Hey everyone!
I got an e-mail from someone a couple days ago (I assume ctrl-alt-delete?) asking about how I was doing. To be honest, it took me by surprise, and I had to see what's up. It's been a while... four years at least since I last logged on and probably another four years before that that I was really active. Surprised me how quickly the time went by. I registered on this website 12 years ago this Halloween. I can't think of anything on the internet that I've known that long, except maybe Google.
I squirreled around a bit before posting just to see who was still here. It's remarkable that so many of the same faces are still around. I can remember many late nights on this site and in chat, passionately discussing so many pointless topics. I'm a bit sad that those days are behind me but I'm glad to see that the site is still here for others to enjoy. AGN was a very substantial part of my life for many years and I would hate to have seen it disappear like so many other fleeting things on the internet.
So what have I been up to?... Well, life is honestly pretty great. My wife Jen and I have now been married for 8 years this past august, though we've been together for 13. We have a very happy marriage and are currently going through the process of buying a house (we've made an offer and it's been accepted, our lawyers are working out the contract right now. We hope to be in by the end of november if all works out).
I have a son who is now 7 years old. His name is Daniel and of course he's awesome. He's really into Sonic the Hedgehog, Transformers, Legos and all sorts of other things that I was into when I was a kid. He's in second grade now, taking Karate, and is excellent at video games. He looks just like me. We’ve tried a few times to have another child but so far have been unsuccessful. We lost two pregnancies – one last year and one this year. Some of the most difficult times to go through, and if we didn’t have such a strong, loving marriage, I don’t know how we would have gotten through it. Those of you who know me, know I’ve never been a religious person, but I have always know that I am truly blessed for what I have.
I have a great job at a building supply. I started there many years ago- back in 2001 as a stock boy. I worked there for about 6 years, and became a key part of the business, but never really thought about making a career out of it, mostly because it was a mom and pop store and the family ran the business. In 2006 I left to run my own screen repair business for a couple years, which was moderately successful. In 2008 an investment group bought the building supply, and asked me to come back to work for them. Now it’s few years later and I'm running the place. All modesty aside, I’m pretty good at my job. ☺ I’ve got a good career with a solid company, a bright future, and I’m appreciated for what I do. Not everyone can say that – especially out of those of us who didn’t go to college. I’m proud of it.
I’m also really proud to see that my ZC.com design is still there. I poured my heart into that site and the QDB and I’m glad it’s still functioning. I’m sure it needed some maintenance over the years, and I want to thank whomever took over the responsibilities. It’s funny, back in the day we were always paranoid about Nintendo coming in and tearing the site down for copyright infringement. I would guess that now that it’s been up for over a decade, and there have been plenty of re-releases of the original Zeldas during that time, it’s probably not on their radar of threats. That’s definitely good news!
I don’t spend much time on the internet anymore. I’m not a facebook person, though I do have an account to keep in touch with a few friends and family. At the same time that I left AGN, I pretty much backed off of the internet entirely – it was consuming a lot of my time – too much of my time. Between AGN, my own site afterblur.com, webbeddesigns.com – a design company I attempted to start, and the countless hours and hours I would spend online every night… it got to be way too much. I guess I got burned out. I left the internet behind and haven’t really looked back. It sounds like a really hard thing to do, but It was a release I needed and it’s given me the time to move on to a lot of other things “IRL”. Sometimes I miss the time in chat rooms, and repeatedly refreshing forums to see the next post in a conversation… but it’s rare. It was a point in my life that I remember fondly, but I don’t think I could ever do it again.
I’m glad I had a chance to stop in and say Hi. It was a bit of a battle… the e-mail addresses I used to set up this account I don’t even use anymore! It took a lot of resetting passwords to figure it out, but here I am. It’s funny - it just so happens that the e-mail I mentioned above couldn’t have come at a better time. I had surgery on Tuesday of this week and I’ll be laid up for another couple weeks. I have a little bit of free time to kill, so what the hell - might as well see what’s up with AGN! Don’t worry, the surgery went fine, and I’ll be up and kicking in no time.
If you remember me from way back when, I would love to hear how you are doing. I’m sure you’re all “doing good” but give me some details. It’s kinda like a high school reunion for me. What are you up to? How has life treated you? Jobs/Family? I would love to know. Please share your stories!
I can’t promise that I will be around much to post and reply, but I would love to read your stories and catch up on your lives. Don’t be shy, please share. I’ll poke my head in from time to time to see what’s up.
Thanks for reading, and thanks for the memories. Much love and best wishes.
Your God (lol), Eckels
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Originally Posted by Eckels
