What is Fandom?

Fandom is focus. Fandom is obsession. Fandom is insatiable consumption. Fandom is sitting for hours in front of a TV screen a movie screen a computer screen with a comic book or a novel in your lap. Fandom is eyestrain and carpal tunnel syndrome and not enough exercise and staying up way, way past your bedtime.

Fandom is people you don’t tell your mother you’re meeting. Fandom is people in the closet, people out and proud, people in costumes, people in T-shirts with slogans only fifty others would understand. Fandom is a loud dinner conversation scaring the waiter and every table nearby.

Fandom is you in Germany and me in the US and him in Australia and her in Japan. Fandom is a sofabed in New York, a roadtrip to Oxnard, a friend behind a face in London. Fandom talks past timezones and accents and backgrounds. Fandom is conversation. Communication. Contact.

Fandom is drama. Fandom is melodrama. Fandom is high school. Fandom is Snacky’s law and Godwin’s law and Murphy’s law. Fandom is smarter than you. Fandom is stupider than you. Fandom is five arguments over and over and over again. Fandom is the first time you’ve ever had them.

Fandom is female. Fandom is male. Fandom lets female play at being male. Fandom bends gender, straight, gay, prude, promiscuous. Fandom is fantasy. Fandom doesn’t care about norms or taboos or boundaries. Fandom cares too much about norms and taboos and boundaries. Fandom is not real life. Fandom is closer than real life. Fandom knows what you’re really like in the bedroom. Fandom is how you would never, could never, be in the bedroom.

Fandom is shipping, never shipping, het, slash, gen, none of the above, more than the above. Fandom is love for characters you didn’t create. Fandom is recreating the characters you didn’t create. Fandom is appropriation, subversion, dissention. Fandom is adoration, extrapolation, imitation. Fandom is dissection, criticism, interpretation. Fandom is changing, experimenting, attempting.

Fandom is creating. Fandom is drawing, painting, vidding: nine seasons in four minutes of love. Fandom is words, language, authoring. Fandom is essays, stories, betas, parodies, filks, zines, usenet posts, blog posts, message board posts, emails, chats, petitions, wank, concrit, feedback, recs. Fandom is writing for the first time since you were twelve. Fandom is finally calling yourself a writer.

Fandom is signal and response. Fandom is a stranger moving you to tears, anger, laughter. Fandom is you moving a stranger to speak.

Fandom is distraction. Fandom is endangering your job, your grades, your relationships, your bank account. Fandom gets no work done. Fandom is too much work. Fandom was/is just a phase. Fandom could never be just a phase. Fandom is where you found a friend, a sister, a kindred spirit. Fandom is where you found a talent, a love, a reason.

Fandom is where you found yourself.

Dallas Comic Con 2014

This weekend, I went to my first ever Comic Con with a good friend of mine. It was an absolutely amazing experience and I met some amazing people. Neither Matt nor I had ever been, so we weren't exactly sure what to expect. I think this will definitely be something that we return to in the future. Instead of boring you all with details, I'll just let the pictures speak for the weekend. 

Lifescouts Friday: Dear god, I really am a nerd

Happy Friday, all! This week's Lifescouts is a continuation of the "nerd" theme from last week. A couple of these are well... incredibly nerdy. I never realized how much until I started to write about them. Even though I may have gotten teased as a kid for being a nerd and liking space and Star Trek, I've now that it is more than okay, its great, to be a nerd. That's probably why I love John and Hank Green and all of Nerdfighteria because I've learned it is okay to be a nerd because, as John has said, "because nerds like us are allowed to be unironically enthusiastic about stuff. Nerds are allowed to love stuff, like jump-up-and-down-in-the-chair-can’t-control-yourself love it. Hank, when people call people nerds, mostly what they’re saying is ‘you like stuff.’ Which is just not a good insult at all. Like, ‘you are too enthusiastic about the miracle of human consciousness’.”

Ukulele 

In high school, and even now, I loved art. My senior year, I tried to take as many art classes as possible (to make for an easy year of course) and many of these were art classes. Since I did this, one of my teachers wanted me to create something to submit to the state competition at the end of the year. One of my pieces was a scene I painted on a ukulele I found at a thrift shop. I was incredibly proud of it, even though it only got an honorable mention. When I was kicked out of my parents' house, I didn't take it with me and I have no idea where it ended up. I do have another ukulele that I plan to paint and decorate soon...

Observatory 
I love space and the stars and the planets. I think galaxies and super novas and black holes are incredibly fascinating. In high school, I took an astronomy course where once a month we would meet at a college campus to use the observatory to really get a good look at what we were learning about in class. I wish I had more opportunities today to take the time to look out into space and watch the planets and stars and everything else out there. Space is really quit breath taking. I'm actually in the process of writing a paper for a geology class about black holes and how they impact the universes and galaxies that surround them. And I can't seem to stop researching it. It is fascinating.

Scrabble 

Nowadays people play Words with Friends rather than Scrabble. But there's something great about sitting around with friends playing board games. And, unlike something like Monopoly where it can get quit competitive and evil, Scrabble is just fun. Because I love to read, I have a decent vocabulary and this gives me the chance to actually use obscure words that I've picked up. I may not be the best or always win but I still love Scrabble. Actually, I love game nights in general. I need to have more of them.





Bowling 

I'm not a big bowler. I don't particularly like to wear shoes that a million other people have worn. That's just gross. And I haven't gone bowling since high school (dear god, have I done anything since high school??) with my French class. Why did we go bowling? I can't honestly tell you. I think it was just something that the French club could organize to get us out of school early. I have heard that the next company outing is going to be bowling... I should probably try to brush up so I don't make a complete fool of myself...

Klingon 

Okay, so this is probably, by far, the nerdiest thing this week. When I was growing up, I loved Star Trek. Granted, I still like it, but I really don't watch it much anymore. But growing up I actually watched it so much that I taught myself Klingon. I spent a couple years actually learning Klingon. I thought I was something special because I could insult people without them knowing what I was saying (it did have the downside of people knowing just how much of a nerd I was and I would sometimes get teased and picked on).