group going is the fact that we have our activities to work around. But tonight, we didn't have an RPG session, neither did we play videogames. We did play a couple board games (the last three board games we have played have been Star Wars themed oddly enough, but afterwards was when things become magical.
Kevin's room, where we were playing the board games, is like a time capsule back to 1989. We pulled out a box of GI Joes and started looking through them. I was pointing out which ones I used to have before Justin and I substituted them for hockey pucks one lazy summer afternoon. We reminesced how we would use these figures in our various storylines we had devised as kids.
Somehow, perhaps it's just natural, but we each picked out a figure and started interacting with each other. I selected a member from Cobra. He was bright red, wore a helmet, and had a Cobra image on his chest. I liked his look. My guy snuck around a back way and stole an assault vehicle. I picked up a couple of guys on the way. Then we just switched from character to character, creating names, personalities, and situations with ease. There was a familiarity with this thought process, something that felt lost, but never gone, unnurtured. I think it was the fact that you could create and make-believe and not pay the consequences of your actions. It's not like creating a story where you are stuck with and limited by the character you create or with D&D where you make a character and you are stuck with him. With action figures, you don't create but you interact. In a way, it's a little more natural. Since you're not creating from scratch you have to respond to what's already there. Since we don't watch a GI Joe TV show, the personality of a particular figure is unknown to us. We can only go off of the visual hints that the figure's appearance provides. And I think what you do is that you in order to fill in these spaces, you learn to use archetypes because it feels like the most natural thing to do. Like I said, I felt like I was exercising a neglected muscle, but it was better in a way this time around. Since we are older and smarter, we were able to come up with witty remarks and clever rejoinders.
Later, we got army men and had a battle. It was basically Justin against Earl and I with Kevin controlling our snipers. It's kind of funny how these battles work. I had never played with Army Men, this was a new experience. Basically, we set up our two battalions and then as combat commences we say what our soldier is going to do and suggest an effect, then it is up to the other person to follow through. So Earl will say "he loads a cartridge and fires over here," then it's up to Justin to knock over some guys. Since we're older and know this doesn't matter, there are no squabbles over who wins like "I shot you," "No, you didn't." It was purely about the experiential self and if you can transcend yourself into that mode it is truly a wonderful state. I spent my time in the back. All of the army radio men were huddled together making long distance phone calls. The most absurd part came at the end of the battle. Both armies had been decimated except for the General of Justin's battalion, a ninja. All of a sudden, the god of the battle field, Kevin's life-size army helmet, appeared, towering overhead. The chin strap hung towards the ground, spinning around, clearing soldiers like a helicopter. It developed that this supposed War God couldn't speak and would try to communicate with a morse code of chin strap slaps. In a vain attempt of communication it nudged a tank towards the confused Ninja General. The Ninja lifted and tossed the tank and War God chased after like a dog after a stick. The helmet brought it back to be tossed again. To me, this didn't feel that weird, because it kind of naturally led to this point. Earl pointed out that we were using a plastic ninja figure to play catch with a metal helmet using a toy tank. My answer to that: damn straight.
Sure I'm twenty one and I spent last night playing with action figures and I'm aware that I'm supposed to feel bad or immature about it. But I don't. I also don't feel embarrassed about it either. Maybe it's because I've reached a point were I increasingly don't allow others to dictate my reality. The idea that this is childish is absurd considering what happens when you witness "adults" in action. Truth is, adults are just as needy and selfish as kids, despite their "responsibilities". The thing is that they retain the negative aspects of childhood. I don't want to let go of the magic of life. And at this point, I don't want to rekindle it by living vicariously through someone else. I think of the astronomers who every day find something new and amazing about the universe. And the things they don't know they dream about, conjuring all of the possibilities. I want to have the astronomer's point of view. I will die soon. When I do, I will think I had lived a long life. But it will be quick and will be dead, no more. Until then, I want to be the astronomer of my universe, probing, trying. I'm not going to not attempt things like drawing because I don't draw well compared to others. I'm not going to not try to fix my computer because it's too hard. I've spent the past couple of days pushing myself to finish my little picturebook movie for Neal's Christmas Theater of The Macabre party and I will be pushing just as hard to write an adaptation of A Christmas Carol for our puppet show on Christmas Eve. I want to make it a tradition. Performing a puppet show every Christmas Eve. I'm twenty one. It seems too late to start something like that now. If I was really talented, a genius, I would've started this back when I was ten. But I'm not. Quite frankly, I'm rather ordinary and not very talented despite the narrative I tell myself. When I was twelve, I think I was terrified to create. How could I bring something new to the world when there is already so much there? I wonder if I learned this behavior. Whether or not, I don't have to follow it now. Sam Gamgee said that there are some things worth fighting for. He wasn't talking about eradicating evil, but to have the ability to enjoy life and oneself. This is the Christmas season, the most stressful time of the year for most people. But there is something wonderful, magical in the air right now. It's not inherent. It's something that you have to create for yourself as you get older. Somehow this makes it all the more wonderful. Fellowship, friendship. Things I cherish. Creativity, creation, divine yet so human. Filter the commercialism, the materialism, and focus on the intangibles. The things you work towards but never get to touch. Those feelings accesible years later through a distinctive smell. Take the things you love, Victorian carols, holly leaves, gingerbread cookies, eggnog, and enjoy that intangible feeling of holiday that these combined elements create. By putting these elements together or whatever elements that make reminesce of warm things of the past, you become a creator of atmosphere. You transcend into the experiential self and let the spirit of your creation carry you to new things. It is now 6:15 AM.
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