A Foam Philosophy

The other day, I had the opportunity to attend the 11th annual Socal nerf event named "Armageddon." It has been, and probably still is the biggest nerf war hosted within the United States. This year, we had a rough attendance of around 50 or so people. This event is pretty famous for bringing in people from around the country. This year, our Norcal brethren decided to show up once again, in addition to a new guy from Utah who made the trip by himself! This year happened to be the first year I've actually be able to attend in my 3 or so year old nerfing career. It's probably one of the best nerf wars I've ever been to.

At the war, the host said something to another player that kind of stuck in the back of my mind. He was describing "West Coast" nerfing style in comparison to "East Coast" and then went ahead and elaborated with what nerfing means to our little community in Southern California. He said something along the lines of " Socal Nerf, like Jeet Kune Do, is more of a philosophy than a style." Let me explain. The world of nerf as I know it is filled with a ton of posturing and bragging and trash-talking; regardless of the fact that we are actually playing with toys. The point the host was trying to make was that our little group isn't about showing off or being the cool kids on the block. Nerf isn't about belittling people or being the ultimate master of all things foam to us. Nerf is about having fun, making fools out of ourselves, and enjoying the company of like minded individuals who aren't afraid to look dumb and goofy while shooting darts at each other out of glorified toys.




That quote kind of got me thinking about my life. I've always been so concerned about how people see me. I'd be worried about people thinking less of me when I'd go out and interact with people and just operate in my day to day life in general. So concerned that it'd keep me from enjoying myself and actually living. In these past 3 years, I've been learning to let go and realize that sometimes I'm going to look like a complete idiot. Sometimes I'm going to be so embarassed that I'm going to want to hide under a rock until everyone forgets. Sometimes, I'm going to screw up so bad that I'm not going to want to wake up the next morning. I'm totally not just talking about nerf any more. I'm talking about putting one foot in front of the other even after screwing up because I know life keeps going and I ought to keep living it. I'd like to elaborate in the form of a blog post later, so I'll just leave you all with some goofy nerf pics.