Maybe It’s Unreachable for Me: Inadequacy in “SK8 The Infinity”

Note: This post contains spoilers for recent episodes of SK8 The Infinity (episodes 7 and 8 specifically).

It will come as a surprise to no one that much of my sense of self is tied up in my life as a hobbyist. I entered my mid-20s as a mediocre college graduate, employed but not in a field I was passionate about, and began to develop my passions elsewhere by watching a lot of anime and writing about it. I also did fan-art (sometimes) and played some video games here and there. At least as far as those activities were concerned, I felt pretty good about myself. I’d always been praised for my artistic ability as a kid and for a long time I had deluded myself into thinking that I was better than most people, at least when it came to drawing anime-inspired cartoon characters (and any art teachers who may have critiqued my chosen subject matter were just art snobs with nothing to tell me). And as far as video games were concerned, I always managed to play through the most popular ones and when I was younger I’d even give tips and walkthroughs to my friends who were stumped. I spent a long time on the phone walking people through the dungeons in The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, that’s for sure.

Setting foot into the broader world disavowed me of a lot of those assumptions about my own skills. I was never too broken up about realizing that I was “just okay” at video games, because it became clear as I got older that I had less and less time to devote to the sort of sprawling, epic RPG’s I’d loved as a teenager. This felt to me more like an artifact of getting older, and while that’s disappointing to have to confront it’s also predictable. I still play and enjoy games when I get around to them, but I never had dreams of being some big-name gaming journalist or live streamer, so I’ve just never been left with a major sense of loss.

But I was proud of my art, until I got out into the world and met people who were already better than I could ever hope to be at the kind of art I loved to make. I have several embarrassing stories from that period of time during which I had to be dragged kicking and screaming to this realization. One time our anime club was holding a T-shirt design contest. There were several entries including mine. I no longer have the line art, but I recall it was some circular image with an anime-style girl and a mascot character on it. I can tell now that it was fine, but nothing special; when it came to a vote the winner was a friend of mine whose art was clearly superior in both skill and design sense; you know, something you’d actually want to wear on a T-shirt. I remember being so dumbfounded at the time by the fact that my design lost out; it wasn’t even in the top 3 (I’m not sure it was wise for the people managing the vote to give out that information, but they couldn’t have known how much of a disaster I was or how hard I’d take it). I even lashed out at my boyfriend at the time when I discovered that he’d “betrayed me” by choosing the other contender with his vote.

After that and a couple of similar experiences, I felt my desire to draw and paint wane and fade away. I watched my determined friends sharpen their skills and go on to make beautiful works of art, but even when I was still haphazardly plugging away I never really saw much improvement in my own skills, so I mostly gave it up after a protracted period of feeling sorry for myself.

Anime, though, anime was my thing. I lucked out in that the time period I was first active with my writing was also a time where access to new anime was somewhat more restricted. It took some additional knowledge and effort to navigate the shifty torrent websites one needed in order to keep up on new anime at the time, so I easily settled into my own niche. I was that gal who had the inside scoop on what was good and bad as the new seasons rolled out four times a year, and it was a great feeling. Sure, my writing wasn’t that great, but it was enthusiastic and consistent, which was about all that was really required to build an audience at the time. Granted, a chunk of that audience were people who enjoyed hiding behind their anonymity to be abusive, but I suspect that will be a constant truth until the day I die. I felt like I was doing something important, and in the process I just really enjoyed writing.

I’m not a very outgoing person and I’ve always had a really difficult time advocating for myself, so I’ve had to maintain a strong belief in the ability of actions to speak louder than words. I do my best to let the quality of what I do and who I am speak for itself, and in some ways that’s served me well. That post-college job that I thought was temporary has become a 15-plus-year (and counting) career, after all, mostly because I’ve just tried to do the best work that I can and my supervisors have taken notice. For a long time I thought that same mentality would serve me in my writing, too; early on I tried to really push myself to write about anime topics that expanded my knowledge of the medium. I’ve attempted to let more of myself shine through my writing, since so much of my feelings about anime branch off from my personal experiences. I’m no good at advertising or making connections, because I’m just really shy. But in a fair and just world, my day of recognition would come eventually, right?

I recall a moment that illusion came crashing down for me. Some years ago, the ANN podcast was planning an upcoming show related to feminist topics and sexism and I just knew it was time time to shine. At that time I’d been writing feminism-focused essays and reviews for a quite a while, and a friend of mine had connections to members of the ANN staff, so it was as if the stars had aligned for me. I emailed my info and my desire to be a part of the podcast, downloaded and set up Skype, and waited, and waited…

The past couple episodes of SK8 The Infinity, a series that I’ve been digging so far mainly for its ability to be fun and over-the-top, have hit me in a very personal way. After teaching Langa the basics of skateboarding and seeing him suddenly take flight and flourish in the S competitions, Reki begins to question his own skills and by extension his own identity. Skating has always been his thing, a hobby that’s consumed his every waking moment and in which his skills were at least above-average with room to grow. It was Reki’s dream to be a top competitor and skate alongside the greats. To see something he wants so damned badly, which in spite of all his practice and enthusiasm he still has yet to achieve, come so easily to a newcomer, is frustrating and heartbreaking. More so as he begins to hear and internalize the chatter pegging him as “that useless red haired guy who hangs around Snow” (“Snow” being Langa’s S pseudonym).

Reki, in his jealousy, begins to lash out at Langa and then withdraw into himself out of shame. I think this is mainly where he and I differ. I’ve got a personal policy now where I don’t take out my insecurities on other people, because logically I know their success doesn’t or shouldn’t hurt me. Obviously it hasn’t always been this way; just re-read the art anecdote above. But I’ve embarrassed myself enough at this point that I’ve had to actively subvert my instincts in this way. And, you know, sometimes it can feel pretty good to cheerlead others’ successes, especially when the alternative is just feeling sorry for yourself with no reprieve.

I suspect Reki’s storyline will resolve in a way that allows him to utilize his talents designing and constructing skate gear, supporting his friend in the most specific and helpful way he can so that they can both bask in the good feelings that come alongside success. It’s obvious he has an uncanny knack for being able to identify what skateboard components can rebalance and enhance Langa’s innate and unique talents, so they’ll make a great team whenever the series decides to let them.

But like… what if life keeps reminding you that you have literally no unique talents? Being able to support my friends, fellow writers, and even just big name fans I admire from afar is satisfying as its own thing, but as time goes on I realize that efforts I’ve made to convince myself that it’s enough for me have been in vain. I want to distinguish myself in a way only I’m able to, and be recognized for it in a way that’s meaningful to me. I don’t want to imply that the readers and friends I have through my blog and the conventions I attend aren’t important to me, because they are. But I also don’t want to be someone that’s only known for being a nice person or just someone who’s adjacent to successful people or a writer whose output can be described mostly as “competent.” But the older I get, the more I feel like I’m staring at everyone’s back as they walk away from me, their hard work paying off while mine seems to get sucked into a void.

In 2017 I attended A-kon, a large convention in the Dallas/Fort Worth area of Texas. It was a really fun experience and opened me up to attending larger conventions again. But possibly the most memorable take-away from that experience for me was having the opportunity to attend a few panels by anime and fandom scholar Helen McCarthy, a woman from the UK who, over the years, has gained a ton of first-hand knowledge about development of anime fandom in the West. She’s a published author, an avid Twitter-user, and generally just a delight to listen to. I’ve joked a few times that she’s who I want to be when I “grow up.”

But honestly, is it even possible at this point?

There’s a lot of respect that comes along with being a “first” at something, and a lot of expertise that’s easier to obtain when it hasn’t been slurped up by the forever-unsated maw of academia and hidden behind multiple paywalls and gatekept from within. I respect and admire the hell out of people like Helen McCarthy or Frederik Schodt, people whose scholarship have helped make anime appreciation the broad and bountiful pursuit it is today. But there’s no way for me to have been there at the beginning, and each subsequent phase of anime fandom – the untranslated viewings in out-of-the-way viewing rooms at sci-fi conventions, the early days of VHS fansubbing, the transition between digi-subs and legal streaming – have been moments I’ve accessed passively, whether from hearing stories or just as a matter of course. I’m not an innovator, just a consumer. Someone who reaps the benefits without being important to the process.

I’m also just some shmuck who had some minor infamy for a while writing vaguely feminist anime reviews, who then fell off the radar for a few years and now has been eclipsed multiple times over by the excellent writing at places like AniFem and ANN. I admire the hell out of the folks who’ve turned anime fandom into more than just something to chat about on convention weekends, and love reading and hearing their perspective. They’ve made my experience in anime fandom all the more enjoyable. But I wish that my perspective was something worthy of notice, too.

It should be obvious at this point, though, that the reply from ANN about their podcast never came, and the whole experience just inflamed my constantly-simmering imposter syndrome and made me feel so humiliated in front of the few close friends I’d told in my initial excitement that I just wanted to melt into a hole in the ground.

So why bother? As many breaks (intended or otherwise) I take from my writing, I always seem to come back to it in the end. I think one of my fatal flaws is that part of me believes that the world works on some system of fairness that I’ve been unable to access as of yet due to my own lacking toolset. I think that’s partly what draws me toward anime storytelling, because for all the medium’s various types of characters and the tales they inhabit, it tends to skew more toward simplistic morals and uplifting stories. Oftentimes stories operate on a system that just feels fair, where characters are compensated for their hard work or perseverance by gaining some reward. Reki suffers emotionally because the thing he most wants to accomplish is something he might not ever be able to do. But his talents might allow him to be able to do something just as fulfilling, as long as he realizes his own talents in time to use them.

One of the first things you supposedly learn as a kid (or at least as a kid with parents who are motivated to stop their kids from whining) is that real life isn’t fair. I feel the ache of that fact in my bones; the world just isn’t one of equal give-and-take because the laws of cause-and-effect aren’t absolute. My life is not a series of 1-cour stories that are fated to be tied up with neat little bows after 12 episodes. And yet… maybe it’s just stubbornness on my part but I have this innate need to grasp at the impossibility of my broken brain’s interpretation of justice, to mold my life into some semblance of what I see as being “fair.” I just wish that, at some point, I could find out that I have a talent and put it to use, so that I can shed this tattered and broken and sad person I’ve become in the meantime. I want to feel useful to my friends in my anime club, who don’t really need me around to tell them what anime is worth watching anymore; they have access to all the same resources that I do and are capable of forming their own opinions. I want to be able to have a family and be the cool mom who introduces her kids to anime. I want to stop hating my body for not allowing me to have a family. I want to be someone worth admiring.

I want…

I want…

I want to reach for that star.

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