EPTI was a fairly normal child, though somewhat tall and lanky. My house always had cats, so I was fairly fond of them, and my parents decided the best car ride entertainment for me was math problems. Aside from that, I was just your average little girl. I chased boys and threatened them with kisses, I asked every Christmas for a white kitten, and I wrote all of my letters as capitals for a good year or so.
Second grade was treating me fairly well until I noticed I had issue reading the blackboard from a distance. From second grade to sixth grade, I wore glasses. They plunged me into the teased world of the "four-eyed." I responded... well, violently. Both of my parents were martial artists and I had been in the dojo since before I could talk. In fact, I think I knew how to count to ten in Japanese before I knew how to in English. Anyway, when I reacted to teasing with threats and fists, I fell head first into the socially awkward life of the geeky girl that everyone avoids.
In third grade I took to the habit of dressing in boy clothes, which went more punk as I reached middle school. I had always appreciated video games. Though, as a child, I spent more time watching my dad play them than participating myself. Every time he started up Wolfenstein or Doom or Duke Nukem 3D, I'd pull up a chair and watch him play, rooting him on and mimicking the monsters. As I reached middle school, I played the games more actively myself. I started out with FPSs, but discovered RPGs through the few friends I had in the band. Thus my true geekiness started.
I had few friends in middle school and the teasing was worse than ever. Since I was well known for punching the last person who taunted me in the face (he stole my lunch and dared to taunt me with it), the bullying was all extremely passive aggressive. I was constantly blocked from getting in classrooms so I would be counted as tardy, I had water poured in my sports locker during PE, and the girls liked to talk loudly about how they viewed me when I was a few meters away.
I took most of my pent-up rage out on the track. I was on the volleyball, basketball, cross-country and track-and-field teams, but track was my true love. Everyday I had some practice or another, and it kept me out of a lot of trouble I would have probably gotten into otherwise. When I got home, I ground my nose to the books until I was sure I would destroy the material, then I retreated downstairs to my sweet little PS2. That is, of course, until I found the wonders of MMOs.
My first real MMO was Ragnarok Online. I made an assassin cross on a private server with a fairly low rate. I spent tons of time on her, grinding, chatting, pvping, and made a lot of friends in the process. Though I had contacts, I had gotten braces just after getting them, and still felt like automatically had "nerd" tattooed across my forehead. During the day I was the tough, nerd who wore all black and red and chains, and at night I was the flirtatious and hyper "Ryu-chan."
When high school came around, I decided my look and personality needed a make-over so I could make more friends. It's amazing what some normal clothes and a smile will get you. High school went well for me in comparison to elementary and middle school. I made tons of friends and still found myself engaged in band, sports and video games. Though I rarely hung out with friends after school, my school days and lunch times were filled with jokes and chatter. When I got home, I spent my evenings and nights playing games and talking to my online friends, Admittedly, I didn't ever get much sleep, but I did well enough.
I never completely transformed myself for the sake of popularity. I still often wore combat boots and plaid skirts and definitely had a punk-touch to much of my outfits, but not the full-on way I did in middle school. The entire school seemed to know who I was, but no one really had the same opinion on me. Some people just thought I was a stoner, some thought I was just a jock, some thought I was a band geek and some thought I was a nerd. None of them were wrong, but none of them were right, either.
My junior year, I started dating an older guy. He was a sweetheart, but his friends were rather sketchy and I got sucked into their world. I did E, smoked weed, dropped acid, etc. I didn't let it interfere with my school or athletics, but it definitely gave me a dose of the reality that was fast and harsh.
I also became the captain of the track team my junior year and lead... well, myself, to state my senior year, shattering the school record in my main event (the triple jump). Suddenly, all of those girls who were so cruel to me in middle school thought I was awesome and had nothing but nice things to say to me. Part of me wanted to go tell them to screw themselves, but I decided to be polite instead and found myself with a huge amount of support. When graduation came around, I was more than excited to go to college, but I was also a little sad to leave all of the friendships I had made. I worked the rest of the summer at Game Stop and then was off to school!
Losing all of my friends from high school by going to college out of state brought be back into playing World of Warcraft. After canceling my account my senior year due to... well, disinterest, I started playing just after WotLK was released and gained a new-found passion for the game. After getting tired of PUGs, I rejoined my old guild and reformed my old friendships and made many new ones. My freshman year of college, I was in Army ROTC, which ate up most of my time, so I did not make many friends in my class. I also had a hard time fitting in socially, my hyper-forwardness was frowned upon by a lot of the upperclassmen females and I found it to be oddly like middle school in terms of bullying, just a more passive, adult-version. I spent more and more time with my guild, until I really felt like I had a family there. To this day, I still consider them my family, though, admittedly, we talk much less often.
Freshman year was a whirlwind of bad choices, too much drinking and exhaustion. I pulled through and corrected many of many errors my sophomore year, making tons of friends with the incoming freshman and finding another "family" in my dorm. This past year I experimented with a long distance relationship, which burned much of my social life, but gave my liver a much needed rest.
Now here I am. A mechanical engeering looking for an internship and entering her last year of college. I play video games in most of my free time and post blogs daily that are received with mixed reactions. The internet has always been a home to me and feels almost as comfortable as PS2 controllers and mouse do in my hands.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to make a flash game called Snugglestime Ale featuring an amazing, brewing cat.
Oh, and here's a picture to go with my story:
![[image loading]](http://i116.photobucket.com/albums/o4/GinRyuChan/tranformationofriku.jpg)
