A friend and I were talking the other day and he asked me if I could remember a time before “The Simpsons”.  I was six when the first shorts ran on the Tracy Ullman Show back in 1989, but I really don’t have any cognizant memory of my life before Homer, Marge, Bart, and the rest of them.

I remember a day in my young life when I was probably about 8. My brother, who taped all the new Simpsons episodes on VHS (remember those?) was moving and I was in charge of not getting in the way. I must have spent six hours that day watching episode after episode. I believe that day, coupled with my parents growing disdain for the shows antics, sealed my love of Homer and the Gang forever.

I’ve now watched every episode from 1989 to 2002 at least twice. I stopped watching all the new episodes when they started to really suck. This latest season isn’t so lame but its not on par with say, season 9 (the best, in my opinion).

So I can easily say I was, in a way, raised by the Simpson family. Homer taught me to laugh at stress, and when a loved one gets hit in the head with a blunt object. Marge taught me to repress repress repress. Even Maggie has made an impression on me with her quiet tolerance of years of neglect. Hell, my senior thesis at BYU was a twenty page paper entitled, “Homer Vs. Marxism: A Proletariat in King Monty’s Court”.

What are your first Simpsons memories? Did you have to watch it at friends houses because of disapproving parents? Do you remember where you were when Mr. Burns was shot? I’m curious to know if I’m the only freak with a Simpsons upbringing.

Classic Simpsons. They all look like porcupines.

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