Author Topic: Good day!  (Read 2193 times)

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Offline skjaedigare

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Good day!
« on: March 08, 2015, 01:34:00 AM »
Hi everyone!

I've been aware of this forum for quite some time now, but only just decided to join after I finished reading all of Adam and Ifi's reviews of the Animorphs series on their Cinnamon Bunzuh blog!

I can't remember exactly when I got into Animorphs, but it would have been sometime between the ages of 8 and 10, in the late 90s. Back then I used to attend language classes every Saturday at a school that was some distance from my home. Next to the school was a fairly large bookstore that I vaguely remember being extremely blue. Blue carpets, blue shelves, blue walls, blue signs. Anyway, after class, while waiting for my parents to come fetch me for lunch, I often popped by that bookstore, to the kids section. I'd been an avid reader from quite a young age, mostly because I was a very quiet kid, so books were my only friends. I was always on the lookout for new books to read, but I rarely actually bought any, since my own school's library was very well stocked, and anyway I read so quickly it just didn’t make financial sense to buy even a small fraction of the books I read. But I remember one day, in that bookstore, stumbling across #11 The Forgotten, and being totally captivated by that image of Jake morphing into a jaguar on the cover. And that book I had to buy.

I have to say, I was never a massive fan of the Animorphs. I never followed them particularly faithfully. Later I’d buy another two books. I can’t remember which. And in school I discovered I had friends who were also fans of the series, and I’d borrowed a few from them. But I estimate now that, from the time I discovered #11 to when I lost interest in the series in my early teens, I never read more than 15 of them. I lost interest because, like I said, I was an avid reader, and by the time I was 13 or 14 I’d moved on.

I’d moved on from the books, but not from the characters. For me it had always been about the characters. The plot was interesting, but it only ever mattered to me because they exercised the characters, gave them a context in which to develop. And I loved them. During the years I was following the series they were constantly on my mind. I was coming up with my own stories for them, sometimes stories that took them far out of the Animorphs universe into one of my own creation. Even after I’d put the books down this continued. The characters grew and grew in my head until, in many ways, they were no longer the same ones as were in the books. But they had the same names, represented the same basic character archetypes, and when I imagined them, I always saw them as they had appeared to me on the covers of the books.

To this day I don’t know why these characters had so absorbed me. I liked the Animorph books, but they weren’t my favourites. And sure, the characters were interesting but there were other books out there with great characters too that I also loved. But somehow they just stuck with me, and grew with me. They were with me when I turned 16, 18, 21, when I graduated college. I don’t want to create the impression I was some obsessive loner. As I grew up I made friends, and occupied my mind with many other things, many other books, creative pursuits, my studies, which I took really seriously. They were never really the sole focus of my imagination, or even a major part of it. But they were always there, and they molded themselves into the contours of my life, so that in my idle times I could always conjure them up in my mind, and they would be just as real as they ever were, and moreover, completely relevant to whatever I happened to be going through intellectually or emotionally at the time.

Last year, I discovered the eBooks published on this same site. For the first time I had convenient access to the entire series. I decided I would finally get around to reading the series all the way through. So I did. I got through them pretty fast, considering how busy I was with life. Started some time in February, and finished them around the end of March. It was devastating. I knew the series had a reputation for being dark, and I’d also heard somewhere along the way that it had a “bittersweet” ending, to say the least, but I had no idea it was this intense.

The thing is, it wasn’t so much the sad ending that so many of the characters had met that had affected me, as it was the discovery of these sad endings after so many years. It was like leaving my home town, not knowing what had happened to all the friends I’d left behind, for years and years imagining that they had gone on to live average, ordinary lives, just like mine, only to one day find out they’d all died in a tragic bus accident just months after I’d left. And it didn’t help that these characters, or at least the versions of them I’d created for myself in my mind, had been with me through so many of my own difficult times.

After finishing the series last year I’d put it down and again moved on with my life. But just last week somebody pointed Cinnamon Bunzah out to me, and I just had to go back and read it. I’d been reading a blog reviewing episodes of Boy Meets World, another major cultural institution for a 90s kid like me, which had just finished up, after nearly a year and a half of thrice-weekly updates. It felt natural. I completed Cinnamon Bunzah last night, and all the feelings from last year had come flooding back. It was quite nice, actually, but in a sad way.

I don’t know how much I’m going to participate in this forum. Like I’ve said, I never followed the series particularly faithfully, and I still can’t say I’m a huge fan. But it is a series that has touched my life in an intimate way, and I just thought I’d register to share some of these feelings. I thought maybe somebody else would have been through something similar and been able to empathise. So there you.

redtailedsaffa

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Re: Good day!
« Reply #1 on: March 08, 2015, 07:33:42 AM »
That actually made me feel quite a few feels. +1 to you.

It's always great when a fandom touches someone personally. Helps bring more of us together. Welcome to RAF! :D

Offline skjaedigare

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Re: Good day!
« Reply #2 on: March 08, 2015, 07:29:10 PM »
That actually made me feel quite a few feels. +1 to you.

It's always great when a fandom touches someone personally. Helps bring more of us together. Welcome to RAF! :D

Thanks!  :)

Offline .: Asmo

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Re: Good day!
« Reply #3 on: March 08, 2015, 07:40:43 PM »
Impressed you have posted more than just an intro. Most just post that and move on. Hopefully you stick around. ::crosses fingers::
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Offline skjaedigare

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Re: Good day!
« Reply #4 on: March 08, 2015, 07:58:02 PM »
Impressed you have posted more than just an intro. Most just post that and move on. Hopefully you stick around. ::crosses fingers::

Haha. It certainly is my intention to stick around. We'll see, though. I have a dissertation due in about two months, so life is pretty hectic now.

Offline NothingFromSomething

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Re: Good day!
« Reply #5 on: March 11, 2015, 09:59:41 AM »
Aloha, ol' European-type person with a funny hat!

Welcome, have some cookies, etc. 

Person Of Interest re-watch.  Still stunning as ever.

Offline skjaedigare

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Re: Good day!
« Reply #6 on: April 21, 2015, 10:25:29 PM »
Aloha, ol' European-type person with a funny hat!

Welcome, have some cookies, etc. 

It only just occurred to me you were referring to the guy in my display picture. The photo is actually American: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:New_Map_of_Europe_1 918.jpg  :XD: