#trippiest video game experience of my life

[cashweasel]

I would give anything to experience this part for the first time again

[imsorryforthechaos]

Tanner's fun experience.

A story written by someone who should honestly see a therapist. Aka me.

"Hey guys come check this out! I think it's a body!" Squeaked a borderline psychotic child. His curly, dusty brown hair bounced as he excitedly poked the body bag. Piercing blue eyes filled with joy at the sight. The almost paper white skin he had clashed with the dark, metal pole be was using to poke the lifeless corpse. The boy looked like a walking skeleton.

"N-no, I don't wanna see any more d-dead things, Jasper." One scared girl stammered. Her long, unnaturally red hair covered her face as she looked down at the ground with terrified purple eyes. An older, lanky boy was passing by and heard the notoriously creepy kid picking on the innocent girl in his class again.

"Yeah you showed her a dead cat yesterday. How did you even get a dead cat into school?" The boy questioned hesitantly. Instantly regretting even talking to the younger kid. His brown eyes filled with terror and concern as he wipes his blonde bangs out of his face.

Jasper turned towards the two frightened children with a devilish, wide grin. The horrid smile got wider and wider and his teeth got sharper and sharper.

"Do you want to see where I keep my collection? Maybe you could help me add more. I could always use more trophies." Jasper stated in a stereotypical demonic child voice.

"Okay, seriously?" The "scared" little girl asks, clearly annoyed. "You are a demon, I'm guessing? Why do you have to have that stupid voice? It's so overused. Be original for once, excuse my potty mouth, but holy crap! You have obvious powers. You can surely pitch your voice different or talk in a different tone. Or are all demons boring and the same? Not to mention your complete LACK of originality in your word choices."

Jasper's jaw is firmly planted on the ground at this point. Never has anyone talked back to him and made him feel powerless. This girl surely has to be an equal. Jasper walked calmly over to the girl.

"What is your name? No one has ever made me feel powerless. You must be as strong as me. I could have a girl like yo-" Jasper was cut off by a knife made out of a demon tooth being stabbed into his stomach. It started to burn him as it was coated in holy water.

"Where did you- AAAAGGGHHHHH!" Jasper screamed in pain.

"What a waste of time, you can't even turn into a demon yet. I wanted to make a new demon tooth knife. Whatever."

Reyna takes out a very long sword from her, seemingly, tiny backpack and cuts the demon boy in two. He roars in agony. His upper and lower halves fall away from each other. Jasper tries desperately to crawl away.

"Please, I don't want to go back down there. You don't want to know what it's like. Please, let me go."

"Hm, guess you shouldn't have done something to go to hell in the first place."

Reyna stabs the sword into Jasper's head. A bright light surrounds the two halves and he explodes into light particles. Reyna sighs a breath of relief, puts her tools back in her back, and starts to walk back to class. Her stroll to class was interrupted by the cries of the older boy. Reyna turns around to see the boy wide eyed, on the ground, in the fetal position, and crying. She casually walks over to him and kneels down next to him. Her tiny arms wrap around her equally tiny legs.

"What's your name?" Reyna asks innocently.

"T-Tanner." He stutters. Still staring off, visibly traumatized.

"Last name?"

"D-D-Dent."

"Ah, the Dent family. Such a wonderful bunch of people. Loving, caring, and just genuinely good." Reyna says to herself as she takes her backpack off and takes out a notebook. She sits crisscross on the floor and takes off a pen that is resting on the notebook's binder rings and opens the book.

"What are you g-gonna do? Also, h-how do you know m-my family?" The crying boy asked in a cautious manner.

"Oh, I'm sorry here." As Reyna says her last word, she snaps and the world is then turned into a white, neverending room "I'm your... well you see... Ugh, okay, I really don't know how else to put this and I'm sorry if this freaks you out, I can assure you you're safe with me here. Okay?"

Tanner gets up off the now white floor and wipes away his tears. "Okay."

"I'm your spirit guardian. Before you ask, no, not a guardian angel, those are completely different. Spirit guardians are new because guardian angels have to protect their human from a bunch of other dumb things. Like their choices, for example. No offense." Reyna smiles sarcastically. "Also, if you're wondering what this place is, it's your soul. It's not filled with much because you are still fairly new to life. The only things that are in here are your parents, video games, and basic things that a child can love with their heart and soul. I'm also writing down your name and the experienceso your guardian angel can help you forget." Reyna further explains. "Now I need you to do something for me. I need you to say you fully trust in me."

"Why?" Tanner questions.

"I need your trust as consent. So, you're not completely crazy when you grow up. Because you will have flashbacks to when a 5 year old girl pulled a sword out of her backpack and chopped a 5 year old boy in half and then he exploded."

"Yeah, okay, I trust you."

"You put your full trust in me?"

"Yes, I put my full trust in you."

Reyna smiles and turns into a giant, gray and black monster like creature. Sharp, barbed claws attached to disgustingly, wrinkly, pale skin that looks leathery to the touch. All the skin on it is grotesquely wrinkled. "Good." She says in Danny Devito's voice.

Tanner squints in confusion at the voice and then has a sudden realization. "Wait a second, why am I in elementary school? I'm 26."

As he finishes that sentance he is hit in the stomach with an unknown, powerful force that shoots him into a wormhole.

"BRO! BRO! YOU GOOD BRO?." A worried voice echos.

"Wha-"

Tanner comes back to his senses. He is laying on his old, broken couch. He looks around to see his cluttered apartment. He smiles a tired, half smile.

"Yoooooo... dude... you will NOT believe what I saw!" Tanner says in an exhausted but excited tone. Tanner went on to explain everything he saw to his friend, Cam. Who was completely entertained at his friend's experience.

"How did I pass out anyway and how long was I out?" Tanner asks Cam.

"Oh dude as soon as the tab started hitting you ran around like Naruto and slammed your head into the table really hard. You were out for like 5 mins. It felt like forever though. I love you bro, I thought I lost you." Cam explains, getting sadder as the statement goes on. His pale, soft blue eyes brimmed with tears. Tiny bits of brown baby hairs, that aren't long enough for his low pony tail, lightly touch his face as he looks down.

"Nah, bro, I'm invincible! You're never gonna lose me, bro." Tanner yells flexing his nonexistent muscles. "Yo we should watch a movie on this!"

Both men rush to the DVD cabinet and look for the trippiest movies. They settle on Shrek and flop on the couch.

"What do you think demon girl Danny Devito was going to do?" Cam asks a little bit into the movie.

"Probably offer me girl scout cookies. She looked mean but I think she had a heart of gold." Tanner replied.

They marathon Shrek and then cry about their life until they pass out.

The End

[raisingsupergirl]

The Cost of New Experiences

Here I am, sitting next to my five-year-old daughter. We're headed home to MO after a trip to see her cousins in Colorado Springs. She's flipping through a magazine, munching on some Craisins®, oblivious to the fact that we're flying two miles above the ground and our only protection from imminent death is a one-inch piece of glass. I guess ignorance is bliss… Then again, the fact that she's flying this young in the first place probably means that she's less ignorant than I was at her age. And her sister, who's only two, is sitting across the isle from her, watching The Lion King on an iPad, also completely unaware of everything going on around her. What an age we live in, huh?

I don't feel old, exactly. It's just that so much has changed in the few short decades since my birth. I was about six years old when Santa brought my family a Super Nintendo, and my first thought was that there were too many buttons. I was around ten when we got a Nintendo64, and my first thought was to stop myself from puking because the "camera" moved 360 degrees around Mario, and it was the trippiest thing I'd ever seen. And then, in middle school, my family got an actual computer, and the Internet, and everything changed. Sure, it was dial-up, but I didn’t know any different (ignorance is bliss, remember?). The possibilities were endless. I could download songs (about one song per hour) and burn them directly onto CDs. I could also log on to Yahoo Instant Messenger and literally chat with Hollywood movie stars and European supermodels (in hindsight, they may have been other kids acting out these exotic personas, but I hadn't yet learned that everything on the Internet wasn't true…).

When I turned sixteen, my parents bought me my first cell phone (an indestructible Nokia that came with the best game ever—Snake), and within a year, I knew how to send text messages. And when I went off to college, I was introduced to a cutting-edge, mind-altering technology known as a "LAN party" (aka plugging multiple computers into the same network via Ethernet cables and playing games of Halo with dozens of other people at the same time. You've never seen so many rockets launchers). But do you want to know the sad thing about that epic progression of science throughout my childhood? All of it—every video game, downloaded song, and text message—could fit onto the iPad that my two-year-old is watching right now. And that's just the start of it.

My kids have eaten sirloin steak and sushi. They've traveled north, south, east, and west across the country. My oldest learns ballet and Spanish on YouTube. And now they both know what it's like to fly in an airplane. These are just a few of the things that I had no idea about until I was three or four times their age, and to them, they're just normal parts of life. And, to be honest, I'm not sure if I should be happy or terrified.

Since my career requires me to work with high schoolers on a daily basis, I know the new struggles they're going through. Snapchat and e-cigarettes are ruining lives. Everything is documented on the Internet, and kids have panic attacks when they can't find their cell phones. There's this inescapable interconnectedness that's changing the way we think and operate, and it's coupled with growing pressure from parents, coaches, and schools that make it impossible for a kid to ever, well… be a kid—carefree, whimsical, and unproductive on a level that's absolutely crucial for developing creativity and confidence. But, hey, at least they have all of the best stuff.

This past Saturday, it was almost sixty degrees in Colorado Springs, so we were able to take the families to Garden of the Gods, a truly awe-inspiring park and trail system that winds through towering rock formations that no picture can do justice. Both of my kids loved the experience, and my five year old asked a lot of questions about things like the rock climbers and the staggering size of the formation. I have no doubt that the trip expanded her mind and sparked ideas that will help her grow. On top of that, she got to see her cousins, and my wife got to see her sister (along with the rest of her family that flew out with us). It really was great, but a part of me couldn't help thinking, "Couldn't we save thousands of dollars and hours of travel time by getting together in Missouri and just video chatting with our Colorado family?"

I guess that makes me sound pretty awful. But I can't help it if I like the comfort of my home—the comfort of Missouri. I've lived in Virginia. I've been all up and down the East Coast. I've been to Nevada. I've been to Florida and Mississippi. I've been to Cancun and Denmark. But there's no place like home. The ground feels different. The air smells different. Nature sounds different. I've had a lot of experiences, but Missouri is where my heart is. And I'd be perfectly content taking staycations for the rest of my life. You know, if it wouldn't be incredibly unfair to my wife and kids.

You see, I know that I love Missouri because I've experienced other places. I know I love greasy cheeseburgers and medium-rare steaks, but I also love sushi, Korean beef, crab cakes, and pad thai because I've had the chance to try them. I put my faith in Jesus because I've taken the time to (continuously) study and consider other religions, beliefs, and claims that all fall short of what I've found in Christianity. Sometimes, I take my past experiences and education for granted. I'll explain something to my kids that goes completely over their heads, and I don't understand why until I consider that there's a whole missing section of life that they just haven't gotten to yet. During our Colorado Springs trip, my five year old didn't understand why the bags of potato chips looked like they were ready to explode because she hasn't learned about atmosphere, air pressure, or altitude (though I may need to retake some classes, because I thought it would be a good idea to do a 45-minute cardio workout at 6,000 feet…). She didn't understand why she shouldn't run around and play with her cousins even though the Tylenol brought her fever down and made her feel normal again because she hasn't taken biology or physiology yet. And she didn't understand why she got spanked for lying because she hasn't seen how destructive dishonesty can become.

There's so much she has yet to learn, and every experience sheds a ray of understanding on an otherwise dark and mysterious world. Not every experience will be a good one. Some will scare. Some will scar. Some will threaten to push her down ruinous paths. But there is so much good to learn as well, and even the "bad" stuff will help her grow as long as she has a head on her shoulders and a daddy at her back.

And so, we're about to touch down in St. Louis, and stewardesses are glaring at me to put my laptop away. My daughter is now sleeping on my shoulder, and I'm a lot happier about the money we spent to go out and see family in a place truly unlike any other on Earth. Life is about experiences. It's about seizing opportunity and growing from it. It's about spreading love and compassion born out of those experiences, not hiding from them or hording them. We are created to live, to celebrate the complex and majestic world that God created for us. Whether that's on a small scale or a large one, we should appreciate every moment. Because, when it comes down to it, we will leave it all behind someday, but the memories that we created will continue on in those with whom we chose to live life.