Square Peg – Round Hole

July 22nd, 2011 by csdaley

I am constantly amazed at the utter predictability of my inner psyche. Wandering around the San Diego Comic-Con with 130,000 other geeky souls should be the last place I would feel out of place. Yet, I sometimes do. Which I could have told you would happen before I ever got on the plane.

It took maybe half a day before the stupid evil inner voices began screaming, “you are a fraud! They are going to find out.” It’s ridiculous. I am not a fraud. I am a geek through and through. I mean seriously Dark Horse Comics announced they had put Star Wars up in the digital comic shop and I had bought all of them within minutes on my iPad.

I have never felt like I belonged to any group though. It started early in life. My sense of isolation and lonelyness grew every year. I was constantly battling with myself. One moment I was sure I was the nastiest person ever to walk the face of the earth. The next moment I was sure I was the nicest. I have always considered myself a geek. I bought my first comic when I was in third grade. Star Wars was my childhood religion (and sometimes my adult).

If there was ever a group I belonged to it is geekdom. Plus, I have lots of friends down here at the Comic-Con. I have enjoyed meeting so many new people but the voices persist. Sometimes they drive me to distraction. I hope there is some really cool name for this feeling of disconnect I suffer through. If not I am going to call it “ridiculous brain lock up” disease.

I have developed an ability to work past the fear of meeting new people. I am so good at it now that I am sure most people in the room don’t even know my brain is going wrong when I meet them. The part I hate the most is when I am actually standing with a group of people I know like me and my brain is sending out emergency flee signals. Usually at those times I try to pull out a funny story to calm my nerves. I am always best when I feel funny.

Don’t get me wrong. I am having a great time. I am not writing this as some woe is me tale. Mostly, I just wanted to put the thoughts down. To acknowledge that despite all my work and actually growing up into a decent person I still have issues to grapple with. It is one of the reasons I have been making sure to get out to conventions. It’s like geek medicine. It fills my heart with awesomeness.

Now I am going to stop banging at the keys and go hang out with friends. I will successfully ignore the voices in my head (at least until I get back to the hotel room). I know I am a square peg trying to get into a round hole but I am trying to be okay with it. Life is too short to not do what you love.

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