Gathering

Each person out there, no matter how normal they might appear, has deeply repressed embarrasing secrets. Dark, hidden turmoil and odd quirks that they cover up on a daily basis to conform to the oh-so-normal world. I can't back that claim up with any actual evidence, but the thought makes me feel better about myself.


Just yesterday, I was whiplashed back towards earth when something bubbled up from the forgotten muck in a conversation at work. It was something that I used to do a long time ago, and something I have tried to hide as well as I can... but as I started talking about it, I got more and more excited, and then... realized I am a complete nerd.


I don't mean a nerd who got all A's in science class (I didn't), I mean a nerd that, well here goes, played Magic: The Gathering. That's right, the same fantasy card game that consumed the weekly allowances, and thusforth the virginity, of the Board And Games club back in high school. The same game you would see a hunched over group of soon-to-be larpers playing at the school cafeteria, shouting out things like 'mana', 'first-strike', and 'sorcery'.

I may have been too embarassed to 'gather' in those public events, but I am not longer going to pretend that I have never let out my inner pointdexter, and tapped to destroy target tapped creature. While not an exercise in social acceptance, the game is fantasic when it comes to learning strategy, vocabulary, and dodging projectile food products from the jock table.

If only those skills proved at least somwhat useful in the real world. One can only keep buying booster packs and hoping. You know you played as well, and if you didn't you wish you did. And if you didn't wish you did, then fine. Go be cool with your cool friends, Cooly McCoolerson. I'm going to dust of my decks and sift through the blissfully isolated world of Magic: The Gathering.