natalieswayblog

Growing up, I lived in a small town in the Pacific Northwest. There wasn’t much to do. Just a few restaurants, grocery stores, and miles of countryside.

I was homeschooled my entire childhood alongside one of my older brothers, while my eldest brother went to public school. Because of our age gap, we didn’t always experience childhood the same way.

But there was one thing that always brought us together.

Video games.

Before I was even old enough to really know what I was doing, I’d watch my brothers play. My middle brother had grown up playing games with our oldest brother, so by the time I could finally hold a controller, I was sitting right there beside them.

Like most little girls, I had all the Barbie games on the PlayStation 2. They were fun… for a while. But they were mostly single-player, and I quickly realized playing by yourself wasn’t nearly as exciting as playing with someone else.

Some of my favorite memories were playing Minecraft on the original Xbox, Wii Sports Resort, the GameCube, and countless games with our cousins. I was always the youngest, so I mostly just tried to keep up with everyone else.

As the years passed, my cousins grew up. By the time I was seven or eight, most of them were adults moving on with lives of their own. Those big family game nights slowly became less frequent.

But one thing never really changed.

My brothers and I kept playing.

As we got older, our interests changed too. Minecraft eventually turned into Call of Duty. I was probably far too young to be playing it, but I loved it anyway.

I wasn’t the player memorizing every weapon or studying every map. That was my brother.

Instead, he taught me how to be the perfect support player. We naturally developed roles, and somehow we made a pretty good team.

When I was around twelve, our obsession shifted again.

This time it was Star Wars.

We played through the LEGO Star Wars games together, and before long we had completely fallen into Star Wars Battlefront I and II.

At first we only had one Xbox, so we’d take turns playing while the other watched. My brother taught me all the different fighting techniques, and eventually I found my favorite heroes and spent hours leveling them up.

Some of my favorite memories weren’t even about winning.

They were the traditions.

Summer nights with all the lights off.

The windows open.

Blizzards from Dairy Queen sitting on the table.

Playing Ewok Hunt until way too late.

Looking back, I don’t remember every match.

I remember how it felt.

Eventually I got my own Xbox, and something unexpected happened.

Our oldest brother had already moved out, and life had naturally taken us in different directions. But now we could all play together online again.

At first we’d jump on whenever everyone happened to be free.

As adulthood got busier, random game nights became harder to coordinate.

So instead of letting them disappear, we made a plan.

Friday and Saturday nights became our game nights.

We’ve been doing that for around two years now.

Of course, life still gets in the way sometimes. Work happens. Plans change. Someone can’t make it.

But every Friday or Saturday someone usually asks,

“Are we playing tonight?”

Even if the answer is no, sometimes it turns into a conversation.

A weekly check-in.

An excuse to see how everyone’s doing.

I think that’s what I appreciate most.

As adults, it’s surprisingly easy for siblings to slowly drift apart. Everyone has jobs, responsibilities, relationships, and separate lives.

For us, video games became more than entertainment.

They became our way of staying connected.

Some families have golf.

Some watch football every Sunday.

Some meet for coffee.

For us, it’s logging onto an Xbox party and spending a few hours laughing together.

Ironically, those online nights have actually led to more time together in person. Because we’re talking every week, we naturally make plans more often and have so much more to talk about when we do get together.

I think people sometimes underestimate how meaningful video games can be.

Like anything else, they can be unhealthy if they completely replace real life. But they can also become something much more valuable.. a shared hobby that creates memories and keeps people connected across different stages of life.

Looking back, I don’t think my favorite part was ever the games themselves.

It was the people sitting next to me on the floor.

Or the voices I still hear through my headset every Friday night.

If you’ve been wanting to reconnect with a sibling, maybe think back to your childhood.

Was there something you both loved?

Maybe it was fishing.

Maybe it was hiking.

Maybe it was cars.

Maybe it was video games.

It probably won’t look exactly the same now.

But it just might be the beginning of a new tradition.