I cannot remember the first time I held a video game controller, but I was four when I formed my first memories playing video games.  I recall joyous occasions when my dad would bring home a small suitcase containing a Super Nintendo console along with a game to play.  

I was also four when the Nintendo 64 was released.  My first encounter with the console is a vivid memory.  I entered the local Toys R’ Us with my dad and sprinted to the video games department.  Upon arrival, I stopped to gander at what was a small crowd of kids gazing upon a row of what was probably ten stations demoing Super Mario 64.  I soon overheard a mom standing next to me call to one of the kids playing at a station to leave which, fortunately for me, had no onlookers watching.  I casually walked towards the station the kid was occupying and the mother power-walked past me, took one of the child’s arms and dragged him away.  I ran the remaining distance and successfully grabbed the controller before any of the other kids had noticed.  Mischievous, I know.  

On my fifth birthday, my parents bought me a Nintendo 64 as my very first game console.  Sadly, I can only vaguely recall the event, but I do remember gawking at the console’s box.  Specifically, I recall pointing at every picture on the box and telling my two-and-a-half-year-old brother that “I am going to get that game.  Oh, and that game.  Oh, and definitely that one…maybe that one too.”  What transpired afterward is lodged too deep in the chasms of my mind for me to remember.  I can only imagine that shortly after the box was unwrapped, that the console was unpacked and installed.  Then, sounding out of my family’s TV for the first out of what would have to be a few thousand times:  “It’s a-me, Mario!”