Allow me to shill a video that had dropped very recently from Exclamation Points, talking about Love, Chunibyo, and Other Delusions, and how growing old sucks, especially for those with strong imaginations who played pretend back when they were younger.
I can pretty much immediately relate to the content of this video and the anime it's talking about (to the point I think I might give it a peek one day after hearing about it, just cause I wanna feel sad about losing the childhood spark that once was =D). I'm sure many of us played pretend way back in the day, and not just imaginary friends either... but making up stories and characters, playing with pretend weapons, making up games, and the like. I myself had a very active imagination, and I loved to imagine all sorts of things in the world around me, make up plotlines, create abilities... hell, I still have my personal character stat sheet from way back in the day (and no, I'm not posting any of it, cause it's embarrassing as hell XD).
I can very distinctly remember the moment when my imagination flipped a particular switch when I was getting into my mid-teens. I remember being on a road trip with the family, looking out into the world and letting my mind go wild. The sky had a pink hue as I went through a land with MASSIVE plants and flowers the size of buildings, roots weaving around each other, with pollen-like particles floating around. I then blinked, and without knowing why... it was all gone. I tried to picture it the same way, and I could piece some of it together, but none of it was as vivid as it once was. After that, it was hard to rekindle the same level of clarity I had for imagining the world around me as something else. I can re-create the image now, but, there was a vividness to it that simply isn't there any more. It was almost alien to feel that happen, so see it all suddenly turn off like that...
I eventually got some of the spark back early into adulthood as I began to get ideas for worlds and stories I wanted to tell, which in turn sparked my interest in playing Dungeons and Dragons. Soon enough, I found the player side of things too restrictive, tried being a DM, fell in love, and now almost exclusively play the DM for other people so that they can experience such fantastical stories again. And while I can't quite picture the world the same way as I did before... I can certainly rekindle at least some of the child-like wonder I had before through my stories. Growing old doesn't have to totally suck, after all
I can pretty much immediately relate to the content of this video and the anime it's talking about (to the point I think I might give it a peek one day after hearing about it, just cause I wanna feel sad about losing the childhood spark that once was =D). I'm sure many of us played pretend way back in the day, and not just imaginary friends either... but making up stories and characters, playing with pretend weapons, making up games, and the like. I myself had a very active imagination, and I loved to imagine all sorts of things in the world around me, make up plotlines, create abilities... hell, I still have my personal character stat sheet from way back in the day (and no, I'm not posting any of it, cause it's embarrassing as hell XD).
I can very distinctly remember the moment when my imagination flipped a particular switch when I was getting into my mid-teens. I remember being on a road trip with the family, looking out into the world and letting my mind go wild. The sky had a pink hue as I went through a land with MASSIVE plants and flowers the size of buildings, roots weaving around each other, with pollen-like particles floating around. I then blinked, and without knowing why... it was all gone. I tried to picture it the same way, and I could piece some of it together, but none of it was as vivid as it once was. After that, it was hard to rekindle the same level of clarity I had for imagining the world around me as something else. I can re-create the image now, but, there was a vividness to it that simply isn't there any more. It was almost alien to feel that happen, so see it all suddenly turn off like that...
I eventually got some of the spark back early into adulthood as I began to get ideas for worlds and stories I wanted to tell, which in turn sparked my interest in playing Dungeons and Dragons. Soon enough, I found the player side of things too restrictive, tried being a DM, fell in love, and now almost exclusively play the DM for other people so that they can experience such fantastical stories again. And while I can't quite picture the world the same way as I did before... I can certainly rekindle at least some of the child-like wonder I had before through my stories. Growing old doesn't have to totally suck, after all
