Growing up, I was always the weird kid in class. I was the one who was laughed at for imitating Data when ST:TNG had their “The Naked Now” episode. (Can’t forget that sexy security officer, Tasha Yarr!)
I was the kid who wrote random stories and fan fiction before I knew what fan fiction was.
I was the kid who got angry a lot, because no one seemed to understand what was going on in my head.
Being part of the comics community is fantastic. There are so many people who were the weirdo kid like me, and I love that. But it’s my non-comics friends that deserve a shout out.
My best friend from high school doesn’t read ANY comics except for mine because she wants to be supportive. She’s a voracious reader (she LOVES mystery/romance novels) and a mom, so where she gets the time to pour over my work is beyond me. But she does, and her support is unimaginably important to me. I’m here because of her love and support of me for the past 25 years.
My friends from college may have initially had trouble reconciling the combination of angry badass, athlete, grunge rocker, sorority girl (DG!), and comic book geek all wrapped up in five feet five and a half inches of me, but they also knew that I’d fight tooth and nail for any one of them. Many of them are still close with me today. And the ones I haven’t spoken to in a while still know they can call on me if they need to. After my dad passed away this past April, friends I hadn’t spoken to in ages came out of the woodwork just to send their support. That meant so much.
I am who I am today because of the people who love and support me, and who I love and support. Hubs is a big part of that, too.
Anyway, I love you all, but I wanted to give a special shout out to these particular people…and SK, AS, JA, FM, CC, CC (yes, another one) KM, JW, EB, EB (yet, another one), WP, SR, ER, RR, JD, VV, GS, ML, FM (and another one), BG, TS, BW, MK, MW, SA, EP, JE, JP, CF, BS, MS, ST, PT, MF, JD (aand another one), LG, NZ, SE, BW (aaand another one), and too many other people to remember right now. You know who you are because I’ve emailed or texted you a million times in the past month or so, and I thank you…THANK YOU!
Enjoy Saturday, everyone!