Don't Be A D*ck -- Part 2: "Snow Days"

 

Post #2 in my "Don't be a D*ck" series.

Snow Days!!

Do you remember how awesome and special it was when you were 10 years old and a snow day got called? The snow forts? Popping the can of Quik with the edge of your spoon for microwave hot chocolate in a coffee cup? Uncle Bob Barker and the Price is Right? We all got the gift of not having to deal with teacher's hard books and dirty looks.

For at least a few kids in my school, it meant a day in the back seat of a cold car without lunch. I think that was why back in my day GRPS rarely cancelled school. Kids could come to school and have heat and a hot meal. Maybe. For most of the kids in the district though, it meant having to walk on unshovled sidewalks with hand-me-down, inadequate snow gear--probably just cheap coats and regular shoes. Most of the time, people's children would have to walk IN the streets because at least they would have been plowed.

The thing that really irks me (in the same way that "are people too easily offended" irks me) are the people who say "have we gotten too soft?" What those people call "soft" I call, "being compassionate." An understanding of what is otherwise an extraordinarily complex situation involving unpredictable weather patterns, parents with varying abilities to cope with transportation, caring for kids during work hours, and most importantly, a calculation of risk.

If ONE kid is saved from getting hit by a car walking to school, or if ONE kid doesn't get frostbite because their sweatshirt hoody wasn't enough, than it was worth calling a snow day. If calling a snow day means ONE family doesn't end up in a car wreck, it was worth it.

Planning for possible snow day is par for the course as a parent. We all know they're coming. The people I hear complaining about snow days are generally the people best equipped to deal with them--which is ironic, really. They have access to family, finances, and foresight--three resources to which not all parents have access. Have some compassion for them.

Most importantly is to have compassion for the kids who are literally at the mercy of the world around them and should not be made into victims to meet a quota or to make life more convenient for us. Those kids could be kids whose parents can't clothe them well enough or drive them to school.

AND THEN employers need to realize the "human resources" (yikes, don't get me started on THAT dehumanizing term) they employ could also have little "future resources" at home and have a little compassion for the parents' situations when snow days occur.

You can take your toxic toughness and shove it straight up your ass. People's unwillingness to consider that others are dealing with difficult situations is the "weakness" *I* can't abide. I stand with the meek and helpless who for whatever reason, don't have the gifts of safety or flexibility that yours and my family are able to enjoy. It is not weakness to stay home on a day with a markedly higher chance of injury at the expense of some rich person's profit margin or a manager who hasn't accounted for enough coverage.

Your willingness to put your life at risk at the expense of an unknown child in your local school district is not, "strength." That toughness gets people worn down. That toughness gets people killed. I was thinking of ending this by quoting the bible here. The quote about the meek inheriting the Earth has something to teach us if we can get out of the shadow of our American-ness where we enslave ourselves to a profit-driven work ethic. That toughness gets people worn down. That toughness gets people killed. Maybe not you, but someone. Instead I will quote the voice actor of Optimus Prime telling the story of his brother Larry Cullen, captain in the US Marine Corp:

"Don't be all tough. Be strong enough to be kind. Be strong enough to be gentle."

Don't Be a D*ck -- Part 1: "The Offended Culture"

(First Draft 12/5/24)   

As a culture, have we become inclined to be more sensitive and easily offended?

     From my point of view it seems society has become less inclined to suffer assholes, the ignorant, or      bullies.

     People needs to sit back, open their ears, and do a little self reflection before they speak. Put                 themselves on the other side of their own words with an open heart. It is important to make sure            we're not on the wrong side of the tolerance paradox.

That was a Facebook post I made. It was followed by some interesting comments by friends and family posted below it. Fair points, but some missing the points I was trying to make. I've never been the guy who felt the need to defend my honor. I've never been in a real fist fight because of something someone else said to me or about my mother. The real toughness is the mental fortitude it takes to realize words can't hurt me. It would be weak to lash back out physically or verbally.

But . .  words DO hurt people. That's not hyperbole or weakness. Words have set entire cultures back. Words have led to discriminatory public policies or deeply held cultural--or even religious--beliefs that have harmed generations. We cannot be so fragile as to cling to our old worldview in the light of real information and data that shows the way we communicated and acted in the near and distant past has caused harm. We cannot be so ignorant of the generational effects of the resulting oppression that we write ourselves off as "not responsible" for present day effects. Nor can we hold the people who are rightfully speaking about hurtful speech or policies as "too fragile" or "too offended"  They are the ones seeing a harm and we all need to listen.

Being free to speak does not mean we need to say everything that comes to our mind. Strength of character also means having a level of introspection and compassion for the people around us and their experiences. It takes a bit of effort! Some people walk around feeling entitled to be an asshole and hide under the "freedom of speech" but then begin to whine when they are faced with the consequences of people calling them out for being an asshole. I think my Facebook post made a few people feel "seen" in that uncomfortable, self-reflective way.  

Which brings me to the tolerance paradox. I haven't fully come to terms with the morality of this concept yet, but to sum it up:  If a fully inclusive and free society tolerates those who are intolerant, it risks enabling the eventual domination of that intolerance. It feels to me like people complaining about the easily offended are the intolerant fighting for their domination. (the sympathetic side of me says, hey, they feel personally attacked. That's fair. They're wrong, but their feelings are real) Politically, it feels like those people are "winning." I remember hearing about tens of thousands of Americans dying fighting Nazis. But now people are throwing a fit and threatening the funding of college campuses refusing to host Nazi speakers? That right there is the tolerance paradox and there seems to me to be  only one moral answer.

The people in the public eye I most often see complaining about the coddling of the offended are the people who are the most . . . verbally offensive--condescending--unkind. They are the Bart Simpsons swinging their arms around their body with their eyes closed while shouting, "If I hit you, it's YOUR fault." But I am not unsympathetic. From their point of view, their family values are threatened by LGBTQIA culture. They see their station in life is threatened by the idea of migrant workers and reparations. They see themselves personally attacked for being unthinkingly unkind when just using language that has been acceptable by their social groups in the past.

There are two possible outcomes if we want to have a fair, equitable, accepting, fully-tolerant society. Remove, write off, or segregate the intolerant. (yikes) or teach them--hard as that may be--to become tolerant.

What is the lesson here to mitigate intolerance for an "offended" culture fairly expressing the harm they're seeing? Take responsibility for how your words make others feel. Being offensive is funny to the right audience. Me? I generally err on the side of being self-deprecating. I think that's hilarious.  Being offensive for the sake of hurting the feelings of others or to diminish their personal value, freedoms, and humanity, is a d*ck move. Speak up if you're offended. Ask why that person is finding that offensive and take responsibility for it.  And that's me, not tolerating the intolerant.

Meeting The Voice That Defined My Childhood

 

This past weekend I got to meet a celebrity. (Originally written October 24th, 2022)

You all know I am unashamedly a self-admitted geek. There is something unique about my generation in how a lot of us relate to and think about the pop culture of our childhoods. At its surface it was only about the commercialism, money, and the psychology of advertisers creating addictions. Beneath that surface, I strongly believe there is a manifestation of our human nature to tell stories and create reflections of humanity and our collective unconscious in the vein of Carl Jung, Joseph Campbell and the Monomyth. Serious stuff. These pop culture characters are the Greek Gods of our time. Morality and the foibles of humans told through larger-than-life characters so we bloody-well remember the lessons.

One of the modern Titans who means a lot to me is Optimus Prime. The Kenworth, cab-over-engine semi truck who changes into the humanoid, robotic leader of the heroic Autobots. Essential to that character is the voice actor’s portrayal. Peter Cullen has been voicing the character, more often than not, from 1984 to the most recent cartoons and the live action movies. His warm, bassy, grandfatherly gravitas was a compassionate, patient voice in my chaotic childhood. Even as a kid I somehow filled in the gaps left within awful, ham-fisted kid-show dialog. He was a reluctant fighter; powerful, but would rather use his words. His anger was tempered by his patience and compassion. He would not give up on anyone–be they his compatriots, or even the worst of villains. There was hope in that voice.

Peter Cullen based that voice on his brother, Larry. Larry Cullen left the family farm as teen and came back from Vietnam as a captain in the Marines. Cullen tells a great story about going in for the audition to play Optimus. Long story made short, he intentionally channels the man his brother was into the voice. My pal, who went along to the con, got to chat with Peter longer than I did and he says it is obvious that Peter Cullen is not Optimus Prime. Peter is quiet-spoken. Lighter. Softer. Optimus Prime IS his brother Larry speaking through him. The military-man. Decorated with the Bronze Star, two Purple Hearts, and the Combat Action Ribbon. The leader of men with a commanding presence who had witnessed the worst things humans are capable of doing to each other. Larry told Peter as he left for his audition to be a cartoon a semi truck, “be a real hero. Not one of those fake, Hollywood heroes. Be strong enough to be gentle.” Larry Cullen died in 2011 and Peter gets choked up when he tells this story at fan conventions.

The line to see him was long. The whole week before the con I was piecing together what I was going to say to this guy. He was the voice of my childhood. He greeted me when I came home from a long, arduous day of Kindergarten and my Uncle Mark had to catch me up on the parts of the show I missed. The voice reminded me–and still reminds me–of the gentleness and kindness of my Grandpa Ray. I wanted to tell him how much a silly kids cartoon meant to me and how it affected my life, and how happy I was he’s kept going with the voice. I wanted to tell him how he was also the voice of Optimus for *my* kids having reprised the role for the 2012, preschool-aimed, Transformers: RescueBots cartoon. There were at least 300 people in line for the hour-long autograph window. Do the math.

As we were ushered through zig-zagging lines formed by invisible stanchions and out into a long hallway, it became clear they were behind schedule. He had a panel immediately afterward where people were upstairs already cued up to get seats. Volunteers twice walked the line saying, “have your item ready, get in and keep moving.” So I began to cut down what I wanted to say–editing it in my head. Instead of just babbling stream of consciousness style, I preened and pruned what I felt like I had to say to him. The guy hears the same stuff all the time. When meeting celebrities, I try to be as authentic as I can be despite the blood pumping audibly in my ears. I try to be original. I try to show them I understand they are humans too. The actors aren’t these characters–they were punching a paycheck reading the lines written for them by others who were also just cashing checks. This time I was trying to convey all of those things while getting across, directly or by inference, the most important parts of what I needed to say. 

 

The line entered his little conference room. It was empty apart from a single table, his personal assistants handing the items and markers to him, and the ten or so people from the line they were letting in at a time. He was a small man made to look smaller by the mostly empty room he was in hunching over rows of various sharpies and paint markers. But there was this man whose voice I had heard all my life, but who had no idea who I was. The teenage kid and his family who were in ahead of me (we had talked together a lot in line; they were super nice people) were in front of him. The 15 year old handed him his beat-up, RescueBots Optimus Prime toy. The kid said, “that is my first Optimus Prime.”

 

I couldn’t hear or don’t remember what Peter said to him as he awkwardly scrawled his autograph across both tiny, plastic windshields of the toy. All I remember was that his voice seemed tired and soft. He was quiet. Small. Not frail. This was just the real him. Maybe he was saving his voice for the panel where he would undoubtedly be doing his many characters for a huge audience. The kid was ushered off and it was my turn. All together, I was in and out of that room in less than 30 seconds.

 

His assistant passed him my gray semi trailer. The same semi trailer I received on the Christmas of 1984 while sitting on Santa’s Lap at my Uncle Dave and Aunt Marie’s house. The same one that survived my childhood, 6 moves, and almost 40 years. 

 

“This was my first Optimus Prime, too.” I said, voice cracking. 

 

I didn't hear his response for the blood coursing anxiously through my face and ears dulling my senses, but I started the message of appreciation I had prepared and rehearsed in my head while in line and managed to get it out without messing it up:

 

“The spirit and honor that your brother inspired in the voice of that character lives on through me in how I teach my students and raise my children.” 

 

By the time I was finishing my words, I was already being guided away by a convention volunteer. Walking backwards, I saw Mr Cullen look up and lock eyes with me. Maybe it was an old man's tired, watery eyes, or maybe I had actually caused him to tear up. He reached out toward me with his right hand and whispered, “thank you” as he closed it and squeezed–as if to give me a hug that seemed more for him than me.

And I was gone, walking back past the still-long line of people with a fresh, still-wet paint marker scribble across my childhood toy. I met Optimus Prime and I got to say thanks.

Being a Pokemon Villain and Raising a Child

My first job was at Toys R Us. I worked there in 1997, 1998, 1999 during the height of the first Pokemon craze. I was a bit older than the target Pokemon's target audience, but I bought the game anyway and got into it pretty hard core. The thought was that I could take a little pressure off the parents when they brought their kid into the store and the kid and I could get lost speaking this foreign language. Plus, the parents loved me because I saved gobs of money by pointing out that Red and Blue were the same game but only had a few different critters. It was fun.

When I eventually got my job at FuncoLand, people would come in and trade away their Pokemon Red, Blue, and Yellow games. I would often sit there on my breaks, trading critters back and forth completing my own, original pokedex on my Pokemon Red. I got up to 148 of the 151 critters. I even got a legally-obtained Mew that was given out at a Toys R Us tournament at some point.

Now Oliver has gotten into Pokemon. Through some magic Japanese drug, mixed with an amount of design philosophy that tickles everyone's inner Asperger's, and a healthy amount of psychological manipulation, the property is still popular and they haven't run out of colors to name games. In our household we start our obsessions at the ground level and work up to modern day, so I picked up a few new Red, Blue, and Yellow cartridges from the late 90s for he and I to reboot and advance through the story together. I sure as heck weren't going to reboot my original game I started in 1997.

Then Oliver discovered the cartoon on Netflix. I've always hated the sensibilities of Japanese animation, so this has been painful because I won't let him watch it without me sitting next to him, and he can't marathon it because I've watched this stuff just climb into kids' brains--and it's dated and it unintentionally teaches some old-school gender role stuff rolled in with the usual Anime's unhealthy tendency to sexualize young girls. So it's a lot of work for me. BUT.

We just watched this episode. The bad guys, Team Rocket, had taken over a Pokemon beauty salon. Their cat sidekick, who is arguably the leader, says they'll take the ugly pokemon of these rich trainers, slap a little makeup on them, and laugh all the way to the bank with their money. When someone walks through the door with a rare pokemon, they'll just steal it!

I realized that sounded a lot like what I was doing back at Funcoland. Kids would come into the store, and we'd buy their old Pokemon game for dirt cheap, often with hundreds of hours of work put into it, and I'd sit there, on break, and trade the rare Pokemon critters on to my system. And then I'd sell the drained and rebooted cartridges to the next excited child.

I am Team Rocket -- blasting off again.

Consuming the Galaxy of No Man's Sky

There's this game.

It's not actually a game, it's something else. It's someone's interactive piece of art. A simplified but massive simulation of the Galaxy. If you're a fan of 70's cerebral sci-fi novels you'd love it. There are
18,446,744,073,709,551,616 planets to discover (that's the actual number!) and explore is mind numbing and tantalizing. The game came out and there were some very loud people on the internet who shat on it. I've had a great time mainly because I didn't go into it looking for a game, but an experience. A laid back trip through someone's work of art.

I got picked up and accepted into a community who has claimed an area of space around the center of the galaxy. It took me better part of a year to "warp" the hundred-thousand plus light years to get there. Things have been very active and it's a very positive community. It brought the game to life for me again in a completely new way. We were approached by some member of the video game press and one of the administrators of the group suggested he approach the players. I got asked by this guy to answer some questions. I love to write words whether they're fun to read or not, so I answered him.  Below, for your reading curiosity or boredom, is my copied and pasted reply:

(If there are typos, I'll peek back in and fix them and make the words flow fancy)




I'm very excited to share my thoughts on the game. There's something special about it and with my recent discovery of the NoMan'sSky Love Hub, my energy and excitement for it got rekindled.
  

When did you first start playing and what drives you to keep playing the game?

 

I was a player from launch. I was sold on the game by one of Sean Murray's demonstrations. He was at some conference in a private interview showing basic gameplay on a planet's surface. When he launched into space from his starship, barnstormed some freighters, then zoomed out to the galactic map and I saw how HUGE the game was, I was hooked. The gameplay looked chill. At almost 40 years old, I can't complete with the high school and college kids on Call of Duty, and I don't have the time with two young kids to bang my head against new, innovative control schemes. No Man's Sky is laid back, can be played in bursts, and doesn't put you under any pressure at all do accomplish anything. It is very literally a sandbox you can use however you want. 

Has your expectations for the game been met upon launch, or did it take time to get there? 

I was immediately satisfied at launch. I watched as many interviews and gameplay trailers as everyone else, but I didn't notice at all what was supposed to be missing. The environments were spectacular and the ambiance had me memorized. I could regale you with stories of my early outings and the gut-wrenching despair and loneliness. The game immediately played with my . . . what's the word . . . the game got into my head. It effected my emotions, my feelings. . . I was immediately immersed.

The updates have done a little to, I think, take away from some of those feelings of being a lone explorer. The theme of the game changed a bit from "go to the center and explore everything along the way" to "find a nice planet, build a base, and settle down. Keep exploring, but now you have a home."  So I noticed a tone shift and the feelings of being immersed are gone but have been replaced my something just as rewarding (which I'll go into later)

Many people seem to write off the game because of its harsh backlash when it was launched but today it seems to be thriving in it's own way. What is it that you think drives people to keep playing the game?

I don't believe that most people who play games are picking over every gameplay trailer frame by frame, or reading transcripts of interviews checking things off a list. The type of people who do that are also the type of people who get onto the internet and complain. I think the harsh backlash was coming from an extreme minority of players. We all have access to numbers of players playing and . . . oh man that number is disappointingly small. Stacks of the game are for sale used at all my local video game stores.

BUT the people who still are playing this game are playing it because they never felt mislead about what the game was "supposed" to be. Ultimately it's a game for people just like me--older folks who grew up on Star Trek and read Isaac Asimov and Arthur C Clarke books.  The game is more cerebral and it takes goofy people like us to enjoy it. The game isn't for everybody. Some people looked at the gameplay and saw Star Wars. Other people looked at the trailers and saw Andy Wier's The Martian.

What are your thoughts on community-driven initiatives such as the Galactic Hub and the Love Hub as well, and how do they change the general impressions of the game for you?

I had played the game very heavily before getting distracted by Overwatch on PS4 and Breath of the Wild on WiiU. I took time off but did peek back in to the r/NoMansSkyTheGame subreddit every now and again, and the game as well. When I first learned about the Galactic Hub, I was disappointed to find that I had already passed it on my way into the Galactic center. I had anticipated that players would congregate somewhere and I thought that would have been around the galaxy's core. I wasn't so much interested in seeing other players or interacting as much as just poking around seeing how the more creative players named things in the systems.  So when I made it to the center (before my long break) I felt very very alone and was afraid to go too far from my base star for fear of not finding it again. I played the other games a while, checked back in every now and again to build up resources and money in case another update drop, and checked out.

Then one day on Reddit, I read that there was a hub at the galactic center: NoMan'sSkyLove.  I immediately took down the coordinates, packed up my base, and used the third-party coordinate app to find NMSL - 1. I was at it for a solid week. In tracking down the star system, I found the Facebook community and immediately learned there are so many players out there who like the game for the same reasons I do. I had felt so alone in the game (it was sort of the point of the game at launch, I feel, to manipulate your senses into being a lone traveler) but I now saw this family there, this community and was overjoyed. The best part has been the feeling of acceptance. I could come onto the Facebook page and ask a stupid question about how to find my system; Reddit conditioned me to expect, "Noob, Use Google, LOLZ" or "Didn't you read the page rules?"  But no!  I've watched one of the admins (Ty Beecham) answer the same question I asked to at least 10 other potential MNSL Dwellers with the same enthusiasm and excitement as if it were the first time he were asked.

I have met people in voice chat ALL OVER THE WORLD. It is amazing. The UK, New Zealand, Australia, and that far off place known as the southern United States, (I'm from the midwest US) And every single one of them is an absolutely solid, great human being. I've only been a part of the Dwellers group for maybe over a month. I feel compelled to give back to the community as much as I can just to support it, and contribute to its life. And now I get to stroll around looking at everyone's creations AND spread our naming convention around as I explore new worlds and seek out new life. The game came alive like it never had been. The loneliness has been replaced by family and connections with other humans.

What do you hope to see for the future of No Man's Sky?

As an artist, I feel we should all be at the mercy of what the designers intend. I know what I want to see, but ultimately, I'm more interested in experiencing the game Sean and his team want to give us. My silly ideas might just destroy some critical game mechanic or change the tone, or have unforeseen consequences.  But here are my two cents anyway:

I want to see the Universe reboot. I want to see all of us players brought back to the outer rim--maybe us old timers get to keep our gathered resources, maybe not. With a universe reboot, I want to clear out all the discoveries and have a more robust engine for naming, tracking, locating, and logging discoveries with an ability to fix spelling mistakes and "un claim" named things if we want to vacate a system.  The main purpose for the universe reboot is that there can be more variety added to the algorithm that generates planets. I'd love solid city-worlds, post apocalyptic worlds, gas giants (and new ways to gather resources), ringed planets. . . I want to see Freighters, starships, and vehicles to work a little more in concert with a little more of a Star Trek flair. I'd like to see occupations play out a little more. I want to design and build starships others can buy. Other people could be miners, traders, bounty hunters, base builders, on and on.

I do not DO NOT want to see any sort of versus experience. I don't even want them to spend the time building an isolated mode for it because the tone of such a thing doesn't match and I don't think the long term players are hankering for it. It opens the world to griefing--another player coming in to my world, my life, my living room to ruin my day. It was never intended to be that sort of game and as bad as the dude-bros who gripe about the disappointments of No Man's Sky, they would come back if it meant they could grief people. Some people thrive on that. But that's NOT why I love No Man's Sky. Now Co-Op? An ability to invite one or two people into my world? Yeah, that'd be neat if done well. Certain (infrequently placed) space stations that act as a gathering place to meet other players (like how the Citadel felt in Mass Effect or how the Tower in Destiny works as a social hub)






After that, he thanked me for my time and closed the letter. I hope you cared enough to enjoy reading!  THANK YOU!

Catching the White Whale: A Collector's Story

The young’ns call them blogs. I call them, “essays.” I wrote the following essay the moment I got home from a very successful trip to a nearby comic convention, I was still riding the emotional high and was very excited to capture the energy, my emotions, and the experience. I needed to get it out and to share it. Since it was written I've gone back in and edited things for clarity and humor. Please forgive me if you catch a screwed up past or present tense verb. If you make it to the end, thanks for your time. I even heard that two of my friends teared up while reading it!

On May 15^th, 2015, I completed a collection. That doesn’t sound like much of a to-do for the “normals” who aren’t into that sort of thing. “That sort of thing” being, “the compulsion to seek out trivial bobbles that fill some imagined hole in one’s life,” but today ended a quest I’d been on since I was eleven years old. This isn’t the first time I’ve completed a collection, either. I completed my video game collection a few years ago. (that didn’t end well for the video game collection, but that’s another story) I don’t fully understand why my brain chemistry makes collecting things so important. The importance of objects has diminished greatly since my son Oliver was born, of course. In some ways, however, he’s a catalyst to inspire more collecting. We just had to track down the complete set of the preschool, Rescue Bot Transformers. Yet my love for his social well-being inspires me to make sure he understands how collecting, left unchecked, can be a harmful distraction from an authentic, stable, social, and financial life.

All Things in Moderation.

Knowing the Difference Between “Want” and “Need.”

Be in Control and Conscientious in Everything You Do.

Know when you can throw all if those rules out the window. . . responsibly of course. Right?

At Motor City Comic Con, I found issue 29 of volume 4 of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. For me, that completes every main-line book Mirage, Archie, IDW, and Image ever printed on the Turtles. Every one of them is a first print, except for the original, 1984 issue 1. No one NEEDS to spend $10,000 on a comic book printed on the cheapest of yellowing newsprint. I didn’t know I had begun collecting anything at all when I walked into a used bookstore with my mom—maybe in 1992—off of 36^th Street near the corner of Division Avenue in Grand Rapids, Michigan. It was a colorized, trade paperback reprint of the original three issues of the Mirage Ninja Turtles. It might have even been my first comic book ever. It was darker and grittier than the cartoon I loved, but it was awesome to my little 12 year-old brain--despite the perceived "errors" of having all their masks colored red, and Splinter having originally been a rat and not a human. At the time, I didn’t know the comic WAS the original. And gosh, that old book smell. I love the smell of that book. Between that trade paperback and the first two regular issues of the Mirage run my Aunt Marie got me for a birthday (issues 48 and 49), these were my first Ninja Turtles comics and they’re still in my collection. Only now? I have EVERY issue.

Having every book in that run means a lot to me. I don’t know why. It’s very comfortable. Like having sorted your record albums autobiographically.

Realistically, in the grand scheme of life it means very little. Logically I know that. Maybe those feelings come from the simpler time of my life when I’d get on my bike—sometimes with my friend David—and ride down Division Avenue to the Shell Station on 28^th street to buy the Archie Ninja Turtles series off the spinner rack. Remember when comics were sold at the grocery stores and gas stations? Fond memories. It’s part of my childhood. Maybe it’s not part of who I am now, but these books, these characters, these friends and memories are the runway on which adult Joseph Reed was launched. Having all these books is a physical connection to that time.

Dang, I’m old. I’m old enough for comics to come off a spinner rack?

Marrying my wife Jennie, hearing Oliver thudding through the house, being a teacher to many wonderful students . . . these things make me feel complete. These things make me the man I truly am. Having a complete collection of silly paperback books with anthropomorphic amphibians is . . . different. Having a family and a good job is the food. The nourishment. Collecting funny-books and toys is the candy of life. It’s the sprinkles and novelty wax candle number on the birthday cake. Totally unnecessary, but absolutely fun. Being a complete adult and being a complete geek don’t compare at all . . . except I just managed to make a food metaphor of it so maybe I did compare them.

I’ve been hunting for this book for . . . well . . . about twenty years. I didn’t know it; it was printed in 2008, but it was always “destined” to be released. So yeah. Twenty years. I’ve been specifically and actively hunting for this particular book for two years. I saw it at Motor City Comic Con one or two years ago and passed on it. At the time, I was purchasing the Turtle books sequentially from low numbers to high, based on how much disposable cash I had budgeted for myself on that particular outing. I saw it in a bin of back issues. At the time, I didn’t know how rare it was. I just bought the rest of what I needed to fill the gaps in the set. So once I got some of the other books out of the way and started looking for the later issues, I realized how gosh darned difficult 29 was being to find, I kicked myself for not knowing better and buying it when I saw it.

I waited in line outside the Suburban Collection Showplace on May 15^th, 2015, got my ticket to the Motor City Comic Convention, and walked straight for the booth I knew would be most likely to have it. This particular booth, run by the guys who put on the convention, always had a lot of Turtle books in their bins. It’s consistently been the most respectable selection of Turtle books I’ve been able to find in three states. No dice yet—they were still setting up the booth. I was too early. At the back of the booth, behind the long boxes of comics set up on tables, the racks (where the valuable comics usually were) were still empty. “If it’s going to be here, it’ll probably be back there on that rack,” I told the clerk. He agreed and I left to hit every other comic vendor in the building. I ran into Gavin and Deanna who manage a local, Grand Rapids comic store, Tardy’s Collector Corner. We’re pals, and they know what I’m into and what I’m looking for. “I’m on the hunt for that book. It’s the only reason I’m here,” I tell them. They’ve had their eyes open for me in the store as well and I love them for it. Compassionate people with the hook-up are awesome. I owe them for their awareness. The search continued. Over the next hour and a half, I had hit every comic booth and didn’t find a single thing I wanted or needed.

Defeated, I walked through artist’s alley and celebrity row. There were several folks there who broke my brain. Realizing Lieutenant Dax from Star Trek is a real human being complete with a waist, legs, feet, and shoes you don’t usually get to see on screen—and has a real life outside of the alien make-up. As a clear-thinking human, you know she’s an actor when you see her on TV, but seeing her and these other celebrities in person shocks you awake to the reality.

By then, I had given up on finding the book. I was sad and feeling it. It’s an investment using a personal day from work, driving across state, buying a ticket to a huge convention. . . and all for this one book, essentially. It ends up being a gigantic waste of time and money considering there are real-life things I could have been accomplishing. Still defeated, I head back toward Don Rosa to get an autograph for Oliver on his Scrooge books. I picked up a few other things here and there. Star Wars on BluRay for cheap. There was a heartfelt sadness as I walked by the Tardy’s booth again and talked to Deanna about not having found it. But you know? It’s a rare book. I knew very well I probably wasn’t going to find it. There were only 1000 of them printed and, as far as I’ve been able to research, were sold ONLY through the Mirage website. You had to KNOW the book was coming out AND you had to order it before it disappeared. There are fewer of these books than there are of the original #1 which had a print run of 3000. The likelihood of finding this book in the hands of someone who wasn’t keeping the book for his or her own collection was slim. Realistically, it ain’t gonna happen that easy. Keep in mind for over a year, not one week of my life had passed without my heading to Ebay and searching for, “tmnt turtles comic –idw –cover –variant –archie.” I usually searched daily if I managed to remember. I hadn’t seen the book online in those two years. Not once.

I am very literally on my way out of the building when I noticed, while walking by that first booth, behind the long boxes, the shelves were finally filled with the rare comics. I immediately stopped mid-stride to head over there.

On a rack, (oh my god there it is), I can see half the cover sticking out from behind a Peavey guitar box leaning against the shelf. Weeks ago I predicted I would be a blithering, weepy mess when I eventually did find it and I was not wrong. My trembling hand pointed at issue 29, volume 4 of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and my literally-quavering voice managed to weakly whimper out, “that’s the one I need.” Those words were all I could manage to get out. The clerk took it off the shelf and initially tried to tease me by picking it up and holding it just out of reach, saying, “you mean this one? THIS one?” I think he saw the very real tears welling up in my eyes because is face switched to concern as he handed me the book  without another word. He realized that this grown-ass man was about to have a breakdown and took pity. There are all kinds of socially awkward at conventions and he had no idea which one I was or wasn’t. I managed to keep it together (mostly) for never actually expecting to see it in person. The book is within the price limit I had set for myself and the clerk gave me ten bucks off without negotiating. Better still, it was even autographed by Peter Laird.

Yeah, I’m done. Bam. Cash handed over.

I didn’t even put the book in my satchel. I just carried it around with me like a security blanket in my trembling, numb hand. I took it over to Gavin to show him—the nearest person I knew who would give some sort of shit about what I just done. He was happy for me. I didn’t realize right away that he was holding out his hand wanting to see it. He probably thought I was keeping it like My Precious, but I’m not THAT crazy. He took it, gave it a discerning, experienced once over with his comic-shop-owner eyes, congratulated me and confirmed it was a good price. I certainly agreed. With that, I was officially done and could leave the convention. There was nothing else in that building I could possibly want. Were there more obscure turtle books I could have found in some bins? Unlicensed appearances? Crossovers? Yes. But I really didn’t care and I left the convention three hours earlier than I had scheduled. No other Turtle book out there will be as hard to find. And I can say that literally having searched E-bay for over a year.

What do normal people do with their spare time? People who don’t have this psychological candy to live for? What do they do to occupy their hands? I might call them, “boring” except the adult in me knows they’re probably living a social, spiritual life that is more complete than my superficial, material-based second-life. This is who I have though, in the little corner of my psyche: My inner child still plays there. That 9 year-old boy playing with Todd Binsz’s little plastic turtle toy still lives. Todd was a grown man who received it as a gag gift, but he let me play with it and started a lifelong love affair with martial arts terrapins. I had no idea what I was committing myself to by falling in love with that little thing as a child. It’s finally come full circle and his journey is complete. I mean seriously complete.

Whatever that means.