Middle Earth

I read The Hobbit for the first time when I was 11 years old, in the beginning of my 6th grade year. Having played fantasy role-playing computer games for a few years, I was no stranger to the idea of hobbits, elves, dwarves, goblins, trolls, and other mythical races and creatures but I had never—and haven't since—read anything quite like The Hobbit. I was completely mystified. Having recently moved back to Orderville when my dad got out of the Army, life wasn't very much fun for me at that time. Moving into a small town where the class you move into has been together since kindergarten, at that age when kids aren't the nicest to each other left me in desperate need of a way to get away from real life, if only in my imagination. The story is written perfectly to capture the imagination of an 11-year-old whose imagination needs to be captured. Tolkien tells us about what Bilbo was doing and feeling, but is somewhat general about most everything else, which is fitting since the story was originally one he wrote for his children. My imagination filled in the details with images that I can still clearly see. I live in Provo, at the foot of Squaw Peak and just south of Mt. Timpanogos on the western edge of the Wasatch and Uintah Mountains in Utah. Sometimes when it's stormy it appears that the top of Mt. Timpanogos just vanishes up into the clouds and it looks like the mountain goes up forever with no top. At those times a small part of my mind is Bilbo, looking up at the Misty Mountains (now you all know that I really am weird). Whenever I go into wooded areas where the light doesn't quite all make it down to ground level, that same small part of me is Bilbo in Mirkwood Forest, trying to find the dwarves. Every time I read The Hobbit I get the same sense of wonder that I did 15 years ago, and I never get tired of reading it. Each time a part of my mind wanders down to the past when I was 11 years old and all I had to worry about was getting picked on at school and escaping from my cares with Bilbo and the dwarves.

Not long after reading The Hobbit I read The Lord of the Rings for the first time. Even though I was young (maybe 12 or 13) I remember being struck by the depth of wisdom showed by some of the characters and seing a clear contrast between the "for children" style of The Hobbit and the depth of The Lord of the Rings. Since that time I have read all 4 of the books every year (except while on my mission) and sometimes twice in a year. I'm currently sitting in the Council of Elrond (for the 18th time) trying to decide with them what to do with the One Ring. And this time, like all the rest, it's almost like I'm there.

The Silmarillion followed a year or two later when my dad told me about it. I think I was 14 or 15 at the time, and at first it seemed really boring. The Silmarillion is Tolkien's account of the creation of Middle Earth and the events that shaped the world long before we ever hear of hobbits. Many of the legends and songs in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings make reference to the events told in The Silmarillion, when the elves and the first men fought against Morgoth trying to regain the Silmarils he stole. I did notice, however, that there were some amazing similarities between the beginning chapters detailing the creation of Middle Earth, and the creation story found in the Bible. At that point in my life, Tolkien's treatment of the necessity of evil made more sense to me than much that I had "learned" in church. So every other year or so I read The Silmarillion again and remember just how much work Tolkien did to create a world that was true to his beliefs and to document the entire world of it, and not just the 4 books from it that happen to be the most popular.

These books represent a special place for me. By reading them and becoming so immersed in them when I was young they, like the scriptures, shaped my perspective on life. When I read them I am taken back to a simpler time. Back then, I went to school, shot guns, lifted weights, and read. I remember how I felt when I read them for the first time. Everyone has a "special place" that represents happiness or peace. Nicole's is Disneyland. Mine happens to be an entire world, populated by elves and dwarves, orcs and trolls, hobbits and from time to time a stranger just getting away from computers, cars, bills, and school.

Fantasy and RPG's

My love of Fantasy Role Playing Games (FRPG's) began a long time before I knew that Dungeons and Dragons existed. Believe it or not, it was the Walt Disney movie Sleeping Beauty that started it. When Prince Phillip went chopping his way through all of those little goblin critters on his way out of the dungeon and fought Maleficent in her dragon form, my 5-year-old imagination was hooked. Then, when I was 7 or 8, my dad acquired a Commodore 64 computer. What I wouldn't give to know the name of the first dungeon crawl I played on that old gem. You explored a dungeon, finding treasure and fighting goblins, trolls, ghosts, (dreaded) drakes, and other monsters. When you were killed, it played a little midi version of the death march. Then, along came a game called Questron 2, which actually had a story beyond going deeper and deeper into a dungeon killing monsters. Not long after initially being introduced to Questron 2, an Apple IIgs replaced the Commodore, and with it came a bunch of my uncle's games that wouldn't play on his new Macs. In addition to the Apple version of Questron 2, I now had Wizardry I, II, and III and Bard's Tale I, II, and III. I was a 9-year-old in absolute heaven. On Saturdays I would get up long before anyone else to rush through my chores so I could play my computer games. Bard's Tale III: The Thief of Fate was the "newest" and had the best graphics, so naturally it drew my main attention. Some of the quests/puzzles in the game were a bit tricky for a 9 year old kid, but I persevered, started over, persevered, and started over until at last when I was 14 I finally beat that blasted game.

When my dad got home from Operation: Desert Storm in the spring of 1991, he started playing a pseudo-RPG with us where he would tell the story and we would say what we wanted our characters to do. It was very simple, but I was enthralled. Then one day in the fall of 1991, I picked up The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien for the first time. I'll just say that The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings led to more fantasy novels from the Dragonlance and Forgotten Realms series, and more FRPG fun.

When I got home from my mission in 2001, I picked up a copy of Icewind Dale and discovered that computer games had come along way indeed since The Thief of Fate. That winter, when I wasn't at work in St. George, coaching the wrestling team at my high school, hunting varmints, or sleeping, I was forging my intrepid party farther in the frozen wastelands of "Faerun" (the world in which Icewind Dale and other Forgotten Realms stories take place). Having been a while since playing DnD, keeping the characters in my first party alive required nothing short of tactical brilliance, and sometimes the only thing that worked was starting over from a saved game several times.

After Icewind Dale, came Icewind Dale II and eventually my latest "spare time killer" Neverwinter Nights. As the games have gotten newer and (in most cases) better, I've come to the conclusion that I still like Dungeons and Dragons. All of the computer games I've played in recent years (except for the Diablo series) have been based on the official DnD rules (and the Bard's Tale series was loosely based on them as well). DnD rules make for a game environment where character development is (for me) almost as fun as progression through the story. I can begin a game with a character or group of characters that I have imagined up, and play them entirely and consistently according to my imagination.

I attribute a good deal of my "imaginativity" and creativity to my experience with fantasy and FRPG's. Nicole just rolls her eyes when I say that, but where else would a 9 year old kid find the necessity of using creative solutions to problems in a manner that he likes? Although I greatly enjoy reading, sometimes it's kind of fun to play an FRPG where you are (in a way) writing your own book as you play, especially in the games that allow for good character development and widely varying options for different types of characters. Aside from the imaginatory and creative benefits I've gained from reading fantasy and playing FRPG's, it makes for a nice escape from reality every now and then (since I don't play nearly as much or as often as I used to), and isn't that what taking a break is all about?