There’s a standing joke at the office (har har – indeed, she sits in the end office and her name is “Tracy”, you may have met her) – in which a colleague called me a “a breath of fresh air”, after I’d baffled her with some display of Tracy-ness. Such as Jikking the hair dye splotches off my face, or discussing whether attic or basement would prove a more suitable hiding place for a rapidly decomposing corpse, over the photocopier. My preference for Ricoffy over the fancy stuff is also cause for concern, as is my constant swearing talking to myself and inability to walk in a straight line without crashing into a wall.
The joke, of course, is that she doesn’t mean I’m “pleasantly different” or “someone or something that is new and different and makes everything seem more exciting” (thanks The Free Dictionary). What she is trying to say in her roundabout & clumsily offensive way, is that I’m weird. Strange. Odd. Baffling.
Yes, yes I am.
And I’m okay with that. I can – and do – laugh at myself. A lot. I don’t take myself very seriously. This is a good thing, I think. Humility is a colour which looks good on me – it brings out my eyes, don’tcherknow. And there’s just so *much* to be humble about.
Long, long ago in my youth (okay, right up til about 45 minutes ago, then) I had some issues with comparing myself with others. Not feeling good enough. And I won’t lie, that ol’ insecurity beast still sticks her bitchy nose in my business sometimes and makes me feel kak about myself. Today was a bad day, I admit. But mostly I have her beaten. Into a bloody, mucousy pulp, which incidentally – is better stashed in a basement than attic. Colder, see. Slows decomp. Less smelly.
But back to my story.
I was lucky – I escaped the teen body image angst (which a LOT of women carry with them in their fashionable, definitely *not* fleamarket knockoff handbags all the way into supposedly sensible adulthood) by handily getting pregnant. Teen pregnancy is the perfect cure for “does my bum look big in this” disease – because yes, yes it does. And that’s that. It serves up a hefty dose of Get The Heck Over Yourself Woman, and I kinda never caught back up in the caring about cellulite race. A win there (and one they never mentioned in Juno).
Unless you happen to find the sight of me in my leggings offensive, in which case, darling – look away.
I never learnt the knack of peer pressure. I didn’t know I was supposed to be influenced by The Media. When the other girls were given the lesson on Starving Yourself To Look Like a Supermodel Cos You’re Supposed To Otherwise Nobody Will Ever Love You And You’ll Die Alone, I was eating Flings with my baby son and finding out who I really am.
Thing is, yes – I do feel sometimes feel like I’m not okay as I am – but it’s almost always fleeting, in response to something some outside person has said, someone who doesn’t know me. Among *my* people (of which there are not many, another tick in the Freak Box for me), I feel fine. I feel valued, supported, loved, understood. By myself, I KNOW that I’m happy with me in all my freaky glory.
My point was here somewhere. Ah, yes. I see the other ladies with their worries of fashion, ageing, weight and keeping up with the Kardashiwhatsits Jones’. I will, on occasion, have a look at a “woman’s magazine”. And I’m just kinda like *shmeh*. Whatever. That doesn’t apply to me. They’re not talking to me. Or about me. I might as well be reading an article on lost tribes of Borneo in National Geographic. It’s foreign. Interesting, sometimes- to learn about. But I’m as likely to get a facial (or even WANT a facial, or even pretend to know what that entails, actually), as I am to chow down on some tasty long pig with the South Seas cannibal dudes.
I know I don’t look as pretty as those other sparkly ladies. I know I’m chunkier, my hair’s not as nice, my skin not as smooth (it’s the Jik – not ideal), my *look* (using unfamiliar technical terms here, bear with me) not as polished. Neither are my nails. Ever. I staple my hems when they come undone. I am clumsy and shy. My repertoire of small talk is miniscule and I don’t hug, squeal or flirt.
Those sparkly ladies look like they do because they spend time, money and effort on making it that way. You only spend time, money and effort on things you care about. And just don’t care enough about that stuff. In the words of the immortal Granny Weatherwax: “I can’t be having with that”.
But suck it. I don’t apologise for any of it. I don’t try to hide any of it. Laugh with me when I tell you about it, because it’s funny, dude. If you can’t laugh me with me – go ahead, laugh at me because I admit to things you can’t. Says more about you than me, I’m thinking.
Life is very short. I want to do what I want to do because I want to do it. That is what happiness is.
And so I shall continue to breeze freshly through life with my Freak Hat on, knowing that it will cost me sometimes. It’s a price I’m willing to pay, I guess. We all have a price on our head, the one we were born with – the cost of being truly ourselves. I’m paying it, and it IS worth it. Every day.
