Never Fit In
He turns around to face me in the grocery store and exclaims loudly. "I look a lot different from everyone else in this store I bet. More like someone European from a long time ago I guess." He is undisguisedly gleeful about this fact. He has no desire to fit in. I love that he so joyfully fails to conform, all the time. I love that he's far enough removed from all the pettiness of childhood peer groups to think the whole thing is just silly. He rarely, if ever, worries about what other people think of him. It makes me swell with pride when another kid's dad takes the time to tell me that my kid was painstakingly honest in telling him what happened, even when he is at fault. I know he can't sleep at night if he has been dishonest, not telling a lie, because he hasn't, yet, that I know, told one. No, he hangs back after a week of not sleeping well to tell me, with tears and hesitations, of things done in secret. Because butterscotch chips pilfered fro