Tuesday, August 16, 2011
Beer Street
My housemates and i have started a new blog. It's like Texts From Last Night meets Shit My Dad Says meets The Jersey Shore. Read it.
Monday, August 15, 2011
It Is Well With My Soul
This song presented me with my first ever theological issue to wrestle with. I remember singing it in church one evening and thinking about how beautiful it was, and then suddenly becoming profoundly uncomfortable with the lines:
Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say,
It is well, it is well with my soul.
Thou hast taught me? I was confronted with an image of God as an unsympathetic math professor saying, "You will use this every day for the rest of your life. You need to learn how to do it right. Say it: It is well with my soul." I didn't have the education to articulate all of my thoughts correctly, but if i had i would have said that i pictured myself as a dog, and God as Pavlov, teaching me to respond in certain arbitrary ways to His predetermined stimuli.
I asked my mom about it. Since we were still in church, she couldn't address the issue fully, and i was left with my question only half-answered. She said that it was less about God teaching us (forcing us to recite) something, and more about us learning (wilfully submitting). But i was still uncomfortable with a God who, when tragedy struck, would ask us to simply recite a cliche refrain and expect us to be comforted. Merely saying that it is well with my soul does not make it so.
I faced a lot of other theological wrestling matches over my life, and this one fell to the wayside. But it was never really resolved. I read The Problem of Pain
, and while it helped, it did not really answer the question. I heard sermons, i read books, and experience taught me. I eventually figured out that "taught" could mean an experiential lesson, that this was not a stern task-master forcing me to recite a memorized lesson; God had "taught" the lyricist to say that by showing him the beauty and peace that exist even in the darkest moments. God became not a Pavlovian dictator, but an advisor who walked beside me to teach me to see beauty in life.
But this was not enough.
There may be a rose growing in the dungheap, but while it may distract you from the grim reality, it does nothing to correct or even lessen it.
Life is full of dungheaps, and there is no good reason for this. The fact that i have been taught to find hope in darkness does not excuse the existence of the darkness in the first place.
I wish i could say that i had recently had some great revelation on this point. I wish i could share twelve alliterative bullet points, or a promise verse, or a piece of wisdom suitable for bumper stickers and t-shirts. I have none of that.
I can tell you that i have found peace to be a far deeper and less joyful concept than i had previously believed. You can be at peace with a situation and still be pissed as hell about it. You can even be pissed at God about it. Being at peace with a situation doesn't mean that you are happy about it, or even that you are neutral about it. I can't tell you yet what 'peace' does mean. I don't know all of the words to explain it, and i haven't completely figured out how to feel it.
Sometimes, even now, when something happens to me or to a loved one, i hear the little bell ring, and i obediently recite the cliches i have been taught.
I know that peace is something you have to fight for. I've seen the t-shirts: "Bombing for peace is like fucking for virginity". I understand the point, but it's not really right. Peace is not something that just happens. It's not the natural order of things. Everyone is born a virgin, but they are born into a world of conflict and pain. Fucking for virginity will get you nowhere. But you can't have peace without a struggle. This is the shape of things.
I have learned this: there is an extent to which merely repeating a worn out cliche does bring some measure of comfort. They are cliches for a reason. Truth does not become less potent with age or use.
And that's all i've got. It is well with my soul, but my mind is troubled. And i guess i'll have to learn to be okay with that.
Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say,
It is well, it is well with my soul.
Thou hast taught me? I was confronted with an image of God as an unsympathetic math professor saying, "You will use this every day for the rest of your life. You need to learn how to do it right. Say it: It is well with my soul." I didn't have the education to articulate all of my thoughts correctly, but if i had i would have said that i pictured myself as a dog, and God as Pavlov, teaching me to respond in certain arbitrary ways to His predetermined stimuli.
I asked my mom about it. Since we were still in church, she couldn't address the issue fully, and i was left with my question only half-answered. She said that it was less about God teaching us (forcing us to recite) something, and more about us learning (wilfully submitting). But i was still uncomfortable with a God who, when tragedy struck, would ask us to simply recite a cliche refrain and expect us to be comforted. Merely saying that it is well with my soul does not make it so.
I faced a lot of other theological wrestling matches over my life, and this one fell to the wayside. But it was never really resolved. I read The Problem of Pain
, and while it helped, it did not really answer the question. I heard sermons, i read books, and experience taught me. I eventually figured out that "taught" could mean an experiential lesson, that this was not a stern task-master forcing me to recite a memorized lesson; God had "taught" the lyricist to say that by showing him the beauty and peace that exist even in the darkest moments. God became not a Pavlovian dictator, but an advisor who walked beside me to teach me to see beauty in life.But this was not enough.
There may be a rose growing in the dungheap, but while it may distract you from the grim reality, it does nothing to correct or even lessen it.
Life is full of dungheaps, and there is no good reason for this. The fact that i have been taught to find hope in darkness does not excuse the existence of the darkness in the first place.
 |
| magnet in my school store |
I can tell you that i have found peace to be a far deeper and less joyful concept than i had previously believed. You can be at peace with a situation and still be pissed as hell about it. You can even be pissed at God about it. Being at peace with a situation doesn't mean that you are happy about it, or even that you are neutral about it. I can't tell you yet what 'peace' does mean. I don't know all of the words to explain it, and i haven't completely figured out how to feel it.
Sometimes, even now, when something happens to me or to a loved one, i hear the little bell ring, and i obediently recite the cliches i have been taught.
I know that peace is something you have to fight for. I've seen the t-shirts: "Bombing for peace is like fucking for virginity". I understand the point, but it's not really right. Peace is not something that just happens. It's not the natural order of things. Everyone is born a virgin, but they are born into a world of conflict and pain. Fucking for virginity will get you nowhere. But you can't have peace without a struggle. This is the shape of things.
I have learned this: there is an extent to which merely repeating a worn out cliche does bring some measure of comfort. They are cliches for a reason. Truth does not become less potent with age or use.
And that's all i've got. It is well with my soul, but my mind is troubled. And i guess i'll have to learn to be okay with that.
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
love languages
Quality time:
John and i spend a lot of quality time together. Recently, we were sitting on my couch while dinner cooked. We were each playing our own game on our own computer. We were not watching TV together, we were not playing a game together, we were not cuddling. We were not even talking. But we were together. We each knew that the other person was there, and it was enough to simply be together in that moment.
We also eat meals together. We go on walks together. We spend time with friends, we go to concerts and plays, we go to church, we sit and talk, we watch movies. Quality time is important to a relationship. Whether participating in a specific event or simply being in the same room while you each do your own thing, the act of occupying the same physical space is powerful and wonderful.
Physical Touch:
This isn't just sex. This is when John and i are driving somewhere and i reach over to run my fingers through his hair. This is when we're at lunch with friends and he touches my knee under the table. This is when we're watching a movie and i lean against him. This is when i roll over in my sleep and he rolls over too, because even asleep he wants to be near me.
This is a simple expression of emotional intimacy. Skin-on-skin contact speaks volumes, and while we still don't fully understand everything about touch communication, we know that it is important and instinctive.
Gifts:
This is more than materialism. This is about sentimentality, tangibility, and permanence. I save everything, even ticket stubs from shows that John has been involved with, because they are a tangible reminder of something special that we shared. Yes, big sparkly diamonds are nice, and they are certainly also a tangible expression of memories and affection, but a gift can be an expression of love even if it is only flowers that you picked from your mother's yard (and John has brought me such flowers twice). Spending a lot of money on someone really does make a statement about your perception of their worth. But so does spending a lot of time making something for them, or spending a lot of energy to find the perfect greeting card.
Gifts are important because you can keep them. Quality time passes by, physical touch is fleeting, words are forgotten and acts of kindness come to an end, but gifts can be preserved. I still have gifts from old boyfriends that i don't even talk to anymore, because they are tangible memories of significant relationships. The relationship may not be in my life anymore, but it was important once, and it is partially responsible for me becoming who i am today.
Acts of kindness:
A few weeks ago, i came home from work to find the kitchen in shambles. We had all been up late the night before and had not cleaned the kitchen before going to bed, and the evening was full of gym trips and social engagements for my roommates. That left me to clean the kitchen or to not eat dinner. Before anything could be cooked or eaten, the dishwasher needed to be emptied and the dishes put away, the dishes in the sink needed to be put in the dishwasher, and several things needed to be washed by hand. The counters needed to be wiped down, the trash needed to be taken out, the stove needed to be cleaned, and the floor needed to be swept and Swiffered.
As i began unloading the dishwasher, John began washing the dishes in the sink. He had not dirtied any of them. I had not asked him to help. I was complaining about the fact that my roommates hadn't done anything in the kitchen, but i was not dropping hints. But he helped me anyway, because i was tired and stressed and he wanted to make my life better.
Words of affirmation:
This one is the most important one to me, but everyone is different. I express myself most easily and understand others most clearly through words. This is why i write letters, this is why i ask questions, this is why it kills me that i don't have a word to express how i feel. There is far less ambiguity in words than in anything else. A touch on the arm could be affectionate or accidental. Helping me with the dishes could be an act of love or a desire to hurry up and get the kitchen clean already so i can make your dinner. A gift could be meaningless to you, whatever significance it has to me, and quality time could simply be killing time until something happens. But words are what they are.
I save text messages and post-it notes from John. This poem was written almost entirely from those texts, notes, and actual out-loud conversations. Words matter to me. Gifts are great. Spending time together is great. Doing nice things for one another is great. Physical affection is great (actually, physical affection with John is amazing). They say that actions speak louder than words. But words speak more clearly.
John and i spend a lot of quality time together. Recently, we were sitting on my couch while dinner cooked. We were each playing our own game on our own computer. We were not watching TV together, we were not playing a game together, we were not cuddling. We were not even talking. But we were together. We each knew that the other person was there, and it was enough to simply be together in that moment.
We also eat meals together. We go on walks together. We spend time with friends, we go to concerts and plays, we go to church, we sit and talk, we watch movies. Quality time is important to a relationship. Whether participating in a specific event or simply being in the same room while you each do your own thing, the act of occupying the same physical space is powerful and wonderful.
Physical Touch:
This isn't just sex. This is when John and i are driving somewhere and i reach over to run my fingers through his hair. This is when we're at lunch with friends and he touches my knee under the table. This is when we're watching a movie and i lean against him. This is when i roll over in my sleep and he rolls over too, because even asleep he wants to be near me.
This is a simple expression of emotional intimacy. Skin-on-skin contact speaks volumes, and while we still don't fully understand everything about touch communication, we know that it is important and instinctive.
Gifts:
This is more than materialism. This is about sentimentality, tangibility, and permanence. I save everything, even ticket stubs from shows that John has been involved with, because they are a tangible reminder of something special that we shared. Yes, big sparkly diamonds are nice, and they are certainly also a tangible expression of memories and affection, but a gift can be an expression of love even if it is only flowers that you picked from your mother's yard (and John has brought me such flowers twice). Spending a lot of money on someone really does make a statement about your perception of their worth. But so does spending a lot of time making something for them, or spending a lot of energy to find the perfect greeting card.
Gifts are important because you can keep them. Quality time passes by, physical touch is fleeting, words are forgotten and acts of kindness come to an end, but gifts can be preserved. I still have gifts from old boyfriends that i don't even talk to anymore, because they are tangible memories of significant relationships. The relationship may not be in my life anymore, but it was important once, and it is partially responsible for me becoming who i am today.
Acts of kindness:
A few weeks ago, i came home from work to find the kitchen in shambles. We had all been up late the night before and had not cleaned the kitchen before going to bed, and the evening was full of gym trips and social engagements for my roommates. That left me to clean the kitchen or to not eat dinner. Before anything could be cooked or eaten, the dishwasher needed to be emptied and the dishes put away, the dishes in the sink needed to be put in the dishwasher, and several things needed to be washed by hand. The counters needed to be wiped down, the trash needed to be taken out, the stove needed to be cleaned, and the floor needed to be swept and Swiffered.
As i began unloading the dishwasher, John began washing the dishes in the sink. He had not dirtied any of them. I had not asked him to help. I was complaining about the fact that my roommates hadn't done anything in the kitchen, but i was not dropping hints. But he helped me anyway, because i was tired and stressed and he wanted to make my life better.
Words of affirmation:
This one is the most important one to me, but everyone is different. I express myself most easily and understand others most clearly through words. This is why i write letters, this is why i ask questions, this is why it kills me that i don't have a word to express how i feel. There is far less ambiguity in words than in anything else. A touch on the arm could be affectionate or accidental. Helping me with the dishes could be an act of love or a desire to hurry up and get the kitchen clean already so i can make your dinner. A gift could be meaningless to you, whatever significance it has to me, and quality time could simply be killing time until something happens. But words are what they are.
I save text messages and post-it notes from John. This poem was written almost entirely from those texts, notes, and actual out-loud conversations. Words matter to me. Gifts are great. Spending time together is great. Doing nice things for one another is great. Physical affection is great (actually, physical affection with John is amazing). They say that actions speak louder than words. But words speak more clearly.
Friday, August 5, 2011
God is Love
We say this so often that it has lost all meaning. Think about it: what do you mean when you say that God is love? What do you think of when someone says it to you?
God is love?
If taken to its fullest extent, it must be reversed: love is God. Every time we show love to one another, it is God.
If taken to its fullest extent, it must be reversed: love is God. Every time we show love to one another, it is God.
Continue in this train of thought for a time: God is nothing more or less than love, nothing more or less than emotion, nothing more or less than charity, friendship, and trust. God is not a being, but a feeling.
For what elevates us like love? Everyone from two to a hundred suffers agonies and celebrates triumphs because of it. There is no passion quite like it, no emotion that can come near it in terms of its power to shape and hold us. Is it so different from our ideas of God: an all-powerful being or force, which has some measure of control over all of us, which we can never completely understand, and which all of us need in order to be fulfilled? Is it so outrageous to suggest that Love might, after all, be this thing that we have worshipped?
Don’t walk away. I’m not finished yet.
The truth is, love is God. God is the God of emotion, the God of charity, friendship, and trust, the God of interactions, of relationships, of intimacy. Any time that we open ourselves to another person, God is indeed in that openness.
All love is love, as i said before. And while it may be true that only God is capable of a love so deep, so pure, and so strong as to be called “agape”, it is also true that all love springs from this. The most shallow, tainted, and weak attachments have their roots in agape, for God is love is love is God. It’s all the same.
Do not misunderstand me. I am not claiming that God is only emotion; rather i am claiming that this particular emotion is more than just a feeling that we sometimes experience. And do not make the mistake of believing that this idea in some way degrades God. It is not humbling to say that God is love; rather, it is elevating to say that love is God. We are all capable of some form of love. We are therefore all able to see God, and to be God to others.
Yes, love is God. No love is possible apart from God. Perhaps this is the Divine Spark that is in each of us, this ability to love. Perhaps this is what makes us the children of God.
For love is a powerful force, one more healing than compassion and more destructive than hate. Love creates both connections and divisions. Love made whole makes both the lover and the loved whole with it; love broken breaks us.
Love is something beyond our comprehension, something that makes life worth living. How can we doubt that it is closely related to the nature of God? How can we doubt that God is love; and, once we have accepted that, how can we doubt that love is God?
1 John 4:7-19
Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed His love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through Him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and His love is made complete in us.
We know that we live in Him and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit. And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent His Son to be the Savior of the world. If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he in God. And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are like Him. There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.
We love because He first loved us.
For what elevates us like love? Everyone from two to a hundred suffers agonies and celebrates triumphs because of it. There is no passion quite like it, no emotion that can come near it in terms of its power to shape and hold us. Is it so different from our ideas of God: an all-powerful being or force, which has some measure of control over all of us, which we can never completely understand, and which all of us need in order to be fulfilled? Is it so outrageous to suggest that Love might, after all, be this thing that we have worshipped?
Don’t walk away. I’m not finished yet.
The truth is, love is God. God is the God of emotion, the God of charity, friendship, and trust, the God of interactions, of relationships, of intimacy. Any time that we open ourselves to another person, God is indeed in that openness.
All love is love, as i said before. And while it may be true that only God is capable of a love so deep, so pure, and so strong as to be called “agape”, it is also true that all love springs from this. The most shallow, tainted, and weak attachments have their roots in agape, for God is love is love is God. It’s all the same.
Do not misunderstand me. I am not claiming that God is only emotion; rather i am claiming that this particular emotion is more than just a feeling that we sometimes experience. And do not make the mistake of believing that this idea in some way degrades God. It is not humbling to say that God is love; rather, it is elevating to say that love is God. We are all capable of some form of love. We are therefore all able to see God, and to be God to others.
Yes, love is God. No love is possible apart from God. Perhaps this is the Divine Spark that is in each of us, this ability to love. Perhaps this is what makes us the children of God.
For love is a powerful force, one more healing than compassion and more destructive than hate. Love creates both connections and divisions. Love made whole makes both the lover and the loved whole with it; love broken breaks us.
Love is something beyond our comprehension, something that makes life worth living. How can we doubt that it is closely related to the nature of God? How can we doubt that God is love; and, once we have accepted that, how can we doubt that love is God?
1 John 4:7-19
Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed His love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through Him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and His love is made complete in us.
We know that we live in Him and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit. And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent His Son to be the Savior of the world. If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he in God. And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are like Him. There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.
We love because He first loved us.
(bolding mine)
Thursday, August 4, 2011
Agape
Someone once said that when we are young, we believe that there is only one kind of love. Then, when we are older, we believe that there are many kinds of love, and that the Greeks had different names for all of them. And then, when we are older still, we know that there is only one kind of love; though it is deep and many-faceted, every layer of it is still love.
Countless books, sermons, and devotionals have been written on the different kinds of love. Every word was penned in the devout and sincere hope that it would help to clarify this complicated topic; but more often than not we are left more confused than ever, these brief flashes of illuminated thought having served to blind rather than enlighten us.
Countless books, sermons, and devotionals have been written on the different kinds of love. Every word was penned in the devout and sincere hope that it would help to clarify this complicated topic; but more often than not we are left more confused than ever, these brief flashes of illuminated thought having served to blind rather than enlighten us.
I think we overcomplicate love. Yes, love expresses itself in a lot of different ways. Not all of these ways are healthy, and not all of them are obvious. We do not all experience love in the same way. We do not all express love in the same way.
But we do all love. Some of us are shy of our emotions and give our love only to a few. Some of us are starved for love. Some of us are prodigal with our love, and some of us are surrounded by it. But love is something we all have access to on some level. Love is something we can all give, something we can all have.
We are told that only God can love completely and perfectly. But we all can love God, and His love in us can bring us to new heights and depths. We’ve been told to read through the “love chapter” and replace every instance of the word “love” with God’s name. We’ve been told that this is a good way to understand what God is like.
We are called to love with the love of God. If we read the love chapter and replace each instance of the word “love” with our own names, will this not teach us a more excellent way? Will this not show us how we are to behave toward one another and toward God?
1 Corinthians 13
If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.
1 Corinthians 13
If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.
(bolding mine)
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
all for love
I'm an odd mix of cynicism and romance, as you've probably gathered from the posts so far. But this post will be a departure from the norm. In this case, romance totally trumps cynicism.
These are wonderful people and they are definitely worth a dollar.
http://www.marrymeemily.blogspot.com/
Emily is one of my dearest friends. Even if you don't necessarily support either of them, you should still give money so i can wear a pretty dress and give an embarassing toast at their wedding. I promise i'll post a funny and touching (and probably slightly cynical) story about it!
These are wonderful people and they are definitely worth a dollar.
http://www.marrymeemily.blogspot.com/
Emily is one of my dearest friends. Even if you don't necessarily support either of them, you should still give money so i can wear a pretty dress and give an embarassing toast at their wedding. I promise i'll post a funny and touching (and probably slightly cynical) story about it!
Monday, August 1, 2011
Trapped in a Video Game
I have always had an overactive imagination. I'm not sure whether my imagination grew from restricted TV/computer privileges or whether the pre-existing imagination made the restrictions bearable, but the fact remains that as a child, i was only allowed one hour of TV or computer time each day. For those of you who think you may have read that sentence wrong, allow me to reiterate: in a given day, i could watch one hour of TV, or i could use the computer for one hour. When i was in middle school, the growing prevalence of longer films such as The Fellowship of the Ring
convinced my parents to extend our priveleges to three hours a day. But by then, i had already spent much of my childhood outdoors.
Keep in mind that one hour of computer time was hardly restrictive to a seven-year-old in the pre-Facebook era. I mostly used my computer time to play computer games
, and i was perfectly happy to invent my own games when not reading or watching "The Magic Schoolbus". In fact, my siblings and i often invented games together. We'd play slaves or pirates or war (or some combination of the three) on the dirt pile by the deck. We'd climb to the top of the swingset and inch our way across. I'm not sure what the point of this was, but it was fun. We'd deconstruct our plastic play house and rearrange the parts into castles and businesses. We'd make whirlpools in the swimming pool, we'd prepare for an apocalypse-level natural disaster in the corner by the peach trees, and we'd build houses out of discarded tree limbs and bricks found in our grandmother's back yard. But our favorite game of all was "Trapped in a Video Game".
The fact that none of us had ever played a video game until 2000 or so did not deter us one whit. We played this game for several years, often adding sequels to the original game that had started us on this crazy adventure.
I'm not sure where the idea came from. I know we were aware of video games, and i know we'd seen Jumanji
, so it's possible that it was some combination of the two.
Basically, a highly-anticipated video game was released on the black market. The reason it was only available illegally is that every single person who had played it during the testing phase had mysteriously disappeared. No one knew what had happened to them, but since this epidemic was only affecting players, it was assumed that there was some kind of link. Of course, since this story was written by Hollywood -- i mean, a bunch of homeschooled children who had never played video games -- the game continued through all the testing phases despite the ill-defined danger that threatened all players and was released, albeit illegally.
My siblings and i got our hands on a copy of the game and began playing. It was prefaced by a disclaimer, warning us of the danger that awaited all players. We ignored it, chose our characters, and began to play. Suddenly, we were pulled into the TV screen! We dissolved into pixels and found ourselves inside of a strange, digital world. We realized (because we were psychic, i suppose) that we had to play through the game and defeat it in order to escape and rescue the other players. None of them had been able to finish playing yet because none of them had our intelligence, strength of character, physical fitness, or resilience. (Also, though we didn't know enough about video games to think of this, because most of them were testers who were stuck in a beta test version full of bugs and half-written story lines.)
We were eventually victorious, of course. The game involved a number of dangerous challenges, such as climbing on top of swingsets and jumping around on dirt piles and battling fierce (imaginary) foes. The sequels that i mentioned before all happened as a result of our cunning and courage. After everyone had been freed (and made up some more plausible excuse for their disappearance than "sucked into a TV screen and trapped in the video game"), the makers decided that their game wasn't so dangerous after all. And since we had "defeated" it, ordinary citizens could now play without danger of entrapment. So the weird rumors died out, the game became immensely popular, and the makers decided to capitalize on their success by creating a sequel. Whose testers all mysteriously disappeared.
By the time we got to the third or fourth sequel, the world had pretty much figured out the pattern: testers all disappear, game somehow gets finished anyway, banned because of disappearances, sold on the black market, and then somehow everyone shows up again and the game is fine. So legally, of course, the games couldn't be sold, but no one in our imaginary universe really cared if the games continued to be made and sold. And so my siblings and i were able to buy all the sequels as soon as they were released, and save the world over and over again for many years. You're welcome, world.
And if you're thinking that this all sounds a lot like Spy Kids 3, i'd remind you that these games had pretty much ended by 1998 or 1999, while the first Spy Kids movie didn't come out until 2001. And also that we didn't use any lame 3D special effects.
convinced my parents to extend our priveleges to three hours a day. But by then, i had already spent much of my childhood outdoors.Keep in mind that one hour of computer time was hardly restrictive to a seven-year-old in the pre-Facebook era. I mostly used my computer time to play computer games
, and i was perfectly happy to invent my own games when not reading or watching "The Magic Schoolbus". In fact, my siblings and i often invented games together. We'd play slaves or pirates or war (or some combination of the three) on the dirt pile by the deck. We'd climb to the top of the swingset and inch our way across. I'm not sure what the point of this was, but it was fun. We'd deconstruct our plastic play house and rearrange the parts into castles and businesses. We'd make whirlpools in the swimming pool, we'd prepare for an apocalypse-level natural disaster in the corner by the peach trees, and we'd build houses out of discarded tree limbs and bricks found in our grandmother's back yard. But our favorite game of all was "Trapped in a Video Game".The fact that none of us had ever played a video game until 2000 or so did not deter us one whit. We played this game for several years, often adding sequels to the original game that had started us on this crazy adventure.
I'm not sure where the idea came from. I know we were aware of video games, and i know we'd seen Jumanji
, so it's possible that it was some combination of the two.Basically, a highly-anticipated video game was released on the black market. The reason it was only available illegally is that every single person who had played it during the testing phase had mysteriously disappeared. No one knew what had happened to them, but since this epidemic was only affecting players, it was assumed that there was some kind of link. Of course, since this story was written by Hollywood -- i mean, a bunch of homeschooled children who had never played video games -- the game continued through all the testing phases despite the ill-defined danger that threatened all players and was released, albeit illegally.
My siblings and i got our hands on a copy of the game and began playing. It was prefaced by a disclaimer, warning us of the danger that awaited all players. We ignored it, chose our characters, and began to play. Suddenly, we were pulled into the TV screen! We dissolved into pixels and found ourselves inside of a strange, digital world. We realized (because we were psychic, i suppose) that we had to play through the game and defeat it in order to escape and rescue the other players. None of them had been able to finish playing yet because none of them had our intelligence, strength of character, physical fitness, or resilience. (Also, though we didn't know enough about video games to think of this, because most of them were testers who were stuck in a beta test version full of bugs and half-written story lines.)
We were eventually victorious, of course. The game involved a number of dangerous challenges, such as climbing on top of swingsets and jumping around on dirt piles and battling fierce (imaginary) foes. The sequels that i mentioned before all happened as a result of our cunning and courage. After everyone had been freed (and made up some more plausible excuse for their disappearance than "sucked into a TV screen and trapped in the video game"), the makers decided that their game wasn't so dangerous after all. And since we had "defeated" it, ordinary citizens could now play without danger of entrapment. So the weird rumors died out, the game became immensely popular, and the makers decided to capitalize on their success by creating a sequel. Whose testers all mysteriously disappeared.
By the time we got to the third or fourth sequel, the world had pretty much figured out the pattern: testers all disappear, game somehow gets finished anyway, banned because of disappearances, sold on the black market, and then somehow everyone shows up again and the game is fine. So legally, of course, the games couldn't be sold, but no one in our imaginary universe really cared if the games continued to be made and sold. And so my siblings and i were able to buy all the sequels as soon as they were released, and save the world over and over again for many years. You're welcome, world.
And if you're thinking that this all sounds a lot like Spy Kids 3, i'd remind you that these games had pretty much ended by 1998 or 1999, while the first Spy Kids movie didn't come out until 2001. And also that we didn't use any lame 3D special effects.
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