Geek
I've tried writing this post once before and I couldn't figure out what I wanted to say. I'm just going to let my fingers sort it out for me. Otherwise I'll be up till the wee hours and that practically guarantees a bad tic day tomorrow.
For as long as I can remember, I've loved to read. My folks were super diligent about reading to me from a very young age, and I still remember some of the details of Herbie the Ice Cream Man, a story my dad made up. As a little kid, my favorite book was "My Teacher is an Alien". I must have read it twenty times. By the time I was finished, I think the book's spine was held together entirely by my fondness for it. My copy of "Ender's Game" suffers the same malady from repeated reading and lending out. My high school girlfriend got me into fantasy books like "Wizard's First Rule" and "The Ruins of Ambrai" (funny note about that last one: the author wrote the first two books but never the third. Real burr in the saddle, that is). I'm currently obsessed with Brandon Sanderson's "Stormlight Archive" series. I've never had a real life conversation with another Tourette's patient or another Stormlight fan. I'm not sure which would make me more excited. Also check out N.K. Jemisin's "Broken Earth" trilogy. She has won three consecutive Hugo Awards, and you'll understand why if you read them.
I've also always been a big fan of video games. I remember getting my cousin's old Atari 2600 after we moved from the Bronx to NJ, and I can also remember the drive home from the electronics store/toy store where we got the little adapter to hook it up to our TV. My dad has always been supportive and kind and nurturing, but that dude had ZERO sympathy for my brothers and me when he played us in Atari Basketball. ZERO. The seminal 1995 classic Chrono Trigger holds a place of high esteem in the ranks of stories that have affected me most in my life (Don't believe me? My son came home from the hospital in this onesie). I know every secret of the Mushroom Kingdom, every trick for breeding chocobos, and my (now retired) level 85 Tauren Shaman helped rid Azeroth of the scourge of Deathwing. I now have the aforementioned son, so most of my gaming time is spend in quick matches of Fortnite before I go to bed.
All this is to say that my two favorite leisure activities are almost 100% internal, non-social things. I wonder now, in retrospect, how having Tourette's may have informed my choice of pastimes. Let me be clear: I regret nothing. I have ridden the waves of other people's imaginations to places I love as if they were real. I have seen a timid girl become a badass space pirate. I've been there as the Wheel of Time turned through an Age (yes, that's capitalized on purpose). I've lived and died and lived again with Roland of Gilead and his ka-tet as they sought the Dark Tower. I regret none of the time spent with them or with Mario, Solid Snake, Kratos, or the Master Chief. I just wonder if having TS made me more susceptible to enjoying fantasies of control.
Think about it: who is more perfectly controlled, both in-game and out-of-game, than a video game character? If Solid Snake is trying to infiltrate a base and he can't help but make a bird-chirping noise with his lips, the world is doomed! Metal Gears for everyone! YOU GET A METAL GEAR! YOU GET A METAL GEAR! YOU GET A METAL GEAR! If the Master Chief is dual-wielding pistols and suddenly has the urge the drop the one in his right hand and give some Covenant baddie the middle finger, the whole galaxy is screwed! Flood everywhere! These characters are super-chill and in control in game, and the fantasy extends out of the game where I have control over their movements and actions. There are buttons to move and buttons to jump and shoot and drive vehicles. These characters will never do anything I don't make an input that commands them to. There is no tic button in Halo. World of Warcraft doesn't have a hotkey for the "Quiet Grunt" ability (though earlier Warcraft games had a unit called the grunt). While inhabiting these characters in their worlds, I have control that I sadly lack in the real world. Same goes for books, although I feel like characters in novels have flaws and setbacks they need to overcome too. I guess that's pretty relatable to just about anyone.
For as long as I can remember, I've loved to read. My folks were super diligent about reading to me from a very young age, and I still remember some of the details of Herbie the Ice Cream Man, a story my dad made up. As a little kid, my favorite book was "My Teacher is an Alien". I must have read it twenty times. By the time I was finished, I think the book's spine was held together entirely by my fondness for it. My copy of "Ender's Game" suffers the same malady from repeated reading and lending out. My high school girlfriend got me into fantasy books like "Wizard's First Rule" and "The Ruins of Ambrai" (funny note about that last one: the author wrote the first two books but never the third. Real burr in the saddle, that is). I'm currently obsessed with Brandon Sanderson's "Stormlight Archive" series. I've never had a real life conversation with another Tourette's patient or another Stormlight fan. I'm not sure which would make me more excited. Also check out N.K. Jemisin's "Broken Earth" trilogy. She has won three consecutive Hugo Awards, and you'll understand why if you read them.
I've also always been a big fan of video games. I remember getting my cousin's old Atari 2600 after we moved from the Bronx to NJ, and I can also remember the drive home from the electronics store/toy store where we got the little adapter to hook it up to our TV. My dad has always been supportive and kind and nurturing, but that dude had ZERO sympathy for my brothers and me when he played us in Atari Basketball. ZERO. The seminal 1995 classic Chrono Trigger holds a place of high esteem in the ranks of stories that have affected me most in my life (Don't believe me? My son came home from the hospital in this onesie). I know every secret of the Mushroom Kingdom, every trick for breeding chocobos, and my (now retired) level 85 Tauren Shaman helped rid Azeroth of the scourge of Deathwing. I now have the aforementioned son, so most of my gaming time is spend in quick matches of Fortnite before I go to bed.
All this is to say that my two favorite leisure activities are almost 100% internal, non-social things. I wonder now, in retrospect, how having Tourette's may have informed my choice of pastimes. Let me be clear: I regret nothing. I have ridden the waves of other people's imaginations to places I love as if they were real. I have seen a timid girl become a badass space pirate. I've been there as the Wheel of Time turned through an Age (yes, that's capitalized on purpose). I've lived and died and lived again with Roland of Gilead and his ka-tet as they sought the Dark Tower. I regret none of the time spent with them or with Mario, Solid Snake, Kratos, or the Master Chief. I just wonder if having TS made me more susceptible to enjoying fantasies of control.
Think about it: who is more perfectly controlled, both in-game and out-of-game, than a video game character? If Solid Snake is trying to infiltrate a base and he can't help but make a bird-chirping noise with his lips, the world is doomed! Metal Gears for everyone! YOU GET A METAL GEAR! YOU GET A METAL GEAR! YOU GET A METAL GEAR! If the Master Chief is dual-wielding pistols and suddenly has the urge the drop the one in his right hand and give some Covenant baddie the middle finger, the whole galaxy is screwed! Flood everywhere! These characters are super-chill and in control in game, and the fantasy extends out of the game where I have control over their movements and actions. There are buttons to move and buttons to jump and shoot and drive vehicles. These characters will never do anything I don't make an input that commands them to. There is no tic button in Halo. World of Warcraft doesn't have a hotkey for the "Quiet Grunt" ability (though earlier Warcraft games had a unit called the grunt). While inhabiting these characters in their worlds, I have control that I sadly lack in the real world. Same goes for books, although I feel like characters in novels have flaws and setbacks they need to overcome too. I guess that's pretty relatable to just about anyone.
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