The Origins of a Nerd

My friend Mickey at Nerdily challenged fellow geek bloggers to share their origin stories with the world. It has been awesome reading everyone’s rise to nerdom because they come in all different shapes, sizes, and timelines. No two nerds are created alike, so make sure you check out all the lovely links at the bottom of this post to read about the other ladies sharing their origin stories. I know you’re all dying to read this thing, so I’ll just jump right into it.

My Origin Story

I’m not complaining, but I’m going to start this post by blaming my mother. Her solution to keeping house while managing a toddler was television. “Sadie was the best child. I could sit her down in front of the TV with a cartoon, and she wouldn’t move for hours. I never had to worry.” Hours of Disney, Thumbelina, and the Land Before Time have me convinced that I’m living proof that too much TV does not turn your brain to mush. I remember we had one tape that had five movies on it. It minimized the time needed to be spent on rewinding and changing tapes. I think this plays a big role in my love for the term Netflix and Chill. Yes, I want to continue watching; what kind of a stupid question is that?

Let’s fast forward a few years because until I can actually remember anything besides watching TV my brain probably really was just mush. I don’t feel like I can write my origin story without helping people to understand where the seeds to become the cosplay obsessed individual I am today were planted. The first Halloween I remember was one of many where my mom handmade costumes for my brother and I. You may remember I talked about why Snow White was my first Disney cosplay. My mom also managed to make my brother and I into several other characters over the course of our elementary years. I’ve featured some of them below because we are just so cute.

My dad has made his contributions as well. I probably didn’t turn out to be as big of a car nerd as he would have liked, but I do have a serious appreciation for a nice ride. It just so happens when your father owns a body shop. I know a lot of people say their parents are their biggest supporters, but I feel like my father (and my mother) have been extremely supportive of me growing up. They truly told me that I could do anything that I wanted, and they would support me. They have taught me that above all happiness is the most important thing that you can choose for yourself, and everyone has a different path to what makes them happy.

I think their support is a little bit of why I was so awkward in elementary school and middle school. They didn’t suppress the weirdness. Oh, and this big thing called puberty in middle school, but I wouldn’t take back one second of awkwardness. I was a huge book nerd. Children’s stories such as The Little Hen, The Boxcar Children, and Where the Sidewalk Ends were a couple of my favorites before I could really read, but Harry Potter is when I became truly obsessed with reading. Some people may remember a website called Mugglenet, and I have been a Hufflepuff since I could log on. I’m extremely socially awkward. I find so often that people mistake enthusiasm for the label of being an extrovert. Don’t let me make you think I didn’t have any friends or sat and ate lunch by myself, but I think that I found peace in books because they could take me to a place where I felt like I fit in no matter what.

A few other shout outs to my foundation go out to my grandparents. My mother’s parents were cow farmers. I wanted to be a vet before I found out what that actually meant. Grandma and Grandpa were the beginning of my love for animals. My dad’s mom (Oma) was an artist and adventurist. I never knew my dad’s father (Opa), but I’ve been told that I am the grandkid most like him; he was a photographer and chemist.I spent a lot of time with Oma, and she is the reason I wanted to be a Disney Animator/ Character Designer when I grew up. My brother, G, also gets a shoutout for making me interested in fandoms that I never wanted to have anything to do with such as Yu-Gi-Oh…still not my favorite.

Oh okay, let’s also not forget Jill, Leslie, and Sarah. These are my girls, and they always will be. Together we are Crap 4 Life, a ridiculous bond that we share (G too). It all started the summer before eighth grade at a sleepover in my backyard, in a tent with little ventilation and too much spilled nail polish remover, Eminem, and a birthday present that to this day is known as the Book of Crap. If this paragraph means nothing to you, but explains a lot about me then it has accomplished its purpose in life. Here is at least a selfie taken very recently of drunk Sadie having found the Book after believing it to be lost…

High school was a lot different for me. I was still kind of awkward (that’s a lie… super awkward), but my high school was so big that being book smart wasn’t the worst thing in the world. I dabbled in a bit of everything through high school: art, tennis, ballroom dancing, robotics, physics, quiz bowl team. I loved Quiz Bowl because my dad and I loved Jeopardy. I wanted to play tennis because I knew we had rackets, and I loved Mario Tennis for N64. High school was fun because it was the beginning of the era of where being a nerd is cool.

“Engineer by Day” from my slogan is not a joke. I went to Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology for college. There I was able to earn a BS in Optical Engineering as well as a Minor in Literature. Rose not only gave me an education and the ability to get a job afterwards, but a community/culture where I could really let my nerd out of it’s cage without judgement. I was even homecoming queen AKA QUEEN OF THE NERDS!

I already had pretty deep roots established for the fandoms I love, but the one thing I’m happy to have gained from college was a love and respect for anime/manga/Japanese culture. My relationship with anime was rocky because I got told in high school that if I didn’t want to be a Manga artist that I wasn’t good at art. That pretty much squashed any interest I had for the genre. My friend Mike Lester forced me to watch My Neighbor Totoro after much resistance, and I loved every second of it. I should have known better than to be so resistant to a whole genre, especially knowing I have always been enamored by Sailor Moon.

Finally, four years ago I moved to South Carolina. Moving twelve hours away from home is like getting to push restart on life. I’ve been lucky to have time to focus on myself, and become the person I am today. Two years ago  is when I started cosplaying. Sick of being a silent member of the community I decided it was time to find my voice. Since then I have been to a ton of conventions, and have added comic books to my list of things that truly make me a nerd. I feel like this is only a glimpse of my story, but I did the best I could without writing a novel.

I really hope this story inspires others to uncage the nerds within. Be yourself. Don’t let the world get you down. What is your origin story? Don’t forget to subscribe via email or Bloglovin’ to never miss a post. Also, check out all of the other fantastic origin stories below!

Other Great Stories

Nerdily’s Story

Ami Reports’s Story

Geeky Brunette’s Story (Coming Soon!)

The Bizarre Brunette’s Story

dePepi’s Story

Mandy’s Story–from The True Ultimate Fangirl Officially (Coming Soon!)

Nyanla’s Story–from Geekeries de Nyanla

Dina’s Story

Her Geekery’s Story

The Gamer Wife’s Story (Coming Soon!)

Lydia’s Story

Princess Eevee’s Story

Prima Geek’s Story

Kayly’s Story from My Open Sketchbook

Michelle’s Story from A Geek Girl’s Guide

Kimi’s Story (Coming Soon!)