I'm moving. I'm going through things. I'm scared.

I'm choosing what gets kept, what needs to go. I have so much to sell. I feel overwhelmed.

Today I gave away my Animal Crossing amiibo cards. I had a special binder I gave away, too. My friend and I, we couldn't help but paw through it.

Baabara was my first neighbor. Kevin was my first friend. I set his catchphrase to "bromeo," which pissed off my boyfriend to no end (and delighted me in equal measure.) I built a shrine of public works projects when Keaton left. I paid 17 million bells to a forum user for Eric. I wrote in my real world journal how much I wanted to cry when Annabelle left. She went to my sister's village - it wasn't the same.

The year I played Animal Crossing: New Leaf was the year I got and had depression the worst. I played 1,000+ hours of this game. I 100%'d it. There was not a square inch of my town that wasn't thoughtfully decorated. I had every piece of furniture, every holiday event item from every region, every piece of clothing. My house was immaculate, my museum a marvel. Places that I would legitimately enjoy spending time in. I stopped playing because I literally ran out of things to do.

I once spent 8 hours resetting my game because I was so particular about where Bianaca put her house and I refused to compromise. I didn't like the system of drawing my paths, so I covered them all with 4-leaf clover. I learned how to hack my 3DS because of this game. (Fuck you Isabelle, that bridge needs to be behind my house at an angle to get to the train station and like hell I care about your zoning laws. I OWN YOU!) Blue and gold roses, purple pansies, every square littered with opulences that made visitors describe my town of Merriam as a wonderland.

G3 B3 G4 G4 A4 G4(held) F4 E4 (rest) D4 E4 D4 C4

I spent so long writing that song and it still comes to mind so easily. (The first D4 is actually a wildcard in-game, but it’s a D4 when hummed correctly.) It worked so well as a chime entering a store. I remember how Pashmina always squeaked singing the first D4. It felt like such a wonderful anthem in so many ways for so many of its uses. I was always taken off guard when visiting another town with a different tune, and always felt so natural and at home whenever I came back to it.

Do you know how invested I was talking to that little hedgehog at the sewing machine until I became her friend? Knowing nothing about this franchise, not knowing that she was a series staple gimmick? I was ecstatic.

When Reese had a special on sharks I was at the island fishing sharks all day long.

The amount I loved these little animal critters is legitimately Fucked. Up.

Seriously.

It seemed so natural the stories that sprung up in my mind. Al and Ceaser were the weird gay couple that were ugly but happy. Cookie bullied Rhonda into moving, and then left herself when there was no one to control. Pashmina had her eye on Kevin, who only had his eye on the ball. Julian was the cool friend I didn't think I deserved to have, and Henry left because he felt the same way.

When they sang Happy Birthday to me I near bawled my eyes out. Because for as touching and heart-warming as it was to have these little spirits sharing love for me, spirits that I had loved so much, I was still, in the real world, alone and playing my 3DS on my birthday.

That's the real rub of the magic and terror of Animal Crossing. Magical because you feel real emotions. Terrifying because you can see the code. They're puppets. Dolls. Elaborate and adorable, but predictable - and you still love them all the same.

But they're kind. They're understanding. You can hurt their feelings, blow them off, mess up their yard - and they'll still write you letters when they live next door, give you presents, and stop by your house to see what you're up to. Maybe each individual interaction is annoying, or doesn't register as important. But in aggregate, those emotions stack up. Each time they give you that piece of fruit you were looking for. That rare piece of furniture that completes your set. Each time they change outfits into something so stupid or so cute that it sticks in your brain. You feel real little things. Imperfectly perfect little moments seeded in time enough to weave in with the passage of time in your real life.

When I had insomnia, Static stared at the moon with me. I remember naming my town at my sister's graduation party. I remember my parents watching the New Year's ball drop on the TV and then looking at the fireworks in Merriam. I remember sitting at the kitchen table when the town was covered in snow for the first time. I remember hunting for beetles at Tortimer Island while dying of summer heat at my uncle's place in Arizona.

I have memories. Good ones. Real places, real emotions of these happy little animal people. And yet these little animal people are not. fucking. real.

Somewhere on a back-up hard drive or a laptop I lost the charging cable to, I have the save data for the perfect date of Merriam. A day in May in a particular year. Where the hydrangeas are in bloom, and the weather is perfect, and everyone who is supposed to be there, is there.

Do you know how raw and cringe it is to talk about loving anything about this game? Like, if you don't understand the appeal of this series, GOOD. Be healthy. Have self-respect. Everyone over-shared about New Horizons because the pandemic ruined everyone's sense of shame. But loving this game is not good. It's not healthy.

At the same time.

That grammar is hiding a lot. Was loving this game healthy for me? No. But was I healthy? Would I have been healthy if I hadn’t been playing this game? Fuck no.

You need time to get invested in Animal Crossing. Real world time that you do not get back. Real world time that is, in fact, a valid currency for trying to make connections in the real world. The potential opportunity cost for getting "the most" out of Animal Crossing is wild.

I hated New Horizons because I could tell the villagers didn't want to be my friend. They wanted to be Instagram fodder. But maybe that is for the best. Because that recontextualizes the appeal of the game to being something that you show off to other humans. That the Animal Crossing aesthetic is there merely to facilitate a shared experience with other people of how you've played with your lego set.

I'm going to miss my friend. I'm putting my life into boxes. And now I get it, that once your life is in boxes, it's too late for anyone to change your mind, too late for your mind to even matter. You can't not go.

Going through those cards, reminiscing of which ones were my favorites, my sister's favorites, remembering the hours we spent cloning flowers - it made me realize how Animal Crossing gets its hooks in you. How the connection to the real world's time gets you invested, but there's no closure. You can always come back. Most of your villagers will still be there and know who you are. Your furniture will be just as you left it. So not playing means there's always the possibility of coming back, and things being a little different, but capable of being the same. But here, with these cards, I had a tangible thing to hold in my hands, in the real world. Unlocked memories. Recreating the paths I walked in that town for months. Something I could make peace with. Something I could give away. Something to pass off at the end of a season.

As I spoke with my friend, I let myself talk honestly about what these little dudes had meant to me for the first time aloud. Because I could trust him to understand what I had been going through. What it meant for me to be that invested. What I was really telling him with these silly nonsense stories. Because he had played New Horizons the same way. And he knew that when you can honestly describe how something made you feel, in a way that previously would have been so vulnerable, you've truly moved on. And I needed to know that I wasn't still the person who lost a year of his life and redirected it into Animal Crossing.

I had to take them back. He can keep the binder and Diva and the dozens of strangers who mean nothing to me. I needed to keep the cards of the villagers who were with me at the end. At the end of playing pretend. Of when I ran out of ways to play. I'm still missing Static and Zucker and Pierce.

Maybe there isn’t shame in using Animal Crossing for what it was. A bridge, a crutch, a reminder of what kindness and friendship looked like in a time where those were in short supply. Don’t we sometimes use real people the same way? Aren’t some real friendships just as shallow, but mean just as much? Few friendships last a lifetime, the same as few games are played forever.

I don't want to move. But I can't not move. I have to forgive myself for the people I used to be. I have to find grace in seeing what I learned from the experiences I would never wish on myself again. Including my ability to love Animal Crossing.