Black Sheep

I grew up in a serious, conservative, large Catholic family.  I realized at a fairly early age I was absolutely none of those things.  I always felt different.  And back then, I didn't think of being different as anything favorable.  In fact,  because I was a sensitive child, I found it isolating and sensed I was misunderstood.

 I was the black sheep of my family.  

So when I became a mom, my priority was to have a funny, liberal, large almost Buddhist family.  But the kids didn't have to be any of those things.  And I didn't expect them to make their beds either. Because I found it a huge waste of time and I didn't want to waste energy nagging them when there were far more important things on the nagging scale, like homework.

I encouraged my kids to be different.

And one of them is particularly different.  Just not in a way that I ever expected.  I anticipated a whole spectrum of contrasting views about a huge array of issues.  I was so mentally prepared to welcome them all with open arms.  Discussing them all over a nice dinner of healthy, organic, sustainable, fair trade lentil loaf.  I WAS THERE I TELL YOU.  Until I discovered, one of my kids is  *gasp* conservative.   Whaaaaaaaaaaattttttt?  Where did this come from?

Maybe it's mandatory that every family have a black sheep.  

To challenge everything you thought about yourself and everything else.