I was talking to my awesome friend the other day and she exclaimed about how normal I was, working, cleaning my house, taking care of my shit and not having any major hang ups (like addictions). It’s funny because no one would have used that term for me as a teenager. I was outside the norm. I expected to remain where I was forever. I disliked the norm. My fishnet and velvet wearing, dyed-hair self was more than a little bit pretentious and arrogant. Of course, I was a teenager.
And I’m not now. In those years, I have done a lot of things but perhaps the most important is that I have grown up. I don’t know if that phrase quite explains it. To be blunt, I have shot up when it comes to maturity and personal responsibility. I have shot straight past most of my peers (by age) and this was a fact that my awesome friend took the time to remind me. I am a normal person, living my normal life at only 24 years old. 24. I know. If you forgot that I’m only 24, you’re not alone. People do it all the time. I do it all the time.
But here I am, nonetheless. As if to further prove my point, the fact that someone can call me normal is something that makes me smile. It’s a compliment–if not a little amusing, considering I’d never expect to be here of feel that. It’s hard to believe that what I want now is so similar to what my mother has when, all I wanted a few years ago, was to be anyone but her.
Growing up required me to reconcile what I want with what the rebellion inside me raged. And a lot of that raging rebellion didn’t coincide with what I truly wanted. I was struggling with what I thought I should want. I have come out in a more confident way and I am much more comfortable in my skin because of it. I feel like I finally know myself and I have accepted that what I really want is sometimes simple, normal–and there’s nothing wrong with that.
It’s not that I would ever turn down an extraordinary life but I have come to realize that it’s not necessary, that I don’t need something that is unique from everyone else in order to be happy. I guess that makes me normal.
