Happy indeed is he who can turn his fantasies into reality, whereas most people, seeking escapism, lose their grip on reality and slide into their fantasies. The former approach has become the preferred route for the guru of the Dungeons and Drag­ons crowd, Mr. Tim B., known to his fans as "The Wizard of OZ." This was not always the case, however. It appears the turning point for this creative and imaginative genius came during the winter of 1993-4 when young Tim happened to find himself in the magical Creative Expression class taught by the enchanting and Legendary Mr. Christopherson. Up to that time, young Tim had been a quiet, well mannered boy on the outside who experienced wild excitement only in his inner mind while thinking about D&D role playing fantasies. The following account of that winter trimester comes straight from the incredibly detailed notes kept by the Legendary Mr. Christopherson (by the way, notes were kept on all of his students, not just young Tim, since it was obvious that the future would want to know more about the background of all of these wonderfully successful young people that got their start in the exceptional Creative Expressions class).

Noting immediately that young Tim had an interest in stretching reality to encompass things magical, the Legendary Mr. Christopherson used to perform little, simple slight‑of‑hand tricks when only young Tim was watching. . . trivial, but entertaining, little things such as changing a pencil into a piece of licorice, or (slightly more difficult) changing a chunk of lead into gold, or (one of Tim's favorites) quickly turning his neighbor, Kyle B. into a guinea pig and back before Kyle knew what had happened (this trick may have had an unplanned, subcon­scious effect on Kyle B.'s future, see his story which is part of this collection). As one can see, the Legendary Mr. Christopherson had a great knack for building a rapport with his students. Young Tim became the sorcerer's apprentice and learned quickly the tricks of the trade. He was soon creating all sorts of havoc, playing tricks on everyone (except the Legendary Mr. Christopherson, of course, since he would not dare bite that wondrous hand that fed him so much trickery). Young Tim was very careful to see that none of the students ever found out about his playful tricks since he attended a forward thinking middle school here which still listed in its disciplinary code such punishments as the rack, the iron maiden, and your standard, no‑frills, burning at the stake.

Thus, during the first weeks of the Creative Expressions class, young Tim confined his apprenticeship to smaller scale things: changing people's hair color, making books fall off tables, causing students to trip and fall, giving deserving kids a plague of fleas, creating an overwhelming need in some to use the bathroom, and so forth. Only occasionally did the Legendary Mr. Christopherson feel the need to step in and rectify a situation, preferring most often to give the boy his head, believing that he could learn from his mistakes and needed to solve his own problems anyway. Much can be said for the general level of tolerance among these students who never seemed to feel especially put out by all of these possibly annoying, frustrating problems that came their way, preferring to, more often than not, place the blame on the perversity of nature (that is, laying the blame on that same doorstep as one would the effects of earthquakes, floods, hurricanes, etc.).

Young Tim's project for that Creative Expressions class was probably the most fantastic project ever done there, although interviews with other members of that same class do not seem to agree. Trusting to the notes mentioned above, we must conclude that a certain amount of mysterious memory erasure was necessary among students after the project was presented, to assure the continued safety of young Tim. For you see, the project consisted of a full scale D&D enactment wherein all students were involved, playing the rolls of dragons, trolls, elves, and various sundry animals. The feature that made this so exciting a game was that all students were actually transformed into the real character they played. For that one class period, the room and the extensive caverns beneath the old middle school were filled with bazaar, frightening creatures, clawing, biting, screaming, and slash­ing at each other, in fact approaching in nature and ferocity, as some might say, 6th grade lunch time in the cafeteria.

Today, the mature Mr. B. has taken his talents for D&D and opened the wildly successful "Caverns & Creatures" theme park, designed to allow anyone to live out their fantasies as reality. Whereas other virtual reality theme parks provide similar experiences, they still require the wearing of bulky headgear and wired gloves. The advantage to Mr. B.'s much simpler and straight forward approach is that the person actually becomes trans­formed into a different character and is placed into a real synthetic scenario. Mr. B. is also branching out as well, having just entered an agreement with Walt Disney Productions to provide real, talking, cartoon‑like animals for Disney World and Disney Land, although we've learned the European Disney Land in France is resisting this change claiming that they don't need any more real talking animals, what with all those Germans living to the north and east of them.

It certainly seems that "C&C" is the wave of the future, as now, thanks to Mr. B. (and, of course, the Legendary Mr. Christopherson), we may all bring our fantasies into reality. Soon none of us will be able to separate fantasy from reality anymore; they will become one and the same. what a very different world this is about to become!