Last Thursday night, as I took cover behind a fake stone wall and waited for my vest to come back online, I had an unexpected moment of self-reflection. Lost in thought, I didn’t notice a Blue team member come across the corner and shoot me dead with their laser gun. “Take cover,” the vest commanded in a tinny voice barely audible over the loud music, explosion sound effects, and screeching light guns and plastic vests. So I did, but my mind was no longer in the game.
The overriding thought was something along the lines of, “I’m 33 years old and I’m playing Laser Tag with a bunch of other supposed adults. Should I be spending my time on this?”
I’ve always resisted the notion that as an adult I need to give up on things like video games, roleplaying games, science fiction, and so on. There’s a subtle societal pressure to do this, to get a real job, have kids, be responsible. And granted, this was a friend’s birthday party, and I was happy to be there helping him celebrate in the way he wanted.
But I had this sudden fear that others would perceive me, a 33 year old married guy playing shoot ‘em up, as pathetic. Worse, for just a moment, I saw myself as pathetic, as worthy of pity. My train of thought wandered to what I would do with my life if I had financial independence, and I didn’t think that playing Laser Tag at 7:30 PM on a Thursday night would probably rank high on the list, if I could do anything I wanted. I’d be exploring the rain forest in Central America or Roman ruins in Italy. Watching the sun set over the Indian Ocean on the East African coast.
But I am not wealthy and I can’t do anything I want. And I like my friends, and I have fun playing Laser Tag. Sure, we might seem pathetic and weird to the parents picking up their teenagers, but why do I care how they perceive me?
Sometimes I think life was a lot easier when I was completely lacking in self-awareness. It was easier to write, easier to make friends, and easier to have fun. Why do I have to go and complicate my existence by thinking so damn much?
Today, I noticed a very, very gray hair on my temple. And I turned back to that question; am I getting too old for all these toys and games?
Will I be a 90 year old D&D player? Will my friends still have their collections of superhero action figures lining the walls when their grandkids come to visit? Do I want to be a 90 year old D&D player?
I don’t regret having done these things, but I worry that moving forward, time spent on these instead of other things will be time I regret spending. It’s always good to be with friends, isn’t it?
I don’t know the answer to any of these questions yet. They’re making me deeply uncomfortable for the time being. I have a deeply engrained suspicion of “growing up.” And maybe that says more about me than just about anything else. About my generation, even.
Tags: gaming, growing up, laser tag
I haven’t been able to put together a reliable D&D group in years, but I hope I make it to 90, and that I can find some like minded old farts. Old people seem to spend plenty of time playing games, and I’d choose roleplaying over bingo any day!
I know how you feel about it though, I was working on quite the collection of plastic robots from childhood, and I finally eBayed them all off and used the proceeds to build an office.
My goal has been to ditch the nostalgia and keep a hold of the imagination of my youth. Thanks to my two kids though, I am still able to spend a lot of time playing with toys and games.
Borrow a kid from someone, anyone will gladly part with one for a few hours, and it will make your play a lot more fun and respectible!
I run a weekly game of D&D. It gets canceled about as often as it happens due to busy schedules, but we’re talking of moving it from Monday night to Sunday afternoon, which might alleviate that.
If I had the space, I’d probably collect the crap out of cool toy stuff. I admire your willpower. I think the only thing that keeps me from accumulating that kind of stuff is a small apartment.
We’ll probably have kids of our own sometime soon. I’m scared, but excited about the idea.
That’s the nice thing about D&D, because you need a physical group it’s self limiting unlike MMORPGs. I only play video games with an end because I’m just too paranoid that I’d get sucked in and disappear!
Kids are a lot of fun, rediscovering my love of dinosaurs and robots all over again ;)
You know me (and rightly so) as a man not given to absolutes or certainties, but in this instance I’m pretty comfortable in saying I’m sure you’re worrying about nothing… or rather you’re worrying about what others will think of you, which is far less important than what you think of yourself.
If Laser Tag’s fun, then get the hell out there and play Laser Tag, and when the parents picking up their kids look down their noses, pity them for having bought into a myth of adulthood that says you make all those sacrifices for no payback whatsoever. Play is precious; I’m sure the long faces of ‘normal’ people are a reflection of the way they’ve walled themselves off from seeking fun for its own sake every now and again. Because, y’know, it wouldn’t be the grown-up thing to do
Screw that, man. Do not seek to justify your enthusiasms; your enthusiasm is all the justification you need. Geek 4 life, beeyotch. ;)
To be fair, I was worried as much about how I saw myself. Some of it comes down to “I could be doing something productive” as well.
“play is precious” I often forget that. Thanks for reminding me.
I forwarded this blog entry to my husband who enjoys gaming when he can and who has a collection of Garbage Pail Kids, He-Man action figures and other childhood memorabilia re-purchased and displayed prominently in his home office, and he said this: “Tell him to have kids. Then he gets to share these things he loves with his kids and that is never time you will regret.
PS I think doing a laser tag party for my birthday may be a good idea.”
So…you’re not alone. I say that if it’s making you happy, and if you’re not hurting anyone, then who cares if your interests aren’t mainstream or “grown up”? Kids of your own or no, don’t cram yourself into a mold that doesn’t fit you, based solely on the idea that it’s what’s expected.
I used to be one of those jerks who thought games like D&D and Laser Tag were stupid and only dorks played them. But now that I’m older, I realize that the younger version of me was just trying to fit in with those people who think hunting, football and beer is all a man needs. I didn’t even know what D&D was all about and I’m still not sure how it’s played, but I don’t object to anyone playing it. I’ve never played Laser Tag either, but it sounds like fun and I wouldn’t mind giving it a try. I love video games, at least. Finally got around to buying Left 4 Dead 2.
I do like football, as well as other sports, especially baseball, and I love beer, also, admittedly, hunting is one of my interests too, though I rarely go as planned because I don’t feel like sitting out in the cold waiting for a deer to walk into view. But my interests aren’t limited to those things and I’ve given up on trying to fit in.
Just do your thing. Only an asshole would judge someone for playing D&D and Laser Tag.
In the movie “Yes Man,” Zooey Deschanel says “The world’s a playground. You know that when you are a kid, but somewhere along the way everyone forgets it.” I think life was simpler because we saw everything as playgrounds.
Oftentimes while brainstorming things to blog/write about, I think about writing stories about what my young self would think of me now. Would he look up to me? Would he think I was cool? Or would he think I was a loser, and hope to change history so that he turns out to be something different? I try to make sure he would think I was cool, and no one else really matters*.
*Of course, my wife matters, but she uses similar parameters to 11-year-old me.
Seeing the world as a playground is the kind of worldview that works well for a trust fund brat, but not so much for someone who has to work for a living. I think it’s a bit tragic, but it seems almost no matter how much we like something, it always turned into the dreaded work when we do it for a living. Some avoid this trap, but not many, it seems.
I don’t care too much what my young self would think of me. Because he didn’t know what responsibility was. He’d probably wonder why I don’t live on Mars, or in the Amazon. He wouldn’t understand the external factors of supporting oneself and one’s family.
I think hunting, a pick-up football game, watching sports on TV or at the stadium are all play activities just like playing laser tag. I also think sometimes the jockish guys who do that stuff start to feel the same as you: should I be doing something more productive right now? I don’t think the fact that your preferred methods of play are dorky is really relevant, right? It’s just an issue of playing vs. working?