Wild Thing

Renae Brumbaugh Green

 

I’ve come to the conclusion that, as much as I want to be one of the cool kids, I’m really just a big nerd. I told you I’m back in school, and I shared that I was a little nervous about it. Turns out, the only thing I needed to worry about was not being that kid.

 

You know. The overeager one who groans when there’s no homework.

 

Turns out, that’s me.

 

See, I forgot how much I like school. I forgot how much I like having assignments, reading books and writing papers. I forgot how fun it is, discussing academic-y type things.

 

So I’ve found myself in a quandary. I keep doing all my work for the coming week and turning it in early. But the professors don’t want us working ahead, so I sit there, drumming my nails, wanting something more to do. And that’s when my inner rebel comes out.

 

I mean, they’ll never know I worked ahead, if I don’t actually turn it in until the due date. Right? So I—please don’t rat me out on this, because I trust you, and you’re my friend—but I work ahead.

 

I do. I’m a dissident nonconformist.

 

I’m a wild thing, I am.

 

And all this wildness has released something dangerous in me, and I’ve started defying the status quo, tossing the rules aside left and right. Just yesterday, I was wearing boots, and no one could see my socks. And do you know what I did?

 

I wore two different colored socks. I know. I know!

 

And this morning, I was sitting at a four-way stop and no one was around, in any direction. And—get this—I didn’t use my blinker. Just threw caution to the wind and made a right turn without notifying the universe first.

 

Call me eccentric. Unconventional. I prefer the term avant-garde.

 

It would seem that going back to school has set me free: free from my inhibitions, free from my self-conscious hang-ups, free from my ideas about who I am and how I must behave. It kind of reminds me of how Christ came to set the captives free. The world places rules on us—standards we can never live up to. It tells us we’re not rich enough or skinny enough or attractive or smart or athletic enough. It feeds us lies and tells us we’re not worthy, not wanted, not loved. And somehow, those lies cement themselves to our spirits in big, rough blocks, and we walk around heavy, weighted down, deformed.

 

But those lies hide the truth. They cover up the beautiful, worthy, loved people we are—people made in God’s image—and hold us prisoner.