memories of the 80s
Feb. 25th, 2018 11:48 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
brushwolfSo I was talking earlier, on Mastodon, about how one of the nastier bits of 45's regime for me is how having this script, "the President's an egregious asshole and the Republicans do whatever the hell they like, and my fellow citizens are cool with this," constantly running in the background, is a really bad callback for someone my age.
A lot of whitewashing and gaslighting was going on in my personal life, and that stacks up really badly with the context of being told things were just great/we live in the best country in the world/the president's restoring the pride we lost when we withdrew from Vietnam/etc etc. So for me, having that background script automatically makes the my personal crap feel a lot more threatening and oppressive than it would otherwise.
Something my younger friends will thankfully not have, because of an internet that just wasn't around in the '80s (net neutrality is important, y'all). Basically everything in your reality came through what the adults wanted you to think and, well, if you weren't lucky...
This means I wanted to talk about a happier memory relating to the same lack of context, and true to form, it's about D&D. Okay, AD&D at the time.
I'm going to do the classic Old Guy Story trope of having to walk uphill for miles in really uncomfy weather - because this is true. With no car, getting to the Perimeter Mall's Sword of the Phoenix (which would count as an awesome hobby shop now) depended on getting a lift from my Dad. I could use public transportation to get to the Lenox Square Sword of the Phoenix - it took hours so this was during the summer. I'd walk about a mile or two to the bus stop, hop the bus to Decatur Station, take the train to Lenox Station, and walk across the street, out of the blistering heat into air conditioning... and the FLGS.
And what a games shop it was!
Right at the corner as you went in was a big display case full of painted miniatures or those pewter display miniatures - you know the sort of thing, rearing unicorns, pointy-hat wizards and butterfly winged faeries, usually holding plastic gemstones. Further in there was a display case with unpainted miniatures, sold individually. Each was next to a little label; you'd ask the cashier/owner to see UN74 or whatever, and he'd find the little plastic drawer behind the register labelled UN74 and pull out that 25 mm, heavily armored death knight holding up a severed head that I wanted, or whatever (a real treasure to take home and paint up with big thick globs of Testors or Poly-S paint). If I were going to get anything it'd usually be one of these single miniatures, or a magazine; something like the Black Prince's Balrog Chariot would have been way, way out of my purchasing power.
Off to the left the wall had been painted up to look like a stone castle wall, and that's where the store kept the board games. And beyond the counter, on the far wall as you went in, were the roleplaying game section, dice, and miniatures in their little plastic and foam packs. This would include Dragon Magazine, later Dungeon Magazine, and this exotic magazine, White Dwarf, from Britain or something. This related to the equally exotic Citadel Miniatures in packs on the wall - I think I got interested just about the time they were starting to have SLOTTA BASES, and was during the Giant Hands Giant Feet point in Games Workshop history. In fairly short order there were things like Rogue Trader or boxes of plastic Squats and Imperial Guardsmen, stuff like that. And then... whoa, you mean there was a greater storyline with some big rebellion fought with clunky ugly giant robots, against the God-Emperor of humanity, then an armored young immortal? The Wall of Miniatures also included a lot of historical stuff. I was as likely to spot 25 mm Ral Partha uKhandempemvu or 15 mm Essex curassiers as I was to be wowed by the more flamboyant Citadel metal figures.
Here's where I get back to the original point about no internet.
Y'see, nobody played TTRPGs in the 80s. Nobody. Like if I wanted a game I'd need to get in touch with a very small group of misfits in the already tiny misfit clique in my school, or hang out with the friend from grade school who initially got me hooked on the idea, or go to the monthly meeting of the greater metro area game club, DAGR. But when you went to Sword of the Phoenix - either location - you'd be immersed in this world of miniatures and rulesbooks and dice for not just games you'd played, like AD&D or Call of Cthulhu, but a myriad others. The magazines let you know that there were people in Dayton, Redwood City, Nottingham, a batch of other places, who had regular games and who cared deeply about things like Dragonlance or mounting Variable Fire Rocket Pods on Trikes. You got the sense that there was a much larger world of people who were as into this stuff as you were. Maybe more into this stuff.
The actual games and miniatures were really really cool, but the feeling of being less alone in the world was a legitimate miracle.
A lot of whitewashing and gaslighting was going on in my personal life, and that stacks up really badly with the context of being told things were just great/we live in the best country in the world/the president's restoring the pride we lost when we withdrew from Vietnam/etc etc. So for me, having that background script automatically makes the my personal crap feel a lot more threatening and oppressive than it would otherwise.
Something my younger friends will thankfully not have, because of an internet that just wasn't around in the '80s (net neutrality is important, y'all). Basically everything in your reality came through what the adults wanted you to think and, well, if you weren't lucky...
This means I wanted to talk about a happier memory relating to the same lack of context, and true to form, it's about D&D. Okay, AD&D at the time.
I'm going to do the classic Old Guy Story trope of having to walk uphill for miles in really uncomfy weather - because this is true. With no car, getting to the Perimeter Mall's Sword of the Phoenix (which would count as an awesome hobby shop now) depended on getting a lift from my Dad. I could use public transportation to get to the Lenox Square Sword of the Phoenix - it took hours so this was during the summer. I'd walk about a mile or two to the bus stop, hop the bus to Decatur Station, take the train to Lenox Station, and walk across the street, out of the blistering heat into air conditioning... and the FLGS.
And what a games shop it was!
Right at the corner as you went in was a big display case full of painted miniatures or those pewter display miniatures - you know the sort of thing, rearing unicorns, pointy-hat wizards and butterfly winged faeries, usually holding plastic gemstones. Further in there was a display case with unpainted miniatures, sold individually. Each was next to a little label; you'd ask the cashier/owner to see UN74 or whatever, and he'd find the little plastic drawer behind the register labelled UN74 and pull out that 25 mm, heavily armored death knight holding up a severed head that I wanted, or whatever (a real treasure to take home and paint up with big thick globs of Testors or Poly-S paint). If I were going to get anything it'd usually be one of these single miniatures, or a magazine; something like the Black Prince's Balrog Chariot would have been way, way out of my purchasing power.
Off to the left the wall had been painted up to look like a stone castle wall, and that's where the store kept the board games. And beyond the counter, on the far wall as you went in, were the roleplaying game section, dice, and miniatures in their little plastic and foam packs. This would include Dragon Magazine, later Dungeon Magazine, and this exotic magazine, White Dwarf, from Britain or something. This related to the equally exotic Citadel Miniatures in packs on the wall - I think I got interested just about the time they were starting to have SLOTTA BASES, and was during the Giant Hands Giant Feet point in Games Workshop history. In fairly short order there were things like Rogue Trader or boxes of plastic Squats and Imperial Guardsmen, stuff like that. And then... whoa, you mean there was a greater storyline with some big rebellion fought with clunky ugly giant robots, against the God-Emperor of humanity, then an armored young immortal? The Wall of Miniatures also included a lot of historical stuff. I was as likely to spot 25 mm Ral Partha uKhandempemvu or 15 mm Essex curassiers as I was to be wowed by the more flamboyant Citadel metal figures.
Here's where I get back to the original point about no internet.
Y'see, nobody played TTRPGs in the 80s. Nobody. Like if I wanted a game I'd need to get in touch with a very small group of misfits in the already tiny misfit clique in my school, or hang out with the friend from grade school who initially got me hooked on the idea, or go to the monthly meeting of the greater metro area game club, DAGR. But when you went to Sword of the Phoenix - either location - you'd be immersed in this world of miniatures and rulesbooks and dice for not just games you'd played, like AD&D or Call of Cthulhu, but a myriad others. The magazines let you know that there were people in Dayton, Redwood City, Nottingham, a batch of other places, who had regular games and who cared deeply about things like Dragonlance or mounting Variable Fire Rocket Pods on Trikes. You got the sense that there was a much larger world of people who were as into this stuff as you were. Maybe more into this stuff.
The actual games and miniatures were really really cool, but the feeling of being less alone in the world was a legitimate miracle.