w00tstock Reflections

It’s been a week since the super awesome fun time that I had at w00tstock 2.3 at the Guthrie Theater.  I could write about the five incredible geek filled hours and what happened at the show, but there are likely better accounts of it.  Not only that, I’d posit it’s actually hard to encapsulate the night sufficiently enough so that someone who wasn’t there would understand.  They won’t and the best you can hope for is mild empathy.

But circumstances being what they were, w00tstock ended up being for me more than just a geeky good time, but a reaffirmation of being a geek and being comfortable with that.  None of this may have happened without a couple of unfortunate things to happen before w00tstock even started.  On the day of the show, Melanie was ill and couldn’t go with me.  The unseen side-effect of this is that I drove by myself to the event and had the time to get my poster signed by the performers (this last bit might not have happened as Melanie is not a night person and may have wanted to go home immediately after the show).  Driving home after the event for an hour and a half with no company to blather my geeky squee gave me time to reflect, not just reminisce fondly.  Most of what I thought about was the sign-line.

When I got in line to get my poster signed by the show participants, I felt really nervous.  What would I say?  With the exceptions of Tim Bedore, a very funny comedian whom I had not seen before that night and Dr. Kakalios, who gave an absolute hilarious physics presentation, I knew the work of everyone else at w00tstock and held their work in deep admiration.  And as I drew closer to them, they all seemed pretty much like me…which was weird but wonderful at the same time.

As I actually started to get things signed by these people, I started to babble a bit.  It starts with John Scalzi at the first spot.  I enjoy his books greatly, his blog more and wanted to let him know.  But I didn’t…I said something incoherent about how I wished I could’ve brought an actual book for him to sign.

Shortly after, Trace Beaulieu signed my poster and SHOOK MY HAND.  He was classy and also noticed the t-shirt I wore.  Being a huge MST3K fan, this was fun to meet someone who really shaped my appreciation for quipping and obscure humor.  Same could be said for Kevin Murphy and Bill Corbet, and all three were fun guys, really enjoying the moment.  Paul and Storm were two guys I had not seen live but love their work.  It was a lot of fun meeting them.

The last two were Wil Wheaton and Adam Savage.  Both had very funny bits and I was surprised at Adam’s way of energetic story-telling.  It was here I really froze up and just thanked them for doing w00tstock in general.  I really didn’t know what to say.  I did get to shake their hands as well, but it seemed awkward to me.

After finding Molly Lewis to get her to sign my poster (her song about Stephen Fry is classic), I left the Guthrie and finally figured out how to get into the parking ramp to get my car.  I started the long drive home, thinking about the night and how damn happy I was.  Driving for an hour lets your mind wander a bit and eventually my mind drifted to thinking about the actual participants.  Here were a fine group of people who were really enjoying themselves and got to do something fun with other people they admire.  I’ll admit; I was a bit jealous.

Then it struck me.  All of the w00tstock performers embraced being geeky and weren’t trying to be someone they weren’t, but they were just being themselves.  Their fan base is easy to understand as people naturally gravitate towards genuine people.  My thoughts then took a good left turn and how I was writing recently.  My writing was more of imitation, of wanting to be like other writers and not just writing like me…for me.

And just like that, the fog lifted.  My writing issues over the last years seems less daunting and more fun.  I remembered the times in college where I wrote uninhibited and free from my internal editor.  The only way I would be able to regain that freedom would be to fully embrace who I am.  I am still in many ways that geeky kid in college who wrote crazy newsletters with a running plotline for his college theater group, the same one who wrote quirky vampire stories fueled by coffee at 2 A.M. at the local 24 hour restaurant, the person who regularly bounced comic book ideas off his friends, the guy who made weird, strangely funny movies about Kung-Fu, Santa Claus, bitter men and movie producers…all of this was a part of my past, a past I had forgotten or stashed away since graduating and trying to “grow-up”, whatever that means.  All the nights spent playing AD&D, all the times strumming a guitar and making up blues songs, all of the notebooks we scribbled stories about a rogue cheese terrorizing the town, all of the stuff I tucked away when I got a real job came back to me.

w00tstock made me remember.

Since that night, the writing has been easier.  I’ve never completely shed my geek label, but in the past years it has been muted, dimmed by just trying to get through the day rather than trying to make the day something to remember, kept alive by being a tech geek, a gamer and my love for obscure trivia.

At the end of w00tstock, I felt strange about that general thank you, but I was right.  I thanked Wil, Adam, Paul and Storm, though at the time I didn’t know exactly what for.  That voice was just my inner geek giving thanks for being renewed.