Christmas is a time of love, caring and sharing. It’s also a great opportunity to ask Santa for a new video game. Growing up, money was always tight, so we counted on Christmas as that one time we’d definitely get the game we wanted. Even if we ended up with a game that sucked, it didn’t matter. You’d grow to love it because it was the only game you’d be getting for another 12 months. Think of it as a gamer’s version of Stockholm Syndrome. New game consoles, however, were a hard sell no matter what time of year it was.
The Sega Genesis was my Red Ryder BB gun. It didn’t have a compass in the stock or a thing which told time, but it had 16-bit graphics, a stereo headphone jack and three buttons on the controller. And if that weren’t enough for you, it also had “Sonic the Hedgehog.” Oh, Mario can run, jump and shoot fireballs out of his hands, but Sonic can spin through loop-the-loops! Just one look at the awesome graphics told you all you needed to know. My parents required a little more convincing, though.
For reasons beyond my understanding, the Genesis had become my nexus. Thinking about the Genesis had every neuron in my brain firing at once. Anything and everything was possible, and I could see an entire universe of possibility within the black, plastic confines of that miraculous machine. So, sometime around November of 1991, I decided that I had to have one. Somehow, it would be mine.
I wrote a very nice letter to Santa, prayed as hard as I could and then had a nice little chat with my mom. She never actually said, “No,” but, somehow, I just knew. That was it. Game over, man. Game over. Christmas was ruined in the span of about five minutes, and it wasn’t even December yet. Then, just to make things worse, my mom said words that have haunted me to this day: “You already have a Nintendo. It’s got all the same games.”
Inside, I snapped. The words she had said — they made no sense. The same games? Was she serious? These were not the same games! They were better; they were superior. They had 16 bits. That’s twice what the Nintendo has! And have you seen how slow Mario walks? Mario is a dinosaur; the Nintendo is a fossil!
Unfortunately, there were forces at work against me, machinations that were in place to thwart my desires. Or so I thought. The real issue was money — we just didn’t have any. Try explaining that to a 12-year-old in the throes of technological lust so strong that he’s seething with it, though. He’ll blame a diabolical scheme. He’ll invent one, if he has to. It was like “Silence of the Lambs” with me. I’d drawn and scribbled Sonic decapitating Mario all over my notebook. The slogan “Genesis does what Nintendon’t” adorned every page in block-print letters alongside a faithful recreation of the SEGA logo. It got scary, even for me. And then, the big day finally arrived.
I’d love to give you a happy ending, and I will, but it didn’t come until months after that Christmas. I was satisfied with my new portable CD player and — I swear to God, I’m not making this up — my copy of Michael Bolton’s “Time, Love & Tenderness” — but I was not as happy as I would have been if only there had been one last gift tucked away, waiting in hiding to surprise me at my lowest point. I was pretty heartbroken.
Now, it’s just a bittersweet memory. Mr. Bolton was right; nothing heals a broken heart like time, love and tenderness. The Genesis helped, though. We did eventually get one. I still have it, in fact. No telling where that Michael Bolton CD went, though.
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