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stevedonnellyfaith-blog · 5 years

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Family Gatherings (Post 118) 12-2-15

About two months ago Pam's mother Barb let me know about that Pam's Aunt Patty was planning a family reunion for the Saturday after Thanksgiving and asked us if we would be able to make it down. I told her we would attend as my social calendar is as empty as the state of Wyoming in a spring snow storm. I think my next semi-firm appointment is my brother's retirement from the Navy this spring. I don't count the plant Christmas party because really that is business.

I will probably attend that as well, as my office mate has solemnly promised me that he will not twerk this year. Several people have offered to provide me with video clips of his outstanding performance last year, but I am a "no twerking none of the time" type of guy. Anyway I guess I have a few things I will be going to this holiday season, but a trip down to Maryland sounded like a good way for Natalie to get to meet more of Pam's family than she has gotten to see since we migrated back East.

Although Abby had made plans to spend Thanksgiving with her friend Tyler in New York City, she arranged her schedule so that she could catch a bus down to Baltimore on Friday morning. As usual, she had everything about her week in New York and the transit south to meet up with the rest of the family planned down to a tee. Nicholas also performed to his consistent level of planning efficiency by forgetting to ask off from work at O'Reilly's Auto Parts but that was serendipitous for me as his oversight freed me from having to kennel the two dogs that my middle children conned me into allowing them to purchase nearly two years ago. One of the two critters is actually lying on my legs and gnawing on a raw hide product as I am typing.

So everything about the trip to Maryland went smoothly unless you count the text message that I got almost immediately after leaving my Ohio house. It was from Tyler who let me know Abby's schedule because Abby had left her phone accidentally in Tyler's dormitory room and was headed to Baltimore incommunicado - something no normal person has considered doing on purpose since 2005. Unfortunately for Abby, I had goofed off that morning and slept in late enough so that my vector was trailing her now silent arrival into the greater Baltimore area by several hours. Luckily, Barb was able to coordinate an effective meetup without the need of cellular communication. I wasn't all that disturbed as the rendezvous was in broad daylight at the White Marsh park-and-drive which, in no way, resembles the hood.

Stephen, Natalie and I arrived at Barb's house a few hours later to find Abby and Denny, Pam's father, binge watching some type of post zombie apocalypse martial arts cable series of which I had never heard. Abby had planned to stay at the house with Denny, Barb, Pam's brother and his son. She wanted to do what she could to cheer up Denny who was recovering from shoulder surgery and has been feeling out of sorts. In retirement Denny likes to keep busy but physical activity does not mix well with a shoulder sling. My father-in-law looked quite pleased to have his granddaughter handy for watching what looked to me to be the modern equivalent of a spaghetti western.

The rest of us, on the other hand, were scheduled to stay with Pam's uncle Johnnie, a retired probation officer who lives alone in the old house that his father had built for the family fifty or sixty years previous. Johnnie gets a kick out of Natalie and Abby, but was quite satisfied to have at least one of them under his roof, which is located about twenty minutes away and within a couple of minutes' drive of the family plot where Pam is buried along with her grandparents. We met up with Johnnie at one of Pam's sisters' houses located another twenty minutes from Pam's folk's house in another direction entirely. Pam's Baltimore-centric immediate family does a Friday night post-Thanksgiving left-over pot luck that was quite enjoyable. Plates cleared, we trailed behind Uncle Johnnie, or UJ as the kids call him, back towards his Hanover, MD abode after the dinner broke up.

I stayed up a while talking with him after Natalie shuffled off to her guest bedroom. Stephen and I were sleeping in the living room. I enjoy talking to Johnnie as he and I share many interests. His politics are more conservative than mine and he prefers the Latin Mass only while I am more Catholic with respect to my Catholic masses, but we both share a love for military history. With regard to the Civil War, he likes the gentility of the Gray while I prefer the idealism of the Blue. I am forever a Yankee in all respects other than baseball, but Johnnie and I appreciate each other's opinion. We also share an unspoken camaraderie as circumstances have turned both of our lives into sometimes lonely but not morose slogs in the footprints of those who have preceded us towards and though the veil to eternal life.

We woke up relatively late, breakfasted and made a quick stop at the cemetery for a visit with Pam and her grandparents before heading to the family reunion on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. Natalie was pleased that her memorial stones painted as a butterfly and hamburger were still in the same positions on the graves where she had left them in September. Some poor soul had pilfered the bronze vase from the marker assembly of Pam's grandmother, but Johnnie was already aware of the desecration and seemed resigned to the fact that we live among a generation of grave robbers.

After a short visit and no tears we began a much longer car trip than I expected to where Barb's other sibling, Patty, now resides. Her husband, a twice retired cop - formerly a barracks commander for the State Police and then a County Sherriff - has now found work in an unelected second-in-command at the Sherriff's office of a county that is very close to a place called Ocean City that I had heard of but never visited. I believe that Ocean City is a Maryland equivalent of the Jersey Shore without as much swearing and orange toner. That might be an inaccurate characterization as I am a rank amateur with respect to Maryland cultural studies.

The journey did include a fly-by of Annapolis, my stomping ground several decades previous, but mostly the drive broke new ground for me. I am sure that I probably have been across the Bay Bridge - Chesapeake version, but I didn't really remember the road or the scenery. I did notice a definite improvement in how property was maintained in the towns of the Eastern Shore in comparison with some of the Baltimore neighborhoods we had driven through the previous day. Things appeared conservatively well-kept if not crazy wealthy and the drive was a pleasant one. I was just glad that the reunion was not planned for the summer as there seemed to be only one main drag, Route 50, which probably would be grossly inadequate for the onslaught of weekend beachcombers if we were visiting in the last days of July instead of the final November weekend.

Once we arrived, we enjoyed the party although we found the festivities slightly divided along family lines as many reunions tend to be. Patty's relatives tended to congregate in the living room and sun room of the house, while her husband's relations mostly conversed in the kitchen and family room. It was a natural division and an amicable one. I had joined the family over a quarter century pervious and had encountered a couple of Scott's extended family members less than a handful of times.

I caught up with the lives of those few that I knew, but mostly played wingman for Johnnie when I wasn't conversing with Abby. Natalie played with the pack of collective kiddies, while Stephen wandered around the yard which had little bit of a beachhead on a creek-side location that let into a river then into the Chesapeake and eventually into the Atlantic. I was disappointed not to catch of whiff of salt marsh, an odor that evokes my seafaring days. Unfortunately, this property was more inland and manicured like a golf-course in a tasteful and charming sort of way. Perhaps Copperopolis, Round Valley and Muir Wood has spoiled me so that I can now only appreciate the breathtaking. Ohio fall forest colors does fit the bill, though.

While we were frittering through the afternoon in small talk over light snacks, I did catch a bad vibe from Johnnie. The nexus of his discomfort seemed to be the respective spouses of the brother and sister who had been the flower girl and ring bearer at my wedding what seems like eons ago. To my eye both had married well. The ring bearer had picked up the tools of the family trade, a badge and pistol of some sort. His spouse was a pretty blonde whose slim waist seemed in congruent with her three rug rats that I could see pictured in the family portrait on the coffee table next to where we sat. His sister had married a nice looking young man that was thoroughly balding but pretty athletic for a posture that was probably pushing thirty-five. I watched him pitch whiffle balls to his two pre-school aged sons alternately. The younger one was a tiger.

I didn't see the problem, so Johnnie explained the issue. Both the spouses were atheists and none of the kids had been baptized. Under closer observation, I noticed that neither of the spouses really smiled or enjoyed other people. Maybe they were put off by being tertiary participants in a family gathering that didn't interest them, but they seemed to be alone within a large group of joyous people. It is possible that other people were thinking the same thoughts about me, but their separation seemed to be palpably different, and I considered adding the two of them to my prayer list, but I didn't know their names. Johnnie couldn't provide them, he said that he had never been introduced in the half decade since the two joined the family. Evidently, both the flower girl and ring bearer live quite close to Johnnie, but there is no contact between them. I expect that UJ is the Godfather of both of them as he is to one of my children.

The separation seemed strange and disheartening to the both of us. Both of the little families had raised high bulwarks to prevent any possible intrusion of Jesus Christ. I expect that someday and unforeseen tragedy will visit them in their purposefully insular worlds and they will discover that their walls bricked to keep out Our Savior will unfortunately form a bathtub of pain for them to marinate in. Neither Johnnie, Jesus nor I are satisfied with that situation, but we respect and disagree with their choices as responsible adults.

I am not a particularly good prayer warrior, but I do plan to spend some time praying for something to innocuously breach the walls of their atheistic aquaria. Advent seems like an excellent time to affix our eyes on a better outcome for whatever relatives and friends we have that have chosen problematic paths that are currently orientated away from True North.

#Jesus #God #The Holy Spirit #The Virgin Mary #grace #hope #faith #love #family #holidays #gathering #bereavement #Latin Mass #Catholic #eternal life #baptism

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williamsjoan · 6 years

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DualShockers’ Game of the Year 2018 Staff Lists — Chris’s Top 10

As 2018 comes to a close, DualShockers and our staff are reflecting on this year’s batch of games and what were their personal highlights within the last year. Unlike the official Game of the Year 2018 awards for DualShockers, there are little-to-no-rules on our individual Top 10 posts. For instance, any game — not just 2018 releases — can be considered.

In a year that I characterize with existential fear and internal anxiety, 2018 is when I figured out that while video games may not save society, they can at least help the individual. “Escapism” is an overused and reductive term, with the games I dug into providing a variety of positive forces: inspiration, awe, contemplation, camaraderie, and so on and so forth. This was also a year where I tried my darndest to play video games just to try to make myself feel happy.

But enough of that sappy stuff. I got some games to talk about, and this might come across as an unusual bunch. Most of this year for me was spent catching up with games from previous years, mainly titles that I waited for Switch ports. Once I was informed that games from any release year were fair game, the list that I already had was suddenly in flux.

First off, let’s pour one out for the titles that made my shortlist, but not my final top ten, including Hollow Knight (Switch), Dead Cells, Sea of Thieves, Wolfenstein II (Switch), Heaven Will Be Mine, Marvel’s Spider-Man, and Red Dead Redemption 2: the latter three are games that I wrote pieces for on DualShockers, all which I linked to. Also, I never got a chance to play Florence, The Messenger, Gris, Return of the Obra Dinn, or Donut County as of this writing, and these were all titles I was looking forward to.

To be quite honest, this list, especially the tenth spot, kept changing every few hours. But I had a strict deadline for this, so let’s capture, in time, how I felt about games during this particular hour before I regret everything:

10. A Way Out

Okay, it’s here where I’ll straight up admit that this list is a weird one. I can’t particularly say that A Way Out is an exceptional game, but the experience of playing it was just fascinating. I played the main story with a close friend over two days, and while much of the core gameplay is standard or contrived, I couldn’t help but want to explore the environment and all of the activities that surrounded us. Well, at least after you break out of that prison.

A Way Out inspired the part of me that just wanted to break games. I wanted to see what my limits were, or if positioning our characters in a certain place together would prompt anything, or if there were activities that I can cheat in. While I was disappointed that some of the final missions of the game turned into an Uncharted ripoff with a Scarface vibe, the turn at the end of the game was peak “me trying to break this game.” Boy, was this fun—and the experience was so memorable to me that A Way Out just barely slipped into the list. Congrats, “f*** the Oscars” guy!

Check out the DualShockers review of A Way Out.

9. Call of Duty: Black Ops 4

The general narrative around the Call of Duty games seems to be that the series just hasn’t been the same since Modern Warfare 2. There’s a bit of truth to that, but I must admit that I’ve always had a soft spot for Treyarch’s Black Ops subseries. The stories are usually absurd fun, but in terms of new features and gameplay mechanics, Treyarch has been forward-thinking. While I loved Black Ops II, Black Ops III proved to be a massive disappointment. Against my expectations, Treyarch won me back the fourth time.

Obviously, there’s less story here this time around, but the multiplayer is what keeps us all going anyway. I have to admit my surprise about how manual healing subtly changed up the gameplay—it may seem like a small addition, but I felt that I had a bit more agency and control as a result, and it added a small new layer of strategy. Blackout is a blast, and as someone who missed out on the PUBG craze when it first debuted (though I made up for that on PS4), the Call of Duty interpretation of it quickly won me over. Exploring that map also made me realize how weirdly nostalgic I was for World at War and the Black Ops games—maybe a silly thing to have reverence over, but a reverence I hold, regardless.

Check out the DualShockers review of Call of Duty: Black Ops 4.

8. Fortnite

That new-fangled video game with the floss dancing might be the most basic thing to like in 2018, but gosh darn it, I still fell victim to its charms. With cross-play finally making its way to Fortnite this year across all consoles, this battle royale game became the default multiplayer option amongst my circles. While I’ve never been wild about the gunplay, exploring the evolving map and learning how to utilize building to its fullest potential has been a truly unique and exciting experience.

And speaking of that evolution, I am just floored by how Fortnite’s battle royale mode just keeps adding elements and changing everything up. I was already thrilled when the golf carts were added, but last I saw, you can fly a freaking biplane now. The crazy map events inspire intrigue, and even though there is only one map, the fact that it changes regularly somehow keeps it all fresh. Do I think that it’s lousy that Epic is stealing dance moves? Oh yeah. But will my friends and I keep playing it? Probably. Ugh. Sorry, all.

Check out more of my thoughts in this editorial about Fortnite.

7. Tetris Effect

I’m often thrown the question of how Tetris is able to make me relax when the gameplay is inherently stressful. Still, to this day, I struggle to come up with words to describe that phenomenon. Luckily, Tetris Effect made that much easier to explain—I still don’t use words, but instead, I simply point someone towards some gameplay and ask them to use their eyes and ears. In case you don’t know by now, Tetris Effect is a gorgeous game, and it ended up as one of the most therapeutic experiences I’ve had with any piece of media this year.

It’s a game that just wants to inspire joy and inspiration, using historical and cultural imagery; sometimes its lifting and appropriating, but that’s an entirely different discussion for later. It wants you to admire the feats of humankind throughout millennia, but even if you couldn’t give a damn about humanism, it still sure looks pretty. I greatly appreciate how completing the Journey mode will allow players to simply enjoy the sensory experiences by themselves, because this game can get really difficult at times. Most of all, Tetris Effect affirms my love for adaptive soundtracks, something that you can only really find in games.

Check out the DualShockers review of Tetris Effect.

6. God of War

I can certainly see why the DualShockers staff picked God of War for the top prize this year. I had never touched any of the previous games in the series, and father-son stories are a bit played out at this time, but I rode the wave of PlayStation 4 first-party “prestige” titles, third-person character-focused action games like Uncharted, Horizon: Zero Dawn, and the like. While I completely fell off of Horizon last year, God of War surprisingly entranced me.

The single take camerawork in God of War is a gimmick for sure, but as a big fan of Alfonso Cuarón, I’m a sucker for it. I appreciated a new take on Norse mythology that wasn’t from the Marvel Cinematic Universe for once, and the world was large and interesting without being intimidating. Combat in God of War hasn’t won everyone over, but it was a system that I strived to get better at. Ultimately, I stayed on because of Christopher Judge and Sunny Suljic (who was excellent in Mid90s, by the way). And it doesn’t necessarily need repeating, but God of War looks real, real nice, even on my above average display.

To be real though, it’s all about recalling that Leviathan Axe. That’s a cool-ass feature.

Check out the DualShockers review of God of War.

5. Celeste

Challenging platformers always scare me away. Why do you think I’ve never played Super Meat Boy? I couldn’t tell you how I got over the fence and ended up purchasing Celeste—maybe it was my love for Towerfall or the fact that I wouldn’t stop hearing about how good Lena Raine’s soundtrack was. Regardless, Celeste helped me get over my irrational fear of difficult games.

Here’s the thing about the game: it’s really easy to play! Well, not easy to finish, mind you, but Celeste was more intuitive and inviting than I made it out to be at first. Pretty quickly any frustration I expected was instead replaced with determination. The trial-and-error nature of the game made me think carefully rather than rage like games with consistent deaths usually do. It also helps that Madeline is just a fun protagonist.

Celeste is just a wonderful mix of gameplay, music, and writing, and anyone who doesn’t like it is just not a good person. Got it?

Check out the DualShockers review of Celeste.

4. Night in the Woods (Switch)

There are so few stories that accurately depict the aimlessness of the formative 20s age range, and Night in the Woods is really the only one that I can think of off the top of my head. I won’t get into any self-flagellation here in describing how miserable my own 20s are (I wrote about that elsewhere, if you’re curious), but I will say that the story and art style provided some healing during particularly difficult times in my life this year. The Switch port came just in time for me.

Mae, Gregg, Bea, and Angus are all wonderfully-realized characters; the dynamics and dialogue between them were a delight, and sometimes painfully realistic, from my own social experiences. There’s not too much gameplay to speak of, but I looked forward to each new in-game day to walk around the town and see what the folks I passed by had to say. The story took a real Stephen King-meets-Hot Fuzz turn, and I was down for it. It captures so much truth, and is one of the most authentic pieces of media I know of—and this is one where all the characters are animals.

Check out the DualShockers review of Night in the Woods.

3. Hitman 2

Agent 47, you are one weird dude, and I love you so. As I mentioned in my written review for this website, the “first” Hitman game in 2016 was one that I watched constantly, basically playing it vicariously. With this new game, I graduated to finally, uh, playing it, and almost every moment of it, whether it was a moment of success, failure, or absurdity, has been worth it. Hitman 2, more than any other game this year, is one where if I even think about it, I will have the visceral urge to play it immediately.

I know that I am encouraged to commit these assassinations as smoothly and quietly as possible, but nothing brings me more joy than a contrived plan gone awry. Hitman 2, while very similar to the previous game, added so many fun toys to play with inside its expansive sandboxes. Even with Mission Stories to somewhat guide me, I always found ways to come up with left-field solutions to seemingly simple problems. Stealthily murdering terrible people has never been so much more fun.

Check out the DualShockers review of Hitman 2.

2. Wandersong

I’ve spent the past several months annoying the hell out of everyone I know about this lovely piece of art from Greg Lobanov. Wandersong, in case this is the first time I’m annoying you about it, is a wholesome story-driven game that thematically deconstructs “the hero’s journey.” You play as the Bard, someone without the physical constitution to even pick up a sword, yet is able to use the power of song and vocals to their advantage. It’s a game about a person spreading happiness not only to the game’s world, but to whoever is playing it.

It isn’t too complicated to play, and the song wheel mechanics are a bit finicky at times, but playing through the entire game was such a profound experience for me. Not only did I appreciate its handling of familiar narrative tropes, but I also admired its depiction of mental health and depression. You can tell that Greg and his friends and colleagues put a lot of love into the game’s visuals, sound, writing, and design, and I’m eternally grateful for their work.

Check out the DualShockers review of Wandersong.

1. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate

It’s a tad bit unfair to put Super Smash Bros. Ultimate at the top of my list. Not only did it release so late in the year, but it’s essentially the game of games. I’ve been obsessed with the series since its first iteration on the Nintendo 64, and Ultimate represents such a fantastic evolution of the franchise, and this evolution comes in surprising forms. More so than even its predecessors does it come across more like a celebration to basically every franchise that Nintendo has ever even touched.

I’m not just talking about the Spirits, though those are fun in their own way—the World of Light campaign is long and exhausting, but I remain gleeful every time I see a creative Spirit concept. I’m not just talking about the music, even though the option of creating playlists and basically using your Switch as a music player with its screen turned off is absolutely genius. I just appreciate recent Smash efforts to having characters play like they came out straight from their own games. The trend started with Mega Man in the previous Smash, I feel, but new additions like Simon Belmont and Inkling (from my beloved Splatoon) really take everything further.

I don’t think people talk about this enough, but Smash Bros. is just a great-looking game. It’s a happy medium between the darker look of Brawl and the cartoony colors of the fourth Smash Bros., and I am still in awe by how Ultimate is able to make all of these characters, with totally different designs, aesthetics, and body proportions, look like they all belong together in the same game.

Everyone is here, indeed.

Check out the DualShockers review of Super Smash Bros. Ultimate.

0. Nickelodeon Kart Racers

Did you know that they misspelled “brake” as “break” in the controls menu? Jeez, what a mess.

Check out the DualShockers review of Nickelodeon Kart Racers.

Check out the other DualShockers’ staff Top 10 lists and our official Game of the Year Awards:

December 17: DualShockers Game of the Year Awards 2018 December 18: Lou Contaldi, Editor in Chief // Logan Moore, Reviews Editor December 19: Ryan Meitzler, Features Editor // Tomas Franzese, News Editor December 20: Scott Meaney, Community Director December 21: Reinhold Hoffmann, Community Manager // Ben Bayliss, Staff Writer December 22: Ben Walker, Staff Writer // Chris Compendio, Staff Writer December 23: Eoghan Murphy, Staff Writer // Grant Huff, Staff Writer December 26: Iyane Agossah, Staff Writer // Jordan Boyd, Staff Writer December 27: Max Roberts, Staff Writer // Michael Ruiz, Staff Writer December 28: Noah Buttner, Staff Writer // Rachael Fiddis, Staff Writer December 29: Steven Santana, Staff Writer // Tanner Pierce, Staff Writer December 30: Travis Verbil, Staff Writer // Zack Potter, Staff Writer

The post DualShockers’ Game of the Year 2018 Staff Lists — Chris’s Top 10 by Chris Compendio appeared first on DualShockers.

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