Growing up as a scrawny Star Trek nerd in the '90s, I learned pretty quickly to hide that part of myself to avoid being bullied just because I knew a little Klingon (Qapla'!).

• Now, approaching my 40s, I've learned to let my geek flag fly — and I'm glad, Axios' Alex Fitzpatrick writes.

🌌 The big picture: Part of what makes this easier is that the world has changed. And, yes, I'm older. But now geek culture is mainstream culture.

• 🎮 Star Wars is inescapable. The Marvel Cinematic Universe is a $30-billion-plus franchise. The video game business generates more revenue than movies and music combined.
• I've also got a partner who (mostly) appreciates my nerdiness, or at least finds it endearing.

💪 Between the lines: It's empowering to embrace a side of myself that I once felt pressured to tuck away.

• Nerd culture offers some genuinely great storytelling. Letting myself love it fully, without irony, is a tremendous relief.
• It also helps to still be a little embarrassed of my nerdiness — in a fun, slightly self-deprecating way.

I fully recognize that lots of Star Trek output, for example, is objectively not great.

• But when it hits, boy does it hit. "The Inner Light," "City on the Edge of Forever," "In the Pale Moonlight" ... the list goes on.

🎙️ I owe a lot of my comfort here to a pair of podcasters, Adam Pranica and Benjamin Harrison, whose decade-long Trek show, "The Greatest Generation," models positive, inclusive, self-aware geekdom.

• That approach also helps avoid the pit of toxic fandom — nerd culture should be inclusionary, not judgmental.
• Otherwise, the once-bullied become bullies themselves.

🌟 Then there's my son. He's 6, currently deep in his Star Wars era, and watching him fearlessly geek out is just so dang wholesome.

• He's still way too young for Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.
• But give it time. When he is, I'll be right there.

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Finish Liner Rick Battson of Washington State traveled to Sun City, Ariz., earlier this month for spring training. His team: the San Francisco Giants, who train at nearby Scottsdale Stadium!