Tonight it feels like there is validation in conformity.  There is comfort there and safety there.  Here in this small town we all march along in the tight formed lines of the public eye, caring what they see, caring what their mouths say when all they really want is someone to feel like they do.  They want someone to be the same as them, so that their mediocrity looks normal, so that it comforts them in their cookie cutter beds and their cookie cutter life.  The life that is cut from the same place that every other one around them is and that all our ancestors before us lived.  The fear of being different is a fear of being lesser.  If we are the same we are not less.

I want to be different. I have known this my whole life.  I am not content to wear someone else's name like a badge of honor, living how they think that I should.  I love my kids and I want to be the best mom that I can be for them.  I don't want the public sticker that says I did a good job.  I want moral character and true happiness rooted so deep inside their souls that it radiates and leaves a trail that twists and turns throughout their lives.  That will be my measure of good parenting. I don't want them to conform.  I want them to be their best selves.  It seems like some people frown on this desire.   It seems as though they think that I should not want that for them. I should want other's definition of happiness. Happiness is being true to myself, every belief and experience.  That is where my happiness lies.