Tuesday, March 6th, 2007...9:00 am
Release your inner dork
I see you there, no use hiding. Come on out, it’s ok. No one will make fun of you. At least not to your face.
Being a “person”, I share many commonalities with other “people”. Among them is a certain anxiety that friends, family members, and strangers might “find out” that I am NOT the personification of the image I would like to project.
In other words, that sooner or later, everyone around me will realize I’m a huge, blaring, unmitigated dork.
Luckily for me, everyone else is, too. Like to keep statistics about what Metro train lines you take every day? Crap on a stick! Enjoy spending an hour every night reading the dictionary? Shitballs! Secretly pick your bellybutton lint and take photos of the best ones? Good god!*
Is this such a terrible thing? Is it hard to admit that we are ALL dorks and we love to participate in dork-related activities? Many bloggers probably think so.What’s the first thing your typical blogger says when people find out he/she has a blog? He’ll probably engage in some self-effacing humor meant to cut down his own writing.
It might go like this:
Blogger slightly embarrassed to have a blog: “My blog? Oh, it’s nothing, it’s just a little thing I do for fun.”
Friend of blogger, backing away slowly: “You are such a dork.”
Blogger now mortified to have a blog: “I know.”
When we were children, we were not only allowed but encouraged to act like dorks. We ran naked through sprinklers on hot summer days, collected baseball cards and alphabetized them, and played with our sister’s Cabbage Patch Kid because we were jealous that she had one. No? Just me? Ok, let’s move on.
But once we reached adulthood, we had to suppress this inner dork. Does that mean it went away? Probably not. We just became really good at hiding it. The smart ones will do dorky things in earnest but call it “ironic”, thereby maintaining the appearance that they’re cool.
For example, take the 14-year-long trend of wearing horn-rimmed eyeglasses. These glasses were abhorrently dorky for decades and quickly became Hollywood’s favorite way to showcase a nerd in high school movies.
But when I was in college, it became mod to wear these thick, black frames. BECAUSE the look was so dorky, people wore them ironically and, therefore, were cool for doing so.
When I found out I had astigmatism, I was thrilled because that meant I could buy these eyeglasses and fulfill the hipster dufus look I was going for.
So release your inner dork. Don’t fret about what you think and feel might mean to the world or your status within it. Play kickball with other dorks, become the captain of your darts team, put romantic comedies in your Netflix queue.
But please don’t pick your bellybutton lint. That’s too dorky.
* I only do one of these things.
20 Comments
March 6th, 2007 at 9:12 am
I’m glad you chose the word “dork” to describe such behaviors. Some people confuse dork nerd, or worse, with geek. As a nerd, I resent being called a geek, but “dork” doesn’t bother me nearly as much.
There are MAJOR differences in all those words, you’re right. I’m still traumatized by the time in sixth grade when I tried talking to the real-life sister of the girl who played Heather in Mr. Belvedere and she called me a “nerd”. Ouch.
March 6th, 2007 at 9:13 am
I thought kickball existed so dorks could have meaningless - and certainly awkward - sex with other dorks.
I’m not sure if dorks have dorky sex. Do all good-looking people have great sex? Probably not.
March 6th, 2007 at 9:23 am
One more quick note on glasses… I “blogged” once about how glasses these days have a decidedly large sex appeal. I don’t quite get it. I just bought some sporty new tortoise shell frames that seem to be a hit. Something about librarians. *shrug* The mysteries of men are endless.
I was attracted instantly to my girlfriend because of her glasses. Like knee-high boots and girls making out with each other, it’s hard to explain why.
March 6th, 2007 at 10:46 am
I’m pretty sure you keep track of the metro lines you take. I have a running list of all the over-night trips I’ve been on over the past few years, complete with “mode of transportation” and “number of airplanes.” Yeah, I know…
Good guess, and you’re right. Why do I do this? No idea. But, as I’m sure you’ll attest, it’s fun.
March 6th, 2007 at 10:50 am
I’ve gone above and beyond the dork. I read science fiction and fantasy books. I am officially a nerd.
I also sometimes snort when I laugh. But I’m not ashamed to admit it.
Come on, Jo, I know you do much dorkier things than that. South Americans aren’t as cool as people think.
March 6th, 2007 at 11:12 am
photos of bellybutton lint = gross. not dorky. just resist the urge, arjewtino!!
moving on…the quintessential dork with those glasses is rivers cuomo. he sang with muppets AND at the playboy mansion. but not at the same time.
jo, you and i were totally separated at birth even if our spic cards were issued from different countries. dude, snorting when you laugh isn’t dorky, it’s FUNNY. it amazes me how people stop and mock the snort. jealous!
Just to clarify, I do NOT pick bellybutton lint and take pics. But if I did, I would post them on flickr.
March 6th, 2007 at 11:27 am
there’s nothing wrong with picking belly button lint. or in sharing one’s joy in such a hobby with others.
So you still do that? Tough habit to break, I guess.
March 6th, 2007 at 11:28 am
so now we’ll know what the next unidentifiable photo really is…ha! btw, i did post about that article you passed along.
Nice, I’ll read it and write mean yet witty comments about it later.
March 6th, 2007 at 12:11 pm
I resent this commentary on my religious beliefs.
March 6th, 2007 at 12:42 pm
I am a total advocate of embracing one’s inner dork. Hello? ‘Member the Heelys?
And nerdy girls are the hottest kind.
Have you recorded yourself skating on them yet for everyone’s amusement? I think that might have to be your first video post.
March 6th, 2007 at 12:48 pm
LMNt- Heely’s are the devil’s work. Evil things. Evil, evil, evil. *makes a mental note to post on how much I hate heelys*
March 6th, 2007 at 1:04 pm
Here’s the thing though, I have a tremendous amount of belly button lint that is absolutely fascinating to me. Why do my shirts have so much lint? How does it all travel to my belly button? Does my belly button have some sort of gravitational pull? These are questions that I will always haunt me and I’ll never be able to answer. I don’t go so far as to take pictures of it though, that’s just weird.
I actually have little to no bellybutton lint, which I find sort of weird. Still, as a non-lint person, I am fascinated by lint people like yourself. Where DOES it come from? What makes you lint people different from us non-lint people?
March 6th, 2007 at 1:16 pm
I love a man in glasses.
In my 20s, I was the girl who would beg to try on the glasses of strangers, running to the restroom to check my bespectacled self out in the mirror. So I was elated when my perfect vision began to fail me, and I was “forced” to get glasses. The novelty has worn off somewhat since, and I now only wear them to the occasional movie or when I’m driving somewhere unfamiliar, but they definitely make me feel a bit Naughty-Librarian.
I am in the same boat as you, K. I only wear mine when I drive (because the DC DMV told me I have to ) and when I go to the movies.
March 6th, 2007 at 2:32 pm
i love it when guys wear glasses and it’s totally hot when you get to the point where a guy goes from “cool” to “nerdy.” it gets me everytime. i’m not so much a fan of the word “dork” tho.
Can’t speak to how they look on men, but I agree insomuch as the same applies to women.
March 6th, 2007 at 2:46 pm
Ahh the wonders of 20/15 vision.
I believe Will Clark of the San Francisco Fucking Giants had 20/10 vision, which is why he rarely struck out.
Showoff.
March 6th, 2007 at 5:58 pm
I love my dorky glasses, though my husband calls them my sexy librarian glasses. Not only do we play darts, also chess, Risk and we bowl. Dorky enough?
Not even close. I captained a darts team, joined my high school chess club, and duckpin bowl. Winner.
March 6th, 2007 at 7:01 pm
I’m with you I-66…perfect eyesight means never worrying about what your glasses imply. HA.
Another showoff. It’s perfectly sighted people like you who give us vision impaired folks a bad rap.
March 6th, 2007 at 9:32 pm
“We ran naked through sprinklers on hot summer days, collected baseball cards…”
I have thousands of baseball cards, so I certainly understand that. As for running naked through sprinklers, that never happened in my neighborhood.
My mom threw away all my baeeball cards. My well-organized and categorized baseball cards. Tragic.
March 7th, 2007 at 9:40 am
When I read books that have words I don’t know, I like to look them up and write down the definition in a notebook I generally keep with me. My ex used to make fun of me for it, but I know he was secretly jealous of my incredable vernacular.
The smart ones will do dorky things in earnest but call it “ironic”, thereby maintaining the appearance that they’re cool.
Gaaa, hipsters. What would we do without them? >_
I think that would be cool, but I’m a dork, too, so that might uncoolify it. Uncoolify…that’s a word, right?
September 27th, 2007 at 1:07 pm
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