Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Part 2: Everything During

Continuing from the previous post, I was in my freshman year of high school when I came to the realization and knowledge that I was going to put my life on hold until I could actually be who I wanted to be.  I decided that I'd try to enjoy myself and see where it led.  If I were going to make it through, I'd have to find ways to amuse myself.  After a few more years of trying to fit in with the same group of friends I had forever, I gave up and started hanging out with others who were more into video games and music.  I was only about a million times happier!

 I was also what we called at my school, a bandie.  I played drums starting in the 5th grade, all through Junior High, finishing on snare drum my senior year.  In 5th and 6th grade, I was the best drummer.  Even in junior high I was in the top 3.  Once I hit high school though, it was very different.  I was still good, and could have learned the rhythms, but drummers don't play from sheet music.  You memorize everything.  The problem is, none of the upperclassmen wanted to teach me how to play.  Since I wasn't cool, there was no chance of learning from them unless they were forced to do so.  The other people who played drum were not bad people I'm sure, they were just dicks.  They could play really well, but they just did everything they could to make me feel like I was less of a person than them.    I wouldn't finally enjoy myself in band until my junior year.

Freshman year, I met the best friend that I have ever had.  We both were kind of in the same boat, and we still have a great time today when we hang out.  Usually after a football game or pep band, she'd pick us up and we'd all hang out over at her place.  Our first time over, we played Final Fantasy VII.  It was the first time I'd ever touched the game and I never looked back after.  It was so much of what I wanted, and there was Aerith.  Later that same year, Final Fantasy VIII came out, and I found one Sir Laguna Loire, with whom I fell madly, yet secretly, in love.  That's pretty much when I knew there was no going back to girls.

She also started my interest in all things anime and manga.  Although I had watched Sailor Moon and Megaman growing up, I had never really known much about the world of anime and manga.  I had watched a few episodes of Ronin Warriors too, but never understood it of course.  Finally, it all came together when I saw Record of Lodoss War.  Well, to be more specific, after I saw Karla and especially Orson.  I started watching lots of series through another mutual friend who had a higher speed connection, and downloaded lots and lots of series for us.  She and I also stood in line from 5:30 until midnight waiting for the release of the PS2.  We clutched them in our arms after we paid and ran out like nutcases.

My best friend also inspired me to start writing my own series.  If she and her boyfriend hadn't been as big of fans of Dungeons and Dragons, and working on their own stories, I never would have gotten into it as much.  Of course, part of that had to do with playing some really fun games with awesomely bad story lines.  So the more I thought about it, I began writing. This was my sophomore year of high school.  Without her, I don't think I would have made it through high school.

Meanwhile, school became more and more unpleasant.  My best friend graduated, and went to the local college.  We'd still hang out, but it meant I would only see her the weekends from then on.  If I could have just done the work and not had to deal with all of the morons, I would have been more than happy.  My sophomore year of high school was a ridiculous farce as to what education should have been.  That whole year of school was enough to make me want to have taken my GED, and left early.  Of course, my parents had no idea what was going on, and just kept telling me the same thing; just finish up at your high school and then you can get on with your life.

6 comments:

  1. Hi tamayn,
    I'm Tim, live near Tours.
    I wanted to tell you I have been enjoying, and learning lots about France as an expat.
    I am having fun with this new design, it is a bit like watching "Avatar" ....compared to the old...I do miss your photo as identity..
    So, interesting stuff here! You write well.
    I notice in comments we often visit the same places on what I call, the blog crawl!

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  2. Hi Tim! Tours is a beautiful area. I spent some time in Vendôme with family before we moved to Rennes. We also spent about a week in Tours, which was a lot of fun. It was the first time I had Quick and Hippopotamus.

    I'm not sure what to really think of the new design. I tried to keep it as focused on the writing as possible. I mean, photos are nice, but they take a lot of pagination to do right. I may play around more with styles before I decide on one.

    As I've said before, as long as people find it interesting or helpful, I'll continue. Part of the reason I stopped before was because it seemed a bit like screaming into the darkness.

    Quant à la blog crawl qu'on partage, I'm sure I'll see you around! :-)

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  3. Did you get that template from Blogger?

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  4. Yeah, it's one of the new dynamic templates. I'm good with computers, but programming isn't my strong suit. CSS and Frames still scare the crap out of me.

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  5. I see you came back to a more simple design! I must admit, I still prefer these ones. This one in particular is the same as the one on my blog except I changed the background image.

    I think you would get along with my 25 yo nephew. He is also working on his story and drawing all his caracters manga style. I think he started drawing even before he could write his name. ;)

    The whole D&D arrived just a little bit too late for me to catch up on it, but I'm sure I would have dive into this craze.

    We all had our own refuge. And my parents told me EXACTLY the same thing: "Finish high school"!
    ;)
    Hugs
    Jon

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  6. I did like the idea of the new template, but I felt like it might have been scaring some people off. It's a bit picky, and I'm not sure if it runs HTML 5 or Flash, but either way, it was probably slogging down some people's connections. In the end, I decided it was better to be a bit more traditional.

    Manga style is great because of the variety it can give a story. I only got into drawing because of my brother and friends in college.

    Also, it's never to late to dungeon master it up!

    I do also wonder how many people just had parents tell them high school's another hoop to jump through, so get it done?

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