Different?

“Why you gotta be so different?”
If I had a dollar for every time I heard that, I would be in Tahiti right now…
This time a young lady wanted to know…
“What do you mean, sweetie?”
“I don’t really know, but you are. First of all you too cool. Everyone I know gets beserk and goes off. But not you…when we act up, you just look at us all cold and stuff and we straighten right up. Do you ever cuss anyone out?”
I smiled inside.
“Very occasionally, but not often. It is a waste of time.”
“Huh?”
“It is, when you are in a conversation with someone and it goes wrong, it is real easy to cuss someone out. But in my opinion, when you do that, you are throwing away your power.”
“What power?”
“Your power to have control of your own life. When you allow people to make you so mad you have to cuss them out, then they are in charge of you. I don’t allow people to be in charge of me.”
“Did you ever?” I had to think about this and smile again, my mama always told me I knew my own mind.
“Of course, I was a child once. But mostly from about age thirteen on, my mom trusted me and so long as I followed the rules I was allowed to control my own life.”
“What were the rules?”
“Good grades, respect for myself, chores….stuff like that.”
“So at thirteen what were you allowed to do.”
“Go to movies, go hang out with friends, sit outside staring into space…whatever I wanted to do.”
“What about boys?”
“What about them?”
“Were you allowed to date?”
“Of course not. I was thirteen. But I negotiated a deal with my mom, she had told me sixteen, but when I got to almost fifteen she allowed me to date. By then she knew she could trust me and she also knew it wouldn’t affect my grades, my respect for myself and stuff like that…”
“I told you Ms. A, you just different.”
“Is different bad?”
“No, it is all good…I think I will try to be different too.” My heart surged.
“Don’t nothing beat a fail but a try.”
“Huh.”
“We will talk about that another time.”
“Love you…”
“Me too…”

angelia