I never got to go to an anime convention

Today a seventh grader told me I was strange. Seriously, twelve-year-old? You think I’m strange? Do you realize how strange I was when I was twelve? Man, if I’m strange now I must’ve been a severe weirdo back then.

Seventh grade was one of my favorite years, probably because I was blissfully unaware of how strange I was. The summer prior I discovered anime, but my obsession with the band Hanson was still going strong. During my first week of school in a new state, I met my two best friends, one of whom had a self-proclaimed “Q-Tip” hairstyle and an obsession with tornadoes (hi Kim!). During that year and through the beginning of high school, I spent a lot of my time writing stories and songs. Mostly stupid ones. What I didn’t realize then was that while I was pretending to morph into a Sailor Scout, or listening to “MMMBop,” or learning how to write HTML (Tables! Frames! Geocities!), my classmates were having PARTIES. WITH ALCOHOL AND BOYS. AND PROBABLY LIKE PLAYING SPIN THE BOTTLE AND STUFF.

Then they all got herpes.

I’m thankful for being a nerd, really, because being a young nerd meant maintaining my childlike wonder. I was not interested in growing up much in high school, nor did I know a lot about grown-up things. Instead of begging my parents to go to a party with my friends, I begged them to go to an anime convention. (They said no. They probably thought it was a cover for a rave.) And I kept that behavior up until I enrolled in college at a music conservatory and suddenly deteriorated into a swearing, inappropriate, obnoxious snob. You wouldn’t catch me listening to any music with a I-IV-V-I progression, no sir. I was pretentious.

Thankfully that phase is over. I’m going back to my roots, discovering all those nerdy things I missed out on when I was too busy listening to Scriabin. Join me in my quest for rediscovery. Now that I think about it, I bet this quest can probably be psychologically interpreted as an innate response to my fear of death or growing up or something. Hmm.