Memory Lane….

God gave us our memories so that we might have roses in December.

J.M. Barrie

                With that thought in mind this week I wish to speak of the power of memories. Both of our own separate life’s experiences and those we share with the remarkable people as we journey thru this fragile shell we call life. Sometimes an event might be regarded as a mere footnote in the pages of our lives by outside observers but their impact on our personalities and expectations can be as profound to the individual as the birth of a child or the happiness we feel at achieving our hearts desire. That being said allow me to share a few observations over the past week on a “trip” my wife and I made to Independence MO.

                I preface this story by stating my wife, the lovely and gracious Mary, and I are members of an online gaming community called “The Wrath of Zero, Path of Ascension”. Something akin to the old school Dungeons and Dragons role playing game that was all the rage back when I was in High School. Now before I start taking hits on how ‘evil’ those games are bear in mind that I DO know the difference between fact and fiction and taken at their face value, these games can be anything from harmless escapism to general all around fun and adventure. It’s all a matter of perspective.

                Allow me to jog a few memories of what it was like growing up in the 70’s. On T.V. we were watching the ABC Movie of the Week , All in the Family, The Bionic Woman, Lavern and Shirley, Maude, Phyllis, Rhoda, Sanford & Son, Six Million Dollar Man, Alice, Dallas, Dukes of Hazzard, Flo, Mash, One Day at a Time, 60 Minutes, That’s Incredible, and Three’s Company. On the radio our music heroes were Stevie Wonder, Edwin Starr (His 1 hit wonder was “War”), Creedence Clearwater Revival, Aretha Franklin (the ORIGINAL “Queen”), Jefferson Starship, Pointer Sisters, Glen Campbell (“Rhinestone Cowboy” was cutesy but worth a mention here), The Isley Brothers, The Knack (Another 1 hit wonder with “My Sharona”), and Michael Jackson. Growing up in a small town the TV and radio were our trusted outlets to what was happening in the real world.

                Quick primers for the uninitiated, role-playing games are “fiction in action.”  Each player develops one or more fictitious characters as his “playing pieces.”  The game involves the activities, interactions and experiences of these fictitious folks.  Characters can vary greatly, depending on the game system and the situation and whim of the players.  You can have people of various types, legendary beings like elves or goblins, and even the bizarre such as aliens.  The end result is a mix of storytelling, sheer creativity and moving fiction. Most of the Role Playing games of the 70s were in the medieval Mythic genre and it was here where a select group of my friends and I would meet to “Fight” ogres, Dragons, trolls, and a whole host of creatures that populated these worlds.  We each learned what the other was like as a human being based on the social mores each gave their player characters. These games do allow you to choose your alignment, be it any combination from Lawful good to chaotic evil. For example, my childhood friend Dale would ALWAYS play lawful Evil and he did it well. Dale is now the District Attorney of Amarillo, so was it prophetic or just a coincidence?

                Many Friday night we would meet at one another’s house with our ever present Players guides, our many sided die, (One of the females of the group, Kellie, had a 100 sided dice set and she never would tell me where she bought them), and our snacks (usually Dr Pepper and Doritos but we found out this varies from group to group). While the Dungeon Master was dealing with an individual in our group the other present would talk about the little things in life that were important to us at the time. So many plans were made that we “swore” we do. For the most part a few of us were able to achieve our goals and dreams but we tried to meet them with the exuberance of youth.  I swore to travel around the world and did so 3 times before I was 21 in the US Navy. John wanted to be an Astronomer but ended up working for an equipment rental company. He married a woman from Scotland and even though they were never able to have children they have dedicated their lives to being Foster parents for children that are considered terminal cases by DHS. They know these children won’t live long but for a short time these children will know love and caring.

                Danny, the artistic one wanted to be a great artist. He now is a Drafter for a Houston architect firm and he still does it old school with mechanical pencils and the like. Kellie wanted to teach school and she does so now as a special education teacher in our home town of Lake Worth. Gary wanted to play pro baseball and was good enough to pass the tryout for the Texas Rangers. Sadly Gary was found to have a small hole in his heart and did not pass the physical. He ran a fairly successful entertainment business till he died of a heart attack @ 10 years ago. Elvin was the enigma of our group. We always knew he was a cowboy and would end up riding in a rodeo somewhere. He did end up for a bit in the amateur circuit but the last time I heard he was “Shacked up” with a much older woman in Corpus Christie trailer park.           

                Many nights we would play into the early morning hours sometimes dozing off in our chair to be awakened by an attacking dragon or band of half-orcs. Usually when we did manage to get a couple of hours sleep we would wake up and reach for our morning DR Pepper and Doritos. Most of the friendships we cultivated during our gaming sessions have carried out and lasted all these many years through the joys and the heartaches of life.

                A little over 2 years ago I received a birthday gift from my brother-in law. Most people know him as Madmike in the gaming communities. The birthday gift was the boxed set for Neverwinter Nights and the expansion packs. It looked interesting and the cover art brought back fond memories of all the gaming nights so long ago. When I installed the game on my lap top I had failed to notice the statement on the box “Join the growing on-line gaming community”. When I reached the startup screen one of the options I saw was “Join Internet Game” so on a lark I chose that option. I was suddenly inundated with choices to join not just action games but adventure, arena, roleplaying, and any combination thereof. I took the first choice of “action” and this led to another screen that had more choices than I dreamed of.

                As I scrolled thru the choices there were a few I recognized from playing the ‘pen and paper games’ like forgotten realms and Ravens loft. I noticed at the bottom one called Wrath of Zero POA and my curiosity was piqued. I made my selection and the die was cast. After I created my first character I logged on the game to find myself on a boat being asked questions by the boat’s captain. After a successfully answering the questions, on my 3^rd try, I was sent to the “Front” of a town called Ascension. As I was standing there taking stock of the equipment I was given all of a sudden some crazed person called “Arazern” shouted “YOU WANKER”. I thought to myself “this bears closer investigation so thus began my career on “WoZ”. 

                During my time on WoZ I have met many people with interesting names such as Arazern, Lethalshell, Dacrimera, Wizardkiller, Narcheska, Sasquatch, Canyonclimb, Red 88, and I was finally able to find the person to place the blame for every problem in the world. Someone called Morvis. (I know he’s real because his name is the only one that doesn’t trigger my ‘spellchecker’ wavy red line. We all have shared many an epic adventure on the site and I am glad to call these people friends. Once I installed a program called Team Speak on my computer I opened up an entire new level of game play. Party members no longer had to type in their response and were able to talk in real time. I admit at first all we talked about was the game but over time we all started to talk about life in general as I did “back in the day”. Since then I have seen the next generation of players arrive on the scene.

                Another aspect was we find ourselves interacting with people not just in our own towns but now we have become a global family with people in faraway places such as Brazil, England, Romania, Africa, and as far away as Australia. We all find out that regardless of age and location, we all still have the same basic dreams and goals as I did long ago. Nevets is a young gentleman from ‘across the big pond’ who is somewhat of a music lover. Morvis (my science advisor) is a neighbor from the north whose name I can’t reveal (has something to do with some import/export law on hazardous material), Red 88, Arazern, Lethalshell, and Narcheska are from Australia and I have enjoyed so many of their ‘unique’ perspectives on life. Oh and who can forget my amigo Coco from Brazil? He is the clown of the group and it’s always a riot to game with him.

                All this leads up to last weekend. About 1 ½ months ago I heard Dacrimera and Narcheska talking about a Labor Day Bar-B-Que Dacrimera was having and it was suggested that since Narcheska was going on a world tour why not stop by his house in Independence MO. And have a real cookout KC style. She agreed and soon the word was out, “Narcheska invades America”. I turned to my wife and asked “?” and she replied “!”. That’s the benefit of being together so long. Sometimes words are not needed.

                After booking our flight on priceline.com (So this is what retired star fleet captain’s do) we waited with anticipation. And we finally flew from Mission Texas to Kansas City MO on the 30^th of august. We soon were booked into a motel on the plaza near downtown KC. After a phone call we got Dacrimera’s address and began our journey of discovery of this DM that we had talked to so many times in the game. It was about a 25 minute drive from the motel to his house and during that time both Mary and I were a bit apprehensive. What type of people were Dacrimera and his wife? Who else would show up? Should we have stayed home and just lived with our opinions of who these people were? Would they even like us?

                We realized that you can’t live your life in the twilight zone of never knowing “what could have been” so we decided, come hell or high water, we would meet these people. As we found their street I slowed down and started looking for their address. We soon found it and my first impression was “Nice house”. The front stairs were a bit high for my liking but that’s a story for another day. As we nervously climbed the stairs I reached out and hit the doorbell and the front door opened to…. A young couple that was in their mid to late 30’s and no different than any other couple you would see walking down the street. Where the difference lied was the twinkle or gleam in their eyes (Dac later said it was allergies to his cat). After the obligatory handshakes and hugs all the way around we were invited into the “Lair”. We were soon talking about the game and Mary was talking to Dac’s wife about everything in general and nothing in particular. After a few hours of “Quality game time” with this DM, Dac and I talked about our past experiences and found his history was not that much different than mine.

                All of us that night in just a few short hours went from complete strangers to ‘old friends’ and the personalities they shared with us on-line came shining thru like a beacon in the darkness. Soon we had another gamer, who is known as ‘Leo’ on-line showed up and he joined our merry little group as we all played the game that brought us all together. Soon the hunger beast showed up and we decided to go eat and what better place than the American icon “Arby’s”? Here we were joined by another gamer by the handle “Canium” (Found out this was Dac and Cheryl’s daughter) and a cute little lady and future gamer called Briana which was Dac and Cheryl’s granddaughter. Briana proceeded to steal the hearts of all of us that weekend (not a bad feat for someone under 1 year old). After returning to the lair we played for a while more and it soon digressed into a chat session much like the one’s I held with my original gamers so long ago.

                We actually had to call it a night because the guest of honor, Narcheska, was due to arrive the next day. While driving back to the motel Mary and I talked about our new friends and couldn’t wait till Sunday to meet the one Mary calls ‘Sis’. Many a night I talked to the Narcheska and had set ideas about just what an ‘aussie’ was. Both her and I were guild leaders in the game and had much shared quest together and epic adventures with our acolytes. Thru team speak I learned about her husband and kids and like parents the world over, the problems that we each face in ‘real life’.  So many memories from so long ago came flooding back and I thank her for helping me remember the important things in life.

                As we woke the next morning we were soon headed back to Dac’s house and then on to the airport to meet Narcheska. We had all posted a picture of ourselves at some point in time on the games website and had a basic idea of what we all looked like. Even though I knew what she looked like she still managed to walk past me as I was getting Mary her daily fix of Starbucks. I soon found her chatting with the rest of the group and as I walked up the second she said ‘ello DC’ there was no mistaking it was her. Side note, one thing is universal; airlines DO lose your luggage regardless of who you are. Another gaming friend, jdsii, aka Johnny Crash, who works for American Airlines, always tells me “Carry on man, that’s the only way to go”. Darn it, I hate it when he’s always right.

                Dac said “who’s hungry?”  and we all said yeah so he decided “Hey lets go to Outback”. I was thinking “Oh no you did not….” But before I could finish that thought Narcheska said “Sure”. We were soon heading down the highway on our way for a taste of “Aussie fare” (Dac is easy to follow if you look for the sparks from his tailpipe). Dac had explained to us that when the Outback there had just opened management made the workers speak in the worst fake accent ever and they gave it up after 6 months. Soon we were seated at a booth and with menus in front of us, I’m sorry but I couldn’t help myself, I asked Narcheska “Does anything on here look even remotely familiar?” She looked thru the menu for about 3 minutes and said “Nope” (Well I can’t say what she actually said, after all this is a family blog). We struck up a friendly conversation with the waiter and told him we had an authentic Australian here and she was there to grade the restaurant.  The waiter was the typical mid-west, corn-fed, USDA Grade meat on the hoof, high school jock type (well, you get the point), and a pleasant enough fellow. He basically reinforced what Dac had said earlier about the “fake” Aussie accent.  After a rousing game of “What the H*** are   kukabora wings”? we all settled on what were ‘safe’ meals, (at least they were identifiable by most educated standards). A rather enjoyable meal with good conversation and by the end of the meal we were all talking like old friends just out for a night on the town.

                As we arrived back at Dac’c house we proceeded to play Neverwinter nights and Dac’s new pet project ‘Return to Ascension’. More on that one at a later date. We all gamed till around midnight and Mary and I decided time to recharge these old batteries so off we went back to the Plaza. Next morning we awoke early and headed over to Dac’s for a cookout of epic proportions. Our day was filled with everyday mundane chatting, playing the game and generally engaged in the American birth right of eating too much. Ribs, hot dogs, adult beverages, and good old everyday conversation were on the menu and a good time was had by all. Even Dac’s pets got into the act a bit. Narcheska will always remember the “Toe Attack” by the house cat and I will always remember Hercules (A male miniature Pinscher that has ‘issues’). During the lulls in the action we all split up into our own little groups just to pass the time away talking about the small things in life that don’t really mean that much but makes all the difference in the world.

                We called it a night around mid-night again as those who arrived by plane were due to fly out the next day to return to our own little slice of the world we had just escaped from. Meeting up again the next morning for a final breakfast we decided on the legendary “Big Biscuit”. Nothing much more than a hole in the wall place but a world legend just the same. I consider myself a big eater and this uber egg, ham, sausage, cheese (3 types), onions, hash browns (mixed in the eggs), and this one actually gave me problems.

                We soon arrived at the airport and were saying our goodbyes at the gate and wishing Narcheska a safe flight on the next leg of her ‘walkabout’.  Dac and Cheryl were going to take Mary and I to a sporting goods store but Dac’s chariot proved to be temperamental and it was decided that we would return to the airport and wait for our flight. We bid farewell at gate and soon Mary and I were flying home to Mission Texas.

                I wish now to thank David, Cheryl, Leo, Carina and all the Wozzers who were online with us and we are now planning to repeat the event next year so stay tuned kiddies….