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My Grandfathers' Nintendo
Each year my grandfather would give us the weirdest presents, you know, the typical gadgets every little kid wants. Whether it was the 3D view master that allowed you to see storybooks through its lens, or the Waterful Ring Toss in which you had to put little colored rings through some obstacle. Yes, my grandfather was an expert at giving us gifts, and keeping us kids entertained on the dinner table. It’s Christmas Day 1999, my family and I start our every year ritual and head over to my grandparents’ house. This year was very different from the rest. This year was the start of a new tradition my brothers and I would have with my grandfather. This year as we walked through the door that Christmas, my grandfather rushed us to the play room, and what we saw was a Nintendo set that had been stashed in his attic for 5 or so years. My brothers and I had never seen anything like it because my parents weren’t the biggest fans of those sorts of games. He immediately turned on the big old TV, and gave us the cassettes of videogames that marked our childhood years, The Duck Hunt and Super Mario Bros. As a little girl, I was not expected to be excited by a game that consists of shooting ducks, or with a game that requires guiding a little man through pipes and obstacles. As a little girl, I was expected to want to play dress up and play with dolls. But when I was a little girl, starting that Christmas day, I became the biggest fan of my grandfather’s Nintendo set. Playing videogames was a tedious thing that involved fighting over the controls with my brothers, and deciding who got to play first. This is the scenario my grandfather enjoyed most, watching his grandchildren all together in the playroom, whether we were fighting or not. Our first encounter with the Nintendo set left us wanting more, and my grandfather couldn’t help but smile and cheer us on every time we won a game or even through our multiple losses. That Nintendo set has lived through many ordeals, my brothers and I would actually hit it when it would get stuck, and it is still up and running. Until this day, and every time I go to my grandparents’ house, I see that Nintendo set just sitting on the shelf under that same old TV, just as it did 16 years ago.
