I play Dungeons and Dragons. There. I said it. This isn't a great secret or anything; I freely admit what I do for a hobby as quickly as I admit to having been married twice, divorced once, separated for four-and-a-half years, and having two children. But so many people have one stigma or another in mind when they hear that someone plays D&D, I see this as an opportunity to let them know how right they are.
And just how wrong they are.
I read The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings for the first time at the tender age of 8. That's right, I said eight….not eighteen. I didn't misspeak or leave out a 1 that leads to 8 becoming 18. Eight years old and I'm reading the same novels that my Aunt Gina is reading at the same time. Although, to be fair, she had finished them by the time I started in on them. She was a senior in High School and I was in the third grade. She was 18, but I was 8.
As I looked up to my Aunt with adoration, I did my best to emulate her as best I could. I listened to the same music, which meant The Beatles, The Osmonds, The Jackson Five, Lynyrd Skynyrd, and whatever happened to be playing on American Top 40 with Kasey Kasem. I burned her incense, wore her headphones, and added many layers to the hip 70's artwork formed by burning candles over top of a Pepsi bottle and allowing the wax to flow down and build up around the glass. So it was only natural that I should want to read what she was reading. I remember her laughing when I asked if I could read The Hobbit, and we both still talk about her reaction when I'd finished it over a long weekend of rain showers on my Grandma's farm. I still love seeing the smile on her face as she recalls my "book report" before she drove my brother and I home for another week of school.
So yes, I'm smart. Smart enough to have read Tolkien when I was 8, if not smart enough to understand everything I was reading that first time through. I think if there was a "Top 5 Things People Think of When They Hear You Play D&D" list, smart would be near the top. Somewhere right after geek or nerd. I qualify for both of these as well. I spent 20 years in the Air Force as a computer geek. At least that's a respectable kind of geek, but it makes me no less a member of that oft maligned group.
Of course, nerd goes right along with geek. No, I don't have BCG's (birth control glasses) or wear a pocket protector, and my pants are never too short. I don't have an obnoxious laugh or wear plaid, nor do I have a name that takes the mind to nerd like Poindexter, Melvin, or Matilda. But being a nerd is really about being different. My first name is Britt, which I was incessantly teased about in grade school. "Why do you have a girl's name?" got old somewhere about two weeks into Kindergarten. Thank the gods no one knew my middle name is Ashley.
Oh…I just said "thank the gods." If that doesn't prove I'm a nerd, I don't know what else would.
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