The story I am about to tell you is a retelling of my unusual life. Of course, to tell a good story, they say you have to start at the beginning. If you ask my parents, their story officially started in the mid-90s, 1994, when they met through the website Academic Companions, at a Japanese restaurant no less, my cousin was born, and I was but a twinkle in Daddy's eye.
Since I don't remember the 90's, not even getting my Grandma's coat so she could leave when she visited, for me, it all started in the early 2000's, the dawn of the millennium.
Ah, the 2000's. My little sister had just been born, the internet was just starting to take hold in popularity, Grandma was still living at her old house, I would get excited over the latest movie, cartoon series, or book series, Mom would take pains to find paraphrennilla of whatever I was intensely interested at the time, be it Hilary Duff or Alvin and the Chipmunks, Mom would pile said paraphrennilla in the car to keep me entertained during car rides, I was in the public school system, Benedict Cumberbatch wasn't a household name yet, but Backyard Sports was….okay I digress.
As someone with autism, it wasn't always easy for me to connect with the world. Even as a child, I would merely sit and shuffle wood chips as opposed to playing with the other children on the playground- I just couldn't be bothered with them. But what I did always have going for me, was my amazing imagination, which I wanted to put to fruitition for as long as I can remember. However, it took me a while to realize "what" my dream in question was. Was it something meaningful? Or was it just a childish fantasy? Still a small child, I didn't understand why I created these worlds with these characters.
Anyways, I finally realized my dream- writing for the movies- in 2003. (I'm honestly not sure when this came to fruition, as the early 2000's are pretty much a blur for me, but I started using a computer religiously by then, so I'm cementing it there.) Basically, at my old elementary school the library section had some pretty cool computer games, including I Love the USA! (Did I mention this was shortly after 9/11?), a geography game where you can explore cool places in the United States, even underwater!
After I got the game to play at home, I found an avatar that resembled me (sort of...she had braids and olive skin, but otherwise reminded me of myself.) I remember thinking to myself as I played the game "I'd sure like to go on some fun adventures as her!," which was basically the bread-and-butter of the game, anyways.
Then the following year, my parents sent me to a computer camp at the request of yours truly (I really liked computers back then), I discovered this cool series called Backyard Sports. That's when I experienced an amazing awakening. Everyone in the series was different, the way I myself was different, but hey, it didn't matter. After all, everyone got a seat at the table, or field in this case, even the kid who was disabled (and was Chinese to boot!) I finally felt as though there was a place for people like me in the world, kids who didn't really seem to fit the mold.
They had 30 child characters in the series, and that's just the main characters. You had to pick them through a "menu" to create your own team, and I had my favorites- Jorge Garcia, the snobby rich boy, Angela Delvecchio, the sassy Italian girl, Achmed Khan, the rocker, and Maria Luna, the perky girly girl. In my mind, I wasn't a disabled girl who couldn't handle reality- rather, I was part of a "Five Musketeers" group where we did the coolest things ever. And since no good story is complete without a good villian, I casted Stephanie Morgan, the baseball queen, as the "bad guy." Yes, you read that right. I made their least popular character a superhero and one of their more popular characters as his archnemesis. I didn't dislike the character, per se I just thought my stories needed an equally cool antagonist to go against our heroes- she just happened to be there.
After a bit of begging from Mom, she finally bought the series for me to play at home (which I often did with favorite computer games, whether I played them at school or at camp) and after a while of playing it, I applied my amazing imagination to the series, and the rest, they say, is history- in the van carpooling to school, Kidz Bop kids singing "Steal My Sunshine", I would imagine the kids, especially Achmed Khan the rocker, singing out the songs in the little cartoons I created in my head.
And in her Christmas letters later that year, Mom said "The best way to reach our older daughter, is through books and computer games, oh, and now I can breathe a sigh of relief. Saddam Hussein has finally been captured by the US Military!" (The only way that letter could've been more 2004 is if we had mentioned Nipplegate, and since we wouldn't have had cable for another several years, we had no idea what Janet Jackson's boob, let alone her own nipple, looked like.) So, while most people's biggest sports memory that year was seeing Michael Jackson's sister semi-topless, mine was discovering the Backyard Sports series and realizing what I was meant for, at the tender age of eight years old.
Of course, the computer camp I went to that summer, turned out to be a haven for pop culture, not just cool computer games- it was basically Disneyland for me. I've always been fascinated by the beauty of cartoons and the cinema- fun characters, great adventures, and at that age, you could always expect a happy ending. Always. Even when they didn't, for some reason. To be fair, I was still quite young & my parents only exposed me to these kinds of movies- not to mention my disability made me less suspectible to the terrors of reality.
So anyways, because of both my intense imagination and deep love of pop culture, I would often either pattern my life toward various shows that I discovered at the YMCA camp, or try to create adventures with myself in said shows, and imagine that as my cool movie.
For example, I imagined Maurice from Beauty and the Beast- my favorite Disney movie- as my dad, getting kidnapped by a seemingly horrifying monster and all, and of course, me coming to rescue him. Hey, it kinda works- after all, he's basically a cross between him and British actor Simon MacCorkindale.
Seriously though, on my first day at school since the fateful summer of '04, I walked up on the playground and said, ball clutched in hand, and declared "When I grow up, I want to have my own show with all my favorite characters!" in the perky little voice I had.
Nobody took my dream seriously, what with it being dismissed as a typical little kid fantasy at the time, but as I grew up and held on dearly to my amazing dream- that's how I truly knew for sure that I wanted it to be my life goal. It didn't really matter that I conceived it at a time when most girls my (then)-age wanted to be pop stars or Disney Princesses- back then, I know that this was something I wanted to do with my life, not because I wanted to be "Famous" or anything.
By 2006 though, my mother had run out of secular educational screens, and got me interested in the show VeggieTales. As in, I talked about all the goddamn time, to the point she was thrilled when she found out I was watching something that wasn't the show. Yes, really. I was having difficulty talking about things, so whenever I got interested in something, I got so excited about having something to talk about, I talked about it non-stop. Needless to say, it really annoyed her.
There was, however, a reason I was so interested in the show. It used cartoon variants of Bible stories to teach small children about religion- showing that there's no "one way" to tell a cool story, and that storytelling can "evolve," whether it's through adaptation or creating something new influenced by older works. And sometimes, these tales are told through the art of "parody"- poking fun at something through your own art- and the following year, 2007, pop culture was rife with parody. Jon Stewart & Family Guy were ruling the airwaves. The Simpsons were getting their own film adaptation. Paris Hilton was in jail for a DUI. George Bush became a huge joke, but we knew we would be rid of him in another couple of years- there was, after all, going to be an election next year. And of course, my favorite website at the time was Newgrounds, a website where people could post their own cartoons- think Youtube meets Deviantart, despite pre-dating both websites- which often mocked social issues mercilessly as the website didn't have much of a filter. And yes, some of these cartoons made fun of Paris' jail stint. I thought of creating my own episodes for the website, but sadly, I never got organized enough to create anything, and besides, I can't animate to save my goddamn life.
I was, however, getting interested in Biblical history thanks to my interest in VeggieTales, which in turn evolved into an interest in film and storytelling- after all, if there's anything the series taught me, it's that there was no "one way" to tell a cool story! One of my favorite stories from the show, Josh and the Big Wall, told the story of Joshua and how he bravely brought the Israelites into salvation despite being unable to cross into the promised land. I thought to myself, What if Jorge stood up to a bunch of schoolyard bullies who wouldn't let his fellow classmates cross the playground into the "higher land?" He's pretty supportive of his fellow Backyard Kids despite being a rich snob, and he'd love being the center of attention. And anyways, it sure beats watching Paris Hilton go to jail.
Another interesting facet of 2007 pop culture was the abundance of film adaptations. Underdog, Hairspray, Transformers, and Alvin and the Chipmunks, and needless to say, I was pretty excited about them. (Except maybe Transformers...too much testosterone for me.) Especially Alvin and the Chipmunks. I would often tell my mother, who was a fan of the cartoon as a kid, "Oh my gosh, this is going to be the coolest film ever! The kids will love it, the parents will enjoy the nostalgia trip, even the grandparents will find it cool!" Yes, seriously. Yeah, I know people get really excited for the movies, but not to the extent I was excited for Alvin. Even my mom got pretty annoyed at my interest, as there's only so much nostalgia you can handle. There was, however, a reason I was excited for the film. I thought it was cool that the cartoons my mom watched as a kid were getting their own film adaptations- it was, after all, "sharing an older story for a new generation." Or, whatever. My dad did take me to see a film adaptation of Rocky & Bullwinkle as a toddler, which might have sparked my fixation in film adaptations of dumb cartoons.
As for now, I'm currently going to a special needs school. I do fairly well for myself, do charity work, get straight-A's, if only because the work is too easy for me. Seriously though, I got more challenging work in middle school- that's why I keep myself busy with projects like charity work and writing Backyard Sports fanfiction, which I finally got the focus to write after seven years. And when the day is over, I go back to my home in the suburbs, where I live with my parents and younger sister, to, um, do stuff. And by "do stuff," I mean, "Dick around on the internet." My parents are concerned about my future, because they're currently looking at colleges and aren't sure which one is best for me- because, you know, they typically don't cater to, um, interesting people like me. They do, however, hold out hope that I'll get the supportive place I need to succeed. After all, holding out is kind of all they have right now.
Little did I know that, last week my life would change forever.