When Did I Realize I Was A Geek?
Written by AJ Dent, GeekGirlCon Staff Copy Writer
My little brother representing the Minnesota Twins while I geek out as Raphael the Turtle.
One of my clearest childhood memories says so much about me as a person, it boggles my mind to this day. My cousin Nick and I were playing at our grandmother’s house and discussing kindergarten, which we had both recently started attending. He boasted, “You know, I have a girlfriend now. Her name’s Sarah.”
Ever overly competitive, I shrugged. “Yeah? Well, I have a boyfriend.”
Nick was instantly skeptical, seeing right through the lie. “Yeah, right!”
“I do!”
“Really, then what’s his name?” he snapped.
I hesitated for a split second, then practically yelled the name of my very first crush of all time. “Raphael!”
Needless to say, Nick was soon telling all of our relatives about my belief that I was dating a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle.
Through the rest of my childhood, my geeky interests (and lack of a real, live boyfriend) continued. I loved playing The Pagemaster on my Gameboy, built entire Lego towns with my brother, and totally wanted to be Demona from the cartoon show Gargoyles.
It wasn’t until high school, though, that I realized what I was and am: a big ol’ geek girl. Rather than picking up romance novels like my older sisters did, I was content to curl up with Archie comics. Each year I took as many writing classes as possible, and wrote papers on things like lava lamps and the history of Goosebumps books. To top things off, every summer my friend Amanda and I would dress up like pirates and bury toy-filled treasure chests around town for children to find. No joke. We were cosplaying it up without even knowing the term.
From “dork” and “nerd” to “weirdo” and “geek,” I was called ‘em all by both my classmates and my closest friends. And I accepted them with smiles! Even if I’d denied my geekiness, my Batman shirts and wire-framed glasses showed the truth.
I was just always trying to have fun, and this often led to activities that are now considered hipster and cool: thrift store shopping, crocheting, rollerblading, being obsessed with my family’s cats. Nerd is the new black these days, of course, but living without at-home internet access in a town of three thousand people, I had no inkling of the impending geek-chic explosion.
Lifelong crush: Even as an adult, Raphael’s my dream “man.”
Since moving to Seattle a couple years ago, I’ve made a home-away-from-home at Shorty’s, a local pinball bar. Its circus theme, retro arcade games, and spicy nachos are always rad, but that’s not what draws me there every week. The regulars are a variety of tattoo-showing, superhero shirt-wearing, art-creating, punk music-listening geeks, much like me. I feel as if Shorty’s—and even Seattle at large—is the place where formerly outcast nerds congregate for fun and to feed off each other. If I could go back in time, I’d tell my adolescent self to hang in there because there’s a place out there that’s awkward and poetry-filled and amped up about dorky things, too.
Between the wonderful dweebs in my life, the adulthood acceptance I’ve found, and GeekGirlCon’s encouragement, I have never been happier to be a geek!
When did you realize you’re a geek?
