Tuesday, August 6, 2024

Rites of Passage

 I don't know when or how it happened, but I've been keeping some sort of record of things since I was a youngster. It seems it has always been a natural tendency of mine to jot down things in words, drawings or both and in these latter years I've discovered that it's become a kind of vouge thing to do either in an attempt at lay people indulging in more creative habits or as a type of  popular, therapeutic self-care. It's become more prominent in the mainstream, in no small part, since the advent of social media because so many "gurus" of mindfulness suddenly appear out of nowhere as "experts" on ways to release one's demons through journaling , to use a popular term. 

It brings to mind the Barbara Mandrell hit from 1981, I was Country when Country wasn't Cool because all the newly discovered ingenious methods of healthful practices are things I've been doing for decades. Stopping just short of saying I was bullied for it, I took much kidding and razing throughout the years for doing such things. The harassments continued even well into adulthood. Now, with a nod toward Ms. Mandrell,

Look at everybody trying to be what I was then.

I confess my pride about how It gives me sense of victorious satisfaction to know that the things that the undesirable people in my past who often tyrannized my preferences by chasing me down hallways after school to rip up my collections of drawings and notes or who took the books I was reading and ripped the pages out of its binding, are the ones now trying to mimic me, even though they would never admit it. Okay, so maybe it could be described as bullying but it was at a time when bullying was seen as more of a rite of passage.

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