As I sit down to begin writing this, I'm waiting on some random guy my dad lined up to come down and take a 7x20 foot shrunk that has been in my family almost as long as I have.
Earlier this morning, the photographer for the realtor that is selling my parents' house came by to take pictures for the online listing, marking a checkpoint in my parents' latest move: The open house period.
Which means I now feel like I'm living in a museum.
Most of my belongings are now kind of hidden away in my room, and there they will stay until I leave. My room has been rearranged for appearances over comfort. Heck, there was discussion for awhile about kicking me out of my room in to a guest room for the next month, and the thing that saved my life and space from being -completely- upended by this process was the fact that my couch is a slate gray color that clashes with the living room. At least I get to keep my mini fridge.
I know I sound like I'm complaining. In a way, I kind of am. Complaining is a stress relief, and I can better tolerate an inconvenient, annoying, stressful situation like being hit with a surprise move across the country at a time I had planned to be focusing on my thesis, and preparing to make my first conference proposal for Pop Culture 2017 in San Diego.
I research when I can. In fact, this morning, I got more research done than I have in the past week, and I'm getting close to the article count I set to begin writing and really getting in to my lit review in earnest. Somewhere in between the yard work, packing, and lifting, I also managed to draft an abstract for my proposal...though that probably needs some work.
Heck, this very post is just a stress relief. Something to vent on and iron out the thoughts in my head while getting back in to the swing of semi-regular posting. So, as nomadic as my life has been the past year or two, it goes on. Now with a sign taped to my door declaring it a family room.
Yesterday, I got in to a little bit of a conversation with the carpet cleaner as I was moving furniture around in my bedroom for him about video games. He saw I had Fallout on pause, and he started talking about his first game, Commander Keen, AKA that game I played during computer class in 7th grade to pass the time. As I made chitchat with him about our first loves in video gaming (Mega Man 2 is mine. Oh, you better believe I can beat Air Man~) and I started to let my mind wander off, how I let what much of mainstream society sees as a mere electronic distraction and base entertainment to come to define my academic pursuits.
To spill a few beans on my thesis studies, my work focuses on the differences between interactive and non-interactive media, with interactive media representing storytelling mediums that require direct user input to progress the plot or to reach the conclusion, which video games is the primary example. One of the reasons I got in to journalism is, while I may hate being social and don't particularly like talking at length, I do love telling stories. Stories that I know people will love, will make them laugh, will make them cry, will just generally affect their lives, even in a small way.
What attracted me to video games, I think above all, is that its that interaction that allows me to tell myself my own story. It gives me the gratification of telling a story without needing an audience to do it. Unlike movies or books, the motivations and events aren't being dictated to me, but I am crafting them as I go.
Don't get me wrong, I love non-interactive media as much as the next guy. "Macross Delta" in particular has my undivided attention, as far as shows go. But watching characters take part in daring dogfights in "Delta" to a thrilling soundtrack doesn't compare to playing a game like "Ace Combat 5." In games, I am not watching a character do these amazing things, I am doing them, even if by proxy via a controller in my hands.
I am telling my own story, in the framework that the game gives me.
Now, I could go on and on about the myriad of reasons I love gaming, but that is a story for another time. Mostly because shrunk dude is 15 minutes late, and I want this big, heavy, wooden beast out of my life.