Writing Territories

Every person has a passion-something that they always feel that they must get better at, something that drives them. For me, that is, as cheesy as it sounds, a card game. Not a normal card game-this is no poker I speak of, but rather a fantasy card game called Magic: The Gathering. (Incidentally, my love of fantasy novels probably helped to draw me into this). I first discovered the game when I was a very young child. A friend of mine introduced me to it, and showed me some very basic cards from the game. I was, to put it simply, only mildly interested at the time. I did not imagine then, what a huge part of my life that card game would become. A while after this, my mother (whom I had told about this) noticed an advertisement for a class about the game. I figured "why not?" and enrolled. I still remember the room where we learned. It was pretty bare bones, mostly grey. But they had several great huge tables throughout the room, and the instructor, who I remember only vaguely, informed us that if we did not have our own decks, we would each recieve what he called "a starter deck." Looking back on it now, the deck wasn't very strong at all, and needless to say, I lost nearly every game I played. Even still, I fell in love almost immediately. What wasn't too love? We got to battle our opponents with all magnificent arrays of creatures and spells! I soon began buying my own cards and creating my own deck, which, beginner as I was, wasn't very strong either, but I began winning, at least. I played off and on for a few years, until about seventh grade, when Magic became a fad at my middle school. Suddenly, everyone was playing! It was at about this time that I started getting interested in playing competitively...I don't know if it is an exxageration to say that if I hadn't had that experience, I never would have continued with magic as I did, but it definately contributed. Retelling my entire story would take hours on end to do, but suffice it to say that today, I still play the game every weekend, at a competitive level. It's a huge part of my life...but to be honest, I wouldn't trade it for the world. And I would definately do it all again, if I had to.