Back in about 1996 my brother pushed a new cartridge into the SNES and said I would enjoy this. Coming off of Chrono Trigger, I had mixed feelings about Final Fantasy VI (or Final Fantasy III as it was known back then). Why was I teleported into another screen when it was time to fight? Why were we standing in a row? Why were the enemies much larger and more detailed than my party members? Why did these battles seem to happen randomly instead of me touching an enemy wandering around the screen? Don't even get me started on the giant chickens and these white ghosts called "moogles" that were only capable of saving "kupo kupo."

But then I reached a point in the desert where this crazy clown tried to capture the girl. And this glorious music was playing in the background. Up until that point, I was like any other child and hadn't fully developed my taste in music, rather mimicking whatever I heard around me. Listening to The Magic Flute on my parents' record player. Popping in Harlan's Wu-Tang cassettes. Even watching music videos of NIИ on MTV when Harlan was into them. But for the first time in my life I alone without any outside influence thought this song was fucking amazing. I would start the game from the beginning and proceed to that point in the desert just to have that song in the background as I did other activities. Before I started acquiring MIDIs, this was all I could do: I had several strategic saves before great songs. I racked up so many hours on my saves from listening to music alone. And when I got the ability to have my own MIDIs (and later mp3s), I wasn't downloading the latest Backstreet Boys but rather the entire Final Fantasy VII or Chrono Cross OST. To this day if you look at my song library, classical and video games dominate everything else.

I met Uematsu the other day, the man who started me down this long, long road. Thanks for everything. You made me into a fucking nerd who can't talk about music with anyone other than a select group of friends.