Last year all of my friends were playing Destiny and I felt pretty left out. This year they’re all excited for the new expansion, Rise of Iron, and I feel left out again. No one likes being on the outside.
There’s nothing worse than being on the outside of an inside joke. I know this from experience, but also because I’ve got a lot of inside jokes with my best friends.
I’ve had plenty of people tell me how they feel left out when my friends Vince, Nate and I laugh at something completely random. When I attempt to explain why the concept of junior highers driving themselves to church is hilarious, though, I end up looking stupid and the people I’m speaking to end up bored.
That’s the problem with an inside joke: even when explained it doesn’t have the same meaning.
That concept can also be applied to different nerdclinations.
My life has been filled with so much Destiny lately. A lot of my friends have either been playing Destiny or talking about it for months. Ron, my co-host on The Christian Nerd Podcast, has been obsessed with the game for weeks. And now that The Taken King has come out I feel even more left out than I was before. It’s like Bungie created the world’s biggest inside joke and I’m standing on the outside all alone.
Here are some other nerdclinations that make me feel like I’m on the outside.
Anime
I just don’t get anime. SyFy had an anime week when I was younger and that was about as deep as I ever got into it. I haven’t ever watched any of the mainstream anime like Dragonball or any of the obscure ones like… I don’t even know any obscure anime to name. I could never get beyond all of the stylistic differences between anime and American animation. I like clean lines and fluid movement; anime was always way more stylized than that. I suppose anime’s style was cooler, but I preferred that with which I was comfortable. I suppose anime is like cool, indie rock, but I pretty much just want to listen to U2.
YouTube
I also don’t understand the term “YouTuber.” I don’t subscribe to many YouTube channels and I never go to YouTube as a source for original content. For me YouTube is a place to watch movie trailers and videos of animals. Apparently, though, people will spend hours on YouTube watching their favorite YouTube stars. I know an actual YouTube star and I still don’t understand the concept. Along with making me feel like I’m standing on the outside, not understanding YouTube also makes me feel very, very old.
Disneyland
I love Disney. I think Disney is a tremendous company that understands the most profitable merchandising comes from creating the best content. I don’t understand, though, people who go to Disneyland five or six times a week. I have plenty of friends and students with Disneyland passes. They seemingly spend as much time at Disneyland as they do their homes or their jobs. And they treat going to Disneyland like a job, something they have to do. I really don’t get it. I’ve had Disneyland passes before and it was fun to go and walk around the park without feeling compelled to do as much as possible. I don’t need to spend hundreds of dollars to be on the inside with this one; I’ll happily remain on the outside.
When I was younger I hated being left out; I always wanted to be on the inside. As I’ve gotten older, though, I’ve realized that we can’t be on the inside with everything. Choosing to be on the inside in one area means we’ll be left out of another. I just want to make sure that I’m choosing the best places to be inside and not wasting my time on the wrong ones.
If someone bought me Destiny, though, I would happily move to the inside.
What nerdclinations leave you feeling left out?
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