“The French press of years”- a critical analysis
By: Paul Louis Allen Reyes
Tags: 2020, Final Fantasy Vii Remake, Coffee, Animal Crossing, Final Fantasy

or, “What we do in the box”

Alone in an empty room, sprawled across a luxurious Queen-sized mattress I look up at the fan on my ceiling, mesmerized by the blades as they spin- each cut flinging dust into my already misty eyes. It’s March 16th. I did the impossible. I moved out of my parents’ house. My family home. Too many times do I read about millennials having to move back into their childhood bedrooms due to economic catastrophe. What if you never leave? That unfortunately was my case. Almost one year later after graduating Highschool in 2011 I got a retail job at our local Walmart unloading trucks for a paltry $7.85 an hour. I spent it on games, anime DVDs (streaming sites like Crunchyroll weren’t quite there yet), and other miscellaneous garbage. I quit after 9 months, and 2 months later would get a job at McDonalds and stay there for a non-consecutive 6 years. One year in leu of a raise the owners of the franchise- a couple in their 60’s- bought a new car. I still see them both to this day at my new job, and treat them with the same respect I treat all my customers. I’m a cashier now at a pretty popular grocery store in Texas, and I can say without falter that I do in fact plan to retire here. I’ve found my place in this sick game of capitalism. I do not in fact plan to let it define me. I wish to be much more than what I am now. Having finally arrived back to the present I sit in my apartment in mid-December reflecting on the year that actually did more good for me than I had initially anticipated. Let’s go back to March 16th for a bit- or rather January 1st. Every day just feels like March so I won’t feel bad for dwelling this time around.

JANUARY 1ST, 2020

Monster World IV for the Sega Mega Drive

“Attention shoppers. The time is now 11:45PM and your local [REDACTED]will be closing in fifteen minutes, at this time we ask that you make your final selections and make to the front of the store for a fast and friendly checkout, and as always we thank you for shopping at your local [REDACTED].”

There was a time where we didn’t have to say that ourselves when the store was closing. The store closes an hour early now in 2020 so we have to belt out the message every night. back to March 16th AKA January 1st AKA December 31st. As the clock struck midnight I served the last customers and head outside and wait for my friend to pick me up so we can ring in the new year the only way we knew how. By playing his Sega Genesis Mini. We played a few hits- Streets of Rage, Sonic, etc- but I was more interested in M2’s Tetris and Monster World IV. I played both of those trying to mind palace myself into a teenager in 1994. I loved what I played. I would play more Monster World a few weeks later at my friend’s cousin’s home that she would house-sit when her cousin would go on vacation- something that we don’t do anymore now that we live in the box. Every year people have resolutions that they try to accomplish within the next 12 months. I jokingly wrote “3840 x 2160” on a sheet of paper in the breakroom of my job where my coworkers would write “lose weight” or “join the circus”. I didn’t want to change much. I just wanted a 4K TV. I ended up getting that TV- and so much more- alongside the deluge of horrors that dwelled within the year that followed. I still use my 1080p monitor almost exclusively for gaming. I need new glasses. I have bad eyesight. I mostly scoff at the ideas of new years resolutions, but I secretly did in fact have a legitimate goal for the year. I wanted to move out of my parents’ house. I paid rent and Internet and for a time I was considered essential for keeping the lights on while my father fought for disability- but my time was up. I did the math. I knew I could afford it. I just needed to save.

FEBRUARY 14TH, 2020

Japanese poster for Sonic the Hedgehog

In a uncommon turn of events I found myself not closing the store and instead found myself getting off at a reasonable hour. I left the building with a bouquet of flowers and a cheesy card for my friend Stephanie as she pulled up the sidewalk in her vehicle. I entered said vehicle and presented her the gifts. She and I headed to the next town over and prepared ourselves for what will probably be the last film I will see in theatres for the foreseeable future.

Sonic the Hedgehog.

I didn’t hate it! We actually both enjoyed it immensely. I spent the night at her place and she dropped me off the next day. It’s probably my last memory before we lived in the box. In the weeks that followed I’d make several lists of “essentials” for apartment living, and start making purchases and start packing them up in boxes alongside the items I already owned. For the first 3 months of 2020 I lived in a small room with a mattress, a Monitor, a PS4, and boxes full of my belongings. My mind was already ready for life in the box.

MARCH 13TH, 2020

The first and last time I would take a photo of money

The word “coronavirus” had already been burned into the modern lexicon by now. We were quickly seeing just how much American economic systems could fall during even the slightest inconvenience. I knew I had to get out as soon as possible. I took out a loan. I took out another loan. I cashed the checks and headed to the office of the cheapest apartment closest to my work. It was literally across the street. I applied for a 1 bedroom and lay in wait for the next three days. In the last few days and soon the next several months I would see first hand how tense things would become. Seeing people from out of town coming to our store just to buy as much toilet paper and hamburger meat as they could get their hands on. One afternoon the credit card machines went down for 15 minutes and controlled chaos ensued. A line of maybe 50 people grew in front of the ATM as we tried to explain what happened to customers. People were for the most part polite. Days prior I sat in my childhood bedroom playing the demo for Final Fantasy VII Remake. I used games to escape everyday life but ended up letting life bleed into my hobby. I couldn’t stop thinking of what the next day of work would bring. I told myself that I wanted to move out before April, so I could enjoy Final Fantasy VII in my own living room in my own apartment. I made that promise to myself and on March 16th I made a call that would change my life forever.

MARCH 16TH, 2020

“Hello? Yes It’s Paul Reyes. I was just wondering if you were done looking over the application. Yes I’ll hold……..Yes? Oh ok thank you so much. I’ll be over as soon as I can to get the key. Thank you so much.”

My father and I headed to the office to receive the final paperwork and get the key to the apartment. I spent a little of the leftover money I had on a quite luxurious air mattress to tide me over until I could get a new bed. Alone in an empty room, sprawled across a luxurious Queen-sized mattress I look up at the fan on my ceiling, mesmerized by the blades as they spin- each cut flinging dust into my already misty eyes. I had been crying for around the high side of an hour. They were tears of joy, tears of hope, tears of reflection. I went to work. I went to my home. I didn’t know how to work my AC yet so I lay in silence for the first time in 8 years. I no longer needed rain sounds piped into my ears to drown out the outside noise. I woke up the next morning and walked back to my job not to work but to shop. I bought a metal pan so I could bake my TV dinner without fear of the plastic tray melting in my brand new oven. I ate alone on my air mattress before (with the help of my friends and family) moving my belongs from one box to another. We already knew about quarantine. We did what we could with what we had. A friend that I haven’t spent time with in over 3 years was in town. He and my other friends sat on folding chairs, a rocking chair I found outside, and the floor as I spent the next few hours grilling burgers and unpacking all my things. I burned the burgers. We used my phone’s data to watch TV on my PS4. It took several minutes to load a ten minute youtube video in 480p resolution. We did what we could with what we had. I spent $300 that day on groceries that should have cost me $200. I had to buy organic peanut butter because that’s all the store had left. An elderly woman says out loud “This is what Socialism looks like”. I didn’t have it in me to tell her who was president at the time.

MARCH 19th, 2020

“MANDY playing on my 24 inch monitor”

I went to my parents’ place to use their wifi (formerly my wifi) to download Animal Crossing. It wasn’t going to release until 11PM that night but you could download the game beforehand and unlock it when it officially came out. I figured I could just do the unlock process using my phone’s data and luckily I was correct. I sat on my newfound rocking chair and watched “MANDY” for the first time in my life. It’s now my favorite film of all time. The morning of the 20th I watched “Color out of Space” for the first and probably last time.

It was ok.

I didn’t know Animal Crossing was going to become a cultural shift in the time of quarantine and lockdown. Animal Crossing was living in the box portrayed as an esport. Animal Crossing was more important than anything else at the time, and it still is for a lot of people. (Hello Stephanie)

APRIL 9TH, 2020

good game playing on a bad TV, shot with a bad camera

My friend and I are sitting on my new couch counting down the minutes until Final Fantasy VII Remake unlocks on my PS4 at 11PM. I’m literally trembling with excitement to finally play a game that was teased 15 years ago as a technical demo for the PS3. During Final Fantasy XII’s launch event in Japan the first recipient of the game got to say a little something to the game’s publisher’s president at the time. People were probably expecting a “Thank you so much” or “please take Vaan out of the game he really sucks” but the boy bowed, received his copy and said

“Please remake Final Fantasy VII for the PlayStation 3 thank you.”

Over a decade later and I’m sitting in my living room playing what is just part one of three chapters of the remake. The next chapter at this rate will come out shortly after my 40th birthday. The final chapter will be laid upon my grave by the descendant I will never have.

MAY 27TH, 2020

Bino

I got a cat. His name is BB, short for “Baby Bambino”. He’s so cuddly and luxurious, and he absolutely will bite the shit out of you now as an adult if you aren’t careful. I love him with all my heart despite the scars. Lately I’ve been calling him “Bino” to save time and he seems to not be offended. I give him 1 million kisses before work each day and rub his fat stomach until he tries to chomp me and I could honestly go all day talking about how much I love this little goblin. Getting a cat was probably the best thing for box life. I go from one box at work to another box, but this box has a cat in it so I’m pretty content with the box now. Living in the box isn’t just being in a box, it’s several boxes….sometimes they’re not boxes at all.

JUNE 13TH, 2020

Their pizza contains 100% real cheese

I’m taking an extended siesta. My friend Stephanie and I are travelling 75 miles to see our friend for the first time in months. We arrive at a Buccee’s gas station to a roaring several hundred people walking around the store- maybe 40 percent not wearing anything to protect themselves or others from the virus. We finally arrive at our friend’s apartment and he takes us to a local restaurant and orders us some tacos. They were the best tacos I had ever eaten, because I ate them outside at a gazebo with friends. Shortly after eating our lunch we walk across the street to Half Price Books and purchase some old anime DVDs and a volume of a manga series I’ll probably never finish. Stephanie and I head to the hotel in hopes that it isn’t packed. She and I alongside maybe three other families were the only ones staying at this Motel 6. After unpacking our things we head to the store to pick up some snacks and spend the next several hours at our friend’s apartment drinking, playing Mario Kart, Super Smash Bros, and discussing what would eventually become a fruitful Dungeons and Dragons campaign.

JULY 29TH, 2020

“Frozen Sick” from Dungeons and Dragons

I started my second D&D campaign ever with a two of my old friends alongside two of my new friends- the latter who will quickly bond with me and become my closest friends. The brother-sister duo would serve as Dungeoneer and Dungeon Master respectively- and I’ll say without a doubt that although It took a while to get into the groove of Dungeons and Dragons I fell into place rather fast if I say so myself. The box hasn’t been kind to Texas. We were the first state to hit 1 million cases. Having said that I live in a city with a population of six thousand, and for the most part I’ve taken precautions. Dungeons and Dragons is where we can escape the box, and how fitting is it for the first campaign we play to be one involving a deadly virus? I see you Wizards of the Coast.

AUGUST 21ST, 2020

I’m a year older. A year wiser. I bought my own birthday cake. Stephanie and I ate the cake. She quickly belted out a fast “Happy Birthday to you” jingle right as I took a bite of the red velvet. I don’t remember much else about August. I was growing used to the box. The months following started to blend together. I was experiencing what people affectionately named “The Hell Zone”. It’s when you have a few days of horrible depression followed by quick bursts of productiveness. It’s the inverse of what I’m experiencing right now as I write this. It never escapes me even today.

SEPTEMBER 20TH, 2020

Stephanie and I head to Walmart to purchase oil for her vehicle. I won’t lie. I know nothing about cars. I can barely drive one let alone tell you what a dip stick is. Having said that I do own a phone in 2020 so I knew everything about cars. I googled it. I was still afraid to feed the heavy iron child its dinner but thankfully a man walked up and offered to help. She tried to pay him but in what little English he spoke he smiled and declined. That wasn’t the first true act of kindness that I had seen all year. In March when the box was first forming around our lives I saw a man use his 2 hamburger meat allowance to buy for the elderly lady behind him. I’ll never forget that day. That’s because that same day a woman screamed at me because I asked her to move six feet away from another customer.

OCTOBER 24TH, 2020

Strangely enough my first mental breakdown of 2020 was deep into the year. I was struggling with identity and shaved my head. With all that hair tugging on my head I couldn’t think straight. This is what I would say if I was being facetious but I’m trying not to these days. I had a mental breakdown because someone I thought I didn’t trust already made a bold claim regarding my sexuality. They didn’t say it to me personally but (I’m paraphrasing here)

“Homosexual fornicators are going to hell”

isn’t exactly something a queer person such as myself takes lightly. I snapped out of it before the end of the night. I was never going to hurt myself. I just wanted to lose my hair.

NOVEMBER 23RD, 2020

It’s the Presidential Election. Everyone is checking the news looking for the newest information regarding exactly how this is going to turn out. I see a woman sitting at a table crying as Joe Biden wins yet another state. She’s not crying tears of joy. I see significantly less politically-charged articles of clothing now. It feels good. When I do see the stray hat floating atop someone’s unmasked face I can’t help but smile behind the fabric. Someone should tell them the news. Later this month I would experience what would at the time be the single most excruciating pain I had ever felt. An abscessed tooth. If I had enemies I wouldn’t wish this pain on them. I seriously contemplated ripping the tooth out myself before finally going to an orthodontist and having them prescribe me with codeine and antibiotics. I still feel a vague, fuzzy pain in my gums that thankfully can be subdued with ibuprofen.

DECEMBER 14TH, 2020

The year is finally over- and I can now in fact confirm that it was a year that happened. A vaccine for the virus is slowing rolling out, the president won’t be in just over a month, and we can finally start to rebuild everything that the box took away from us. But what of those who were consumed by the box? Be it the plastic boxes in our essential jobs, the boxes in the ground, or the boxes that we pretend to live in? I live in a digital and physical dollhouse. I put on my uniform and walk to the other box, slide into yet another box, take a break in another box, leave the box 4,6,8,10, or 12 hours later, then possibly head back to do it all again.

And I don’t even hate it. I never did.

I’m what I like to call a functioning Hikikomori. Hikikomori is the Japanese term for a person who stays in their home all day and doesn’t leave for weeks, months, or even years. They created prisons for themselves. In a time where these prisons have become mainstream I found myself fitting easily into the box lifestyle. I pay my rent, I buy my groceries, I take out my trash and do my laundry, and back in the box I go. It’s because of the wonders of the digital age- the era of Twitter, discord servers, Google duo calls for D&D sessions, and yes, videogames- that I can live comfortably without mental illness corroding my brain. If not for these things I’d probably get by doing something else, but it’s nice to know that change impacted me in such a way that I would be able to easily overcome it. I strived in an environment that was 100% against me. The virus keeping us in our homes, the horrible injustices that brought us out onto the streets, it all came crumbling down in such a beautifully terrible way. We persisted. We made the call. We used the box for good, and now the box may disappear.

DECEMBER 14TH, 2020, 5:17 PM

Earlier this year I purchased a bag of coffee beans, an electric grinder, a kettle, and a French press. Every few days I make a pot of coffee and put it in my fridge. I used to pour the coffee into a nice glass over ice and sit and relax while drinking my beverage before work. Now I literally drink it straight out of the French press. That’s what I feel is a relatively good analogy for this year. It’s slowly building from quick little sips to full on chugging cold coffee out of a fridge directly from where it was originally brewed. I no longer had time to make it pretty. I had all the time to make it fast. Here’s to the next year being faster and faster all while still letting us take it in slow. Let’s hope 2021 is a French press.