Provocative question from a marketing e-mail: "Do you consider yourself a nerd?"
Oh, if only the bullies had put it like that, I might have said, "Sure."
Next question: "Do you want to know where you can go to be surrounded by others who share the same interests and obsessions with certain movies, books, or games?"
I assume it's hell.
The e-mail was a marketing come-on from lombardohomes.com, announcing a national ranking of nerdy states. Minnesota is the 17th nerdiest. We'll get to the methodology in a moment, but for now we must ask: Is being labeled a nerd good or bad?
In my youth, it was a term of derision. A nerd was someone who had no social panache, no sense of the cool. An overly moist lad with a retainer. He wore polyester shirts from Sears in bad plaid patterns. One of my nerd friends had a pocket protector, in case his big Bic four-color pen leaked. He also had a slide rule, in case anyone needed to calculate the amount of fuel needed to get to the moon. It rarely came up.
He was also a Boy Scout and could build a fire using a protractor and a Coke bottle — or, failing that, by concentrating the beams of the sun through his nerd-strength glasses, which he'd had since he was two days old. We were friends because we liked comic books and science fiction — the sort of stuff that defined the pitiful nerd in those days. Walking with a red-shamed face past the homecoming football game while dreaming of rockets and superheroes.
But how does the survey define a nerd? Turns out it includes someone who has furnishings in their house based on a licensed character. "Furnishings?" You say. A Thor-themed armoire? A Star Wars ottoman? And why isn't there a superhero named Otto Man? By day, mild-mannered Turkish furniture store clerk! By night, crime's deadliest foe! Evil can't put its feet up and be comfy as long as OTTO MAN stalks the streets!
Sorry, got nerdy there. Anyway, a blanket can tip you into the nerd category, and that's the case with Minnesota. Mere possession of a Harry Potter blanket will move you to the nerd side.
But ... it was something the kid had 10 years ago. It's in the closet. I asked her if she minded if we took it to Goodwill, and she didn't, but I haven't gotten around to it.
NERRRRRRRD!
What? No. Are you saying that the possession of this blanket puts me in the same category as a guy who has 24 GI Joes in their original boxes lined up on a shelf with halogen lights and the complete collection of Lego "Star Wars" mini-figurines based on the 1981 novelization of "Empire Strikes Back"?
How would you know about such things if you weren't a NERRRRRRD?
Oh, begone, you're a very silly person. Monty Python reference! NERRRRD!
I think the word they're looking for is geek. All this pop culture stuff is geek territory. Nerd is associated with a certain technical know-how. 3M's research labs are full of nerds. The state government's policymaker offices are full of wonks. Nerds can be wonks, of course, and wonks can be geeks, and if you're all three, chances are you were called a dork.
Point is, I don't think we're a particularly geeky, nerdy or dorky state. I think we're sorta kinda wonky-dorky, overall. And that's a hunky-dory thing to be.
