All of My Friends are Pokemon

Sometime in my youth, after Pogs but maybe still before Yo-Mega yo-yos, during the Bennie Baby fad, Pokemon rained supreme. As a consumer product Pokemon covered all its bases, growing from a cartoon into backpacks, shirts and shoes, kids meal toys and even a few movies and many video games. The Gameboy games were so engrossing that on its initial run Nintendo was able to successfully market two different games, Pokemon Red and Pokemon Blue, much in the same way the Zelda series would do later. Arguably though the penultimate form of the Pokemon craze was the playing card game. Like Magic the Gathering before it and YuhGiOh after it the Pokemon franchise was able to do with playing cards what man had been doing with gold, metal and paper for thousands of years- they gave value (sometimes grossly exaggerated value) to something that was before valueless.

Call it childhood pragmatism but I never saw the point of the things. Probably the largest contributor to my lack of interest overall though can be contributed to the lack of interest any of my peers had to show in them. The card game required more than you to play it and that was one more person than I was able to find interested in it. As for the Gameboy games I knew a few neighborhood kids, mostly younger and better off than myself, who played them to the extent that made them brattier and more irritating than little rich kids normally are or ever need to be. Its most likely possible that I missed out on the Pokemon craze for one reason though: alternative education. That’s right, I was one of those weird kids that went to a weird alternative education school where you couldn’t wear shirts with graphics or bring candy on Halloween. And of course there was no room for something like Pokemon.

Though I didn’t participate in Pokemon at all in it heyday I do have a pretty good understanding about it now. (It’s about social Darwinism right?) Either way, what I do understand about Pokemon is the same thing I understand about friendship, and that is that as a child I had no idea what it was about, or how it was supposed to work. But I see now what’s been true all along- that all of my friends are Pokemon.

It sounds strange but when you consider the case its absolutely true. The Pokemon Trading Card Game, like elementary school, begins with a starter pack that offers a player way more cards than they know what to do with, often with doubles and pointless fillers. The more you play the better your deck gets and by trading or buying or by some other means drawing to their deck those cards that they most desired and found compatible with a playing strategy. The same with friendships- you sort through those cards that don’t know how to play with and you’re left with those that always come through and you know how to work well with.

I don’t know much about Pokemon. And I once knew just as much about friends. But know I now Matt, and he’s pretty much my Blastoise. And my friend Eli, well, Eli is Diglett. And along with a few other people (who can also easily be likened to Pokemon) these are the friends I’m going to have for the rest of my life. They are the core of my deck. But along with them is also a bunch of people who I know and appreciate knowing even if we aren’t especially good friends. I value these people because like the cards, sometimes we’re convinced to value things we probably shouldn’t just for the entertainment of a thing. Like the guy in my bio course I always talked about Lovecraft fiction with (Tangela,) or that girl who never shuts up from high school (Zubat) or the one I almost dated who was once cute and fun (like Shellder) but know is a little scary and sexy (like Cloyster,) or the blogger who sits around and writes about Michigan Football and the rise of socialism in America (Drowzee.) Trust me, I can do this for just about anyone- as long as they have a personality, though I know that that may be asking a lot from some people (Psyduck.)

All of my friends are Pokemon. And I value each of them- even if they are priceless.

Ooooh, you're my best friend

In a world we must defend

Pokemon!

Oh, and Paul, if you’re reading this I think you should know- you’ll always be my Slowpoke.