Some nights, I venture my mind deep into my past. Today I wonder, am I the only one that remembers pokemon and all those others jems that my generation shared in our childhood. Sure you pass judgement on such activities because essentially to our, oh so familiar, left brain mentality these past activities are completely inane and useless. I mean, try explaining to your "rational and analytic" mind that pokemon has left a lasting impression on your development. But really think about it. Or I should say just feeeel it. Because brothers and sisters we are all one and if you just feel it is muc better than if you listen. Truly, when we lower our judgement and inhibitions we really understand. Come on my fellow right brainers leave that egotistical persona in math class were he/she belongs. Anyways, enough debreefing (It annoys me to no end, when people do that for about a page and a half, but I understand why some of you do it. No judgement there)...

Pokemon was that fantastic world where you could enter as an average chump holding an abnoxious red and white ball and come out a master of your environment. Yes! A master of your environment. I know that struck true to me; as a kid I was completely obsessed with animals and wilderness. In fact i was so obsessed that I often fantasized that Steve Irvin (you Steve! You were the man. You are still the man, man!) would just send me a misterious letter in which he expressed his exhaustion to me. In fact, it went something like this:

"Goodday, Nico! My name is Steve Irvin I dont know if you seen my shows (little did imaginary Steve Irvin know I worshiped his shows.) It saddens me that not many people find the sheer beauty of the wild, I mean, its absolutely GORGEOUS. Anyways I am just going to come out and say it... I am a man and I know when I need help. You see, mate I have bitten more than I can chew and I have been chewed up more than I can be bitten. I have heard that you have a extraordinary amount of animal knowledge and you sound like the straightforward kind of guy that I need for my future adventures. Also I sense burning ambition in you, not the boring monitary ambition, but the deep meaningful ambition. This is good because I will need to train you to carry on my legacy as the amazing man in history!"

I would proptly daydream about sending an imaginary letter back, but I never really got a letter from Steve. I mean, I can imagine you know how are they going to have mailboxes in the middle of the jungle? It would eventually happen to the child in me, and I kept the studying going (you know the plan B.) Thats why the sting ray tragedy hit me so much, because I really had to tell the child in me that Steve was gone. That his mind and body were not as big as his legacy. To my boy Irvin I keep your flame in my heart wherever I go...

Ah man those are some true words.

Lets go back to pokemon now. The reason that pokemon struck so true in my heart was because I saw everybody enjoying something that fed directly into one of my truest fantasies. I mean, it started with the occasional bold kid stating that they thought pokemon was interesting, and yes I have always been this kind of pioneer. Then the ball started rolling and people started having open conversations about the fad. Some even went as far as to choose what kind of pokemon they would have in their team, if they were interested in that kind of thing of course...

By about the halfway mark of the semester pokemon had become culture. It strung us all together in this web of caricature and optimism. A stranger could easily be approached by simply asking if they traded cards. Sometimes we even disregarded the hello and asked the latter question; everybody traded cards.

There was some magic in the thought that while you were watching that dayly thirty minute cartoon everybody else in your school was watching it, as well. Our sense of petty competition, the desire to put people down to make ourselves look bigger, was put aside to completely wrap our minds around every wonderful detail about the pokemon world.

Sure there were those that looked at our spell and saw dollar bills in their eyes. In fact, we were manipulated into buying pokemon merchandice until the spell wore off and pokemon just reminded us of the rest of the cold analytical world where the fool was always fooled. And we that followed the trend were fooled. But I regret none of it. It is this magical, semingly unreachable elements that make life beautiful. Ten years latter do I still venture into some pokemon action. Damn right I do! It doesnt hold the same naive charm but it reminds me of the sublime part in my head. It reminds me and it should remind you that you forsaked those childish dreams because you figured you would go back to them when you were fanancially secured. Yeah, you told yourself you would come back to them eventually so that the pain of leaving that magic would not be so great. And that's how we say bye to the things we love by not saying bye and pulling them so close to us that we just assume they will follow us into the future "Goodbye, my dear, some day I'll see you again but lets just go because today is too painful." Because our minds are incredible and they are able to find love and create in anything if we really believed. Deep down we never let go of anybody we love either. Every relationship is a tatoo in your heart. Sometimes they tingle, shyly, and remind you of simple pleasures. Sometimes they burn bright and you feel their magic radiating inside and out of you. Sometimes they are quiet. Waiting for you