My Original Vision
The FNB discussion and a movie I watched today kind of brought this to the forefront. I wanted to share with those of you left my original purpose of ATHF and the reason I switched the crew thread to Phil.
When I entered the smash community, I was a misfit. Waffle was my main companion. We weren't really recognized at tournaments much. Then there was this cyberden tournament we went to. It was huge for me. I met there tons people would change my smash career from a hobby to a lifestyle.
The first person I met was EE. I remember thinking EE was "one of those black guys" but he came up to me and said "hey, is this your controller? I found it." He had no idea how much I loved that controller. That controller was my absolute favorite. I was so happy to have it back. That was how I met EE.
Then I got to meet Lil'b in bracket. I barely beat him, with ROB. It was only my 2nd tournament victory, and my first in the winners bracket.
Then I got to play Plank. Plank introduced himself and mentioned that he used to live in carroll county and would love to play sometime. He sought after me and was very inviting to me. We ended up picking up EE once because JCaesar couldn't fit him, and I remembered him as the guy who gave me my controller back. That's how our little group was started.
As we progressed and got better, we started becoming good friends. At one of the cyberden's I met someone who was hungry and begging for food. His name was HAT. I offered him dinner and he was very grateful.
Now if you know my personal life, you know what else I do besides my job is my service to the youth ministry. The biggest reason I serve those students and God in that way is because I was a misfit once too. When I was their age, I was picked on and laughed at and punched and really a lot of awful things. I never wanted to see a student not be accepted somewhere. When I joined Campus Life in high school, I found God's love and acceptance there.
So I started to say to myself, "what if I did this in smash too?" I had always wanted to start a crew with Nate and Phil but 3 was very small for a crew. We kept throwing the idea around jokingly. At the time, crews were huge. I remember the Dead Presidents crew, which was Noraa, Lil'b, B0NK, Sin, and Saki.
They eventually disbanded and everyone mocked their crew. When we put together the idea of making a crew, we heard that Lil'b wanted to join. Of course that would include his brother B0NK too. Knowing that both of these guys weren't really known for being good players, I knew that I needed to live my own example and not be a hypocrite. We welcomed them in.
And from there my goal was to reach out to other students, new students, not just on talent alone, but for a place to be accepted. We met a ton of different students along the way. Junebug and BetaZealot were ones I met in 2008. Along came Smash G0D and LLOD as well, and then eventually Sanoscy. My goal was to keep us united as a group. Shado was let in via being in our area at the time and hanging with us in a crew battle.
This is why when TKO asked to join I never let him in. I just didn't feel like he was right for us. Kenny joined after the others, and eventually NKB also because he had earned the respect of the members.
We had a great thing going. The relationships were solid and I love each and every member that was and has and will be in this crew.
But we lost sight of that original vision. I feel like we became what I didn't want: the ones making fun of the new guys. Eventually, our relationships started to tear. We lost Brandon over the summer, and our relationships with some of our other members is starting to tear as well.
We accepted Seagull later on because he was becoming tight knit with EE and I and we were starting to lose members everywhere. I feel like the 3 of us have the best connection right now.
And here we are today. Nothing close to my original vision. Which is why I switched the crew thread to Phil. It nothing but broke my heart when Brandon quit in the summer. So I want to pose a question for you guys now: What is your vision? What do you want your dream to be? I feel so distant from many of you. I'd really like to start everything over and rebuild with what we have left. I love all you guys and want to see the best for everyone. Not having a tight crew like before has definitely seen me lose a ton of motivation for the game itself. So what is your vision? What is your dream? I want to help you achieve that- whatever it may be.
Tant out
