I gotta catch 'em all!

Seriously though, over the past four months I've found myself with at least 3 new major fandoms. I'd finally gotten the time to play Fallout: New Vegas back in August, which ~Pyreo convinced me to get last Christmas, but didn't get the chance to actually play it until this summer due to the fact it is a very addictive and time-consuming game. But when I did, I found myself highly attached to my player character and I completely fell in love with the Fallout world.
Then last month, the next game in one of my favorite series, Ratchet & Clank: All4One came out, and I found myself remembering how much I adore those games and revisiting the several ideas it gave me. Especially after playing it the entire way through cooperatively with ~Cheri-chan, who introduced me to the Ratchet & Clank games to begin with about two years ago.
And most recently, as in about a week ago, Cheri again managed to enable me into one of her favorite series', Sam & Max, specially through the game The Devil's Playhouse... which is seriously one of the funniest, coolest, quirkiest, and best adventure games ever made. I actually knew that one was inevitable, but I'm amused to see that it happened now among so many others.

I'll be turning 20 next month, and I always thought the older I got, the farther away I'd move from fandom. Sometimes I worry that the fact the opposite actually ended up happening is a bad thing, but... I really don't think it is, because it's not as though it's halting my development as an artist or hindering my schoolwork. I'm certainly still improving even though I'm drawing fan art, and I think ideas revolving around fandom still challenge me in ways. But I also know they inspired me to improve, since I find more and more ideals and things that I admire that I want to aspire to, in terms of both art and storytelling. I was originally struggling with my current class at SCAD but I managed to highly turn it around over only a few weeks, and move my grade up to now where it's looking like I'll end up with a high B or, if I'm lucky, an A... which would do excellent things for my GPA.
If all goes as well, which it's looking like it is, I'll be officially moving to campus in Atlanta this Spring and taking on mostly a full schedule there as an animation student. Obviously I know I won't have as much time to do things like draw fan art while I'm there, but that's really when I am looking forward to applying all my different influences and developing my own original ideas. Besides, I can still enjoy my favorite games and the like when I do have the free time, even if I'm not actively participating in fandom or anything. And who knows what my dorm and classmates there will introduce me to?

I've recently come to define "fandom" for myself in two different ways; one, how I used to define it, as the group in which that really enjoys and creates ideas and fanwork for something. But now I also see it as something I or just a few of my friends love a whole lot, talk about and think up ideas for. Unlike when I was younger I don't feel the need to be among a larger group to feel like I'm in a fandom for something. Cheri and I have just been gushing over Devil's Playhouse the past few days and I totally feel like that's a fandom for me.
I think realizing this will make it easier for me when I move on and enter the next stage of my career as a cartoonist and animator, once I get to being in college full-time. I used to worry about having to give up things that I loved after starting art school, but I don't feel that way anymore. Sure, there will be some things I have to leave behind due to the fact my schedule will be a whole lot busier, but despite how many new things I've been obsessing over... I'm okay with that. I really am ridiculously excited to start learning animation and improving my art with the help of my classes. It probably won't be easy, but I'm definitely looking forward to it, and moving another step closer to my dream of making cartoons.