I like to use role playing games to work through ideas or issues that are on my mind at the time when I make a character. Per my recent post about death and my growing fear of it, I decided that my character in Ars Magica (adventures of wizards set in Europe of the 1200s, with an otherwise consistent history: that makes this game science fiction, by the by) should be a necromancer driven by a desire to extend his life beyond the normal bounds because the typical wizard ways of doing this do not work for him. We had our first session last night and I realized that I had no idea how to play the character as he was. Just now it came to me; he is my father. In less charitable moods, I have opined that he had an overpowering fear of death which drove him to his 'faith'. Seeing as how it dovetails so well with that post, I think I should go with it. My father's fear of death made his early death more tragic, in a dramatic sense (not ironic, because that's not what the word means). I am not sure where this will take me and I don't have time at the moment to give this a longer treatment, but I wanted to put it down now so it can percolate in the background for the next few days.