3/16/2002:

Hey. Sil here.

Kip has a lot of things on his mind at the moment. Thus it looks like I'm going to have to try my hand at the blurb today. Somebody call the office and tell them to set the flying pigs loose.

So what to do? I figure that since the Girl Stories have been drumming up such a response, there is something to be said about the demand for online confessionals, much like the allure of reality tv shows (ok, and also for good old empathy and human connection, silly cynical me). I also assume that Kip's musings can be credited for the gender bias of our readers. Is this because there are no Boy Stories to act as counterpart to the Girl Stories? If so, then I think it's high time Scrubs had a dose of the other perspective.

So here it is. Sil's First Boy Story.

The gender subject was touched upon before, when I realized that, since the launch of Scrubs, I had only received three emails from readers of the female persuasion, a fact which raised a few questions on my part. Does Scrubs repulse female readers with its noticeably male pov? Am I somehow betraying my gender by not asserting my viewpoint enough? Does this really even matter? In the end, I think that the answer, at least to the final question, is a big fat "not really."

I realize that it'd be ridiculous to try and divide emotion along gender lines. There are, of course, some things that transcend all the boundaries that divide and categorize us. In one of his blurbs, Kip said that "a friend asked if this was the first time I had lost love and I'll say that sentiment so frequently echoed by males everywhere. I don't know what love is." But I think that it is a sentiment echoed by anyone, anywhere, regardless of gender, race, or creed. Just for the record, girls get plenty of pain and frustration out of relationships, or the lack thereof. I sure as hell don't know what love is, and I don't think that there's some special insight riding on my extra x-chromosome that is going to reveal the secret to me.

Even still, I have to admit that sometimes I feel like I'm losing Scrubs to some Boy's Club of Commiseration, when it was originally launched by Kip and me as a collaborative project for sharing all the quirky spontaneous fun of our friendship. Don't get me wrong: I realize that I shoulder the responsibility for much of this, seeing as I disappeared for a good five months. Yet, I know that right now, I feel closer to Kip than I ever have. I know that by working together on Scrubs, we have come up against parts of each other's personalities and creative processes that we may never have encountered otherwise, and that we're better friends for it. I'm glad that we started the webcomic, and I think of myself as incredibly fortunate to be living with someone so understanding of my eccentricities, and so amazingly intelligent and creative in his own right. Someone whose insight I have grown to trust and respect, and who still doesn't mind doing stupid shit with me like dancing in the living room or babbling in imaginary tongues. I hope that some of this still comes across in the strip.

-Sil