weird

I am a bit weird.

  That's not quite accurate, I'm a lot weird. I prefer the word eccentric but most people would say weird. I'm ok with that.

I'm not really interested in the things that most normal people are interested in.

I tend to get obsessions about odd things and then I research them and dwell on them, immerse and surround myself with them. Such as, at any given time when I lived in Virginia I was obsessed with either the Victorian era or the American Colonial period. Poor Mr. T. I completely decorated our living room in the Victorian style even though I know he really didn't like it. Of course we never really used our living room so that might have been why he put up with it. He was a smart one.

And I can't even count how many times I dragged him down to Colonial Williamsburg and insisted that we stay in the restored section even though those rooms weren't up to the luxurious standards that he usually enjoyed when traveling.

But, bless his heart, he not only tolerated my quirks (now that's a much nicer word than weird) but he celebrated them. I think he thought all my little passions and collections were adorable even though he could rarely keep up with them because I tend to switch from obsession to obsession with the speed of a cheetah. Ah yes, I used to have a thing for cheetahs.

Then there was the time I loved seals and sea lions, and the time I thought I wanted to learn the autoharp, or how about when I wanted to collect all things Little House on the Prairie and dragged him all around the Midwest visiting museums. Of course we did get to see Mt. Rushmore and the Badlands of South Dakota so I know he enjoyed that part. Or the time when I was obsessed with the American Southwest and decorated the whole house in that style...that came before the Victorian redecoration. Or the time when I fell in love with anything vintage - clothing, makeup, music and we had to go to all sorts of vintage festivals and antique malls. Mr. T wasn't fond of antiques, he liked new, modern stuff but he learned to appreciate my aesthetic. 

There was also my complete obsession with a house builder from the 1920s in Carmel so we went all around the town having him take pictures of all the houses and I spent hours in the library reading microfilms of 1920s newspaper or the lengths I went to to learn everything I could about the WASPs from WWII. Mr. T was supposed to take me to Texas this summer so that I could do more research about them. Anybody out there fancy a road trip to the middle of nowhere Texas?


And the poor guy never knew what color or length my hair would be when he came home. I experimented with my hair for years before finally settling on a style that suited me. In the beginning he might have had a confused look on his face when suddenly my long hair was short or my blonde hair was red but eventually he got used to it and nothing could phase him.

   My longest lasting obsession has been with hats. I love hats and wear them often. Mr. T loved this obsession, he often said I had a "hat head" which meant he thought I looked good in most any hat.

He loved for me to get new hats. On our last trip to California he insisted that I buy 2 new hats at my favorite hat shop in Carmel. It would make him happy to know that I wear one of them often and the other, bought for a vow renewal we never got to have, will make its first appearance at Disney Dapper Days later this month.

I'm also weird because, unlike most girls, I don't give a crap about wearing the latest styles or buying expensive purses and shoes. Actually, Mr. T loved me to have designer purses and the only ones I have are ones he insisted on buying for me. But nobody can make me spend hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars on shoes.

Instead, and this is what makes me definitely weird, I have fallen in love with a style called Boho which is part vintage, part hippie with a dash of cowgirl thrown in for spice. I started dressing this way in 2012 and it was like a light bulb went off in my head. This is me, this is who I am. Mr. T used to call it my hobo style just to tease me but I think he really respected that I marched to my own drum when it came to style even though it wasn't his favorite style. Although I'm not interested in current designer fashion, I am very interested in fashion and style and I spend an inordinate amount of time putting together just the right looks. Mr. T appreciated that I cared about how I looked and the style I presented to the world. He loved to pick things out for me that contributed to that style. He had great taste in clothes and jewelry.

I so appreciate that he loved my weirdness and never judged. I was lucky and blessed to have someone by my side that allowed me to blossom into the real me. Before him, I had never met anyone that made me feel so comfortable to just be myself and let my freak flag fly. He encouraged every research subject, complimented every new hairstyle or outfit, made me feel like I was the cutest, most adorable girl on the planet and he listened to my endless chatter on subjects he probably couldn't have cared less about. For a mostly quiet girl, I can get on quite a roll if I'm talking about something I love. Being a passionate person himself, he understood and encouraged passion in others.

When I get to see him in heaven, the first thing I will do is thank him for giving me the space and confidence and support to become my true self, for loving whatever version of me that I came up with each day. It was the best gift a slightly (very) awkward, shy girl could have ever been given.

And so, for him, I'm going to keep on being adorable and cute and quirky and just plain weird.