Kal Ort Por

Someone said something the other day. Something about me accepting resposibility and learning from said experiences. It led me to a bit of an epiphany:

Forgiveness is circular. You can say you understand that again, and again, and again but you never truly understand it until you are in the seat of the one looking for forgiveness. Its so easy to ask forgiveness from people you have wronged, but how can you ask such a thing while you yourself hold on to “grudges” ( for lack of a better term) of previous trespasses upon yourself?

I’m not saying be an idiot and continue to allow yourself to be used and/or abused, but when the time comes that someone who has wronged you comes to you seeking honest heartfelt forgiveness.. For your own good, don’t turn them away with a cold shoulder. You never know when you could be that person.

After all, we’re all human.

Writing for me comes and goes in spurts. Usually it comes halfway through a run in the middle of the night, and passes by the time I am able to turn around and reach home. I’m sitting here in the dark with my bedroom window open, the cold air spilling in and all the sudden what I really wanted to say just felt like it was ready to come out via my fingers.

When I was a young teenager I was fascinated by the adventures of The Knights of Glory and Beer. It was a group of everyman’s and living legends. People I saw at the bank every day, and people I only read about on sites like Crossroads of Britannia and ImaNewbie. I followed them around as much as I could, and I tried so hard to be as brave and larger than life as they were. They stood up to the seemingly endless waves of griefers, player killers, and scammers. In a world (as Ultima was to me back then.. the only real world that mattered =P) filled with so much evil and mistrust The Knights of Glory and Beer were to me a real life counterpart to the heroes of the films I was raised on. You know the ones I’m talking about.. Films featuring over the top action stars like Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sylvester Stallone, Jean Claude Van Damme, Chuck Norris, Steven Segal, etc.

When I finally became a member of this organization, it was like being in a dream for me. Which coincidentally is rather ironic given that I have so many awesomely fond memories of my time as a member yet I seemed to have rubbed an awful lot of people the wrong way. I suppose thats how it is when you are young - you don’t even realize how much of a loud mouthed retard you are. For some reason for all those years almost all of ‘em were great to me. Hell, some of them still are even to this day.
So you see KGB to me is far more than just a guild. It’s so many things.. The right thing to do, the only real “good guys” left out there. Hell, to this day I’m unable to stop behaving in games like the KGB members I idolized when I was a kid. I don’t player kill, I don’t grief, I go out of my way to help people, and I usually find myself being the one “good guy” in a sea of 4 chan / b-tards. (Much to the amusement of the players who get their kicks mocking the “care-bear”)

KGB is a piece of my youth, a damn big one. It’s my family, my friends, a piece of who I am and who I hope to be. My father was gone from twelve to eighteen - my mother busy working.. Those members of KGB whether through intent or circumstance invested time and effort into making me into a decent human being. Unfortunately, I kicked sand in their faces and ran away before they could see who I became.

Some people don’t understand why reconciling with these people matters to me. They just don’t get why it matters so much to me that I be allowed to “come home”, to change things with what they see is just “a guild”. 

But it’s not just a guild.

It’s a part of me, it’s my family, my friends, and without them I feel like something is missing.

I like to think everyone made mistakes they would like to be go back and change. I’d like to think everyone was as much of a retard as I was when they were in their teens and early twenties. I just don’t understand why it seems there are so many people out there who turn their back when I try and apologize. Even after all these years.. How can someone be so cold and turn their back when you come to them of your free will - looking to make amends and start things new.
Especially people I used to consider close friends.

How can someone not forgive the stupidity of youth?

If I have to spend the next ten years unguilded - Thats fine with me. As long as I can play along side my friends, what does it matter if I have -KGB- over my head.

Blah - I’m going to play some Age of Conan.

Recently I have found myself sleepless on most nights, laying in my bed unable to stop my brain from working away at the situation I now find myself in. I refuse to believe that I’m the only one who wronged others or made mistakes when I was younger. (And by young I mean my teens and early twenties) Which is not to say I am in any way attempting to minimize the things I did. Infact the truth is as far opposite of that as possible.

As I sit in front of my PC at home typing out very personal and intimate apoligies I try and place myself at the other end of the message. Try and view things through the eyes of those I had wronged or treated poorly. Maybe its just me, maybe I’m easy to forgive - but reading over the messages I have composed I find it almost impossible to understand how anyone can read these messages and flat out ignore me.

It confuses and upsets me trying to picture people I used to call friends sitting at their computers, reading these heartfelt and very personal messages from me and closing the window - ignoring my presence and continuing on with their days.
I just don’t know what to think or do. It leaves me sitting awake at four in the morning, unable to sleep.

Edit: And on top of all that - In my absence it seems that I’ve almost become some sort of mythical bad guy. Outlandish claim ontop of outlandish claim has been stacked against me. How do you defend yourself against lies that have been accepted as fact for over four years? The following crazy ass claims have apparently been lobbied against me:

1. I sold the KGB tower: Even though the damn thing DECAYED because no one was paying for the account. No one seems to take into account the fact that said structure doesen’t even exist anymore.
2. I sold the KGB keep: Despite the fact that everyone knows Parn sold it and is a big-fat-fucking-liar that refuses to accept responsibility, everyone seems to assume that his claims that I did it are true.
3. I stalked Jetstar IRL: Wtf? I have no idea who came up with this one. I guess because I called up an old friend at home a few times over the years and left a message for him to get ahold of me I’m a stalker? I dunno - this one is just fucking loopy.
4. I “hacked” the KGB website: Now - you won’t catch me denying that I made unauthorized changes and betrayed Jet’s trust in me. Read: I was not permitted to do what I did, and regardless of what reasons I may have had at the time it was WRONG and Jet had every right to react how he did. I really did deserve a real-life kick in the balls. However there was no “hacking” - not only did I just login with credentials I had been provided with a while ago (again, betraying Romeo’s trust in me) but I’m just not smart enough to know how to hack.. Heh.

With a list like this, I wouldn’t be suprised if the majority of KGB things I’m crazier then Cry For Dawn and Coldsteel combined.

I did an image dump from my rizr camera today, and found a few images rather amusing. Hover over for image text, click for larger size.

Living up in the Puget Sound during the summer brings back odd memories, completely at random. Maybe it has something to do with how green and alive the area is, I’m not sure. Catch me driving down I-5 on a warm summer evening with my windows down and I’m sure to be completely detached from reality, lost in memories that seem like a whole different lifetime.

The strongest of those memories would have to be the ones from the summer of 2000. I was eighteen and my father had just given me my first car. I had money in my pocket from the job my mother got me earlier in the year and I was itching to escape the prison I had pictured my home town to be.
A year or so prior I had joined The Knights of Glory and Beer, an Ultima Online guild I had idolized in the early years of Ultima Online. At that time in my life I couldn’t think of anything cooler then being known and important in the guild. Something like Marcus Tiberius, Nathan Rahl, or Jetstar.

At the time KGB called the Ultima Online server Siege Perilous home, and like any true fanboi I spent every available moment in the KGB irc channel and logged into Siege Perilous. If there ever was a classic case of MMO addiction it was me. I honestly had a hard time telling real life from the guild, and my priorities reflected such. So when word came round that the community members of Siege Perilous (and by proxy BattleVortex) were planning a real life gathering in San Fransisco and Jetstar was attending.. Well lets just say my priorities quickly shifted away from work to the long trip down I-5.
I can still remember how the temperature of the air seemed to change and increase the moment I cruised down the highway across the Oregon/California border. I still swear to this day that there is a magical temperature barrier you cross the moment you enter California.

I must have driven for eleven hours straight at least. The trip as beautiful and awesome as it was really was nothing more then a hindrance to me. Jetstar was waiting for me on his yacht(or at least it seemed like a yacht to me) in Alameda. I couldn’t put to words how excited I was. This guy was larger then life for me, he was my guildmaster, my friend, and a bit of a father figure. He was rich, smart, and just all around awesome. I think its fair to say I thought the man was invincible.
Nothing seemed to be able to get me down, not the locksmith I had to call because I locked myself out of my car near Mt Shasta, not the one Limp Bizkit cd I brought playing over and over, and not even how I got lost in Oakland at one in the morning when I finally made it to the Bay Area.

Once I got myself back across the bridge and out of Oakland I called Jetstar from a pay phone and we agreed to meet at a grocery store I recalled passing a few miles earlier. Once I hung up the phone all the pent up excitement and tension hit me like a ton of bricks. My stomach knotted up and I had a whole family of butterflies going to town in my gut. I remember hesitating, and even considering getting in my car and driving back home. What if I didn’t measure up to Jetstar’s expectations? I was supposed to be a trusted leader in an organization he had nurtered for *years*! Who was I kidding? I wasen’t some battle hardened General, hell I wasen’t even brave enough to stand up to my Mother.

Fortunately for me I was closer to Jetstar’s boat then I realized, and in the time it took me to panic over all the different possibile judgements he would lay upon me he had pulled his VW Bug up to the store. To my amazement, no judgement came. He didn’t laugh at me, he didn’t turn his car around and drive away. He smiled at me and told me to follow him in my car. The slip was close, and I parked my car a few spots down from his. The funny thing is, as I got out of my car and started to walk toward his I can’t remember any butterflies, knots, or any other symptoms of panic of nervousness. I had realized in those few moments that Jetstar himself wasen’t the seven foot tall barrel chested greek-god of a man I had imagined.
He was better, he was -real-. Its kind of hard to describe Jetstar the person. The leader I knew online was understanding but firm, kind yet ruthless in defending his people. He seemed more like a myth then an actual person. The man that met me at that grocery store in Alameda seemed just as excited to meet me as I was to meet him. No judgement, only friendship.

Alot of that weekend runs together, so its hard to pick out isolated memories. I was starving when we finally got to his boat, and he offered me a few burgers he had left over from earlier on in the night. Sometimes when I close my eyes I can almost taste the burgers and feel the warm summer air as I laid there on Jetstar’s boat, talking about the guild and the upcoming weekend until we fell asleep.

Its memories like those that haunt me almost every day now. Like most young men I took the good things in my life for granted, and about four years later I would eventually treat Jetstar with such disrespect and treachery that it cost me one of the best friendships I’ve ever had.
So whenever I find myself angry with someone, or I find myself at the short end of the stick - wronged by someone I trusted and I want nothing more then to turn my back on someone I once trusted I think back to the mistakes I made, and what it cost me.

For the most part I wouldn’t change anything about my life, good or bad. After all it is the experiences we have had in our lives that bring us to who we are and where we are now.

Normally I find that statement to be rock solid.

Except for this one time.

Jetstar was there for me when everyone else turned their backs on me, He was there when I made a total ass of myself in front of our friends, he even was there for me when I flat out lied to him about a damn video game. Jetstar was there for me when my fiance cheated on me, and even there for me when she eventually left.
Unfortunately none of that was enough to talk some sense into me when I eventually turned my back on one of my best friends.

Found out today that TOS/TNG Producer Robert Justman passed away on Wednesday.

Robert Justman, a producer on both Star Trek The Original Series and Star Trek The Next Generation died at his home in Los Angeles Wednesday from complications due to Parkinson’s disease; Justman was 81.

More at Trekmovie.com

So it has come to my attention via some user submitted comments on the blog (that I will not post/get into, because I have no desire to drag such things out into the light) that I may have under estimated how my actions years ago affected those unlucky enough to have dealt with me.

This specific individual has every right to hold a grudge against me, its the fact that said person still holds this grudge (and by the flavor of the comments, it has some staying power) that really gets to me. Sure, this was probably four to five years ago but time doesn’t necessarily heal all wounds. I was immature, I was an ass, and I played just as many back door gossip games as any of the people I spoke ill of.
Before Dan and I each had our own falling out incidents with this person he/she was probably one of a handful of the biggest supporters of The PRC. Hell, to be honest without this persons dedication and help the site could have easily been nothing more than another .com community startup.

I’m sorry if I’m rambling, I just really wanted to apologize for my behavior.

Caught this over at Slate, definitely worth reading through.

As you’d probably expect from the reputation of the series, Grand Theft Auto IV includes—let’s quickly consult the label—blood, intense violence, partial nudity, strong language, strong sexual content, and use of drugs and alcohol. Yes, concerned teenage boys of America, if your parents are irresponsible enough to let you get your hands on this, you can still kill and maim and plunder and screw until your heart is full. But there’s a difference this time: The violence is no longer cartoonish. Shoot an innocent bystander, and you see his face contort in agony. He’ll clutch at the wound and begin to stagger away, desperately seeking safety. After just scratching the surface of the game—I played for part of a day; it could take 60 hours to complete the whole thing—I felt unnerved. What makes Grand Theft Auto IV so compelling is that, unlike so many video games, it made me reflect on all of the disturbing things I had done.

Read more at Slate