Different ≠ Other

I'm weird. An oddball. Different. I've known this for ages, ever since I was little and every time I opened my mouth someone in my hometown thought I was from a different continent. That was due to my speech disorder, which seems to have morphed into something of a southern accent and doesn't get comments these days. But I'm still different. Pagan. Bisexual. ADHD. It's not like there's no one else like me out there, but I'm definitely in the minority.

And that's ok. There's nothing inherently wrong with or othering about being different. The problem arises when someone is pushed to the outside, to where they no longer belong.

One of the best examples of this comes from when I was selling Girl Scout cookies outside a store. Someone else was handling the transaction, but I noticed that the customer wasn't sure what to get. Trying to be helpful, I told him "The Tagalongs are my favorite!" The guy looked at me, back at the other Girl Scout helping him, and said in a tone that was almost scornful, "Where's she from? New Zealand?" He then paid no more attention to me, she said nothing about it, and they finished the transaction. It was pretty clear to me though that because of how I spoke, he considered me beneath his notice, except as an object of derision. And then we all pretended like it hadn't happened.

That brief interaction hurt badly. It's only in the past few years that the memory stopped being painful. I want to say that it's because I've learned to not care, but I have to admit that maybe it's because I apparently finally sound like I'm from the continent I've spent my whole life on.

I want to emphasize though, the problem wasn't that someone drew attention to my speech disorder. That was a regular occurrence that I was comfortable with. The problem was being treated as other, as though I didn't belong. Let me show you another way it could have played out that would have been fine.

"The Tagalongs are my favorite!" "Hey, weird accent. Are you from New Zealand?" "No, it's a speech disorder. And I was born down south, but raised up here." "Oh, ok. Hey, are the Thin Mints any good?"

This one would have also stuck in my memory, but only because no sympathy or reassurance that I sounded fine was offered. (Why reassurance ticked me off would be for another post, though.) What makes this scenario so good, to me, is that ultimately my accent doesn't change how I'm treated. Fortunately, my speech disorder hasn't made a difference to most of the people I've met.

As to what prompted this post...I don't know. I can't even say that being different has particularly been on my mind lately, because it always is. It's kind of difficult to go a whole day without being reminded of how I'm different in some way. But something, somehow, got me thinking about how being queer, Pagan, or whatever, doesn't necessarily mean that one has to be an outsider. And I think that's an important thing to remember.

Fun Times

In writing about the oceanography class recently I remembered a fun craft project we did to illustrate how one can measure the angle of a star, the sun...or anything, for that matter. It's as simple as making a protractor, labeling the degrees, hanging a string with a weight on it, looking along the 90° angle...and then looking at where the string has fallen.

The first time I made one of these was at a Girl Scout day camp, I believe it was part of the Lewis and Clark.

The Girl Scout one

The one I made in school looks a little different. It was made from a paper plate rather than a printout with the degrees already printed on it, as the Girl Scout one was.

The one from school

...and I realize now that in this and the last few posts I've been aiming for a more light hearted note than what's really going on in my head. As of writing this (April 8th...I've scheduled a couple other posts I've written to go up first) I'm doing much better than I have in a while, but it's still a struggle to do something as simple as walk up to the store by myself to get something. Still, at least I'm managing that these days. I guess it's just easier to write about good times than about what I'm dealing with now, and I'm not sure how to strike the right balance between honesty and managing to not make my blog a depressing read.

Girl Scout Memories

For whatever reason, maybe it's to do with the Girl Scout cookies that have been in the house lately (the Thin Mints are really great with Nutella...just thought I'd mention that detail) I felt like dragging up my old Girl Scout uniforms, and in particular my vests. I wanted to revisit the badges I earned, but to my surprise it wound up being the patches on the back that I was more interested in.

I guess I should mention the difference between badges and patches. Badges are earned by doing certain things and ideally learning a new skill set (or in the case of Brownies, it's Try-its and all I had to do was try), whereas the patches on the back of the uniform were usually more to commemorate something that's been done...though they can also be to remember certain achievements.

(Things might be different now...? I don't know. I know things were changing in Girl Scouts when I left.)

Although I might take a closer look at the front of the vests later to try to remember what was what, I found it was the patches on back that held more memories for me.

My Mother is a Leader

My mom was my troop leader when I was a Brownie, Junior, and I think some of my time as a Cadette...I had a different leader by the time I became a Senior, but I don't remember exactly when that switch happened. Despite her long time as my leader this patch was only on my Brownie vest with the date 1995-1996, so maybe I just decided to leave room on my later vests for other things. Since, after all, everyone knew who my mom was. (Sorry, does that sound a little arrogant? I guess I was a bit proud that my mom was my leader, and that she had a leadership role in things getting done even outside of our troop.)

Flag Ceremony

I was pretty proud of myself as Brownie when I learned how to take part in raising and lowering the flag(s). It seems like this would have been a Try-it, but it was a patch. One of two flag ceremony patches on that vest, actually, I guess I was pretty proud of myself.

And since I'm talking about things I was proud of...I took some of pride in how well I could sew patches onto my uniform. These days I take those skills for granted, I guess because I've had them for so long, but at the time it was new to me and I was so happy that no one could even tell what color thread I used. And not everyone took such care with sewing their patches on.

Let's Read

I don't remember the story behind this one. But I guess I loved to read even when I was young. Well, I did get a taste for books as a toddler chewing on my mom's special edition copy of The Hobbit...

End of the Oregon Trail

There's a...I think museum...dedicated to the Oregon trail in Oregon City. As a GS event a bunch of troops got together and walked the last mile or so of the trail, learned about the trail in the museum place (I got to do needlework and make butter!), and then camped out on the lawn in front of the building.

My troop was the only one to do this while wearing period appropriate clothing. I'm sure I still have my pretty floral bonnet around somewhere.

Camp Arrowhead

Just, just...I don't know what to say. I freaking loved that place. In the Columbia River Gorge, huge fir trees...lost of trails...dangit now I want to go back there. That place was so important to me growing up. I think I actually feel almost homesick for it now, is that weird?

There was also Camp Mountaindale, where I'd go for day camp each year, it was a really important place for me too. I guess it had lots of lemon balm, because the smell of that plant always reminds me of Mountaindale.

Hiking

My troops tended to do a lot of camping when mom was my leader. It's no surprise that I picked up this hiking patch somewhere along the way.

Southern Vancouver Island Area, Girl Guides

I think it was the only trip I took where my mom wasn't my leader, I visited Victoria in Canada. We stayed in a building that belonged to local Girl Guides, and I guess we got this patch from them during our stay.

We visited the Butchart Gardens, rode a double decker bus, visited a local government building, and while at a museum I discovered that there'd been a town named Sarita. That was just some of the fun we had. There were also two local Girl Guides who seemed to be doppelgangers (personality wise, that is) of a pair of best friends in our troop. That slightly weirded the four of them out, and greatly amused the rest of us.

Pins

Three pins on the front of my vest. As I recall the top and bottom pins stayed with me all the way from Brownie to Senior, and although they were important I can't remember for certain what they meant. (And I don't want to make guesses since I don't want someone to stumble across this post and then give others bad info about Girl Scouts that they picked up from me.) The pin in the middle, though, saying PA, refers to the fact that I'd become a Program Aid, meaning that I was an older GS helping with the younger ones and learning leadership skills in the process. I took some pride in that one.

There were also patches to celebrate things like selling a certain number of cookies, but even though those were great achievements it's more patches like those above that I pause over when I look at my vests.

Girl Scout cookies

My parents have bought Girl Scout (GS) cookies every year ever since I was young. First it was from me, because I was a GS. Now it's from girls selling at the exits of grocery stores, and/or my mom buys them from a coworker's daughter.

I have some fond memories of selling cookies. Perhaps the best was selling at a grocery store with a friend and her mom. The three of us were in a homeschool family choir together, and we sang when we were packing up at the end of the evening. I think that was the same evening that I bought myself a box Do-si-dos since I'd missed dinner (hey, they have peanut butter in them! peanut butter is healthy!) and my toes practically froze despite my wearing multiple pairs of socks and sturdy snow boots. It was a very cold evening, but fun.

Dream Big GS cookie patch