Just Odd.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm odd. I really do.

All my life I have preferred to be alone. I can remember playing alone a lot as a child. I don't know if it was me responding to my surroundings or just the way I am. I'm the youngest child. So young in fact (he he- that's for my sister) that at times it was like I was an only child. My sister is ten years older, my brother almost thirteen years older. My brother was married and out of the house when I was six, and I was an aunt a month shy of my seventh birthday.

I've never made friends easily. I'm not easily impressed. I'm not a snob, I just have a hard time giving my time and energy to people that I don't respect so my circle of friends has always been small. Aside from my family (the built in friends) and my church family (pretty much like blood relatives to me) I have roughly two friends.

I'm a hermit. One of those social oddities that could, in fact, not leave the house for a week and not notice. My kids will start to get stir crazy and I'll realize that we haven't left our house or yard for a few days.

I get depressed when I go into public sometimes. See this is where I start to wonder if I'm normal, if normal people think this way. We live near a highway that is absolutely saturated with stores and restaurants of all kinds. If it isn't on that highway then it doesn't exist. It depresses me. Society is weird and all that "want" in one place is sort of mind blowing.

I had to do a lot of research in school on artists. I was in an AP art program and it was part of the class I think. I'm pretty sure that was the one. Anyways, the common thread with artistic people I found often was that they can easily get lost in themselves and struggle with relationships. Not in a selfish way, their minds just operate differently...clearly. I'm not sitting here proclaiming greatness. It feels ridiculous to refer to myself as an "artist", but I definitely don't think the same way that a lot of people do.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm good for my kids. I talk to my kids, but I'm not a talker. Those people that you see in public that constantly talk to their children weird me out. I educate my children, we cook together, we play sports and we take walks, but a lot of the time I'm quiet. I just hope that someday they don't think that I didn't care because I had my nose in a book a lot, or music was our background noise instead of chatter.

The only reassurance that I have is that they love to watch me create. They are absolutely wowed when they watch me paint. They think I'm magic. Once again, this isn't me with a blown up ego, they are children. Maybe that's how we communicate?

I'm not one to care what other people think, or compare myself, so maybe I shouldn't bother at all. But I do wonder. I will freely admit that I wonder. I rarely connect with people and feel like I can be myself without people glazing over, or not knowing what to say back. People have said that I'm strange, my own mother. Joking of course, and I'm not offended, but I know that I'm different and that on some level she means it.

I also doubt myself as a Christian. We're supposed to be hospitable, and reach out...be social. It's hard for me. The only reason that people can even begin to think that I'm social is because I have consciously worked on being social for God. When Richie and I were first married I was so backwards socially that he did all the talking. I just stood behind him. I try now. I ask questions and I push my boundaries. Sometimes I even enjoy it.

I just hope that I don't ruin my kids.