Thanks Gary

Gary Gygax died today. "Gary who?" Gary Gygax, the father of modern gaming, the visionary of what became known as "Dungeons and Dragons". I'm sad for many reasons. The more narcissistic reason is that it means I am getting older. I started playing D&D around 1982 in college and back then Mr. Gygax was still active, still a household name in my burgeoning circle of friends. It's difficult for me to believe that it was 26 years ago that I first "slung dice" with my friends. 26 years ago... I now have friends who weren't even born at that time! The passing of personalities who influenced by life brought on by the passing of time simply reinforces my own feeling of mortality.

I'm sad for other reasons too. Regardless of your views on role playing games, I have to say that some of my most intense and closest friendships were formed over a makeshift table, dice in the form of Platonic solids, pencils, papers, cold pizza and warm soda (later replaced by warm beer). I miss those times, the closeness of those friendships. My college roommate Gregg and I still talk (well, more often the 21st century version of talk) after all this time. I recall quite vividly nights in the dorm room gaming with Gregg, Patrick, and Pete as well as many a Saturday afternoon spent in Brady Commons at Mizzou with the gaming society (and after being kicked out going to The Old Heidelberg to play beer and pretzel games). Through gaming I finally had friends. I had gone the first 18 years of my life without any real friends in it and because of Gary Gygax's desire to expand gaming I finally had friends. And this wasn't the only time either. When I later moved to Kansas City to work on my PhD my first group of friends THERE was created because of gaming. Thomas, Darrin, Van... oh so many Saturday nights spent at Thomas' place gaming, eating pizza, and just having fun. Shoot, gaming even got me a date with someone still special to me. In many ways a connection through gaming brought me my friend Andrew here in San Diego as well. So I owe a lot to gaming and Mr. Gygax because through it I discovered a place where I could fit in and find out what it meant to belong.

On a more academic and philosophical level, D&D opened me up to the realm of fantasy, of myth and legend and what they can mean to a person in modern times. My current love of philosophers who talk about issues of myth and story telling I can trace directly back to D&D. The idea of narrative, the power of story, the search for meaning, the beauty of using your own imagination to create, all of these go back in some manner to playing D&D. It was during D&D games I learned to tell my own stories, to spin tales that others found entertaining, to sharpen my own intellectual tools when questioned, to think quickly and coherently outside of simple college work.

So for all these reasons and many others you will be missed E. Gary Gygax.