The important thing is, I'm meeting new people

Nerdiness is a funny thing. It has taken me years to be able to be comfortable admitting this - I’m a true nerd.

As a kid, I was a book nerd. I read everything I could, I liked science and math and sci-fi books, I did well at school. I played the piano and violin. I subscribed to PC World magazine. I didn’t have a lot of friends. I didn’t read comics, or play table-top or collectible card games, or play video games (other than Mario or Tetris) or anything else like that; partly because I had no time (I was at ballet classes 6 days a week from the age of like 12), and partly because I didn’t really even know those things were out there. Even though I definitely had a group of friends who were very much into those things.

But if I had known, would I have been into them?

Probably not. 

I think there’s a big impulse amongst all kids everywhere - in elementary school, middle school, high school, even college - to not be different. To fit in. To be perceived as cool, as popular. I think (I hope) it’s getting easier to stand out, maybe independent streaks are being admired even earlier.

But I wouldn’t have imagined doing anything to make me stand out any more than I already did, as an adopted kid who looked different from 99% of the people around me. By the time I reached my senior year of high school and realized that I didn’t want to live ballet (at which time I cut back to like three days a week, so I could pretend to have a “social life”), I was so concerned with wanting to be cool and fit in that I wouldn’t have chosen an “outsider” interest. 

But in college, I ended up dating a Magic player who was on and off the Pro-Tour (yes, that is something that exists), and being friends with other Magic players, and it was fun. Magic was a game, a fun game, a complex game. I was friends with people who were really smart and really into some seriously nerdy shit; adults, CMU grads, game theorists, with their own language and shorthand and jokes. It was addictive.

Magic sort of released some floodgates of nerdiness. I started playing video games, getting into RPGs and strategy games. I read A Song of Ice and Fire. Twice. Recently, I started reading comics - not just hip, independent graphic novels, but also the DC and Marvel monthlies.

And coming into this now, it’s weird that there could even be a thing where people are faking being a geek. Like my friend Emily said in a super thoughtful post, faking anything is bullshit. And sort of how I worry all the time in general about how people see me, as a recently out nerd, I worry that someone could think that of me too. Or that anyone might not want to show their nerdiness to me, because I don’t outwardly seem like a typical nerd. But that’s why the internet is the best. 

And so, the whole purpose of this post is to put that worry to rest, lest you begin to suspect me. Wizards of the Coast recently released a Magic: the Gathering iPad app, and I haven’t been this excited about anything in… I can’t even remember when. I love it. The app is great, gameplay is great, I’ve already upgraded to the full app (free basic trial, $9.99 to upgrade). 

I love being a nerd.

Also, I miss drafting. If anyone in Austin likes to do a cas booster draft… =)