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I'm sure Gary's influence on my life is the same as other gamers: lifelong friends, nurtured creativity, keeping me out of trouble in rural Kentucky by staying in all weekend creating epic tales instead of drinking and having a kid at 14.
Over and over I've read and heard how Gary influenced our lives socially and creatively. What I want to share is how he helped me and hundreds of thousands of others develop our minds. Tabletop RPG's do something that no other social event I've ever experienced has done; it actively stimulates both sides of the brain in a dynamic and interactive way. Improvisational acting, world creation and storytelling blended with number crunching and the balancing of game mechanics creates a mental exercise that I've never experienced in anything else. On top of that is the simple, raw knowledge we get. My girlfriend is studying for her GRE's and often asks me if I've heard certain words, like dirge, augury, segue, abjure, enervate and innervate. She doesn't even ask "how do you know that" anymore. The answer is always, "Gaming."
