Ptolemyrulz Minecraft Diary

Day one:  ridiculous wandering, finding out how to log on, how to move etc… it is both exciting and exhausting.  One half hour was both plenty of time and not enough.  I killed a pig to eat but could not figure out how to ingest it.  I starved holding a pork chop.  I drowned too.  

Day two:  My son, Ptolemy is taking over the controls.  It is not only frustrating to be me in Minecraft, it is frustrating for him to watch me flounder about in Minecraft.  We are bonding.  He is finally an authority on something, which gives him power.  I will follow his lead, but I want to do it myself.  I suddenly understand what it feels like to have someone showing you how to do something... all the time.  It is somewhat maddening to not have the power.  It occurs to me that this game may have something valuable to teach me afterall.

Day three:  A lot more dying…. This time I have managed to acquire things so to start over is actually painful.  This begins a short era of anxiety, frantically trying to kill chickens and picking up flowers in the hopes I will keep from starving.  Alas, I cannot ingest and starvation is imminent.

Day four:  I find the wiki instructions to be unhelpful.  I am playing creative mode so that I do not develop a stomach ulcer.  It does occur to me several times that I am alone in how bad I am at this game.  If I play with Ptolemy in survival mode I can stay alive but Ptolemy has tried several times to eat Wendy’s chickens.   We are in awe of her awesome house:  it has become our inspiration.  He is certainly starting to understand the meaning of being a part of the online community.  I had not realized before this how easily the development of community mores can be overlooked in the online world.  This is a great lesson for us both.  

Day five: I am starting to have fun playing mine craft.  There are still some frustrating things but as I am navigating in mine craft I am finding ways to get helpful information from the web.