Christopher Randall Nicholson (He/Him)
​About Me

"Since he was very young he had known that in certain ways he was unlike anyone else he knew. For a child the consciousness of such difference is very painful, since, having done nothing yet and being incapable of doing anything, he cannot justify it." - Ursula K. Le Guin, The Dispossessed, p. 106

Courtesy of Darby Eldridge, who probably doesn't even remember this.

A long time ago, on June 23, 1993, in the very white city of Orem, Utah, a beautiful baby was born. Coincidentally, I was born in the same hospital on the same day.

My parents were impoverished BYU students and had been planning to graduate and tour Europe before having children, but they claim that they felt my spirit up in heaven begging them to let me be born. So it was done and I graduated with them. From BYU. Not my proudest moment.

After we graduated we moved from Utah to Glens Falls, New York. Around the age of two, when my first sister was born, my genetic inclination to depression set in and I was no longer a happy baby.​ About a year later we moved upstate to Massena and then Fort Jackson, a thriving metropolis of two hundred by the Canadian border that one friend aptly described as "half Mormons, half Christians, and half sex offenders".​ The region, known to locals as the North Country, had almost zero mental health resources for children. But it was pretty.

After that it didn't take long at all for me to become jaded and cynical, as my original kindergarten picture (which my parents inexplicably made into a Christmas ornament) can attest.

Even though nobody ever bothered to tell me and I had to figure it out for myself, I also turned out to have high functioning autism, which was a huge factor in me being an exasperation for my parents and phenomenally unpopular at school. I started life as an extrovert but after a couple years of being tormented by everyone and their dog on the school bus, I became introverted as a survival mechanism. And did I mention that I was depressed? Things got better in high school, when people stopped tormenting me and other guys only picked on me because that's how males bond, but I was still depressed. How I described myself circa fifth or sixth grade:

Some of my adolescent adventures:

Me circa 2010, when everyone in my family had to get our pictures taken professionally because reasons.

I was born into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints but, like all members, had to decide for myself whether I actually believed in it or not. I thought it was boring and my attitude toward it ranged from apathetic to hostile until a random spiritual epiphany around age twelve or so. From then on it was an incentive for me to not kill myself, first out of fear that I would be punished for it and later out of love for God and hope for a better future. One of the greatest faith-building experiences that I drew on for support was my first and only Especially for Youth (a week-long church retreat, now called For the Strength of Youth) in Rexburg, Idaho, August 2010.

A month after came the first of my faith crises when I learned things about the church's history that didn't jive with what the church had taught me. I had to re-evaluate my faith and alter a few paradigms and then I had to do it a few more times. But I interpreted the intense elevation emotion I'd felt at EFY as a spiritual witness that the church was true, so that was my starting point.

I always wanted to be an author, and English was one of my favorite/easiest classes throughout high school. I owe a debt of gratitude to Miss Compo-Martin, who promised to hunt me down if I didn't pursue writing; Miss Conger, the wisecracking cynic from church; Mr. Palmer, whom I thought I'd hate due to his initial stern and cold demeanor but turned out to be pretty awesome; and Mrs. Snyder, who was more of a wise and mature classmate than a teacher. Her twelfth grade AP English class:

And a poem written about us by my good friend Brandi:

My depression vanished for a year after EFY, but when I moved out to Utah for college (at USU, not that other school), the culture shock and loneliness and my own poor lifestyle choices culminated to resurrect it with a vengeance. I never served the traditional two-year proselytizing mission for my church, and I almost didn't finish college either. I didn't initially choose English as a major because I thought I should pursue something less likely to make me poor forever, but after three stressful years of Wildlife Science I realized that I wouldn't be happy unless I followed my true passion. But crap still happened and I took a leave of absence for a year and a half and it probably would have lasted forever if my father hadn't badgered me to finish. In December 2018, over seven years after I began, I graduated with a Bachelor's degree in English with a Creative Writing emphasis. It was more than a little anticlimactic, but at least I made it.

The worst day of my life -

Yes, thank you. It was January 14, 2020, when my delusional neighbor and her gullible best friend lied to the police that I was stalking them. The first I heard of it was when a mindless bully named Hayden Nelson entered my apartment to yell at and threaten me until I became suicidal. He then forced me to go to the emergency room of Logan Regional Hospital, where the staff treated me like an assembly line product that they couldn't wait to finish. I told them what they wanted to hear so I could get out as fast as possible because I didn't have health insurance. I came within an inch of killing myself that night, and I didn't have a moment of happiness for months. I later filed a complaint against Nelson, but Logan City Police Department refused to conduct the promised investigation and ignored all follow-up contact.

​In fall 2020, at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, I started earning my Master's degree in the same category and working as an English 1010 instructor. It provided just the right amount of challenge, stretching me without driving me to despair, and I loved it. I graduated four very short and wonderful semesters later. My thesis was on "The Underappreciated Intersection of Science Fiction and Satire."

A few weeks later I made the difficult but inevitable decision to leave the LDS Church, for several reasons. I wish I had done it much sooner and not devoted so much time and energy and money to a lie, but I don't regret moving to Utah or meeting so many wonderful people in the church. I don't believe there is one true religion, and my beliefs about the existence and nature of God vary from day to day. After shopping around a bit, I started attending the Cache Valley Unitarian Universalists to retain a religious community and spirituality without the dogma or bigotry.

On December 15, 2023, more than thirteen years after I started it, I self-published my first novel, Crusaders of the Chrono-Crystal.

I'm still on a lifelong search for truth. I try to glean it from every source, gaining a fuller understanding of the world and revising my views and opinions as needed. The world would be in much better shape if more people were honest enough to change their beliefs instead of worshiping their own confirmation bias. Also, I'm asexual/heteromantic. I'm not sure where to fit that into the article so here it is.

Many Bothans died to bring us this information. And there's even more!

My Autistic Life

Depression

Insomnia

Asexuality/Heteromanticism

My Favorite Musics

My Favorite Star Wars Fan Films

My Favorite The Legend of Zelda Fan Films

The North Country

Excerpts from My Autobiography

Interview by Dara Isom

My Testimony