In 1979, for my 9th Birthday, I received upon request the Dungeons and Dragons Basic boxed set. From that point on a lifelong love of D&D and role playing games would shape every facet of the 54 year old (as of yesterday) person that I am today. So many of my life choices were made to enhance and compliment my love of losing myself in a game, and better yet, facilitating that feeling for my grateful players! I’d emulate voices from movies and cartoons that I thought personified the various beings that populated the ever grow fantasy realms in my young mind. I took drama and debate, studied mythology and read fantasy books voraciously.
In 1983, my grade 7 year, I started a school D&D club amidst the height of the Satanic Panic! I can still picture the damning pamphlets claiming “Dungeons & Dragons is a Satanic Cult game, and quoting text about demons and devils taken out of context. For me and my friends, it just made us love the game more, lol. In High school I continued to run a D&D club, and even got my first taste of being a player when one of my club members decided he was going to DM a game. I remember being unimpressed. Where were the over the top voices, the custom maps and monster art, the showmanship? Don’t get me wrong I had great fun, we just approached the job very differently.
My D&D obsession carried through all the editions, and I collected Monster Manuals and art books from editions I never intended to play. As a kid I swore I was going to move to Lake Geneva Wisconsin and work for TSR drawing monsters like Erol Otus or David Trampier. (An impossibility according to my father) The art was a huge part of the love, still is to this day, and It crept into my artwork and metal work in my early adult life. It would later influence my tattoo art and even the tattoos on me. Lolth, the Demon Queen of Spiders is tattooed on my left ribcage, Gruumsh and a bunch of Goblinoids tattooing a captive human maiden graces my left arm, and Demogorgon himself, both baboon heads chained and roaring in rage, covers my entire back, as befitting the Prince of the Abyss. My non TTRPG hobbies, my clothes, my vacations, most things in my current life are a testament to my unabashed nerdiness. Full Frontal Nerdity!
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