SPEAK
WARNING
GROWING UP IRL (IN REAL LIFE)
I embarked upon an epic quest to ditch my geekiness and find friends — only to find out being a nerd is valuable, and great friends were there all along // BEN SULLIVAN
Geeks unite. Ben says he and his friends found comfort in their shared nerdness. Pictured from left to right: Brandon Abbott, Shawnee graduate student; Mike Flaherty, a senior at Washburn University; Peter C. Soto, Shawnee junior; and Javaplyw writes Ben Sullivan, Shawnee junior; and Taylor Brown, Shawnee junior.
Contributed photo
Growing up I didn't know popular songs on the radio or celebrity giftgirl. (I still don't.)
When other kids were getting frosted tips and kick-starting unhealthy relationships with the Dave Mathews Band and MTV reality programming, I was listening to Weird Al Yankovic and watching SeaQuest with my father. I spent my youth adrift in a sea of science fiction and fantasy worlds, only returning to the real one when my mother would drag me to family dinner. It wasn't until I got older that I slowly came to the realization how being a childhood nerd paid off.
Growing up with a different prerogative is difficult. The threat of being ostracized for nerd dom is still very real. Schools definitely have a social caste system. Kids who had parents that allowed them to watch R-rated movies and dress like an Abercrombie and Fitch model were elevated to the front of the herd. The ones who stopped to check out an interesting-looking bush because of severe asthma were quickly left behind. That was me. I grew up as the quiet kid, preferring to spend my time in books than at skate parties. It was tough. Knowing that you don't fit in is demoralizing, especially when you only have 12 years of perspective to draw on.
Briely in sixth grade, I failed an attempted transition into being a cool kid. I purchased an expensive tube of colored hair gel that ended up staining my sink orange. For the few mornings I spent bent over the sink, I came out having done my hair six times to make sure that it was acceptably spiked. To complete the ensemble, I donned the '90s uniform of khaki cargo shorts, the white undershirt and striped button down, complete with a sharks tooth hemp necklace. My clever ruse lasted about a week. If I may paraphrase Douglas Adams, I was almost, but not quite, entirely unlike a popular kid. To my knowledge, I looked, smelled and talked the way I so badly wanted to be, but in reality was little more than one animal in another animal's clothing. So I went off on my own, partially by my own choice, mostly because I didn't belong anywhere else.
Then I found friends. There were others out there who had an encyclopedic knowledge of Star Wars — others who accepted the fact that I played the mandolin, others who had read every book that J.R.R Tolkien has ever written, including The Silmarillion, which is a university-level history text book of events that didn't actually happen. In fact they were there the whole time. I had just been looking in the wrong place. And over the years.
I was blessed with a one-in-a-million collective of fellow geeks. Undoubtedly the presence of like-minded others helped each of us develop our personalities and endure the shiitstorm of mockery that was middle school. We established ourselves in high school and slingshot into colleges across the country.
On the weekends, we happily cloistered ourselves in a life of hobbies and games while other people were developing problematic drinking habits. Across the years we spent thousands of dollars on collectible card games, played full
campaigns of Dungeons and Dragons and spent Friday and Saturday evenings building, painting and playing with plastic models. It was nerdy, we got funny looks, but it was great. It was in the company of my friends.
And the best part came later. As it turns out, special abilities are useful. Teaching ourselves in unconventional areas fostered independent learning later. The hours we poured into literature, computers, music and art gave us marketable skills. Now we're writers, technicians, musicians and artists. The very same activities that had us
pinned as weird now provide us with unique tools to carve a new place in the world.
Really, being the oddball was the best thing that could have happened to me. It wasn't easy, but I owe everything I am to how I grew up. I would challenge anyone who says I wasted my time. I'd win, too. Jp
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