In NASCAR, the checkered flag is waved when the leading driver completes the final lap of the race, signifying the conclusion of the event.

It's time to wave the checkered flag in my life as a NASCAR fan.

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As a lot of you probably knew before I changed my name, the sport has had a glorious effect on my life for a long time - but I personally think it's time to put that enthusiasm to rest, because lately I have not really been living up to my old name. While I may still enjoy things related to NASCAR, I don't follow it at all anymore, well, very little (I don't watch the races live anymore though), it's just not as 'there' as it used to be. Let me just tell the tale of how it came to be.

I was born on June 21st, 1996 in Fairfax, Virginia. From then there have been many complex controversies involving which family member owned me among other things. I was finally chosen to live with my grandpa in a my Vienna home on September 1, 2000, and it's where I currently live now. Some time around then, I had returned from visiting one of my relatives in Florida, and during my time there, I had experienced some sort of traumatic event of which I do not remember. It made me fall into a psychologically erratic state that shocked my guardians. I wouldn't recognize my stuffed animals things from my room and around the house, I wouldn't play with any of my toys. I apparently spent most of my time cowering under the covers. I was mentally scarred, really. To help calm me, my grandpa let me play games on his Windows 98 computer. One game that he already then had was an NHL (American professional ice hockey league) game from 1999. I played it rather often, and to this day, is rather heavenly nostalgic to me when I play it. The same can be said for another game a NASCAR game from the same company and year. Since I then had a particular interest in cars, he had bought me that one in addition.

Over time, I played them very often and I was eventually brought back to a normal mental state. If it weren't for those games, I probably wouldn't have felt better that soon, and it helped, especially considering that was my first year of school. I owe a lot of my enjoyment in life to those two games. I particularly liked the aethsthetics of those games, I have an emotional connection to the teams, players, logos, cars, music, etc. from those old games, and I came to experience those two sports even more for years to come.

Back to NASCAR. Ever since I played that game, I was really interested. But, now I look back and realize I haven't given it the attention it deserved from me. I did go on to buy tons of NASCAR-related merchandise, including more games, over the years. A lot of the old NASCAR games, especially the ones from the early-mid 2000's are really nostalgic to me, and I recognize all the specific cars that were in them, the tracks, the graphics, the controls; everything. But, I never actually saw a race. For whatever reason, growing up I never saw any NASCAR race, not in person nor on TV. I don't know why I never did; I guess I never thought about it. I never actually followed the actual sport until 2009. I did go to the NASCAR Hall of Fame in Charlotte, NC, in 2010 (the year it launched) and 2011, but even then I hadn't gone there since; and now I even realize I've enjoyed certain things more than that.

In summer of 2009, I went to Pittsburgh, PA, to see a race that consisted of old 1930's race cars. For whatever reason, they brought one of the NASCAR race cars to the park to put on display; I wasn't expecting it and was really shocked. It was the first actual race car from the sport I saw in person, and it was just amazing. And soon after that, I actually started watching the races every week, including the small stuff they had during the week.

This continued into early this year. Out of the blue, NASCAR had for some reason started to become a less important factor in my life. I started watching the races a lot less, more interests started taking over my free time, like internet, ponies and hockey (which had sparked in my interests late last year). I have no explanation for this but I have to move on.

Identities...they're the best way to instantly recognize a person. My old name, NASCARFAN160. A huge portion of internet aliases are based on what one likes to partake in. Some time in the summer of last year, I listened to a podcast interview with someone, and a discussion had been brought up about screen names. I hadn't until then realized a very importan moral: original uninspired names have superiority over names based on occupations. For example, if you had a name, say, MLPFan160, it would most likely imply that said individual enjoys My Little Pony; depending one one's definition for the acronym MLP. Now, say, since then, their interest had been deteriorating from visting multiple pony sites daily and watching multiple episodes monthly, to doing each once per three months, it would not really be worthy to be considered a 'fan' in most terms, and thus the name MLPFan160 would be misleading. To have an original name initially is to avoid this circumstance in the first place. Starting off with the same alias makes everything easier from then on out. And I prefer it to be that way from now on.

From my perspective, 2013 was a big year of change, in both other people, corporations and organizations, three mediums where change is most significant. It's one of the things that urged me to change my name. And I feel like I, too, have changed. This fandom has done incredible indescribable things to me, mostly good things. It almost felt like starting a brand new life. I feel different, new, refreshedl I want to break away from the negatives of the past and experience new beginnings. It's an amazing sensational feeling, comparable to love and nostalgia. I like to live for said feelings, I just want to do good and feel good. And I think that this is the best step to a new life, a new identity.

My other interests and hobbies include internet browsing, ponies and ice hockey; all of which had sparked in the past three years. Sometime I depsier the way I balance my schedule, and even with that having issues lately, I can not refer myself as a person who dedicates the time one devotes to NASCAR that I don't. So I decided an adjustment had to be made, and you now know why. The sport has done so much to my life, and I think it just has all died down too much. But enough of that. Change is good. On to better times!

(As for this particular blog, I probably will just scrap it and start a new one, with not promising activity or anything like that.)