One of my fondest family memories is my father coming home from his gruelling job at the lumber mill, smelling of cedar with sawdust in his hair, with a shit-eating grin and a cool looking box under his arm emblazoned with the odd-sounding name ‘Atari’ on it. My dad was a rugged, working class, smart-ass outdoorsman, I was a shy, pudgy, perpetually terrified, and awkward bookish kid. So instead of going hunting and fishing together (I cried when the animals got hurt and nearly broke my nose shooting a shotgun the wrong way like an idiot), my dad and I spent hours laughing and yelping playing 'Combat, ‘Super Breakout’, and ‘Pac Man’ together. I didn’t realize how precious those memories were to me until I typed this post. On the verge of tears just remembering those times.
My dad, who bought the Atari on a whim and didn’t really know what it was, introduced me to video games, a love of mine that fully bloomed when I got an NES (I’m still a Nintendo zealot). I’m adopted, so I was always painfully conscious of how different I was from my family, in the ways that I did differ. Maybe that’s why I treasure getting this love of games from my dad so much.
I’m not particularly proud to admit it, but sometimes even today, if I find myself in a snowy parking lot with no other cars around, I find myself seeing if I still have it…
