Once upon a time, I was sort of a tomboy. That’s not particularly evident now; most folks probably see me as a girly-girl. And that’s fine with me. What surprised me, though, is how I had forgotten my own tomboy past.

You see, in a pattern that holds true to this day, I was a girl who did stuff that most other girls weren’t interested in, and thus ended up hanging out with mostly boys.

As a senior in high school, I was the only girl on the boys’ rifle drill team. In that era, our JROTC team had no hope in hell of ever actually winning the annual competition. What we were hoping to do by have me out there with my own rifle is stir up some chatter and perhaps take away from our lack of elite skills. And so, there I was out on the field in a non-regulation uniform (a tasteful blue suit with a mid-calf skirt), tossing around and spinning an M1 with the guys.

Ten years after that, I was going through an old scrapbook and realized upon seeing photos of myself in uniform that I had completely forgotten about being on that drill team…even though it had been the most important feature in my life back in the day.

The other morning, one of our level designers stopped me in the kitchen to ask if I’d recorded any voice overs for EQII.

“No, we hired outside talent,” I replied.

He went on to describe how some of his friends had been drawn back to EQII for the Living Legacy events and they had created new characters…

“Oh, that’s right,” I said. “I got to write and record a little intro for Kelethin.”

I’d completely forgotten about it. As with the whole tomboy on the boy’s rifle drill team, I’d somehow set aside something that I’d done so completely that it didn’t float right to the top of my mind until someone else mentioned it.

Well. I don’t know what that means about memory in general, or my memory in specific. I do know that I usually learn something intently and then let it go when I don’t think I need the data any longer. But remembering stuff I used to love and had forgotten about makes me feel kind of … weird. Sad, maybe. I want to hold onto everything and never forget…but I’d be sort of useless with all my memories taking up all that space.

In any case, if you want to hear me sounding all serious and stately, feel free to roll up a newbie character in Kelethin and listen as the camera swings you through Greater Faydark. Then you can remind me about it sometime when you see me later!