To Whom it May Concern

January 2011

Dear Whom,

Remember the first time you died in a video game; it mighta been
Pong or SuperMario or Whirled-o-Wore-krap or whatever, but your
avatar, your game piece, your pong-paddle, missed its intended
target and you lost.

You. Lost.

Bells rang, sirens wailed, lights flashed and synthetic compu-
music seemed to be laughing and mocking your downfall. It hurt.
But you could always reset, reboot and refresh. You could always
go back to square One.

As games became more graphic, more complex and compelling,
you learned that it was sometimes easier just to die in order to
allow yourself time to figure out how the game was working.

Level by level you sacrificed yourself to learn how to follow
the maze, when to anticipate interactions, where to find the
magic buttons and extra bombs and bullets. And one day you
were ready to run the gauntlet at the highest level.
But you lost.

That feeling. That helpless gut-wrenching feeling of defeat and
loss of life. It was beginning to get too close to being real. Its
intensity, more real than real life. But, miraculously, once again
your body would reflexively kick-start, your brain would wipe
and you'd jump and kick and curse and punch the air. Your voice
would remind you of your own well being as you flung damnation
upon the machine, a rare animal magnetism flowed out of you like
an orgasm of fury and hate. It was a primitive animal response.

Your reptilian brain was crying out to every cell in your body with its
chemical magic 'I ain't really dead yet. I have teeth! I have claws!
I have thumbs!'

Too often, almost always, you would reset and reboot the machine
without a personal reset or re-fresh. By stages your civilised programming
peeled away leaving only an unreasonable, unthinkable animal-response
to the situation. You never stopped to consider the profound nature of
the resurrection that followed each death.

At an animal level you became addicted to the chemical responses
of near death experiences followed by impossibly sweet possibilities
of revenge and renewal that can only happen in the reel whirled and
never the real world.

Should we believe this a modern Miracle or is it an evil conundrum that
makes us believe the only way to succeed is to die, die again.

Discuss.

I remain your faithful but less than obedient savant,

~ jwf ~

To Whom It May Concern
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~jwf~

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