It isn’t going to be a shock to anyone who reads my blog that I have been considered weird more than once in my life. Of course now that I am in my 30′s, and as close to adulthood as I am ever likely to get, I am comfortable with my quirks and eccentricities, but this wasn’t always the case. So how did I get here? How did I evolve into a confident person who is comfortable in my own skin? Is it just the standard time-line for maturity? Was my youthful geekiness and lack of popularity a blessing in disguise, that has made me the well rounded person I am today?

Like everyone, I was plagued with self doubt and insecurity in my youth, but along with a few of my fellow weird kids, I had to come to terms with the fact that I actually was a bit different. Don’t get me wrong, I was a hell of a lot luckier that some of the unfortunate, acne ridden, and awkwardly incomprehensible nerds that no doubt lurked in the hallways of every school. I was funny, entertaining and even liked, just not that much. In my small school I was rarely able to find long-term friendship, maybe due my geeky hobbies, rebellious nature, sick sense of humour and interest in things that were not deemed appropriate for my age or sex.

Whatever the cause, barring a few short stints as back-up friend or being a third wheel I was best friendless for most of my school years. Although I was comfortable entertaining the group I didn’t really have much in common with the girls in my class, which left me wondering why I couldn’t manage to connect with them as they could with each other. The truth was, they were as unusual to me as I was to them. So without any real malice friendships would generally drift apart, and I could get back to reading strange adult books, playing computer games and generally living in a world of my own, while trying to not look bothered by it.

Logically I knew I was fairly happy in my own company, and that there were people out there who would appreciate my charms one day, but the shame of walking around alone, admitting that I was friendless was almost too much to bear at that age. So for a while I tried hard to fit into the groups in my class in a variety of ways, most of which were more comedic than successful. I tagged along with pairs of best friends, being constantly reminded of my lesser position. I also attempted to fit in with the high proportion of young Christians in my class. I went to sleepovers which ended in Sunday morning church visits, where I would be advised that my family would burn in hell, which t seemed like a steep price to pay for friendship with added disapproval. I even joined Youth for Christ for a few weeks, but after corrupting a few good Christians I had to admit it wasn’t going to be for me.

So once my options had been exhausted I learned to manage on my own while saving face as much as possible. At break time I would try to find a secluded spot or walk round quickly so nobody would notice I was on my own. I generally muddled on like that till my early teens, till I was lucky enough to find some friends who felt as different as I did amongst the sexually confused, different coloured or just plain weird fellow rejects.

Of course since then I have made many friends, and outside of the confines of a tiny school in a small town in Namibia it was easier to be successful. Getting to an age where boys realised they could actually hang out with girls also helped, as suddenly there were people who appreciated my love of comics, films, sci-fi and games. However, finally having close female friends to gossip and share secrets with was also a joy, and helped me realise that I wasn’t that weird after all, or even if I was, there were others like me about.

I am not sure any label is a perfect fit, but geek is probably closest fit for me, although back then the concept of a geek girl was alien, and frankly the geek or nerd labels were only ever used as insults. As much as I liked books and other nerdy hobbies, I didn’t do my homework often enough to be considered one, and was far too badly behaved to fit in with the swots. So I was never really sure where I fitted in. These days however you hear a lot about geek chic, and thanks to the internet there is definitely a greater sense of geek pride that their was when I was a youngster.

So maybe if this pride had been greater back then I would have felt happier and more confident, or at least know there were people out there who were as weird as me. Well I am sure it would have helped, but the reality is that no matter how awesome us grown-up geeks might think we are, the young don’t have that knowledge and some kids are always going to feel like outsiders. We have spent years figuring out who we are, building up life long friendships and finding out own niche, but any kid who finds themselves too far outside the norm is going to have to struggle, and who knows… maybe that isn’t always a bad thing.

Thanks to my childhood lack of friendship opportunities, be it through fate or self sabotage, I got tough. I learned that pretending to be someone else is never worth it and hiding who you are never works. I learned to throw myself into the things I love and laugh at my own flaws instead of trying to hide them, secure in the knowledge that anyone who liked the real me would be the kind of friend I wanted. I learned to love my own company and not care what anyone else thought of me being alone. I accepted that not everyone is going to like me, and trying to change that is pointless, which has saved me a lot of time and misery since.

However happy and confident or kind and friendly I might be, someone out there will dislike my opinions, my conversational style, my beliefs or even just my face. As a child, when my options felt so limited, each snub felt like a personal attack. The fear of being the outsider, the loser, the social reject was so great, it would lead me to obsess over why they didn’t like me. Was I too friendly? Was I not friendly enough? Did they think I was fake? Did they really think I was being bitchy when I made that joke? How can I prove to them that I am not as bad as they think? How do I make them like me?

Now that I am all grown-up(ish), I no longer fear being alone and I don’t feel the need to seek out friendships with people who don’t like me. Why would I when I have so many awesome friends who do? Of course I might feel a twinge of disappointment or social awkwardness when someone snubs me, but I can take it in my stride. If someone finds my opinions or personality repulsive I am unlikely to enjoy theirs, so why waste my time being anything other than polite? Of course sometimes someone I admire will seem to take a dislike to me, which is frustrating, but trying to guess why or change someone’s opinion of you is an exercise in futility. All you can do is be yourself and appreciate the friends you do have.

So am I grateful that I was an odd kid who had a hard time making friends? Well of course I could have done without those years of feeling inadequate, and if fate had been kinder I would have no doubt loved to have a closer friends back then, but it just wasn’t meant to be. I did however learn a lot, not least the value of the friends I do have. So yes, I am glad that I was and am a nerd, a weirdo, a social reject, as all those things have made me who I am today, which has gained me the best friends a geek like me could ever want.