Thanksgiving Eve

I've been doing the whole Month of Thankful on Facebook. My thankful things are usually small ones (coffee, headphones, the way cats twitch when you surprise them), though I have managed to cover the big ones too (friends, family, safety). In the grander sense though, there are some things I'm grateful for that I just can't express in small FB blurbs. Good thing I have a blog for that.

So what am I thankful for?

I'm thankful that I can ignore the people who try to fit everyone into small little narrow boxes. These people seem to never go away (women must do this! men must do this!), but I luckily live in a place and a time when I can choose to ignore what they say and never apply it to my life. I'm thankful that other people ignore them as well.

This kind of restriction comes in so many forms. The fashion and beauty industry are built on the foundation of trying to tell people how to look. Religion and philosophies to tell people how to act. We have countries like Russia and Iran that try and kill people for not fitting in to their narrow view of acceptable sexuality. `Half the world tries to cover up women and the other half thinks we should be near naked all the time. People try and tell us how to be mothers, how to be fathers, how to be children.

In a lot of places, the people with power get to decide how narrow our boxes will be and quite often choose the most tiny box available. They want to reduce choice because choices imply freedom of thought. They certainly don't want anyone thinking for themselves.

I don't live in a place that is perfect. We're still having to fight to keep the people with narrow boxes from gaining control. However, as it stands now, I can still choose to ignore them if I want to. I don't have to be beautiful. I don't have to marry. I don't have to have children. I don't have to be demure. I don't have to be mild and calm and modest and sweet.

I'm so very grateful for this because I, like a lot of other people, would just be dying inside if I had to try and push myself into one of those narrow little boxes. I would hate every minute of it and live in so much fear of being found out as an impostor.

So yes, I am thankful for that. I am very, very thankful for that.