How Suicune Saved My Childhood at the Height of 90s Pokémania

My very first pokemon in the beginning of Pokemania was Squirtle in 1998, i'm like 6-7 years old, I trained it up to a level 100 Blastoise. He was my absolute pokepal, my parents would ask about him and I took care of him as if he was a pet. My brother and the neighborhood kids all had Charizards and feared my Blastoise.

One day my brother, who couldn't read, accidentally clicked "RELEASE" my level 100 Blastoise, somehow saved the game file not realizing what happened, and my Blastoise was lost forever.

I was devastated, legit depressed for months, searching the wild for him in-game for hours a day. I would cry myself to sleep every night thinking about him all alone in the world, like an abandoned puppy. It created genuine animosity toward my brother who i only recently forgave in my mind, realizing he literally couldn't read and was just checking out my glorious Blastoise. I was visibly depressed for a long time, my teacher would call my parents noting it, I kept drawing crayon pictures of me with my Blastoise. They even took me to some type of counselor/therapist to help me let go of Blastoise but I was just 6-7 years old and thought in my head "this grownup is completely stupid, they could never understand the glory of a level 100 Blastoise" (which in hindsight was the totally correct take). The bottom line is I was in a legit deep state of depression because of this, as if a loved one died.

Fast forward to 2000, i get Pokemon Silver. My highest level pokemon is only like level 25 Bayleef. I come across this pokemon in the wild called Suicune. It's an absurdly high level 40, and it's the most beautiful pokemon i ever laid eyes upon. It looked like it was from a dream or a surreal painting or something. I knew i was in the presence of something special and i wanted this pokemon. It ran away from the battle before i could do anything.

I couldn't let go of it, i asked friends about it and since we were all 8 and it was pre-internet era, Gold/Silver just came out, no one really knew what it was and some didn't even believe me.

A few days later i'm training up a Gastly, who happens to know hypnosis, and i encounter the Suicune again. I hit it with hypnosis and caught it it! I was so excited, it was such a higher level than all my other pokemon, and it is\\was absolutely beautiful, it was unlike any pokemon i ever saw. I saw its water typing and moves and it reminded me of an old friend - my old Blastoise.

Since he was such a higher level than all my other pokemon at the time, he was my instant ace, first-in-line in battle, and I steamrolled the entire game with him, leveling him up to nearly 100. He was my new pokepal. My parents noticed a revived mood and would say things like "is this the new Blastoise?" and i would get kind of gitty.

The other kids were extremely jealous because as we learned, catching this kind of pokemon so early on in the game was a winning lottery ticket. I learned how rare and difficult it was to get this legendary pokemon so early on.

I was so grateful that i refused to believe this was chance, I believe this was fate. I believe this was my old Blastoise's spirit returning to me in an elevated form (like when Gandalf returned as Gandalf the White). I was going to sleep one night and saw an old crayon picture i drew of me and my old Blastoise. I got out of bed, and drew a Suicune next to it.

Suicune's beauty and grace revived my childhood and I thank the pokemon gods for it every day.