Well, I’m back. To what though, is the real question. There’s the whole America Collapsing Under Generations Of Racial Hatred thing.

Okay maybe that’s an exaggeration but a year that began with the death of Bowie and continued thru the death of Prince seems hell-bent on taking away everything good and leaving everything bad.

In other words, I’m here to talk all things Pokemon.

Pokemon Go to be exact. Amidst the shitstorm that has been the daily news the past year, it was a bright spot. What’s not to like about people leaving the confines of their home and, phones in hand, tracking down the anime characters of their childhood on their own neighborhood streets?

Well … I hate to be that guy, but someone has to be.

Look, I get it; it’s a game, it’s fun, and what’s wrong with fun? Absolutely nothing. But the parks has become a mecca for Pokemon Go and it’s absolutely cluttered with slow walking I-Zombies hunched over their phone searching for these characters. They’re looking into their phones when they could be looking at the stars, and that’s the problem isn’t it? Not a Pokemon problem but an overall one with my generation and the generation following unable to give up their childhood. We’re in our 30s and 40s, reading comic books, buying action figures, watching old cartoons, watching movies based on those cartoons. We’re looking to the past and missing the present.

I am as guilty of this as anyone. I mean, look at my cork-board above my desk:

Yes, those are 2 GI Joe figures in their packaging – part of the line’s 25th anniversary re-release. No I have no intention of taking them out of the package. Why do I have them there above my writing space where I can glance at them anytime I want? Nostalgia. that momentary thrill I got every time I hit the toy section of whatever department store I visited with my parents back in the 80s. Rounding the corner and seeing all those glorious action figures on pegs, row after row of them, waiting for me to convince/beg/plead with my parents to let me have just one. It’s a silly thing, but the microsecond I get of re-experiencing that thrill fills me with a tiny sense of well-being.

Getting nostalgic is a thing that happens when you’re older. It’s a natural part of growing up. The more serious and complex life gets, the more inclined we are to seek comfort in the past. The past is knowable. It’s predictable. It’s safe.

But I also remember when my childhood ended. Not by year – when you’re a teen you can’t really call it a childhood, but you are still a child. No, ended when I started college; not being in college, but at the end of my first semester when my parents announced they were getting divorced. I was an adult then, but wasn’t until that news dropped that I realized there really was no going home ever again. And I never did, really. That’s a theme running through much of my work; the character in search of a home. I have one now, with my wife and child but there’s a small part of me  that would trade all I have now to experience those years that were far from golden and only seem that way through the gauzy filter I’ve slapped on my formative years. Even the mid-late 1990s when my life kind of sucked has taken on a mythic tone. There was good stuff nestled amidst the bad, but there always is.

So yeah, the day I found out the future would never be the same as the past I wanted that past back, more than ever. I dug deep, into comic books and movies and TV – not the new stuff but the old stuff. Because it was comfortable. Because it was there. Because unlike my future, I knew how the past ended. Only years later did I realize those entertainments and memories associated with them were my life preserver. But then, when I got on top of my shit, accepted the new reality, and forged my own path those toys were put away.

But does childhood even end now? When 40-something bitch about an all-lady Ghostbusters, when people who are actual adults are running around with their phones to find Pokemon characters, when we’re splurging on toys and trinkets that make us think of a simpler time, are we short-changing the present and future by holding onto the past?

I’m as guilty of this as anybody. I listen to 70s-90s alt rock exclusively, though I do listen to my share of newer artists as well. if I really want to go down the rabbit hole there’s YouTube, which has vintage toy commercials, old After School Specials, music videos, documentaries, home movies. Last year as we prepared for our child’s birth I marathoned my way through The Wonder Years and the old Dungeons & Dragons cartoon and Parker Lewis Can’t Lose on Netflix, YouTube, and Crackle; both for completion’s aspects – I missed huge chunks of both series, but because watching them as an adult transported me back to a time I was a child. Mixtape trades on Gen-X nostalgia for the music of its youth. Hell, my next novel, a sci-fi/horror thriller called Underneath, is set in 1988 and features everything from MTV and video stores to mix tapes and John Hughes. You can’t fully leave your past behind. My parents were nostalgic for the Beatles, Woodstock, and their lazy days at the cottage when they were in their 30s and 40s, and more so now that they’re in their 70s. Life moves fast – faster the older you get. Summers used to drag endless; now they’re far too short.

But as my time becomes more precious, I find I have less time for childish things. Having a child is part of that, but I still managed to unload my old Star Wars, GI Joe, and Transformers toys on eBay without so much as a tear shed for those pieces of plastic that provided my childhood with so many fine memories. The time I have not occupied by work and day-to-day maintenance of house and home is spent with my wife and son, creating new memories for all of us.

Though I did hang onto a few choice items for old time’s sake

So I hope you enjoy Pokemon and comics and toys and games; I really do. I hope you find them a salve for the struggles of your day-to-day life because while I don’t know your struggles I know they can beat you down and leave you broken. But I also hope they aren’t becoming substitute for new experiences, new joys, and even new sorrows. My son started walking on his own while on our trip, and I’m happy I was able to see it unfold in real-time, not thru the screen of a phone surrounded by Anime characters. I’m only going to get one chance to experience these things for the first time and I don’t want to miss any of them.

I often joke the worst “life flashing before your eyes” would just be your POV of your phone screen. But it’s no joke – I see it in the playground when pushing my son on the swing and I’m the only adult not staring at their phone while their child tries to get their parents’ attention. When my son rolls his ball across the floor to my desk while I’m working, I feel a sense of shame that he’s trying to get my attention while mine is focused elsewhere. That’s why I turn the computer off and get down on the floor with him; because while work will wait, if you wait too long for it, life will pass you by.