A Nerd In My Own Right

Growing up, rainy days meant staying inside at someone’s house and coming to a consensus on what movie we were going to watch. There were seven movies us neighborhood kids could agree on the most, three of those being the original Star Wars movies. That’s probably a pretty familiar tale. A lot of people would say Star Wars, and other like franchises, were a big part of their childhood. Take Adam, for example. We joke his Star Wars experience started before he even took his first breath as he attended a showing of A New Hope in utero. The Star Wars universe was very much a refuge for him growing up.

Space swashbuckling held my attention as much as the next kid, but there was something else that kept calling me back again and again. In the character of Leia Organa, a scrawny nerd girl got to watch a stylish, sought after princess wielding a blaster, get her hands dirty and command a rebellion. She was a celluloid contradiction to all of the voices, saying I had to be one or the other. And if I picked the tomboyish side, I wouldn’t be desired. She may have been fictional, but that means she came from someone else who believed this combination existed.

While this interest is shared between us, the reception of that interest has been different. I can safely say Adam has never fielded the question, “Did you come with that shirt, or did you buy it because you’re dating a Star Wars fan?” I, on the other hand, have.

For the sake of fairness, the question wasn’t meant to be snarky or rude in any way. This was curiosity plain and simple without any hindsight whitewashing. And, I’d be lying if I said this was the one and only time I had come across this notion that my interests are not wholly my own. In fact, most of the time, it’s a feeling that permeates the conversation rather than an obvious question or statement. All the same, in this particular instance, the question came out of left field. Sure, it was asked before coffee, but even caffeinated, I would have been surprised.

Wasn’t it obvious? Not the possession of the shirt before Adam’s existence in my life. But that I was a fan? We had watched at least A New Hope together. Had he missed me being able to quote along with the movie. And by that, I mean, I could recite the film in almost its entirety. That kind of recitation takes a lot of misspent time.

Whether I was blatant about my interest wasn’t at the heart of this question. I think by now, any of you have read two of my articles know that I was. Gender and the assumptions that go with it are at work here.

I’m not talking about Adam’s or my gender; although mine does get thrown into the mix, I’ll get to that in a bit. The gender coming into play is Star Wars’ gender. Weird writing that down, but let me just rewind time for a minute. Let’s go to Toys ‘R Us. Best place to go as a kid, right? Aisles and aisles of toys as far as kiddo eyes can see. All segregated into genders. Don’t know about anyone else, but I used the terms boy and girl aisles.

I’ve never had a firm grasp on the minutiae that comes along with that idea. Not that I haven’t tried to get a better understanding. It’s impossible to avoid being exposed to it. But the labeling of interests or actions as masculine or feminine ends up seeming terribly arbitrary.

My perspective has probably been colored by the unusual lessons I had in my childhood. Nothing too outlandish or shocking. I mean atypical for a girl, whatever that really means. And given that my family members were responsible for those lessons, I am going to assume this inability to digest such things is hereditary.

The best example I can give is the random Saturday afternoon my Dad decided I needed to learn how to change a tire. I have to hand it to him. He certainly was creative in getting the details across. “So, you take the tire iron and then turn it until the lug comes off.” I was probably eight and still in my boney stage. A quick glance over to me started him off on a slew of suggestions for ways I could enlist Mom’s assistance in resolving the frictional problem. All of them leading to the conclusion, don’t get a flat tire if he wasn’t there.

Although come to think of it, I don’t think many boys got the change the tire lesson seeing as I have been with not one but two boyfriends when a flat tire cropped up. While they did not have the knowledge to get their asses out of the predicament, they absolutely had enough pride to not want to be a guy stranded on the side of the road while their girlfriend changed their tire. This left me relegated to looking like I was helpless while, in reality, I was instructing them on what to do next. So, the knowledge might not have been proliferated, but the assumption that things like changing tires are wholly masculine is alive and well.
Which means, when I presented myself clad in a Star Wars shirt, it was an odd juxtaposition of two opposing ideas. I had shopped on the wrong side of Toys ‘R Us. And when something doesn’t fit, we need a reason for why it doesn’t fit.

In The Runaway Bride, a riff runs through almost the entirety of the movie about how Maggie, played by Julia Roberts, likes her eggs. Richard Gere’s character, Ike, goes around to each of her jilted grooms peddling this question and collecting the answers. In the end, he takes all of those answers and throws them in her face to prove her chameleon and unsettled mindset.

In the case of The Runaway Bride, we see her deferring to her partner’s preference being used as ammunition to blow a hole in the impending wedding. But, this isn’t the only movie where this trope crops up. A lot of the time, it’s a jab at women to get a laugh. Movies, particularly Rom-coms, can only run for so long. Comedies have to get in and out by around the ninety-minute mark in order not to drag out the punch line too long. Stereotypes speed up the audience picking up on things because they are sets of preloaded expectations.

In this article alone, I have admitted to bowing down to the same insecurity, not with one boyfriend but with two. This sort of deference happens a million times a day or more. But, it doesn’t really happen the way it does in the movies. If the scenario of the eggs from Runaway Bride played out in real life, there would have to be two questions asked about the eggs.

How does she take her eggs when they are being made by the partner in question? This would highlight her deferential tendencies because she would be answering out of consideration of the extra effort it would take to make a different kind of egg dish. How does she order them when she’s at a restaurant? Here, you would see her actual preference because dining out is a totally different dynamic.

The version played out in movies is recycled so often and in a medium where attention is, most of the time, undivided, allowing that model of deference to be the more accessible. How often do you catch anyone, even yourself, doing what Maggie was doing in the movie? If you are anything like me, it’s not as often as it should be. It gets lost in the flotsam and jetsom of everyday life, letting the stereotypical situations be the more shared memory.

That version of deferring to a partner combining with the segregation of interests creates a cycle, one where a question is simultaneously posed and answered. Did you come with that Star Wars shirt or did you buy it because you’re dating a Star Wars fan?

The expected, subconscious answer was that I had just purchased the shirt to jump on the bandwagon because Adam had a pre-existing adoration of the franchise. But, just like the eggs, the reality doesn’t imitate art. I, also, had a pre-existing, albeit slightly different, adoration of the same franchise.

Having your interests questioned is irritating, especially since it’s an odd thing to prove. How exactly do you build a fandom resume? I don’t have photographs of movie days with Star Wars on the TV. Those moments not really being picture-worthy. The books I read have long since been donated. Any make-believe played in back yards wouldn’t have proof either.

You can’t build a resume for something like this. And no one should have to. Regardless of the assumptions marketing and media have plugged into our thoughts, I am a nerd in my own right. I did not, and do not, collect interests solely because of the person I was dating. Have I come to new franchises because of boyfriends? Yes, but that didn’t mean I was going to like them all.

Toys ‘R Us was a Mecca for kids. They stocked just about every toy you could want. But, they have shuttered their doors, and we need to start shuttering our minds to the boy and girl aisles model. My reproductive organs had nothing whatsoever in curating my interests. And, frankly, they shouldn’t be the reason they’re discounted even on a subconscious level.

My allegiance to Star Wars, Indiana Jones, and other fandoms was born out of genuine interest and love. Being a girl and liking Star Wars or Doctor Who or [Insert your favorite franchise here] isn’t unusual, uncommon, or unjustified. The idea that girls aren’t interested in these types of things is just an illusion.

When everything is said and done, I have to sit back and take a line from the wise and fabulous Peggy Carter. “I know my value. Anyone else’s opinion doesn’t matter.”