My pediatric dentist was a man named Dr. Wolfman. (That was his actual god-given name. Some people have all the luck.)
When my mom and I first walked into his office, I was shaking with fear. As far as I was concerned, there was a high likelihood that Dr. Wolfman he was the Wolfman, having gone straight and gone for his DDS.
However, I was immediately won over when I saw, in the corner of the office, an arcade-style SEGA system that featured Ecco the Dolphin, the X-Men game, and (most importantly) Sonic.
I like the little bits of sound design that wheedle their way into your ear: the coin collection sound from Mario, the battle theme from Pokemon, the theme for Logical Journey of the Zoombinis.
But picking up Sonic Mania this week, I didn't realize how much one sound in particular stuck in my head: the sound of Sonic doing a skid stop from the original SEGA Genesis game.
It's amazing how a one-second-long sound can instantly make me smell the antibacterial cleaner used in Dr. Wolfman's office, can make me remember the glow of the screen against the fluorescent lights, can make me feel like I'm three-and-a-half feet tall and willing to overlook the fact that my dentist might just be an actual man-turned-into-a-wolf, so long as I could have a few more moments going so fast.