Here is Dante, 13, who drank that Monster drink when he arrived at Grandma's house around 7pm. He drank it and got on the computer. About 1am I suggested he might go to bed. He said Monster drink had caused him to go wide awake. We let that wear off. About 3am (dont tell dad) he was still there, so I made him stop for a little bit and explain to me what he was doing, what had preoccupied his mind so completely from 7 pm to 3 am. He said it was a project, he was BUILDING A GAME! He was programming. I said do you realize you have now been doing this non stop for 8 hours. That is as long as people work. How can you be so fascinated with this. I looked. There was maps. Piles of stuff going here and there. Charts. I said how did you find out how to do this? mumble. I read a book. How long have you been doing this? Oh, about 2 months. Does your dad let you do this. Oh yes, some. I said, I do not understand you, Dante. This is not how I grew up. We did not have electricity. We worked all day. Well, I did read a lot, but this fascination with building a game I do not understand. This morning I saw evidence he had gone all over the Internet. I went back to bed At 5am he was still building. I glanced at the screen and saw that a game of some sort seemed to be in progress. I went back to bed. when I woke up again at 7 am, guess what he was finally conked out on the floor. Oh yes, he had said to give him a tylonol and maybe that would relax him enough so he could wind down, so I did at 5am. I said no more monster drinks for you but then he always acts like this to a degree. He is an extremist. He made no noise. Oh no, he was supremely quiet the whole time, eerily quiet. So at 5am, the last I saw of him, still at his work, I said in the morning I will go get a paper and what do you want for breakfast. Sausage, egg biscuit. Okay to Circle K. Orange juice. He also said he agreed to do another video. I said I might bring up the video camera and tripod, if I was not too tired from contemplating what you are all about. What will we call it "Going into the mind of Dante?" Ten minutes will not suffice. He is deep. I said his mother would probably call for him to go to church by 11am. I said, do you like Church? Your mom said she hoped it would help you. He said, no it was very boring, he hated it, but he could not convince her of anything. I said, well, no, how do you like school. Some classes are boring, but the girls like him. They love him. Oh oh. But he does not let them kiss him unless he says so! Kiss??? Oh no. Well, enough of that subject after some dire warnings. He must have gone to bed about 6am after a busy night on the computer. My computer looks okay this morning. It went on its usual little journeys. But I don't ask much of my computer. I thought well, it is just a computer, so risking its life and limbs seems worth it in order to keep investigating the mind of Dante
