Abnormality

     So here we go. Write what you know. That's always been a common phrase, right? Well, I know myself a bit, so that's the best place to start. My name is Katie Beach, and when I was little, we used to play a game where we ran away from normal people. Instead of monsters, we ran from "normals", because if they touched you, you'd become like them. Nothing was worse than being normal.

     Being normal was considered weird when I was a kid. One of us would be a "normal person" in our bastardized game of tag. The others would be running away from the "normals", and if they tagged you, you had to be a "normal" next. My siblings and I used to run around the park while our babysitter would shout:

"Run away, it's the normals!!!"

Other people must have thought I was the weirdest five-year-old ever.

     Now, a decade and some years from being five years old and weird, I still wonder what life would have been like without that babysitter who taught us how lame normalcy was. I would probably be a sane, upstanding member of society, playing a sportsgame and liking boys and cheerleading and whatnot. That would have been boring, right? Instead of playing a sportsgame or cheerleading or churchgoing, I'm awake at 5:30 AM waiting on the new episode of a cartoon I like a lot. I'm 23. Normal 23-year-olds think cartoons are lame and childish, but not me. I think cartoons are awesome.

     I feel like my whole life has been spent repeating that mantra: "Run away, it's the normals", but now that same abnormality I used to strive for is getting..normal. I started back at my small-town community college this fall, and people are wearing shirts with things they like on them like always. This time, though, people like the stuff I like. I have seen internet references, comic references, and TV show references that make me want to hug people and propose and all those creepy things we do on Tumblr when we want to show we think someone else is cool.

     The problem is, now that abnormality is normal, I can't figure out who was originally abnormal and who is just going along with the "geek" fad. I'm at a loss. I'm having no trouble still being me, but I'm having trouble figuring out who is being themselves and who is just trying to fit in. This is all so confusing. I kind of want to be abnormal again.