"you like stuff"

this week i've found myself thinking a lot about this quote from john green: (one of my top 10 favorite humans of all time)

“…because nerds like us are allowed to be unironically enthusiastic about stuff… Nerds are allowed to love stuff, like jump-up-and-down-in-the-chair-can’t-control-yourself love it. Hank, when people call people nerds, mostly what they’re saying is ‘you like stuff.’ Which is just not a good insult at all. Like, ‘you are too enthusiastic about the miracle of human consciousness’.”

and here's the thing:

i. love. stuff.

rarely ever do i have lukewarm feelings on something.

either i deeply, passionately hate it, or i am deeply, passionately, can't-shut-up-about-it in love with it.

part of what's so wonderful about the friends i've made through blogging over the last two years is that so many of them love stuff too. 

a few friends i've known for years understand my love for stuff, but most don't. 

i'm usually compared to (and rightfully so) that girl at the end of mean girls who doesn't even go here- "i just have a lot of feelings."

but you know what?

i am not ashamed.

i may get overly invested in things that seem trivial, but it doesn't matter.

i think it's better to love a million little things, rather than just one.

and yeah, years later i look back and i am often WILDLY embarrassed by the things i was deeply passionate about, but i'm still happy i loved them.

and just because i can, here are some of the things i have loved most in my lifetime. 

chad michael murray.

y'all i don't even know where this love even came from. i was obsessed with him years before i ever even watched one tree hill. but i had a life size poster of him in my room and (when they were married) a folder of pictures on my computer of sophia bush called "sophia bush man stealer." 

degrassi.

i was in middle school when i discovered degrassi, and you guys, i became a MONSTER. i had a poster hanging in my room that i had made, with a tiny picture of each character, then i drew color coded lines between them based on how they related to each other. 

(don't even talk to me about what the show is like now. i cannot even. recently i was reading an article about it in entertainment weekly, and they were like talking about how the new season of degrassi "totally goes there" (OBVIOUSLY) and as i was reading the description of the new season i thought "oh, AIDS, been there done that. drug use, been there done that. love between step siblings OKAY THAT'S NEW.")

lizzie and gordo. 

i shipped the two of them before i even knew what shipping was.

and okay, let's be real, i own all the lizzie mcguire dvds, and i have watched the episode where lizzie dates that skeezy guy ronnie and then gordo sees them kiss like PROBABLY a million times, because he is so obviously in love with her.

when she kissed him in the movie, my sixth grade self burst into tears, right there in the theater.

that kid from a series of unfortunate events.

honestly, i couldn't even remember his name (it's liam aiken) and i just had to look it up, but good lord was i obsessed with this kid.

i went and saw that movie like 4 times in theaters and i was so in love.

*MAY OR MAY NOT HAVE HAD AN AIM SCREENNAME ABOUT HOW MUCH I LOVED HIM*

i bought this weird postcard book that was basically pictures from the movie, and i hoarded the ones of him like GOLD. 

and then i made a collage of them right next to my bed so that i could look at it when i fell asleep.

i don't even know, you guys.

i could literally go on and on, but i think you get the point.

and if we're being honest, my behavior hasn't really changed, just the stuff i like has.

my more recent love of things (josh hutcherson, one direction, doctor who, the hunger games, ETC) is just as weird and obsessive as these things.

but no shame.

what are some of the things YOU have deeply loved, or love currently?