Normal

 I'd like to be normal, sort of.

But do I?

I've always felt like the outsider, the weirdo, the one who was passed over for being too........(fill in the blank). I'm not comfortable in my skin. I'm not a hero to any actual human, except maybe my children, and even that's in question at times. There are a few friends who manage to look the other way when my weirdness wins out and a boyfriend who accepts most of who I am but with reservations, I think he tries to hide.

My beloved dog and kitties sit by me with patience unaware of my shortcomings. The murder of crows that visit during the winter months for peanuts, well, they love the peanuts and maybe they connect me to them. That might be a form of love. Squirrels, bunnies, and the occasional opossum might have warm feelings for their human neighbor. More likely, though, they love that the dog of the house doesn't give them chase. She just watches them as they go about their business.

But me, I look at my shape and that is not normal. I love my crazy hair, but it is certainly not normal. My yard is unkempt, sleeping under a thick blanket of leaves in a neighborhood of well-trimmed lawns. I choose to give insects places to slumber during the winter. I would champion the bees' cause or thrill at the sight of a Luna moth. It is my choice to leave the lawn and the garden until late spring. Some abnormalities I have good reasons for. 

Still, I see those shiny, slender accomplished women on television and wonder how they feel in their skins. Do they ever doubt who they are? Do they need a script to say things right or are they just as wonderful as they come across? I feel like I could use a script at times or a little elf on my shoulder telling me to button it here and there. It might help me to feel more normal in ways where I would like to be more normal. My mouth gets me into trouble. Recently, I was told that I say too much, to be quiet and listen. It was said with force and some anger, passion. It shut me up, made me take notice. It was an uncomfortable moment. They were wrong but they were very correct. Now I measure each word before it comes out, but the wound is fresh and try as I might to be good, I don't trust myself to actually change. Foot-in-mouth disease runs in my family and I have a very bad case at times it makes me very sorry to not be normal this way.

Twice in the last month, I have been unable to get back into my car because someone had parked too close to it while I was away. When it happened today I was able to climb over the mid-console from the passenger seat into the driver's seat. That is a major accomplishment for a 70+-year-old woman wracked with arthritis, believe me. I'm a large woman but in today's case, my open car door only allowed for a hip width of about six inches. I don't think I've seen that personal size in some forty years. I am fat but supple, also not normal, but I'm gonna go with that is cool.

I look at computer screens and see the reflections, the world in reverse.

I'm lost in a world that appears to be crumbling into dark and dangerous places. If I watch television shows, science fiction doomsday I'm lost in depression knowing that it could happen, it could. I am not okay and that might be the most normal thing I am. I wonder how could anyone look at the world around us and feel like everything is normal. I think it is the 2023/24 definition of SNAFU. 

With the Law of Attraction, if you believe in that sort of thing, (and I do) the Universe gives you what you pay attention to. I am trying my darndest to stay positive and spread love, peace, and harmony so that I can attract all that into my life and into the lives of all those around me and I suppose that is not normal too. It's not easy when everything feels like it does today, cars parking on top of your car, brainless utterances, wars, crazy politicians, global warming in general, giant waves in California, gangs, and skimmers stealing financial data at the corner store..... I'm trying very very hard to focus on the good stuff. 

I'm asking everyone who might read this to focus on something good, be grateful for what you have, show kindness, and save a tree or a small animal. I know it's not normal but it might help. It's a thought.