Stitch

Years ago, when The Boy was still small, he and I watched the movie Lilo and Stitch. For those unfamiliar with the premise, Lilo is an orphan being raised by her older sister. Stitch is a space-alien-critter who happens into their lives and (of course) endears himself to them over time. There’s a poignant moment near the end of the film where Stitch, referring to Lilo and her sister, says, “This is my family. It is small and it is broken, but it is good.”

This was the moment when The Boy, all young and naive and bright-eyed, enthusiastically said to me, “Just like us, Mommy!”

I had to hide out in the bathroom crying for a good hour or so.

Single parents will understand. That whole broken-family thing will nail you in the gut every time. It doesn’t matter how great a parent you may be, or how the world is changing to accommodate different family structures. Single parents always feel second-best. And they always worry that their kids do, too.

I thought of that Lilo and Stitch moment recently, as I found a copy of the DVD while I packed up the last of my belongings still remaining at my former home in the wake of my recent divorce. Here’s where my convoluted life probably requires some ‘splainin.’ The Ex, about whom I’ve blogged until y’all likely wanted to scream get over it already, is not my first ex-husband.

That’s right — I’m 41 and twice divorced.

Yay me!

The Boy’s father — let’s call him Tee — and I met when I was young and foolish and he was old and horny. He was a lot older than me.

A lot.

So much older that, after my family first met him (whilst I waited for the dropped jaws to to be retrieved from the floor) one of my smartass brothers deadpanned, “Well, I think it’s nice. Dad didn’t have much of a father figure. He could use someone to look up to.”

Ouch.

In the face of such quips, I did the only thing I was likely to do at that stage of my life. I married Tee. It didn’t take us long to realize that what we’d done was idiocy. Two weeks after the wedding, I packed my bags and left.

And then I found out I was pregnant.

In hindsight, I think Tee and I get an ‘A’ for effort. We did our best to make the unworkable work. Ultimately, we parted ways, fought and made a couple of attorneys richer for a while, then settled into co-parenting amicably. Tee adored The Boy and was always a great dad. For a number of years, Tee actually worked for my family, managing their golf business. He played golf with my father and brothers. He joined my family for holidays. It was about as good as it gets for an odd couple like us.

Still, I was ever aware that The Boy and I had this awkward, broken little family. His father was old enough to regularly be mistaken for his grandfather. I wondered if we would ever escape the weight of past errors.

Then I met the man you now know as The Ex. He was handsome and funny and, I thought at first, just quirky enough to fit right into our awkward, broken little family. I dared hope he might be Stitch to The Boy’s Lilo.

Over time, though, their relationship became one of the major issues in our marriage. They were just too different, and I was forever caught in the middle. There were other issues, too — stuff I couldn’t make up for any novel. As one who appreciates life most when it’s drama-free, I knew something had to give.

So, once again, I found myself divorced. I worked my tail off to keep things amicable, and before long I landed in the most unusual of situations: living as The Ex’s neighbor. Serving as his housesitter and dogsitter while he was away on business trips. Continuing to help him with management of our former home and rental properties.

A neighbor teased me as I helped The Ex dig one of our tenants out of the snow that had drifted against the apartment door.

“Forget about you writing another book. He should,” he said, nodding at The Ex. “He took your house and your dog in the divorce, and here you are still taking care of both! Now that’s a story!”

Haha. Funny neighbor. There’s a guy who’s lucky not to have taken a snow shovel to the face.

But a lightbulb went on.

There’s keeping things amicable.

And then there’s being a doormat.

The Ex had not been particularly kind to me for years. I walked on eggshells in my own home. When I begged him to help save our marriage, he was willing to do exactly nothing to that end. And yet, every time he appealed to me for help, I was there.

I began to wonder why.

I also began to wonder if I could truly move on while living so close to him that I saw him daily. We would walk and drink beer together at the dog beach while our pups played. Sometimes it seemed nice, as if we should win a medal for being the Best Divorced Couple Ever. More often, though, it was just weird and painful. Sad.

A child’s movie might seem an unlikely catalyst for change, but when I found that Lilo and Stitch DVD, something clicked.

I’d been small and broken too long.

The question was how to move forward. I took inventory.

The Boy is currently living with Tee, attending community college, and trying to figure out the path ahead.

I have plans for a small house I’d like to build. I need to save money toward that goal while helping The Boy pay for college.

Meanwhile, Tee has an in-law apartment in his home, something he and I had spoken about recently. It’s been in need of renovation since he bought the house years ago, and he wondered if I might be interested in doing the work in exchange for an affordable place to live. At first, I thought he was crazy. It sounded like the sort of thing likely to end in an episode of Dateline.

But then again?

Maybe not so much.

Tee and I have functioned as friends and coparents for over 15 years now. And I realized that, while I have been living in one of the most beautiful places in the world, it’s no longer the right place for me. Every lovely aspect of the area is steeped in memories of The Ex. And if the memories aren’t enough, there he is in the flesh: driving past the front of my house in his car, past the back of my house in his boat, walking on the beach, calling me for help with this or that.

While there may be no geographic solution for most problems, this may be an exception.

One of my very best friends lives right across the street from Tee, on the river where she and I swim together as often as possible in summer. Several other good friends live in the same neighborhood. I don’t know what’s in the water there, but it’s Good People Central. And I need good people around me right now.

So I’ve found someone to sublet my little piece of paradise for the duration of my lease. I’m working on making the apartment at Tee’s my own, an affordable place to call home while I find my way forward. The Ex seems to understand that I need to move on, and has promised to enlist a proper dog- and house-sitter.

Here’s a snapshot of my life right now:

I am 41 years old.

Twice divorced.

Escaping my second ex-husband by moving into an apartment owned by my first ex-husband.

And feeling better than I have in a while.

Truth is stranger than fiction, right?

The other night, Tee and The Boy and I were surveying the progress on my new digs, talking and laughing, and a thought made me smile…

This is my family.

It is small, and it is broken, but it is good.

www.kcwilder50ways.com

Midwinter

I was born in Miami.

Because of this, I am quite certain, my body lacks some sort of requisite insulation for the New England climate I currently inhabit. I was built for beach days and balmy evenings, afternoon thunder storms and scorching sunshine. I can weather 100% humidity like a Southern belle, fresh as a daisy.

But winter in New England?

I break out my parka in September. From then until approximately June, I feel like I have ice water running through my veins. Hot baths and hot beverages are my BFFs. Y’all think I am constantly adopting animals because I’m kind? Nope. Just looking for more warm, furry bodies to occupy my bed and keep the heating bills in check.

It’s now February, that time of year when I regularly scour the internet for deals on airfare to warm, sunny places. I dream of escape. This year, though, I have also been trying something new. I’ve been trying to make friends with winter, to reclaim a little of the joy the season used to hold for me as a child.

And whaddaya know? It’s working. This weekend was an excellent example.

Morning: I took a long beach walk with a neighbor, chatting as our dogs ran and played. The sky was stark white and the air smelled of snow. There was no need to worry about leashes or tourists. We had the beach all to ourselves.

Afternoon: I went snowshoeing with a friend. We talked and laughed our way through the pristine winter wonderland surrounding a small pond. The wind stirred the tree limbs above and sent flurries swirling down around us. We scooped up handfuls of snow and ate it like ice cream.

Evening: I drove home on dark, winding wooded roads. Snow fell in my headlights. I saw deer and rabbits. I passed very few other cars.

This, my friends, is something you can’t get in Miami.

Winter in New England is long and solitary. But the days are starting to lengthen, and the snow — while a nuisance — is pretty. How many ways can one weather the bleak midwinter? Let me count a few…

Bundle up and get outdoors.
Catch snowflakes on your tongue.
Sip cocoa by a fire.
Sip wine by a fire.
Paint your toes a summery color.
Eat breakfast in bed.
Eat dinner in bed.
Make breakfast for dinner. Eat that in bed, too.
Bake cookies.
Make snow angels.
Make love.
Tell stories.
Write letters.
Plan a summer garden.
Learn something new.
Make Valentines.
Snuggle.
Read! Read! Read!

Tell me — what would you add to this list?

www.kcwilder50ways.com

Watershed

Up on the watershed

Staring at the fork in the road

You can stand there and agonize

'Til your agony’s your heaviest load

Yep.  Those are Indigo Girls lyrics.  I thought I was done with that angsty duo some twenty-plus years ago, around the same time I decided I really ought to have role models other than Sylvia Plath.

But just a year ago, Pandora landed on ‘Watershed.’  I had to pull the car over.  There on the side of a road in the middle of a sunny winter day, I totally lost my shit.  I was a crying, sobbing, snotty mess.  It was the kind of thing that happens when you realize you’ve been living too long in limbo.

In the months since our second wedding anniversary turned into the sort of colossal train wreck that illustrated all the ways our marriage was not ever going to be what I hoped (and no, he didn’t just forget to buy flowers), I’d known I had a choice to make.  For too long I’d clung to the little moments of bliss: our walks with the dogs on the beach, sunset cruises on the salt pond, the way it felt to wake curled in his arms.  If life were all beach walks and sunset cruises and lazy mornings, I suppose we’d have been okay.  But it isn’t - not in my experience, anyway - and whenever slightest of difficult times hit (a bill that was more than expected, a phone call announcing that his folks would be visiting yet again, the wrong weather on a day off from work), I found myself feeling more alone as a wife than I ever had as a single person.

And then came that damn Indigo Girls song.  I had to make a choice.  I knew that.  The agony was indeed my heaviest load.

I’ve blogged the hell out of what came next.  There was the brutality of separation, the finality of divorce.  2014 was, for me, a year of moving away.  Of treading water.  Of trying not to be dragged under.

As the year came to a close, I realized there is a burden even heavier than the agony of indecision.  It’s the agony of having no goal to move toward next.  If you know me, that may sound funny - I am rarely idle, and I always have about two dozen goals toward which I am feverishly working.  What did I lack?  A larger plan.  A vision of the life I want.

I’ve kept walking with The Ex at the dog beach, kept dogsitting my former dog and housesitting my former home when he’s traveling for work.  Daily, I see what I’ve lost.  Sometimes - when The Ex seems more like the fun guy I fell in love with than the moody man I found myself married to - it’s difficult to remember why I left.  Things always seem so much better from the outside looking in.

Then came Tiny Tim.  If you haven’t read the story of how his life intersected with mine, please do here.  As one who has been rescued by animals time and again, it should be no surprise to me that my focus - my vision of the life I want for myself - crystalized in the very short time I spent with a crippled, abandoned dog at the end of his own life.

I’ll share more in next week’s post, but for now, suffice it to say I feel 2015 is the year I stop moving away and start moving toward.  It’s the year I stop looking back.  (And if I forget this, I know I have at least one good friend who will help me extricate my head from my ass and get back on track.)

There are good things ahead.  I finally know just what they are.

And because life is nothing if not serendipitous, I just received this in an email from my friend Jude, and I pass it on to you:

WHATEVER YOU CAN DREAM, BEGIN IT

Until one is committed, there is hesitancy-

The chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness.

Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation)

There is one elementary truth the ignorance of

Which kills countless ideas and splendid plans:

That the moment one definitely commits oneself, 

Then Providence moves, too.

All sorts of things occur to help one that would 

Never otherwise have occurred.

A whole stream of events issues from the decision, 

Raising in one’s favor all manner of unforeseen

Incidents and meetings and material assistance,

Which no one could have dreamed would have come

One’s way.

Whatever you can do, or dream you can.

Begin it.

Boldness has genius,

Power, and magic in it.

Begin it now.   

GOETHE

www.kcwilder50ways.com

Forecast

I sometimes find it’s good to be grateful for things that don’t turn out the way I planned.

Here’s the scoop for those following my post-divorce dating escapades: The Weatherman has left the building.

Nope, he didn’t turn out to be an Asshat after all.  He was something very different.  Something that illustrated for me some important truths.

For one, there are all sorts of guys out there.  Having been an Asshat magnet in the past has not doomed me to an Asshat-laden future.  However, the mere absence of Asshattery does not a successful relationship make.

I mean, I had my anti-Asshat checklist, and The Weatherman ticked nearly all the boxes.  Bingo, right?

It seems lists (even those typed, single-spaced, and two pages long) will only get a girl so far.  Relationships are by definition reciprocal agreements.  I needed to tick his boxes, too (why does that sound naughty?).  It became apparent fairly quickly that there were some crucial ways I couldn’t.

The interesting thing was that he was able to communicate this to me.  I mean, he actually made it clear that there were things he needed that he felt I was unable to provide.  To borrow a phrase I use with my small nieces and nephews, he used his words.

And I listened.

I pondered.

I realized that while our differences may have been few, they were significant.

I recognized that I’ve worked too hard to get where I am to compromise on some important points - and that the same is true of The Weatherman.

I acknowledged that maybe a girl who is still hanging out and drinking beer and walking dogs with The Ex on a regular basis isn’t quite ready to give her all to a new relationship.  Or that maybe I just need someone who understands that I am not one to carve people I’ve loved out of my life.  I favor evolution over scorched earth.

The strangest part of this breakup?

I could be feeling hopeless, disappointed, a bit like Sisyphus in heels chasing a great big ball of relationship fails up and down an endless hill.

But I don’t.

Instead, I feel a sense of surrender to what is and a hopefulness about what is to come.  There are real, good men out there.  I can enjoy getting back on my feet again; I don’t need to immediately be swept off them.  Life is not a Disney film.  I am not Sleeping Beauty: kissed, redeemed, happily-ever-aftered into submission.

I am wide awake.

Whole.

Grateful.

Safe, sound, and forecasting ever-smoother sailing ahead.

{Need to give Asshats the boot from your love life?  Check out Shannon Bradley-Colleary’s super-awesome, funny as hell Asshat Recovery Program.  You’ll be glad you did - or I will listen to Justin Bieber nonstop for 12 hours.}

www.kcwilder50ways.com

The Lucky One

I sometimes forget just how lucky I am.

This past weekend, I spent some time with The Boy, and I was reminded.

As one who has lived most of my adult life as a self-employed single mother, it has too often been all too easy to count the ways my life was lacking.

For starters, there was that whole “single” business.  Which often felt more like, “destined to die sad, horny and alone.”  Blech.  No fun.

Then there was the living situation.  My son and I lived in a series of rentals.  The place we stayed the longest - seven years - was a one-bedroom apartment.  The Boy thought it was normal for Mom to sleep in the living room.

Money?  Don’t get me started.  Paying the bills was a juggling act.  Car repairs or unexpected medical expenses were a disaster.  I hid in the bathroom and wept every time The Boy found a new interest requiring lesson fees or equipment.

Material gains I made in recent years - building my business, saving, owning a home, investing with a man I loved in a future together - were largely lost in my divorce.  The Boy is in college and those tuition bills are rolling in.  I am back to living in a rental, back to working every spare minute to make ends meet. 

Whiny and bleak with a side of poor-me, anyone?

Of course, that’s not the whole story.

Singlehood?  Sure, I’d have preferred a long-term love story, but I’ve had some really great guys in my life - so there’s that.  Even the most difficult of my relationships has helped me learn and grow.  And damn, I’ve had a whole lot of fun, too.

Those rentals?  The early ones were chosen to place us near schools where The Boy could get the best possible start in education, first at Montessori Children’s House in Providence, RI, then at Friends Academy in Dartmouth, MA.  For several years, fully half my income went to private school tuition - and it was worth every penny.

The seven years spent sleeping in the living room?  I’ll get far less pity when I tell you our small apartment was in a multimillion-dollar house on the water.  The Boy grew up able to fish for crabs from the dock in his back yard, paddle around the marshes in a kayak, make snow angels in the stillness that envelops a salt pond on a winter night.

Money?  Maybe the bills would have been easier to pay if I hadn’t been hell-bent on seeing to it that The Boy didn’t suffer for my failings.  We could have stayed home, could have socked away a little more in the rainy-day fund, but having a child felt to me like having a fresh pair of eyes with which to explore the world.  So we explored.  Hiking ruins in Mexico, skiing in northern New England, snorkeling in the Florida Keys, road trips to DC and Boston and New York.  If you want to know how to travel well on a seriously-shoestring budget, I’m your girl.

And now?  I’ve found another tiny rental with a million-dollar view. The Boy has earned scholarships that defray the tuition bills.  Business is booming.  And while, ultimately, I suppose we all die alone, sad and horny feels like less of a given these days.  

This past weekend, I drove on winding back roads with fall leaves swirling in the sunshine overhead.  The Boy and I sang along with the radio for a while, then I left him at his dormitory and continued on my own.  I felt my heart - that thing I feared mere months ago was broken beyond repair - open wide.

In that moment, I remembered:

                                  just how lucky I am.

The Kids Are All Right

I’d like to take a moment to give myself a little pat on the back.

I have excellent taste in friends.

I think this is no small accomplishment, particularly since I am well known for making poor choices in general.  But when it comes to choosing friends?  I rock.  And apparently I always have.

I recently had a whirlwind weekend adventure with one friend I hadn’t seen in nearly a decade, and two others I hadn’t seen since high school.  It was the sort of thing that could have been a shitstorm of awkward moments.  Instead, it was an absolute blast.

If our younger selves could have glimpsed us - nibbling tapas, sipping drinks, laughing hysterically and sharing meandering tales of our lives in locations near and far - I think they’d be amused as hell.  They’d also be pleased that we didn’t call it a night at nine p.m., but instead made our way to a show and rocked on, drinking beer from plastic cups, into the wee hours of the morn.  That I was only carded because I had tickets at will-call is beside the point.

Today one of my new favorite bloggers, Aussa Lorens, posted about the wistful way autumn nudges us to reflect on the past and make plans for the future.  Summer girl that I am, I have always found fall especially bittersweet.  I am reluctant to trade my flip flops for boots, yet the storyteller within me is romanced by the chill in the air and the smell of woodsmoke.  I also find myself haunted by the ghosts of plans never realized, the trail of losses inevitable in life.  While I’ve had a lot of amazing experiences and have checked a fair number of accomplishments off my lifetime to-do list, there always seems to be more I have yet to attain.

But my friends…

I am sometimes amazed at how lucky I am to have so many kind, funny, creative people in my life.  Old and new, my friends remind me that while we cannot help the losses in life, the successes are worth celebrating.  We who were once thrown out of school for everything from questionable fashion choices (exposed nipple rings, anyone?) to day drinking in math class are now running successful businesses, creating art and music, exploring nature, raising children, rising above tragedy, doing our part to leave the world a little bit better than we found it.  I’m not sure what kind of youthful trouble the friends I met later in life have under their belts, but I know that whether they were buttoned-down overachievers or wild, fired-up messes, their experiences helped shape them into the sorts of people I am very, very glad crossed my path.

This year, as I move from bare toes in the sand to the crackle of a fire warding off that seaside chill, I will try to think less of what’s missing and more of the amazing blessings I can count as mine.

Real friendship, of course, chief among them.

www.kcwilder50ways.com

UnNaked

I had blue brie, crackers and hummus for dinner the other night.  It’s okay, though - I added some grapes to round out the leftover cocktail hour fare and make a meal of it.

Well, okay.

Fermented grapes.

Or, as the French might say, wine.

As some of my loyal readers have noted, I am no longer naked (read: alcohol-free).

My Naked in 2014 post explained some of my reasons for ditching the bottle as 2013 morphed into 2014.  I’ll try now to explain why I’ve picked it back up.  (And yes, one of the possibilities is simply that I’m a drunk and this is what we do.  But, hey - here goes…)

For starters, my Naked post wasn’t as naked as it could have been.  I had reasons for quitting that went beyond a desire to sift through past drinking-related behavior; namely the sudden downward spiral of my marriage and the way I was self-medicating with alcohol.  But that wasn’t stuff I was ready or able to discuss publicly just then.

If I’m entirely honest, The Ex and I got - and for seven years, stayed - together at least in part because we drank together.  And let me tell you, we were awesome drinking buddies!  It was the secret to our success.  We were a case of opposites attracting, but after a few drinks, who cares how whomever voted in the last election?  Who cares about bills or housekeeping or in-laws or any of the other baloney that comes to light in marital arguments?  Have a drink!  Have great sex!  Have…

A midlife crisis?

As 2013 wound down, it became clear to me that I had some big, tough decisions to make.  And that making them while intoxicated would be a bad idea.

I sobered up and assembled a widely-varied team of professionals to help me sort out how my past had led to my present - and how it might yet impact my future.  There was stuff I needed to work on, so I did.

I still do.

Probably always will.

See, I get it.  None of us is ever “finished” with this life stuff.  It’s forever a work in progress.  I could very well be a delusional alcoholic who’s gone back to happy hours and champagne brunches because, well, I’m a delusional alcoholic.

I could be someone whose circumstances led to occasionally unhealthy use of booze to avoid reality.

I could also just be an ordinary person who sometimes behaves well, sometimes doesn’t.

Here’s the thing: I like cocktail hour.  I like hanging out with friends and feeling that buzz and being silly.  I like beer on the beach.  I like wine downtown.  I like drinks on a train or in the rain, on a boat or with a goat, or with just about anything but green eggs and ham.  I like sometimes being a consumer of Chardonnay in unladylike quantities…and sometimes being the girl who sips tea while working on a manuscript.

What I don’t like is drinking to avoid talking or feeling or being real with the people in my life.  And I think I’ve put the brakes on that.  Full stop.  I am focusing on the honest, genuine, good stuff from here on out.

Naked or otherwise, I just want to be happy.

And, yes - have cheese and crackers and (fermented) grapes for dinner now and again.

www.kcwilder50ways.com

The Constant Gardener

One of the things I found most difficult when I left my home of the past five years was that it meant leaving my gardens.  When The Ex and I bought the property, there were no gardens.  There was an overgrown mess in the back yard, some vine-choked trees in the front yard, and a sparse lawn punctuated by muddy truck-tire ruts.

The Ex immediately arranged to have the dead trees removed, and shortly thereafter an actual driveway was installed.  But it was when I - a compulsive gardener - began excitedly making plans for flower beds and slate paths and bird baths that we had the first of our arguments about our new home.

You see, to say the house was in need of TLC would be to greatly understate matters.  We had our hands full with gutting and framing, flooring and sheetrock.  The Ex was correct in stating that the yard was the least of our worries.  He didn’t understand why, after spending a July afternoon ripping out 1970’s-era wood paneling and shag carpeting that reeked of stale dog urine, sweating bullets, I would choose to swing a pickaxe at the earth until the sun set and the mosquitoes devoured me.  He didn’t understand why I would rise early on a Sunday to machete my way through the brambles that had grown over a long-neglected vegetable garden.  He didn’t understand, and he made clear that he didn’t like it.

He’d come out of the house red-faced and scowling, waving his hands.  “Stop!  Stop!  What are you doing?”  I’d look around, trying to figure out what he meant.  Where was the emergency that had him so upset?

Oh, right.

I was gardening.

I just didn’t get why he was so bothered.  I didn’t mind if he felt it was time to sit down with a beer.  Why should he mind if I wanted to have my own beer while up to my elbows in mud and mulch?  I asked him that question every time he looked with disdain on my latest project.  He never answered.

Over the years, I transplanted a dozen trees, shrubs and perennials from locations they’d outgrown to places where they thrived.  I added more than three dozen new plants and trees.  The year my father passed away, I planted a dwarf blue spruce in his memory.  The variety?  Fat Albert.  It felt like a private little joke, as my dad’s name was Albert, but he was anything but fat.  I ran a 300 foot extension cord to the tree and decked it out in little white lights so it would sparkle in the darkest of winter nights.  I loved looking out my bedroom window on snowy evenings, the twinkle of that tree in the midst of my sleeping gardens making the child in me think of the lamppost in the woods of Narnia.

Recently, I greeted the real estate appraiser who’d come to our house as part of the divorce settlement process.  “I love your gardens!” she said as we walked the property.  “Great curb appeal.”  As she gushed over the lilacs, the hydrangea, the multiple varieties of holly, I felt faint.  While for years the story I’d told myself was that I was building a happy home, I realized every single shrub and flower bed held the memory of an argument.

"Some women buy shoes," I’d once told The Ex teasingly.  "I buy plants."

He never cracked a smile.

I never did learn what he so disliked about my gardening.  Was it that it took time away from him?  Was it that it cost money he felt shouldn’t be spent?  Was it that he’d been assaulted in childhood by a rogue rhododendron?

In the end, I don’t suppose the “why” of it matters.  The gardens I planted are no longer mine.  They are browning in the late summer, and I am moving on.  They will bloom again in the spring, and if The Ex doesn’t tend to them, I imagine my badass gardener self will suit up all in black and creep into the yard at midnight to prune and weed and water.

Yup.

When you hear of a woman in South County arrested for trespassing andgardening at night, you’ll know just who they’re talking about.

www.kcwilder50ways.com

Turn to the Left

As many of you know, my only kiddo - a/k/a The Boy - leaves this week for college.  He’s psyched for it, and somehow his excitement seems to have translated into a penchant for dressing like Hunter S. Thompson:

I love it.

I love it, but I try not to say too much about it.  Parental endorsement of fashion is presumably the last thing an 18 year old kid wants.

Still, between you, me and the blogosphere, I love it just as I love seeing kids with pink or blue or green hair - and I love that there seem to be so many of them now.  I love seeing teens with fearless fashion sense and a creative, offbeat outlook on life.  I love that, at least in some corners of the world, our culture seems to be shifting in a way that allows young people to have fun expressing who they are.

As a teenager, I wanted desperately to let my freak flag fly.  My mother bought me khakis and Keds.  I bought combat boots and lace tights.  Trying to leave the house in my preferred attire was like trying to convince Sarah Palin that Hillary should be our next President.

Mom, horrified:  “You can’t leave the house like that!  You look like that crazy Madonna person.  What will your teachers think?”

Dad, stern:  “You’re ruining your life.  Do you want to be a degenerate?”

I thought this was kind of funny coming from a guy who was a fan of David Bowie and Lou Reed, but clearly what was acceptable in rock star fashion was not acceptable in suburbia.  What I didn’t get was why.  I just wanted to wear combat boots and lace tights.  Maybe occasionally use makeup to turn my massive eyebrows into something deliberately severe, a la Siouxie and the Banshees.  What did any of that have to do with my teachers?  Did I ever say anything about their horrific fashion sense?  Those polyester pant suits and orthopedic shoes seemed to me far more likely to carry one down the road to ruin than the occasional blue streak in my hair.

But damn, folks love to fixate on the superficial.

If I had a nickel for every time I was told to do the very opposite of what I wanted to do - of what felt natural to me - well, I’d have a shitload of nickels.  And for what?  I spent my youth fearful of exploring, constantly told to zip my lip, change my clothes, fix my hair, be mindful of what my teachers, my grandparents, the neighbors might think.  That limiting mindset stuck with me for far too long.  I am 40 years old and just now beginning to live the life I’ve always imagined.

It makes me gleefully happy to see so many young people encouraged to have fewer hang-ups and secrets, and more awesome, life-building experiences.

My words of wisdom?

Wear what you want to wear.

Say what you want to say.

Stop worrying about the superficial stuff and go do fabulous things.

Because our world gets better every time we stop worrying about what the neighbors might think…and just get off our asses and make the neighborhood a better place.

www.kcwilder50ways.com

Now give a listen to my new favorite groove: ‘Secrets’ by Mary Lambert.  If this earworm doesn’t make you smile, check your pulse.