{"id":2491,"date":"2015-08-04T09:15:43","date_gmt":"2015-08-04T15:15:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/janetheactuary\/?p=2491"},"modified":"2015-08-04T11:24:43","modified_gmt":"2015-08-04T17:24:43","slug":"from-the-library-just-a-geek-by-wil-wheaton","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/janetheactuary\/2015\/08\/from-the-library-just-a-geek-by-wil-wheaton.html","title":{"rendered":"From the library: Just a Geek, by Wil Wheaton"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Just looked at the comments on my prior post on unplanned parenthood, and I ought to respond \u2014<\/p>\n

(For the record:<\/p>\n

\u201csorry, but The Atlantic did treat the pro-life \u2018unplanned parenthood\u2019 stories as somehow not tragic enough; in any case, there was a recent study of women who wanted abortions but sought them out too late, and who, in the end, loved their kids after all, demonstrating that an unwanted pregnancy is not the same as an unloved child\u201d;<\/p>\n

\u201cthere is a difference between contraception and abortion \u2014 I am not discussing whether an author is making a reasonable choice in forgoing contraception, but rather looking to her insights on abortion and whether \u2018we need legal abortion to guarantee that sex will never result in a child unless youwant it to\u201d is a reasonable position to take\u201d; and<\/p>\n

\u201cI used the wrong tense \u2014 should have said \u2018which comes first\u2019 \u2013 in an individual\u2019s moral reasoning\u201d)<\/p>\n

\u2014 but, to be honest, I go back-and-forth on this. \u00a0I don\u2019t expect I\u2019m going to change anyone\u2019s mind, nor, really, that I\u2019m going say something that strikes others as exceptionally\u00a0insightful. \u00a0On the other hand, well, I blog for an audience, and try to write interesting things, but I also blog because I want to be able to say the things that are floating around in my head.<\/p>\n

But here\u2019s what I read yesterday \u2014 literally \u201cfrom the library\u201d but actually from the library used book sale, having not quite reconciled myself \u00a0to the fact that they withdraw books that are perfectly good, not outdated from a content perspective, but just older and not checked out very often. \u00a0(Holocaust memoirs, it seems to me, are at particular risk \u2014 there are no new ones being published, but the older ones will, from their age, soon show up as \u201ctoo old.\u201d \u00a0One that disappeared that I was particularly shocked at was a \u201cmemoir\u201d of a Jewish policeman in the ghetto \u2014 he wrote it while in hiding at the end of the war, and didn\u2019t survive the war. \u00a0It was quite eye-opening, but when I went to re-read it later, I had to request it from interlibrary loan.)<\/p>\n

And this book is 11 years old by now. \u00a0You can date it if for no other reason than the first sentence: \u00a0\u201cMost of the material in this book was originally written for my weblog, (the cool kids call it a \u201cblog\u201d) an almost daily diary that I publish at my website, wilwheaton.net<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

The book itself<\/strong>: \u00a0it\u2019s written by Wil Wheaton, per the title of the post, but it\u2019s\u00a0not a memoir of his child actor\/Star Trek days, except in passing; it covers a fairly short period in his life, from 2001, when he started blogging, to late the next year. \u00a0And the funny thing is, due to the fact that he\u2019s now appeared on The Big Bang Theory as a slightly evil version of himself several times, and we\u2019ve watched several Tabletop episodes (a Youtube show in which Wil demonstrates\/plays board games, such as Catan or Munchkin), it\u2019s easy to think of him as someone you know already.<\/p>\n

(Plus, we\u2019ve been watching Star Trek episodes from the DVD set I got for my birthday<\/a> and the voice for the German version of Wesley Crusher seems to me to be a bit extra-whiney, so it\u2019s easier to understand the mindset of the Wesley-haters, even though I never had a particular opinion on that debate.)<\/p>\n

Anyway, two things happened during this time period: \u00a0first, he discovered blogging, at a time when the concept was quite new (and, as a geek, he coded the site himself ) and, second, he learned to accept the decisions he made in the past and move on, building a career and a life for himself beyond one \u201cwe chose the other guy\u201d audition after the next.<\/p>\n

Now, the one-star reviews (a minority) on amazon.com complain that he\u2019s just recycling blog material, but that\u2019s a silly complaint to make, as this has become standard practice \u2014 everyone from Hyperbole and a Half to that 365-day crockpot cooking woman have done this, and before that, you had the example of newspaper columnist collections.<\/p>\n

And others complain that he\u2019s too self-absorbed \u2014 but that\u2019s pretty much the whole point. \u00a0The turning point in the book is when he unexpectedly gets two sitcom auditions and stays home from the family vacation (he is married with two stepsons) for them, only to have them go badly and realize he shouldn\u2019t have cancelled on his family for this slim thread of hope at a new acting job. \u00a0He then decides to focus on writing, both on his blog, and transforming the blog items into published text, realizing that his past choices were being driven by that voice in his head that he calls Prove To Everyone That Quitting Star Trek Wasn\u2019t a Mistake.<\/p>\n

He also writes about his initial desire to leave Star Trek behind and his later \u201creturn home,\u201d reconnecting with cast members and beginning to appear at conventions, not just unhappily earning needed cash, but out of enjoyment, and a new connection to fans, especially due to his developing connections with them through his willwheaton.net writing. \u00a0In a late episode, he cites a conversation with a convention organizer where is says, \u201cI tell him that I have more in common with the fans now than I do with the actors\u201d \u2013 and, in fact, the \u201cJust a Geek\u201d title refers to a lifetime love of science fiction, D&D, computers, and other geeky pursuits. \u00a0(I identify because I sometimes think of my public-policy reading as equally geeky, though with different subject matter.)<\/p>\n

Now, a look at his website in 2015 or a read of his Wikipedia profile<\/a>\u00a0will show that he\u2019s been pretty busy, at the intersection of the gaming and acting worlds, and I imagine that the bill-paying crises of the book are past. \u00a0But for the duration of this book, he\u2019s just another guy trying to figure out where he\u2019s headed, and realizing, over the course of the book, in \u201creal time\u201d (via the blog entries), that the destination he thought was always meant for him, wasn\u2019t so.<\/p>\n

So check out your library book sale. \u00a0And in the meantime, for those of you who like to share: \u00a0please tell us about your Wil Wheaton experiences.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Just looked at the comments on my prior post on unplanned parenthood, and I ought to respond \u2014 (For the record: \u201csorry, but The Atlantic did treat the pro-life \u2018unplanned parenthood\u2019 stories as somehow not tragic enough; in any case, there was a recent study of women who wanted abortions but sought them out too […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2209,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2491","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nFrom the library: Just a Geek, by Wil Wheaton<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Just looked at the comments on my prior post on unplanned parenthood, and I ought to respond -- (For the record: "sorry, but The Atlantic did treat the\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, 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