Following Your Dreams
I come from a conservative background, where being different was something frowned upon and ridiculed. In my schools, I wasn’t unpopular, but I stuck out. I was a bit of a tom-boy, the product of two older and somewhat-mischievous brothers. To be honest, I liked to be just a tad bit off normal—though my inner-voice always pushed me to ‘fit-in’.
When I moved out of my childhood home at eighteen, I left some of my tom-boy ways behind and met the world and college head-on. I quickly learned that I had accomplished my goal to be ‘normal’ and now instead of blending in, I stuck out against the dread-headed, unshaven, and often pink-haired comrades that meandered around my college’s campus. I secretly envied their ability to walk with their heads held high as the non-college attendees stared and whispered. How could they break from the normal and not get tired of the strange looks and judgments made by outsiders?