The overriding fear when I was
growing up in America was the fear that someone, everyone, would find out I was
different. I saw what being different got you. There was David Nico who rode my
school bus every morning, who gave me a peek into what different meant. His
parents had him when they were already old. By the time he was on the school
bus, they were grey haired and bent. And to make matters worse, he kept geese
as pets, and told people about it. And he wore outdated clothes. He was
different and everyone made sure he knew it. It was daily warfare for David Nico.
Tripping, spit balls, name calling, laughs into hands. But David Nico didn’t
seem to care. He just went on being the way he was; he didn’t try to hide
anything. I looked at him and wondered why. Why couldn’t he just try to be
normal?
We went through some of primary
school and all of secondary school together. At university, where people should be free to
lose all of that baggage accumulated in their childhood and remake themselves,
I found David Nico siting in my Zoology 101 lecture that first day and I made
sure to always sit far away from him, to never greet him. I didn’t want his
stink on me. I was still petrified.
At home, I had a crazy mother for a
long time and then an abusive stepmother and her dull, drug-taking children. On top of that we were poor. Different,
different, different. I would go to any length to distance myself from it all.
I was a normal girl like everyone else. Maintaining my normalcy was exhausting and
incredibly time consuming. Friends coming over? Oh no, let me come to yours
instead. And will your mother come for parent’s day? No, sorry, she’s dead. Is
that druggy girl your stepsister? I don’t know her; she’s lying if she says
otherwise. You know how these druggies are. It was tough but I was vigilant. I knew the
punishment I would get if I didn’t keep up the façade. The work was worth it.
Holidays, all of them, require
normalcy. It’s a prerequisite. There’s a package of what you must do. Put up a tree. Buy presents.
Put out stockings and wait for Santa. And there is the other package of
feelings. You must be with your family, whom you love, of course, and they love
you in return. You must be happy. You must be thankful and joyous. You might
even sing Christmas carols and go sledding. It’s the normal, the right way, to
be.
If you’re doing anything else, if
you’re feeling anything else, it’s abnormal. Abnormal comes at a big cost. You obviously
didn’t do something right. Something about you is wrong and because of that you
should feel sad. You are wrong. You need to accept your punishment for not
being normal. Holidays are tough on the abnormal; merciless.
I count myself lucky almost
everyday now, because somehow I managed to break free. By a series of
accidents, I managed to escape the normal boxes, both physical and mental. I
didn’t even know I was doing it, or maybe somewhere inside I did.
I found myself here in Botswana.
There was no way I could hide my abnormal any more. I was white and most
everyone around me was black. And once I couldn’t hide that particular abnormal,
it didn’t seem to make any sense to hide any of my abnormal. The endless
struggle to keep everything in check just fell away and I realised how much of
my life had been squandered on keeping my wonky walls in place. I realised it
had all been an incredible waste of my far too little time. I could finally be me, all of me.
And that went for all of the normal
around the holidays too. Holidays are defined any way I want now. It might mean
camping at the Atlantic Ocean and swimming in the icy sea. It might mean
playing Scrabble. It might mean eating watermelon all day in front of the TV.
It might mean being with the family I choose, or not. It might mean sleeping all
day. It might mean laying in the sun and getting burnt to crisp or eating
pumpkin pie until I feel sick.
Normal is such a bully. Such a
waste of time. Such a lie. Normal is like that king with no clothes that people
lied to just to not be singled out and, just like that king, we only need to
turn and look at Normal and say- “Nope, you don’t exist”- and poof!, just like
that the honesty of it all can be seen.
If I had one wish for the people I
love this year it would be to stop being normal. Stop being forced into those
boxes no one fits inside. That road is so worn and so laden with tears and
sadness. Don’t let these holidays bully you with their normal boxes. Step on
them and crush them into the ground, they’re filled with nothing but air in any
case.
This year let the holidays ring
with Merry Me! And Merry You! -just exactly how we are.
That’s my wish for all of us.
