I'm Not Strange- I'm Innovative

I am the first one to admit I can be a bit off the wall. Not in the way of the crazies you pass on the street eating their hair and singing songs about mysterious people and events that probably never happened, but in an ordinary off the wall way where I may say/do/admit to something that would have you thinking I'm slightly quirky. But heck, aren't we all? I'm not special in my quirkiness, I just don't hide it.

For instance, growing up, I refused to let anyone sit on my bed. Not because it was "mine" or I didn't want someone to screw up my very ugly 80's and early 90's comforter (think teals), but because I couldn't handle the thought of a person's smell to be on the bed I slept in. Like an invasion into my safe haven of only me and my germs. Uh. I still can't handle it unless it's someone I'm attracted to. This has also translated into the refusal to use any blanket that I don't know the origins of. Imagine all the germs and smells on those!

Then there is food. Became a vegetarian at age twelve when I started to think literally about food. I mean how can you eat something when it's probably exactly what your thigh would like like baked in an oven? Gross to the millionth degree. I think it's actually a disorder, as I've had to consciously force myself to not think about food literally (like man-made items being essentially sponges injected with chemical flavor on a conveyor belt with depressed people in hairnets) so I don't become a real outcast unable to eat anything. I just don't go there anymore and repress the urge to visualize.

We all have our weird germ issues and phobias. But without getting into it, I know I'm not always conventional in thought. Half the time I have to preface statements with, "I clearly know this is not normal behavior or thought."

Yet a couple weeks ago, when I found myself in that very situation, offering my disclaimer to my uncle, he responded with "I don't think you're weird- you're just innovative."

And I'm taking it and running with it. I'm not strange- I'm innovative!