The Eidoloclast

The past week was marked by me trying to follow up (for once) on one of my ideas: developing a video game. This isn't the first time I've thought about it. I grew up with video games, and like everyone my age that loved games, I've fantasized about making them. I've fantasized about making games the same way I have fantasized about making all sorts of things: novels, short story anthologies, poetry collections, films, paintings, sculptures, academic essays/articles, podcasts, YouTube series, audio dramas, comics, useful inventions, songs, and... well... you get the idea. I've wanted to make a lot of things, and at this point making anything would be nice.

Like every kid with well-meaning parents, I grew up thinking I was going to incredible things. The world was my oyster because I was special. There comes a point for many of us, or at least I think there comes a point, where we realize that our parents lied to us. Maybe you were 30, 25, 20, or even younger when the realization settled in. Maybe it was a song, a movie, an incident at work, or a text from someone you know that made it all click: I'm just like everyone else. There's nothing special about me. I'm average.

I've had the realization before, but as I am prone to do with unsettling realizations, I buried it. I forgot that I knew this about myself, but this week of following up on a creative impulse has peeled my eyelids open and stapled them just so. There's a lot to overcome with a desire to develop a game. You need a solid concept, a well-written story, and the knowledge to code it all. Sure, to some that seems like nothing, but to someone who isn't all that original, talented at writing, or capable of coding, these speed bumps are mountains.

I feel the need to say I'm willing to learn these things and bring in people who are already talented in these areas, but I can't shake off the weight of nearly 26 years of never following through on any of my aspirations in a way that matters to me. For anyone outside of the groups I'll share this with that comes across this journal and has, for whatever reason, a compulsion to read it, I've been through a Master of Arts program for English: Rhetoric and Composition. I completed the program, earned my degree, was told I'm a specialist on hate speech, and my committee patted me on the back as we were all sure I had a future in education. After all, I was a graduate teaching assistant, so I already had the experience. Things seemed even more promising when my supervisor offered me a contract as an adjunct professor, something I did for a single semester.  However, as we all likely realize in the face of COVID-19, things don't always go the way we were anticipating.

Here I am now, scrambling to find a job in the midst of a pandemic because there weren't any positions available for an inexperienced, unremarkable adjunct professor left at the university. Some may quickly jump on me, persistently insisting that "You're special! You're smart! You're accomplished!" I want to take a moment to tell these well-meaning individuals that I don't want to relive my childhood. I don't want all the platitudes that build up some poor, pitiful kid with low self-esteem. Let me give you some examples of why you shouldn't pile on empty compliments: my time in the MA program... no... scratch that. My entire academic career is marked by such an extreme anti-social attitude and under-achieving disposition that all I got out of it was two degrees. I never went to any conferences. I didn't contribute to any faculty research in a way that makes me memorable. I never published anything. Not once did I enter a competition, or join a club/group, participate in a campus event (outside of being required to do so). Don't worry, I also made sure not to develop any enduring friendships with anyone from college. I avoided the nights where my classmates/cohort would go out for drinks after class, refused their offers of getting an apartment together, and became a master at ignoring texts.

The questions at this point seems pretty obvious to me. Why didn't I try harder? Why didn't I socialize more? Why didn't I show some ambition by leaning into my academic work by going to conferences and writing articles?

I offer the only I answer I have for any of my actions: I don't know.

Tonight, as I look back on my painfully average life, I lay out the blueprints for what will likely be another stillborn project. As I try to deny that likelihood, I look for talent, people to possibly bring on board to give this creative endeavor some chance of success. However, as I pour over the accolades of these talented people, I can only see what I've had the continual opportunity to become, but I continually deny... for whatever reason.

I shouldn't be too down on myself. Most people I know are just like me. They all had lofty aspirations, and they've all allowed them to fall by the wayside. Almost everyone I've taken the time to connect with had some dream that they aborted, or at least do nothing to bring to fruition. This is what people do, the average one. Average people don't achieve much beyond the bare minimum to survive. Average people like to imagine doing something unique and creative, bringing something into the world that's all their own, and they must adore never doing so. Average people love to see themselves like they're special. Average people try to escape being average.

I'm trying to avoid being average.

I'm trying to make something.

I hope I can do it this time.