The Other Day Someone Told me There was Such a Thing as a Ford F-650

If I was a woman, and I saw this:

I would feel oppressed.

-Will

Smells Like

It smells like summer tonight.

It smells like movie nights and ice cream and heat receding from the blaring day.

The kind of summer night where, on a whim at 3 am, one might walk down the middle of roads illuminated by orange street signs to get a chocolate milk at 7 Eleven. Where one might grab a couple friends, find a field, and count shooting stars all night. Because there's nothing better or worse to do in the world.

Not too many more of these.

Moshpits, Sweat, and Music

Four years ago today at Warped Tour, I was having the time of my life and sweating profusely in a giant circular moshpit at a Reel Big Fish show (I was able to see them again earlier this summer and had a remarkably similar experience.) I'm going to my second Warped Tour, this time in Virginia, tomorrow.

Certainly some of my fondest memories are at concerts. Cool people call them shows, but I really believe the distinction is made in the venue. The first time I ever saw a band live was seeing Paramore at "The Living Room," an old Providence venue that was essentially a warehouse with a bar. I would call that a show. Since then, I saw AC/DC at Gilette Stadium, where the stage had cannons, a giant bell, and a freaking train on it.

That's no show, that's a concert.

Reel Big Fish played in the House of Blues, which has become maybe my favorite venue. If you enjoy concerts, you should go see one there -- I went to the one in Boston, but I'm sure they're all excellent. The free water alone would earn a hearty recommendation-- they charged three bucks a pop at Dropkick Murphys-- but apart from that it's the only venue that I've been to that's a spectacle in itself. It looks like it belongs in a Guitar Hero game.

I've noticed that there's a pretty standard set of characters at these shows/concerts. The guy who brought a girl and is taking up three people worth of space in his aggressive defense of her. The girl who's on her own and super okay with it. The guy who's on his own and very much not okay with it. The guy who crowd surfs all night. The giant security guard at the front of the stage with a ZZ Top beard and an intense enmity for the crowd surfer. This time, I met a severely inebriated woman when she accidentally punched me in the neck. There was an old lady on the green line who seemed right horrified at the menagerie of people on the subway. I think if she had asked if I just jumped in a pool I would have just said yes.

There will come a time when I'm sure I won't appreciate this delicate combination of sweating, people, and absurdly loud music, but it is not this day. Even now, though, there are aspects of concerts like that that I don't appreciate, crowd surfing being the main one. In movies, crowd surfing is usually when someone in the band jumps off the stage and is carried on a perfect bed of hands for a few seconds. In reality, crowd surfing is crowd throwing; it starts in the back of the crowd, not the front, so after the initial lift, if the "support" doesn't have their heads on a swivel then a man falls on them. It's not a pleasant experience. Even if heads are thoroughly swiveled that just means people are more aware that a man is about to land on them. No one over 150 lbs. should be legally allowed to crowd surf. It's just a life experience that we should miss out on for the greater good.

Conversely, I find moshing, which is stereotypically the less entertaining, by far the best crowd experience. I do have to clarify: most of my moshing experience comes from Ska concerts. I would be concerned about getting into a heavy metal pit, but Ska creates happy moshpits.

If someone falls down, everyone around them makes a circle and they get helped the frick up. That's serious, and no one is so lost in the music that they'll allow someone get trampled. I experienced a similar reaction tonight when someone noticed my glasses got knocked off. This isn't a group of people beating the crap out of each other, it's a people who love the band and want to express that in a physically intense way, and happen to be in a very small square footage. Heads are kicked. Shoes are lost. And necks are punched, apparently. But it's a good time.

You can actually see me in this picture. 10 points if you can find me.

-Will


"It's not so bad being trendy; everyone who looks like me is my friend."

Summer Job (Remix)

This summer, I'm working as a counselor with a leadership camp run by an office I will not name here. The position is "camp counselor," but the class-heavy couple of weeks does not make your typical summer excursion; the role does not match what most people think of when they think "camp counselor." I'm essentially the practical arm of said organization, staying with the kids almost 24/7.

Often this means performing a number of menial tasks that just need to get done; setting up Wi-Fi, making sure the water is stocked, buying shampoo, sometimes helping kids if they're sick or homesick. The issue is this: I answer to the college we're staying at for any mess the kids get in, and I answer to the chaperones for anything that the college screws up (which are many things). My cynical description is that I have all the responsibility and none of the authority. I've described it to a few others (and vehemently to myself, under my breath, with adjectives) as being anywhere on a spectrum from "nuts" to a "nightmare."

The majority of my days are spent moving people to places. I'm in charge of keeping track of the kids in the morning and at night, making sure they are awake and ready to go to breakfast, and getting them on the bus afterwards. In the mornings we go to the Harvard campus to have class. If you ever think to yourself with pride, "yeah, I know stuff," walk through a science building of a prestigious school. Nothing in there makes any sense, and there's an incredible amount of things that don't make any sense. I probably couldn't pass a high school chemistry test at this point, so it's weird that I'm even allowed to be inside a building that has words and phrases like "centrifuge" and "DNA sequencing drop off." For a few days we went to MIT, where the titles made just enough sense to sound even more impressive: "Optimization of Schochastic Strategies for Robot Swarms."

In the afternoon the people moving continues, when I help get them to lunch, bathrooms, the right stores, onto Duck Boats, etc. Imagine herding 32 sheep, who all want to buy something at Starbucks. 

Many problems are no one's fault. In the chain of command, all the people above me are Korean and all the people around and below me are Brazilian, so everyone has their own secret language. I completely understand that it's hard to learn another language-- my French is awful-- so of course I'm not upset at anyone in particular. Everyone's working hard. But not only is it tiring to struggle to be understood, this often causes miscommunication, which is our most rampant problem.

I have to digress here, though. Already I've said "the kids," which is too sweeping a term. That's the issue with talking about a group; the same problem I had when I first went to Africa. It's far too easy to make judgments on a group based on an outspoken minority. In Senegal, one extremely vocal anti-American girl made it look like everyone there hated the US. This assessment might not be completely off-base--no one seemed to care enough to argue with her, after all-- but it was still unfair.

It's a similar situation here; the kids who stand out aren't the one who are respectful and obedient, the ones who are always on time and only have to be told something once-- they were a minority to be sure, but still present. I remember much more clearly the the times when I had to shout to get everyone's attention, when I had to tell the same dude to go to bed three times before he even moved, and when I had to sprint through the halls and unlock doors because people forgot wallets, textbooks, glasses, etc.

Anyway, with one exception, they were all 10-13 years old. And they were all extremely 10-13 years old. It's an age when the consideration lobe is far from developed; very few people at 13 realize that everything they do affects other people. The kids had a propensity for congregating in choke points like stairwells and narrow hallways, and seemed blind to the capacity of trash cans.

Overall, the job is just tough. It's a lot of work. But there are worse jobs. I'd rather work here than at Delta's customer service, for example. And the fact of the matter is: I'm lucky to have a job at all. But man, do I miss three-hour shifts at the coffeehouse.

-Will

"It seems to me I could live my life a lot better than I think I am."

Second Edit

A few days after I posted about the job, one of the girls from the camp said she and a few others had found my blog.

Oops.

She said I seemed "angry and tired," which is fair.

I was. I'm still tired.

But she brought up a good point; although it was honest, it was perhaps too harsh. And though I failed to complete the sentence noting this, it was meant to be a very brief, very unedited update to let people know what was going on. A second edit is incoming, maintaining honesty, while hopefully lacking as much suppressed rage. I'll leave these here for posterity.

Summer Job

I've been pretty incredibly busy the past few days, but a lot of people (including my family) Normally I try to do a little more than just journal about what I've been doing, but I haven't been easy to reach and this is my way to giving everyone a little more detail that "I'm at camp, it's been busy."

It is called "I Wonder What Will's Up To," after all.

(This isn't going through even the limited levels of editing another post might, so bear with me.)

I am working as a counselor with a leadership camp run by The Academy at Harvard Square. I wasn't 100 percent sure what my role would be coming into it, and it's still hard to describe, but basically I'm with the campers serving as the functional arm of The Academy. Mostly it means a lot of menial tasks that just need to get done; setting up Wi-Fi, making sure the water is stocked, buying shampoo, sometimes helping kids if they're sick or homesick. I also am in charge of keeping track of the kids in the morning and at night, making sure they are awake and ready to go to breakfast, getting them on the bus, then waiting for them in the afternoon to take them to dinner, shuttle them around to bathrooms, dorms, etc. Imagine herding 32 sheep, who all want to buy something at Starbucks. 

The jobs is pretty stressful, because even though I'm not doing much administration work I have to keep track of 32 Brazilian kids, most of whom are 10-13 years old, and don't listen to me very well. I don't know if it's a cultural thing, but I like to think that it's disrespectful to ignore people everywhere. They're good kids--they're wicked young and in another country, living without parents for the first time, so they get some leeway-- just hard to organize.

One of the adult counselors with them is really understanding and appreciative, one has not truly listened to a word I've said since she arrived, and one speaks no English so I don't really know her. Technically my hours are 7-12, 5-11, but because of logistic issues I worked about 16 hours yesterday. I've described it to a few others (and vehemently to myself, under my breath, with adjectives) as being anywhere from "nuts" to a "nightmare."

It's been hard to In the chain of command, all the people above me are Korean and all the people below me are Brazilian, so everyone has their own secret language, and it gets old. I completely understand that it's hard to learn another language-- my French is awful--

In the mornings we go to the Harvard campus to have class. If you ever think to yourself with pride, "yeah, I know stuff," walk through a science building of a prestigious school. Nothing in there makes any sense, and there's an incredible amount of it. I probably couldn't pass a high school chemistry test at this point so it's weird that I'm even allowed to be inside a building that has words and phrases like "centrifuge" and "DNA synchronization drop off point."

Because of reasons (related to parent-chaperone-organizer relations) I won't disclose, I am giving short English lessons before the student lecturers arrive. The lecturers are very qualified to teach English; it's their job. I am not, and it is not mine, but we're making it work. Yesterday I taught them the word "wicked," which so far has been very useful. I feel like not giving this lesson, though, was a serious missed opportunity.

By contrast, the campers, chaperones and I are staying at Pine Manor College. I'm beginning to understand why no one has heard of it.  Never host an event at Pine Manor College. The grounds are nice, but the dorms themselves are not, and the lady in charge of summer housing is doing a pretty horrible job. I've had to call her two or three times before anything we ask gets done--there were kids from another college staying in one of our rooms about 10 hours before the kids arrived, and one of our bathrooms was filled with someone else's toiletries.

In conclusion, I'm going to take a nap now.


-Will


"You're never too old to go to space camp, dude."

On Video Games: an Open Letter to Ben Kuchera

 This is a letter I wrote to video game journalist Ben Kuchera, who has recently started a site devoted to long-form video game journalism, which makes it really the first of its kind.

Dear Mr. Kuchera,

I know you’re busy running the Report as a one man show, so I completely understand if you can’t respond to or even read this. But you recommended contacting people who are smarter than you, so I thought I’d give it a shot. Maybe you’ll appreciate reading an email that isn’t a Kickstarter pitch.

            PAX East—which I think was an experience worth five to six times price of admission, for the record—really made me think. Among other various panels, booths, and concerts, I went to a panel of online community leaders, I talked with several professional gamers, and I listened to your presentation on long-form journalism. All provided an interesting snapshot of life in different parts of the gaming industry, but as brown-nosing as it sounds, yours was the one that stuck with me most positively. This isn’t only because your talk was well done, but also because I realized that I have zero interest in being a professional gamer or an online community manager.

It’s not that I expect that it will take less time or work to do these (as you and many others have said, initial failure should be expected in journalism), and it’s not just that there’s zero certainty that such a high level of participation will ever produce a paying job. It’s mainly that I’m not all that enamored with the ultimate goal.

Do I want to devote my life to an online gaming community when I could theoretically be writing about current events? Do I want to devote my life to video games at all?

These are questions I’ve been thinking about a good amount recently. I’ve just finished my first year of college as an English major, but I’m still not sure how video games are going to fit into my adult life. Maybe I’ve been surrounded by people who have thoroughly disrespected gaming for so many years that it’s starting to get to me. I recognize, though, that gaming as a media is in its infancy; it’s not on the same level as literature or film. I don’t believe we have a gaming equivalent of Great Gatsby. And I’m sure I sound naïve; I realize that even if I do choose to write novels, it’s extremely unlikely they would make any lasting impact on humanity. What I enjoy about the Report it’s about people and culture as much as it is about video games. I can get behind that.

You’re someone who has been working in the industry for a while, so I have been wondering what this process might have been like for you. What made you choose to write about video games? Was there a moment when you decided that you wanted to work with video games as a career, or did it naturally progress from a love of them? Similarly, as far a writing goes, did you want to be a writer and then choose your topic or want to do something with video games and choose to write?

I really appreciate your time, and though I’ve tried to avoid sounding like a complete fanboy up to this point, I’ll say that I think the Report is fantastic. The story of the Daigo/Wong fight in particular (which you can peruse here if interested) was fascinating. Have a great weekend.

Sincerely,

-Will Martin

I haven't received a response yet, but maybe that's just because I need a more intriguing subject line than "On Video Games"...

Unto Others

Well, my essay didn't get enough votes to win a scholarship, but in case you haven't read it, I'll leave it here. For posterity, I suppose. A few people I didn't know commented that it was a good reminder, so that's a pretty cool thing. Now: the most important lesson I've ever learned in 300 words or less.

Any question as grand and crucial “the most important lesson I have learned in my life” is difficult to approach. In consideration, I thought about many of my personal experiences—about times of difficulty and joy—but what I came to realize was that I was approaching the question incorrectly. The most important lesson I have learned has nothing to do with me: it is the importance of putting others before you.

The true character of a person is shown in how much they help people who cannot help them back. That it true selflessness; serving others without expectation of reciprocal action.

In this regard, I am blessed to be extroverted; most amicable interactions are fulfilling to me on some level. I love working with and helping people, but although it is easier for me to recommend serving them, the lesson is still valid. Even if one needs more time alone, everyone should make a concentrated effort to help those around them.  

Today it is remarkably easy to fall into self-centeredness. We can bend technology to our whim to meet every inconvenience, advertisements promote the importance of “you,” and Facebook is a churning narcissism machine. Not only does this negatively affect us today, but I cannot see the situation getting better anytime soon. How can I tell my future children that the world does not revolve around them when the world tells them that it does?

There is hope, however. Selflessness begets selflessness. There is a reason that the rule “do unto others as you would have them do to you” has been classified as “golden.” If we understand our prideful, selfish, current situation as a society, we are much better equipped to escape it. The most important lesson I have ever learned is to put everyone above myself.

-Will

 "And a bonus point for readers: If you write for a living, never hesitate to recycle material."

We're on a Break

This is a day I've been dreading for many years.

I think, and have thought for some time, that everyone with a hobby--including video games, or knitting, or football watching-- has a point where they sit back and think about how it shapes their life. I was just hoping that I would be the first gamer to skip it.

Now, an important disclaimer: I love video games. This does not mean that they're all I do. I usually play a maximum of three to four hours a week, and when I have a busy week, which is to say a normal week, I may go the entirety of it without picking up a controller. I have not sunk days of my life into Skyrim just yet, and other people always take precedent over Halo.

A few weeks ago, near the end of Christmas break, I beat Gears of War. While the game was pretty good, the last level was ridiculous. It was horrible. The final boss is legendarily difficult, known for causing controller breakage and the odd tear or two. I finally defeated him after a walkthrough video, a few difficulty changes, and about 50 tries. It was the kind of experience, combined with the countless hours of listless free time I had over Christmas break, that made me question why I played video games.

Enter: Rayman Origins. Spectacular platforming aside, it is perhaps the happiest game I've ever played. The onscreen character is constantly beaming and flashing peace signs, as he traverses bottomless pits and admittedly adorable enemies. When you run into a secret area several people exclaim "oooh!" Almost every sound is on upbeat with the soundtrack which consists largely of didgeridoos and ukeleles. This is a game that was made with constant injections of pure fun.

There are reasons that video games are fairly unrespected as media that aren't simply length-of-existence. Games with the best stories--Bioshock, Mass Effect, and Shadow of Colossus come to mind--are still somewhat outclassed and far, far out numbered by the best movies and novels.

But they do fill niches that exist in other forms of media. Gears of War, I'd say, is the gaming equivalent of the Transformers trilogy. Mario is like a classic Dr. Seuss book. But I don't know that there are any romantic comedy video games. And I have yet to play the gaming equivalent of the Great Gatsby.

Here's my problem: when I get a musical urge, I usually skip awkwardly and poorly strumming the 2 chords I know on the old guitar I have and turn to the instant gratification of the beloved Rock Band series. But while I can still do well on most expert guitar songs, and have made a lot of progress on pro keys since Christmas, thank you very much, I have friends who can play real, actual instruments very well now.

It's an intimidating part of growing up--even in a small college, for pretty much anything I do well, there is a handful of people (usually several handfuls) that can beat me in it. But I'm not going to get better at singing or writing if I fill my slices of free time with video games, even with the delectable Rayman Origins.

And if you can't imagine your life without something, it's time to go without it for a while.

I considered giving them up for a month. A fast, of sorts. I read about a guy who did it for a year once but I guess I'm not that hardcore. And then I remembered that there is a Pokemon League and Tournament (with Blue and Red version) planned for this semester. That may never happen again in my life. I'm not that strong.

So my resolution, then, is to not play them that much for while. I know, I'm a very convicted person.


-Will


"Don't eat fish on Fridays! Unless you forget!"

Going to Learn, to Get Some Knowledge

As you've probably heard from every college student you've had any interaction with over the last few days, it's finals weeks. Which means, as you've probably heard from all the freshman college students you've had any interaction with over the past few days, our first semester of college is almost vanquished. It' doesn't feel like the semester is over, because I still have a fairly significant amount of work to do, but I'm seeing, if not the end of the tunnel, at least the top of the hill.

But classes are over. The semester is, essentially, over. Last year a wise, bearded mandolin player (seriously though) enlightened me to the fact that college courses end after one semester. Maybe this is common knowledge, but if he hadn't told me, I probably wouldn't have found out until this moment. This shocking realization lead me to one even more alarming. I'm going to miss my classes.

I walked, giddily, out of my exam today.  I walked out of an oral exam giddy. Granted, getting out of an exam early is one of life's more exhilarating experiences, but

Those who know me know that I'm not an academic over-achiever. I'm not saying I'm stupid, but there are people who love the very experience of learning and I, until this point, have never been one of them. I have turned in papers five or six words over the minimum, and I will never do optional reading. I don't generally have many positive feelings toward any class after its final exam (Journalism being the exception out of the 28 that I took in high school). Even though my AP Lit teacher was fantastic, and the class did indeed prepare me to college in a beat-into-submission kind of way, I would never take it again. But if you sat me down and told me I had to listen to Borgman rant about Abraham for another four months, I'd be pretty okay with it.
Maybe I got lucky with my class choice this year-- I know, with my earliest class at 11:25, I did with their timing. I had Intro to Creative Writing, which stereotypically had the strangest conglomeration of students, as well as a very personable, very hipster professor.  I took the Examined Life, the required philosophy class that I not only didn't hate, but enjoyed so much I'm considering a minor in philosophy. There was Bible as Literature, with it's meager six students and very eccentric, charismatic, yet somewhat...kooky professor. And then we have Old Testament. For that one, it's not the class I will miss as much as the company of the person to the right of me. All my professors were really nice, all the homework was reasonable, and I frequently slept in until 11:00 am. I promise, I'm not being paid by Gordon for this.

So, after thinking about this for a while, I came to another The internet would make an inception joke here. Looking back at the posts from this semester, realization, learning, is the motif, the common thread running through it all. I learned how good Sam is at creating weaponry from paper, I learned the difference between tuna and chicken salad (and forgot it again), I learned--to an extent-- how much more Africa affected me than I thought. And heck, I've enjoyed it.

I never imagined considering graduate school, and I know it's ridiculous to consider it at this point, but seven and a half years of school don't sound as bad as they once did. There are so many things to learn! I'm majoring in English, but I'm auditioning for a music minor next year, plus there's drama, philosophy, biblical studies...all incredibly interesting subjects worth pursuing.

Even ignoring all classes this semester, I learned that fishercat calls are horrifying, what swag is, that the library steps are best place on campus to see the sky, all seven verses of "O Come All Ye Faithful," that my facial hair is still patchy, that it's really hard to be spontaneous without a car, and that girls don't appreciate incredibly abrasive Bostonian waiters.

There is still plenty I have yet to learn of course. I still don't know why there are hooks on our door if we can't hook anything on them and the proper response for "what's good?", but hey. That's what the next seven semesters are for. Also the rest of my life.


-Will


 "Things that come easy are not usually good. Good things take effort."