My friend Jonathan and I were playing in a field when a young boy ran up to us.
"Sebastian got a Nintendo! Sebastian got a Nintendo!"
Sebastian was a friend of ours who had cerebral palsy so he didn't play around and explore the neighborhood with us.
We would go over to his house on occasion though to play and read comics or go swimming.
He would stand in the water by the edge of the pool but not actually swim very much.
On this particular occasion Jonathan and I were hitting a tree with a stick in order to make the little Cicada shells come off.
You know........ the shells that they leave behind after they molt or whatever it is that they do. Well we used to collect those shells. I still think they're cool.
Of course I barely knew what a Nintendo was at the time. I had heard rumors but we lived in a completely different world.
There was no internet and the only way to find out information like this was to experience it firsthand.
Despite this, we looked at each other after hearing the news with excited expressions and we ran towards Sebastian's house as fast as we could.
Knocking on the door we frantically asked if Sebastian could play.
His mom let us in and we went into his room. He was sitting on the floor playing a game we had never seen before.
It was Super Mario Brothers and it was the most glorious thing I'd ever looked at.
You see, growing up I had an Atari 2600 and I used to play it everyday.
Most of the boys and some of the girls in the neighborhood would come over and we would have competitions playing the Atari 2600.
After that we would go run around and play tag and other children's games.
I had never laid my eyes on anything like this though.
The graphics were like something straight out of the arcade.
The music didn't sound like it came from a little plastic box either.
It also sounded like it came straight out of the arcade.
We played for hours and hours and even though we got to Sebastian's house around 4 in the afternoon it must have been after 8:30 when we left because it was dark outside.
In those days you knew it was time to come home when you heard your mom yell your name and it echoed through the neighborhood.
Since we were inside we couldn't hear our parents yelling and they were not to happy with us when we got home.
I'll never forget that first day playing Super Mario Brothers.
I'm sure part of the experience was the game system itself and most of it was being a young child and seeing the world through a young child's eyes.
It was an experience I'll never forget.
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