how did I get here?

[egypturnash]

I was reading Seven-Day Magic by Edward Eager. Not one of the most famous or lauded children's authors, but I always enjoyed his books of magic intruding into the everyday American world when I was young; they were nothing special, they had no deep undercurrents, just pleasant little bits of fantasy. They've aged tolerably well for me because of this, though it's charming to see him wearing his influences on his sleeve - every single one of his books seems to reference E. Nesbit by name, for instance, and other semi-modern children's classics get mention too.

I have to wonder, though. The kid who enjoyed Knight's Castle and Half Magic and Magic or Not?. Did I ever think, then, that I'd end up here? In LA, in weird corners of animation, kinda loathing the reality of the particular magic (and done right, animation is magic - breathing life into a series of drawings, tell me that's not magical) I was fascinated by from an early age?

I don't think I did. I really had no idea where I was going. There were just things I did. I read, I drew, I watched cartoons, I dreamed of... I'm not sure what I dreamt. I don't know if who I was when I was ten would've been astounded or horrified by who and what I am at thirty-two. Maybe both. Some things wouldn't surprise that kid: I was already a computer geek then, I think. I was certainly already a constant reader and frequent cartoonist; I even thought of myself more as "cartoonist" than "artist". Other things... would. Like burning out on animation. Like the redefinitions I'm going through. Or maybe those wouldn't be as much of a shock. Who knows?

I just hope that kid wouldn't look at where I ended up and say "geez, you sure fucked up your life, I'm gonna try to make sure I don't end up like you." Sometimes in gloomy moments I wonder.

Comments

[draca-serpens.livejournal.com]

*hugs* You an' me both. I would have never dreamed as a kid that I'd be a heartbroken wannabe animator going to college and being scared outta my brain and several thousand dollars in debt. But we just gotta remember that these are only fears that our minds give us when we're feeling down. Getting out of the house more and connecting with people help. Music does, too. Lots and lots of music.

Dr. Phil says that if you want to know how you got to be who you are, define the ten most important moments in your life. Hope that helps!

[shatterstripes.livejournal.com]

Now there's an interesting thought. Shame I can only think of six, and that's straining; only the first three really came to mind readily.

[ultraken.livejournal.com]

Sometimes I wonder what the Me of twenty years ago would think of the Me of now, besides "what's that big thing on your desk... what, you can play Pac Man with it!?".

[shatterstripes.livejournal.com]

hmmmm, 1983? I think it'd have parsed relatively quickly as a computer. Maybe. And yeah, MAME would've blown my mind too. "You cam play almost every arcade game ever made? Plus lots of home games? How do you find the time to eat? And you write videogames for a living?!?" -Young Ken to Old Ken, upon being shown the wonders of emulation

[ultraken.livejournal.com]

Every computer I'd seen up until that point was built into its own keyboard and connected to a television, so I might not have immediately parsed a tall, noisy box as a computer unless I saw it in action.

As an aside, an actual conversation as best I can remember it:
Me: "Why are arcade games so much better than the ones I have on the Atari?"
Dad: "It's because arcade games have thousands of kilobytes of memory."
Me: "No way! Nothing has thousands of kilobytes of memory!"