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The scarcity of non-ironic enthusiasm around here is being noticeably frustrating lately. Everybody's gotta be so jaded and qualify every statement of affinity for fear of being thought naive or, I don't know, unsophisticated. I miss nerds from undergrad.
Well, I should rephrase that. It's not that there aren't nerds here. I meet several of them on alternate Mondays for SCA Quire rehearsals. Most of them are middle-aged, and thoroughly calcified in their awkwardness. Not that I mind awkwardness. It's just not my favorite social function to be the suavest talker in a room. I'm used to (and I prefer) being either the straightman or the quick-reactive sounding board. The occasional younger participant in SCA rehearsals is flexible enough to share the Less Awkward title with me, but I miss the Rice kids and music school geeks who are so enthusiastic about their favorite society-marginal things that they're not even self-conscious about it.
That may be why I like the people I like so much. It's not that they don't contain healthy (or even unhealthy) amounts of irony and sarcasm. They just also have non-denigrating exuberance about at least one thing that isn't themselves.
Well, I should rephrase that. It's not that there aren't nerds here. I meet several of them on alternate Mondays for SCA Quire rehearsals. Most of them are middle-aged, and thoroughly calcified in their awkwardness. Not that I mind awkwardness. It's just not my favorite social function to be the suavest talker in a room. I'm used to (and I prefer) being either the straightman or the quick-reactive sounding board. The occasional younger participant in SCA rehearsals is flexible enough to share the Less Awkward title with me, but I miss the Rice kids and music school geeks who are so enthusiastic about their favorite society-marginal things that they're not even self-conscious about it.
That may be why I like the people I like so much. It's not that they don't contain healthy (or even unhealthy) amounts of irony and sarcasm. They just also have non-denigrating exuberance about at least one thing that isn't themselves.