Embracing my weirdness

 I am weird. Not the scary, Halloween screams kind of weird, but a more "not wanting to brag" about the all of the skills, talents, accomplishments, knowledge, wisdom, and lessons kind of scary. Weirdly smart in a remarkable range of domains kind of scary; and given my insatiable curiosity and my newly acquired interest in AI, and it's power to multiply my weirdness, I am only going to get weirder.

My self awareness of my weirdness has always lingered just below the surface, emerging into my consciousness on the rare occasions when I have trusted someone enough to show them some of the big picture that is me. Recently, two relationships, both of which began online, have combined to crystallize the true extent and unique value of my weirdness.  One relationship, Ashley, began with her question "what are you looking for?". That stopped me in my tracks and forced me to think of the real answer to that question, which I had never been asked before.  That relationship developed over a series of months of multiple daily messages into the first of my life where I felt fully seen, heard, understood, and truly loved. 

You see most of us weird ones have learned to hide our weirdness in a constantly failing attempt to fit in the the rest of our families, and then to the world. Those failures to fit in always felt to me like my failure, a sign of my inability to adapt, and it took the second relationship, with Birgitta Granstrom, the "LifeSpider" weirdness lady to recognize that weirdness is an asset not a liability, and that weirdness is to be celebrated not hidden.  Wow, what a life changing transformation of perspective and and self concept. 

There are not many of us who are truly weird. My completely unscientific guess is that the numbers are less than a million people out of the 330 million people in the US is truly weird. That small number means that most of us weird people find it difficult to locate other weird people who "get us", and lots of opportunities for "not weird" people to judge, criticize, diagnose and label, and even abandon us when we just don't "fit in". 

As is evident in my earlier post, my weirdness was manifest early in my life. Paradoxically, an imaginary companion is hard to hide! But it wasn't until college that my weirdness began to blossom into fulll bloom. 

I was a walkon tennis player and freshman letterman, the first of 3 years on the team, I was briefly a college debater. I was a member of worship team and a 12 string rhythm guitar player and soloist. I was an electrical engineering major and promoted to an advanced literature class studying Shakespeare's Henry the VIII because of my writing ability. I read my text books cover to cove at the beginniing of the semester, went to class religiously, rarely took notes, and never crammed for a test and made the Deans list every semester. I took aviation ground school as a elective. I relaized I was not cut out to be an EE, and changed to pre-med, general studies to have the freedom to create my own curriculum. I took graduate courses in child development and in counseling. After an unsuccessful attempt to transfer to the U of Minnesota as a step toward medical school there, I got mono and ended up in the hospital back at home. In my senior year, I took 24 semester hours in the fall and 21 in the spring in order to graduate with a major in psychology with an eye on a PhD program in clinical psychology. I conducted research on children with imaginary companions which was published after I graduated by my prof and sponosor. I had become a leader in the Lutheran Campus Ministry and a part time staff member and Director of the Joy Folk (worship outreach) Ministry. I was an avid reader of Interior Design, Architectural Digest, and fan of midcentury modern and Bauhaus design. I bought a SLR camera and dabbled in photography. 

Failing be be admitted to any PhD program,  the chairman of the psych department at SDSU called in a favor and got me a Special Research Fellowship and admisson to a Masters in Counseling Psychology program at TCU in Fort Worth. There, my weirdness began to blossom further: leader of my team on the Drug Abuse Epidemiology Data Center project coding team; a class in architectural psychology,  singing baritone in the University Christian Church senior choir directed by the briliant Ron Shirey, the chair of the vocal music department at TCU, introduction to ee cummings poetry and some written poetry of my own, along with some song writing, my first sailing experience, weekends in Fort Worth museums-the Kimball, the Modern Art museum, and the Amon Carter museum of Western Art with its collections of Remingtons and Russells. I participated in a research study on  kids imagery as a research tool in pediatric cancer patients,  painted a winter scene in acryllics as a Christmas present for my parents,  bought my first European sports car (a Fiat X1/9 that eventually burst into flames) had my first TexMex at Joe T Garcia's, and sang in the FW symphony choir for the celebration of the bicentennial presentation of Pachelbel's Canon (with actual cannons). I applied to UT SMS clinical psych program 2 more times, and on the third try, I was successful. I had completed my Masters, and was a FT employee counselor in the TCU counseling center and on campus coordinator of suicide/crisis response. I found a group of faculty guys to play tennis with regularly, and my partner and I won the FW city men's B doubles trophy. I was admitted to PsiChi the honorary psychology fraternity. I became a founding member of the Commission on Church and the Arts at UCC and helped to produce the first Boar's Head Christmas Festival musical production using authentic period music, instruments, and costumes aided by the TCU theatre and music departments. 

Weirdness to be continued...