There is a burden to never fitting in. And I do not. I read too much, but not best-sellers. I've seen thousands of movies, and have popular actors, or directors, who I will not watch, no matter how good the movie is supposed to be. I am married, but no children, no house, no complaining about my spouse. I drink, and but only like really good beer, and am not interested in staying out late, or clubbing, or ever getting drunk again. I am open minded, but do not smoke, or indulge in illegal pharmaceuticals. I have had very short hair, but have had to politely deflect female advances.
I look conventional, but my politics, attitudes toward religion, and experiences are not. I dress very modestly, but I have tattoos and have posed nekkid. I am a nurse, I was in the military, I don't like guns, but I am a good shot with an M16. I dance, write, throw pots, but can't give a rat's ass about stamping cards or crochet or other crafts. I have lived all over this country, but prefer to keep within a few miles of where I live. I get along best with those who are older or younger than I am, by about a decade. My age-mates tend to assume they know what I am about. And are usually wrong. The age gap obviates assumptions, which I prefer.
I talked about this* with Moira yesterday. I am not much like anyone I know. Neither is she. She still feels like a misfit. I have recently come to think that this is the consequence of an authentic life, unmotivated by tribalism. Misfits, I believe, are odd, but trying to fit in somewhere, as hard as they can, and failing that, reacting against - to become a stereotype of a different kind. Would we all be lovely eccentrics, if every choice were honest active responses of each of us becoming who we actually are?
It's a lonely road. No question. For, how many people are there to talk with where there is only the truth and the silence? The dear hard truth, and the kindly silence? No assumed commonality. To never say "Of course... " or "I have to... " save in jest? But I am also beginning to believe that it is the only way to have a real friend, or genuine intimacy. If I cannot bear to look at my bare soul, unique and warty and peculiar, and feel alright about that, how can I let anyone else in for a peek?
Most don't travel this way voluntarily. It hurts, and I have the scars to prove it. But to cram myself into any other life would have been a half death. This way is real, sometimes calm, not gentle, not easy. Very confusing, no answers, no one size to fit.
Still.
Anyone still reading HERE would understand.
*Some of this is verbatim from our chat.
23 comments:
Still reading to the end........ok, warning... am writing someone elses poetry in response to your words ( that have wriggled into my bleary early morning brain and have had me nodding in agreement).
Journal By Edna St Vincent Millay
I do believe that most of me
Floats under water; and men see
Above the wave a jagged small
Mountain of ice, and that is all.
Only the depths of other peaks
May know my substance when it speaks,
And steadfast throughout the griinding jam
Remain aware of what I am.
Myself, I think, shall never know
How far beneath the wave I go.
I would not presume to 'know' you Z, but I 'know' what you are saying.
Many people like "authentic", unusual creatures even if they don't understand them. Some people like to try different foods, go to foreign countries, or make friends with oddballs. Somehow we have attracted such oddballs, and I notice that they are the ones the kids remember and talk about. And that we love.
The only time in my life when I ever "fit in" was in art school from 1965 to 1968. Oh...and in A.A.
Like your writing.
herhimnbryn,
Icebergs all.
Nancy,
Certainly goes both ways. I've been treated as the oddity, to be gazed at and laughed at, though.
Louis,
Art and AA, two truth telling bunches.
I often wonder if there is anyone else out there 'like me'. Someone who has similar opinions in the same combinations.
It can really hurt to find that a group of people you identify with to an extent strongly dislike something that you feel is also a part of you. If you know what I mean... o_O
Pacian,
Yes.
Oh Pulleeeze (I don't usually insist like this)try to get a copy of "Dropped Threads 3/Beyond the Small Circle." It's a collection of fantastic essays by women writers on all aspects of life - and there is one written by a woman who has always considered herself an outsider - and it's fantastic. Actually, most of the book is fantastic.
I thought of this essay reading your entry.
And I empathize, Zhoen. If you fit perfectly, could you write as you do? I suspect that not fitting is part of why we write. Or writing (part of us always the observer)may be why we don't fit? That's a chicken and egg question...
Ummmmm.... chicken and eggs...
I have considered this question, and no doubt the egg comes first. A proto-chicken has an embryo with the final genetic mutation to make it a chicken. So the proto-chicken lays the first egg that will then become the first chicken.
Egg.
I'll see if I can find the book.
Your last line made me laugh out loud. I spent hours this morning writing a journal entry about this same subject.
Hmm. When I used the term 'misfit', I was thinking of it in a very literal, core manner, more true to linguistics than to the usual connotation that accompanies it. Mis fit, not fitting properly.
Was musing today about the lucky fact that I've managed to gather the most incredible people around me. Wouldn't have it any other way. Life is ever so much interesting when you are congruent with yourself, and allow the same in others. Makes for a richer landscape.
Moira,
Ah. The difficulty with fast, written communication. No way to express tone. Got it. Thanks.
Read the whole thing, of course (sic).
Coleenr,
As someone with perpetually messy hair, that resonates.
Sorry folks, SLC, Salt Lake City, as in Utah, as in the Mormon Mecca/Rome. Big bellydance town, believe it or don't.
Oh geez. I used "fantastic" three times in one comment.
Please donate superlatives. Tax receipt on request.
SLC is a big bellydance town?! Somehow I've missed that. Who woulda thunk.
I tend to think that all roads are lonely, and that the excessive drinks, drugs and sex - and religious fanaticism for that matter - are ways of avoiding having to face that fact.
Perhaps you fit in well among those who don't fit in?
A good post.
zhoen, I always feel like that but on the other hand, most of the time I don't *want* to fit in and whenever I've tried, I realised very quickly it's not what I wanted. If one is lucky enough to meet a few people in one's lifetime who really resonate on the same wavelenth, that's enough. I have been lucky that way, but the fitting in to groups, clusters, tribes - ie "society", that's another kettle of fish, one in which we are ill at ease.
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Ooh, yes, still there at the end. Yes, me too. The huge consolation I cling to, I think, is that the few people who have loved me have really loved the real me, it's never turned out to be for the 'wrong' reasons, because I was popular or charming or a status symbol or convenient, rather than for being me. And I only really really like being around other misfits, like you. Trying to fit in would be AWFUL, and I suspect impossible anyway.
Augustine,
I think you say it perfectly.
Jean,
Exactly, impossible.
Maybe you've found the place where you fit after all. Here. With the rest of us still reading.
Maybe nothin'. Certainly.
Yes
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