When I Grow Up...

My friend, Kate, is one of the coolest people I know. No, she isn't the bad ass above with the purple hair, but this stranger did remind me of her. Before I left for my adventure, Kate and I were discussing people and the special beats of the drums they dance to. She was talking about a man who her brother knew that would strangely start walking like a chicken - as in flapping his little wings as fast as he could - whenever he felt like it. The man blamed it on a medical problem, but Kate was intrigued.

"How cool would it be to just flap your wings like a chicken when you wanted?" she said with a laugh, shaking her head.

And, seriously, how cool WOULD that be? To hell with social norms. I want to walk around and flap my wings when I damn well please. While I still believe that there is a time and place for such things - as in, not in the midst of a mass at Notre Dame, for example - I don't see why we can't walk like a chicken when we want to. I've never been one that cares for what people think. I wore whatever the hell I pleased in high school, pierced things, gauged my ears, died my hair every color of the rainbow and did anything and everything that I could in the world of activities. Some people may claim that it was for attention. That teenagers do these things to draw attention to themselves, as a "cry for help" or something. While that may be true for some, it's also a bunch of bullshit made up by people that were too scared to try it. Why can't we walk like a chicken when we please, or dye our hair purple when our hair is white with age? Life isn't about who can fit themselves into a cookie cutter piece that someone made up a long time ago. It's about being happy. It's about being kind and generous. It's about learning to see things from a different point-of-view and experiencing things that startle you. It has nothing to do with the color of your hair, or the rings on your face.

I'm gonna flap my wings when I feel like it.