I Was A Weirdo Kid
And I’m glad I learned a few things
I feel like I need to begin this essay with a disclaimer. I am all about being yourself. I spent way too many years being someone I was not or, more specifically, being less than myself to try to be enough or keep the peace. I would never want anyone to feel what I felt for those years. We should never feel shame over how we were designed. However, I am very thankful for the things I learned when journeying from weird to slightly less weird (smile). I am thankful because as big as we want the world to be, it’s still real, and it’s still pretty narrow. And I knew I had to live in it.
I was a weird kid. I was never good in groups, really. I would rather read and use my imagination to make my dolls and animals talk. I loved to draw. I also loved to color, but I wanted to make my own drawings. When the teacher would pass out a coloring page of a horse or a rose or a house, I would turn it over to the blank side so I could draw my own version. I remember when a visiting artist got out her guitar and sang a song about how roses don’t have to be red and leaves don’t have to be green. I loved that song.
I secretly wanted to be heard and noticed and in the thick of things, but I had no idea what to say, and I was also terrified of the…
