Jeanette Winterson, author of “Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit” has a wonderful story about normal versus happy.
I heard her tell this story during a book club show on the radio a few weeks ago. She told it with great love and good humour.
Several decades ago when she was sixteen Ms Winterson told her conservative, hard-working, Northern English mother mother she was gay. She said she was gay and that it made her happy.
Her mother replied, completely seriously and with love and concern, “But Jeanette! Why be happy when you can be NORMAL!?”
It’s easy to see why her mum, a woman of the Depression and War Generation, might feel sticking your head above the parapet of normality might not be a good idea. Having experienced the damage to people and society that WW2 caused, she may have felt it was important to protect those you loved to the extent of not wanting them to be different and therefore a potential target. Keep them safe, even if it meant suppressing who they were.
It’s strange really that this mentality seems to have continued through to the present day, an entirely different era with different kinds of threats and risks.
It seems no small number of individuals value the ‘safe’ facade of ‘normality’ and ‘fitting-in’ over self-realisation. There’s a different kind of war going on in the 2000’s with more subversive yet just as emotionally-devastating casualties for our society.
When people wrap their essential uniqueness up in the pretence of a perception of ‘normality’ they don’t just deprive themselves of happiness, they deprive the rest of us of their individual expression of human-ness.
So fear not weird one. Be different. Go on. Make the world a happier place.
Image borrowed from Willow Creek Signs from a selection of home decor vinyl lettering designs.
Ivan says:
I came across your blog through a website dedicated to Per Petterson. I came across Per Petterson through the Summer Reading issue of Tin House magazine which contained an excerpt of his novel “I Curse the River of Time.” The excerpt tells of field spotting trips the protagonist takes his daughters on while the distance between him and his wife grows and his divorce comes closer.
I bought the magazine in my fifth week of sleeping on the floors, couches and air mattresses of friends. My wife had begun to live another life. I did not know how fully other she’d become until another two weeks had passed. It’s over, she said. One week for every year, this is how much time it took.
I feel sometimes like a mountain could land on me and I would be okay. Other times I feel like someone is performing surgery on my throat and chest with a hatchet.
The other day I took my art out of our apartment. The walls were left so bare. I have nowhere to put it, but I took it anyway. Why? Was I being vindictive? I wanted her to feel the lack of me, maybe. But I think it’s only pushed her further away; her notes to me no longer end with “I hope to see you soon” and she has abandoned the idea that we can be friends right now. It was something I was going to do, tell her I needed space and time away from her. But I fear I’ve deprived myself of that chance. I want to bring the paintings back and say, “I don’t need them, not right now at least. You keep them, enjoy them, use them like you will the furniture until I find another place. Please let’s be friends.”
This is foolish and won’t work, I know.
Why am I writing this? Why would I leave a comment like this on your page, which has nothing to do with my fear or unhappiness or loneliness?
Near the end of “Out Stealing Horses” Trond’s father tells him, “You decide when it hurts.” I want to believe this is true. “Oh you are beautiful,” it says in faint type next to this small box I am trying to empty the hurt into. I want to believe this is true.
Thank you for your time,
Ivan
05/08/2010 — 4:49 pm
Flora says:
Uh-huh, yes, OK. Here’s the thing: if you leave such beautiful pieces of prose as comments you will cause all kinds of women who read it to fall haplessly in love with you. No, really.
I myself am feeling all a-fluttery after reading your words. Not least because just the day before you left this precious, aching, weirdly comforting comment I was explaining the “you decide when it hurts” nettles scene to a friend of mine in great detail and telling her how much I loved this idea and how I think about it a lot – that WE decide when it hurts and that I had in fact presented this idea to my daughter. And then you go and mention that exact notion – out of all the zillions of phrases in billions of books through time you could have quoted you quoted the one that is resonating with me so potently right now.
And so we connect. Two people who do not know one another at all. And yet we connect. I am glad you noticed my “oh you are beautiful” in faint gray type. I am grateful you typed the hurt into the little box. I am happy there are people like you in the world. Thank you for making life more wonderful for those who read your comment.
06/08/2010 — 11:24 am
claire says:
thank you so much, I am younger than most people trying to find their inner self but yes I am lonely as I am bullied by people but am inspired by you as I have now found some one to rely on and will help with information that I need as I am a very depressed girl and have never really found any part of me that is not feeling.I am very different in class but feel some how connected to the moon and nature as i feel more comfortable with them than people thank you so much.xx
18/03/2011 — 4:54 pm