This was a very thought provoking post, and are we nerds/nurds however you want to spell it. No!
When I was in high school, oh so many decades ago, there were two groups of people, Jocks and Nerds. Jocks talked about sports, and about sports, sports, game matches, sports, and sports, and girls once or twice, but mostly sports. They reminded me of birds, as in roosters, parrots, and male turkeys that go around strutting to show off their bodies and pick on others to show their position. The jocks were the ones that had to show how tough they were by dumping someone else's books in the hall.
The nerds, who got picked on by the jocks, talked about science, math, and other interesting stuff. Where did I fit in? Well in the middle. I couldn't care less really about sports. Still can't and never will. I usually hung out with the nerds because of their hatred of sports. Occasionally I'd have to interface with the jocks, but not much. I usually ended up helping them with their homework. Most were pretty dumb, mostly out of their nerdy obsession for sports.
Sports for me are boring. and as someone else said, they make the thick-heads feel important as they push their testosterone around the gym. I do like to watch a good boxing match, or Nascar race occasionally, but overall I could care less about Monday Night Football. The other reason was I was somewhat handicapped. I was born with a clubbed foot, had surgery when I was young, and could never run fast. Not running fast meant you were picked on, and was usually picked last for any team. So as time went on, I hated sports more and more, and ended up with more interest in science, music, history, and philosophy, so I hung out more with the nerds, although I never was as "smart" as they were.
Was I picked on in school? I sure was. This is because I was a critical thinker, and was not a follower. I was also called a lot of nasty things, which I won't say here in the forum. Are they true, no! I have had several girlfriends in my life. These relationships lasted until the old, lets get married question came up. At this point, I chose to run because I don't like commitments. The last GF I had wanted me to move in. She was a 100% control freak who liked to order me around. We got along fine until I told her that it would be a nice idea if we went somewhere other than where she wanted to go. Women can be weird! Sorry Nikki, don't take offense to this.
Anyway as time went on, my music interests grew, and I even had less in common with the so-called nerds. In fact today, I'm a loaner at work because I truly have nothing in common with anyone I work with. I never did anywhere I worked, and probably never will. So I keep to myself, show off my storm chasing pictures when asked, talk a little bit about music and trains when asked, and that's it. No one really cares, and I care even less about football.
The geeks as we know them today, didn't exist back then. This is a new phenomenon that has come out with the advent of personal computers. At first the nerds were the ones that made these computers work, and people would call the family nerd to fix them. In some respects this earned the respect of the family brainer, but you know this token respect only goes so far. Am I the geek at home. Probably, but out of vocation and not love. I fell into this role because I needed a job, so today I get called whenever something electronic dies, has technical problems, etc. This is also my work as well, which as we know keeps us tied at the desk as we try to keep up on new technology.
Anyway, what I'm getting at here, by using my own life example, is we are who we are by our genes, interests, and exposure to things in life. As we "grow up", and I put that in quotes because I feel we never grow up, but only mature in various ways instead, our interests jell together in one form or another to form our personalities.
So, David, you're not a nerd, geek, or whatever. You are yourself, and should/will always be a self-starter and thinker. Don't let others persuade you to be otherwise. Thinking critically instead of with the pack will get you further along in life than you think. It's the outside-thinkers that became our best leaders and inventors; not the sheep who go along with the popular opinions and ideas.
John