Long ago, the first video game system that was ever given to me was the Nintendo Game Boy. It was a Christmas gift and was totally unexpected. I actually cried for joy when I got it. Now, the game that shipped with the Game Boy was Tetris. I spent many hours on that game and became pretty good at it. It served me well whenever I played head to head battles with other people at school--including my computer science teacher. During lulls, sometimes I’d challenge him to a versus game on the school computers. I always ended up on top; I had a knack for snatching victory from the jaws of defeat. I remember some friends being amazed at how I often managed to survive even with my blocks stacked high. At night, I remember finding an Internet Tetris client: TetriNET. Among my friends and I someone would set up a server and we’d all connect to play a multi-player battle Tetris game. Sometimes these sessions would last until the wee hours of the morning. Crazy stuff. I had a decent track record with that.
I stopped playing Tetris actively after high school. I had a version of the game on my computer, but I didn’t really touch it that often. Over time my skills rusted. I never thought I’d get back into it. The other day though, while I was poking around the Wii stuff at BestBuy, I spotted Tetris Party Deluxe. It wasn’t crazy expensive or anything so I just picked up a copy. I figured that it might come in handy as a party game at some point in the future. I broke it out this evening just to see if I was as good as I was maybe a decade ago. Umm…nope, can’t say I am. I can hold my own, I guess, but…yeah, my old-self would have cleaned the floor with me. No matter. The game is still fun after all these years. It’s so simple, and that’s perhaps one of the key factors as to why this game can withstand the test of time, right?
To close this off, here’s a guy playing Korobeiniki on an electric guitar.
When my parents moved, I had to spend a bit of time helping them out and deciding what to do with a lot of my old stuff. Seeing as how they were downsizing it didn’t make sense for them to hold on to a lot of my things. I ended up taking a lot of it back to my place just so that I could sort it out on my own schedule. As I’m lying down here in my bed, off in the corner of my room I can see a couple of boxes of fansubs that I don’t want to part with despite not having a VCR plugged in anywhere around here. I also had to take the contents of my bookshelves in the old house. I bought a secondary bookcase from Ikea a while ago in anticipation. That bookcase is now full of old textbooks that look good on display but will probably never get air again (let’s be honest, right?)
One find that caught me off guard was the big pile of notes and correspondence from high school and university. If I think about it, some of that stuff is actually more than a decade old now. Why were we (my parents and I) hoarding that kind of thing? I spend about an hour last night picking through the stuff, seeing if there was anything I might want to keep.
I actually spotted one report card from my first semester of high school. Man, I was a decent student back then. If only I wasn’t so lazy. From later on in my high school career I spotted a letter of recommendation from one of my high school’s vice-principals. It’s not like I was openly courting administration, but I still managed to get them to pay attention to me. I also found a few letters of admission from the universities that I enrolled in. Now, we all know that I chose to go with the computer engineering program at the University of Waterloo as my thing, but were you aware how that was actually my last choice? I only enrolled into three programs at the time, and all of them eventually got back to me. I had also applied to the computer science program at Waterloo, the University of Toronto, and York University. I only applied to engineering as an after thought if only because I felt that there was no way I’d get in. Well, wouldn’t you know it, of all four, it was engineering that got back to me first. The rest is history, I guess. I poked through some of those letters. Man…what could have been, eh?
There were a lot of university notes in the pile, along with a couple of exams. As I looked through it all I couldn’t help but feel like I had mentally lost everything that I had learned. Yes, I know the whole thing about how I at least know how to find the information now, but…it’ll be a tough slog if I ever had to do so. Ah, but that’s why society leaves that kind of thing to the people who continue down that path. I don’t see myself having to do any work on a microscopic level regarding substrate layers anytime soon. WHATEVER.
If I found myself to be a bright shining star in my high school years, my university years seems to see that brightness fade. Perhaps it’s a good thing, you know? If anything, that period forced me to develop a sense of humility. It showed me that I have limits, and that even if I’m not the best at something life will go on. I could choose to stay dim and live a low-key life, but I think something in me has clicked as of the last year or two. I think back then it was almost as if academics was all I had. I am thankful that I had that because at the very least it gave me something to focus on. Without that now, I have to find other ways to shine brightly to those that are around me. Perhaps it’s why I find satisfaction in running, improv, and now yoga. Running gives me drive, improv gives me a creative outlet, and yoga helps me to find peace. At this point in my life, I’m comfortable leaving behind the things in my past. They carried me this far, but they no longer serve a purpose. It’s time to look ahead. Perhaps as a sign of that I actually threw out all of the pile.
Admissions letters, mediocre exams, recommendations, reports: all gone. Moving on.
I was hanging out with a couple of high school friends last night. From my friend’s balcony we were able to take in the fireworks from Canada’s Wonderland. So, we sat out there breathing the fresh air in deeply. Given my current condition with my nasty cough, I was happy that I was smart enough to bring my leather jacket despite it being the middle of summer. Off in the glow of dusk, Venus shone brightly on us and our conversation. As would be the case among people that shared a common high school, we talked about that period in our lives from long ago. The names of various people weaved their way through our words. There was one person that came up and my friend mentioned that that person told her that she remembered me as the guy that had a crush on her.
¿Que?
Simply, that comment caught me off guard. In all honesty, I don’t remember ever having a crush on her. There are a handful of people in high school that caught my eye, and I can truly and honestly say that she’s not in that handful. God, I was annoyed last night. Now, you might be wondering why I seem to be making a bit of a big deal out of this. Sure, right? Having someone think that you have a crush on them isn’t necessarily a bad thing. However, in this case it’s all about context. How am I remembered?
Fine. The person in question is mildly attractive. Easy enough to say that. When we last saw each other, it was just under a decade since high school. If you’ll allow me to be a bit blunt and egotist, I had a lot of things going for me in high school. I was one of those unintentionally high profile people. I may not have been the most popular, and I might have shunned the spotlight, but God damn it, everyone knew me. Out of all the ways that person in question could have remembered me, she chooses to remember me for some non-existent infatuation? What the fuck? Remember me for being smart. Remember me for being affable or warm-hearted. Hell, remember me for getting away with wearing a necktie every single day even though it wasn’t part of the uniform. However, reducing me to every other guy that had goo-goo eyes for you?
Back in high school, instead of taking part in all of the physical extra-curricular activities, I was more than likely a participant in the things that had more a mental bend. As such, through the first few years I was an active participant in the DPCDSB Math League. Heck, we even won the championship one of those years. Later on, I was an active participant in the school’s Reach For The Top team. I’m not going to lie, I got such a kick out of competitive trivia. I loved playing around with the various buzzers that we had. It finally seemed like my repository of useless information actually had a use. Our team actually got to the top of Peel Region, allowing us to make it to the provincials in Kingston, Ontario. Yes, we were great. More specifically, I was awesome. We didn’t do so well in Kingston. In fact, we lost a shit load of games there. I swear, if I had a stronger supporting team we would have done better, but whatever: all in the past now.
Earlier, I was hanging out with some 20SB people over at Fionn MacCools. The place was having a trivia night. I was kind of excited, because it was giving me an opportunity to dust off my dormant skills. The questions weren’t so bad, but I was kind of surprised just how many of them I wasn’t able to get. Don’t get me wrong, we did well. I’d even say we did awesomely, however, there were many teams that did a lot better. Perhaps on some level I’m just a little bit sad about not having a better handle on everything. Jason circa 1998-1999 would be able to run circles around me. I guess though, in the end, trivia really doesn’t matter. I mean, that’s why it’s called “trivia” right? Of course, I can’t lose sight of the best thing about last night: I was able to hang out with some fun and classy ladies. We had a good time.
Earlier this afternoon, I was over at my parents hauling a set of heavy books over from there place to my condo. They were looking to clear up some stuff and create some space. I was happy to oblige, but taking that many big books over to my place proved to be hard work. It took me a good number of trips between the basement and my place to get everything upstairs. No matter though because those books have a bit of nostalgic value for me.
So, what’s with these books? Back in 1990, my aunts from New York kindly gave me a gift that I found entirely useful through elementary and early high school. They bought me a full leather bound set of Encyclopedia Britannica. Gosh, I loved that set; it saved me many times during various research projects. Eventually, the research projects became less frequent. Eventually I stopped using the books altogether. For the past few years, the set has just sat there at my parent’s place collecting dust. Sure, it looks handsome and rather classy, but that’s all, right? Ever since the Internet really took off, having the physical books on hand hasn’t been that important. I mean, when it comes to recent topics the books don’t have fully up-to-date information. All of the knowledge held within is pretty much a snapshot of the state of things way back then. That being said, for topics that are static, the books are still accurate. Thing is, it’s often simpler just to look things up online, right?
Anyway, the books are on a shelf in my bedroom; hey might actually make for good reading before bed on occasion. They may be slowly losing their relevancy, but the personal worth of each volume will hold.
I was just reflecting on this a little bit earlier. Some days I wonder what life would be like if I continued living a somewhat cowardly existence by continuing to put up with the people who made me feel inferior, or like there was something fundamentally wrong with me. I think back then all I wanted was a little approval. Really, isn’t that what all of us want? In the end, we all just want people to like us for who we are. And yet, years ago, I was in some situation where I just didn’t feel right.
Back then, due to circumstance I was always the odd one out. It’s hard when everyone else is working on one thing and you’re off in your own world toiling away on things that they couldn’t care less about. It was in this environment that I was trying to find a way in. Despite my serious nature, in a home setting I’m easy enough to get along with. My will to please was running rampant. In particular, there was one person with whom I used to be close with, but over time it turned into personal rejection after personal rejection. Despite this, I didn’t really realize right away that my life didn’t have to revolve around these people. Looking back, my heart kind of breaks for that old Jason. Poor, poor fool.
It wasn’t until a chance encounter, and invitation to watch Idol with people that I didn’t know that well, that it dawned on me that life outside of the bubble was entirely possible. I realized that there are people out there that could possibly accept me in all of my eccentric and maladjusted glory. That’s when I started extricating myself from the poison. Case in point that no one really cared: I haven’t received any contact at all from any one of those old people. Sure, communication is a two way street, but I’m not letting them off the hook. Seeing as how the relationship was lopsided away from my favour, I’m not the one that needs to reach out. Screw that.
So, if I had stayed in that situation, I would be a totally different person that I am today. First of all though, I question whether I would have been able to put up with all that for much longer than I did. I surely think I’d be more messed up than I already was. I have a need for people to like me. Without having that need fulfilled, I think I’d mentally feel like a total failure. I’d still be trying hard to please them. The level of absurdity of the lengths I’d go would probably be higher. Overall, I don’t see myself being content, and depression would have sunk in long ago.
Enough of that though. Yes, all of that is very doom and gloom isn’t it? Let me state that I’ve very glad that I stepped out of that realm. If it wasn’t for that, I might not have gotten closer with friends that eventually became future roommates. I might not have had the improvements in my grades that I was able to achieve since my mind would have been occupied elsewhere. I would not have bonded so strongly with my university classmates because instead of spending time in the labs I would have been in the unit with the others. I am so fortunate that I have these connections with classmates; some of them are still going strong after all these years. More than anything, I’m glad that I was able to find myself. I was able to realize that I am worth my time. I am hardly broken; I am unique. I suppose then that the experiences I had before do serve a purpose after all. They’ve made me stronger and more confident in myself.
Yeah, I know I’ve been making a lot of veiled comments about my various situations on this blog, and for the most part all of the comments still hold. This storm clouds still loom overhead, but at the moment the rain has let up a little bit. Anyway, that’s not what this post is all about! No, this post relates back to something that was posted about 2.5 years ago.
OK, so around that time in 2007, the Simpsons Movie had come out, or was about to come out (to be honest, I totally forgot). One of the tools on the movie’s website was a widget to create Simpsons versions of whoever you wanted. It wasn’t long before one of our team members decided to create Simpsons versions of everyone.
Do you remember that post? Maybe? Well before you click here to go back, do you remember which of these 9 characters was apparently representative of me? I still think it’s mildly obvious, but whatever. We’ve already touched on that in the old post.
So, we have a print out of this image posted on the cork board in our area. Over time, as people left the team, that person or someone else would ceremoniously draw a big red X over their avatar. In the past few months, we were reduced to just three of these original members. Then two were left: me and one other person. Well, as of tomorrow, the other person is leaving the team. At the end of today, he took the image down, grabbed a fat red marker and crossed out his image. And there I was, the only one left on the image, still unscathed.
No, I’m not crowing. I’m not necessarily happy or sad that I’ll be the last of the group. Heck, it’s not even like I’ll be on my own–a couple of other people have been hired over time, right? Still, in my mind the symbolism is sort of strong.
It’s truly the end of an era. I really respect the guy that’s leaving tomorrow. I won’t be alone in handling things when he leaves, but there definitely will be added pressure on me to perform at a slightly higher level. As the last guy standing…I guess I have no choice.
Being a student at a Catholic high school meant that I had to wear a uniform. Really, I think for someone like me it was a godsend (pardon the joke, I suppose) since I didn’t have to worry about what I had to wear, or having to stick out like a sore thumb for not fitting in whatever norms were in place at the time. Hell, given my track record in elementary, I know it would have been a daily shit fest. The uniform was sort of like a bit of equalizing armour wrapped in a cardigan. I figure that when I was starting out it helped me not be prejudged by other people. For someone nerdy like me it at least levelled things out.
The uniform was rather simple. It consisted of a white shirt, slacks or a kilt, and the maroon sweater (or approved black sweatshirt). I remember back then the uniform was always a flashpoint between the administration and the students. I’m sure it’s still that way today, but my memories are from a decade ago. Shirts always had to be tucked in. Girls’ kilts had to be an appropriate length. As a point of rebellion the girls would always hike them up as high as decency would allow–sometimes past, I guess. There are stories of vice-principals roaming the halls with rulers ready to measure just how far the kilts went above the knees. If anyone wore pants, they had to be charcoal grey slacks. I remember a friend of mine tried to get away with some same colour rose stitching on the legs of her pants. As much as they blended in, I remember her fear of being caught. Ridiculous! Why try to exert your individuality over something that you don’t really have much control over? Aren’t there other ways to stand out?
It’s probably expected, but I didn’t do anything to fly against the rules. Why would I? There was no need to get the administration on my ass, right? Well, my memory is entirely hazy on what happened, but my attitude changed on that front one day. At some point I began wearing a necktie with my uniform. I don’t recall the exact point that I started doing so back in high school, but it must have been late in Grade 11 or right in Grade 12. I wasn’t consciously giving admin the middle finger with it. There was no revolutionary statement that I was trying to make. Frankly, I think I just wanted to wear a tie. I was the only one. It wasn’t part of the uniform, but I don’t think there was a rule against it. I wasn’t doing anything that was trying to make the uniform casual or disrespectful, so really none of the teachers could bean me on it. The tie became my thing.
So, why am I having flashbacks to that period of my life? Well, over the past month I’ve been watching some old DVDs that someone gave to me of an anime from the late 90s. The main character for this show is a girl who insists on wearing a boys’ uniform to school. This is due to the fact that she wants to emulate someone she met long ago as a little child. She keeps pointing out that there’s not rule against it, but the counsellors keep harassing her about it. Anyway, somewhere late in the series they talk about another character who gained respect in school by carrying herself with an air of dignity, and doing things for herself and not for the attention of others. I kind of carried that to my experiences. The tie wasn’t for anyone but myself.
I’m not saying the tie gained me any respect, but perhaps it helped. It really wasn’t until late Grade 11 and Grade 12 that I recall feeling like I was coming into my own. Before that I was still trying to find my way around to see if I fit into any groups. Really, that endeavour was a spectacular failure, thankfully. And I say “thankfully” because if I had found a group I think I would have lost out on learning self-reliance. By the later grades it just wasn’t as important anymore. I didn’t really fit in anywhere and was more of a floater. So I ended up just having a “take me for who I am” air about me as I really focused on my academics. Hopefully it’s not imagined, but all of that gained me some respect. Perhaps the tie vaulted me to a place where I was suddenly beyond judgment. I honestly don’t know…
These days, I’m long removed from times where I had to wear prescribed clothing. Even so, upon reflecting on these days gone by I realize that there are lessons that I can apply today. I no longer have to don a necktie to get respect. I know though that maintaining my dignity can go a long way to moulding how others perceive me. Also, continuing to do things for myself and not for the approval of others just commands respect that can’t be picked up any other way.
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