Have you ever had the urge to do something really out of character? I get that urge pretty often. It’s a way to confuse or shock people, which hopefully makes people laugh. Doing something that people don’t expect and certainly wouldn’t imagine of me keeps my little world on its toes. I don’t want to stay there, I just want to do something that surprises everyone…including me. I truly think that I don’t do this enough. I did it more often when I was younger and felt a bit more freedom to unravel the tightly wound impression I had made of myself.
When I was in high school I was known for a few things. I was, in a nutshell, the good little Christian girl who can sing. I didn’t smoke or drink or chew and I didn’t date the boys who do. You know, that girl. I went to a small public school, the kind of school where the kids you went to kindergarten with were the kids you spent every school year with. There was one class for each grade and I graduated with a good percentage of the people I met at 5 years old. That dynamic creates friendships among people you might not normally get to know, almost like a family. I was friends with everyone, no matter what they chose to get into as they got older. We were still friends, and genuinely enjoyed each other despite our differing characters.
Our senior year we got together to make the homecoming float. We were at Keith Sikorski’s farm and decorating a hay wagon. We were doing alright if I remember right, but needed a break. We decided to take a walk. There were probably 20 or so people out there and I don’t remember any adults with us. I ended up toward the back of the group walking with Jinny Bauman, who was smoking a cigarette. I looked at her and at that little group of people and decided to step out of character for a minute. I asked Jinny if I could borrow her cigarette, I popped it into my mouth and picked up my step. I didn’t make a big scene, just acted like a I needed to catch up to someone and had my hand up to my mouth to make it look like I was actually puffing on that thing. The whole group dropped their jaws as I passed. I am always surprised at the people who believe without question, a change in character, simply because they see something they don’t expect. Hadn’t I proven that I wouldn’t smoke a cigarette in my 17 years of previous character? To most it was funny. To a few it was suspect.
Stepping out of character, making people laugh out of shock or surprise, putting a dent in the flat parts of life can break up the typical and be a little bit refreshing.
This morning I’m relaxed and looking around at a semi-clean house. I could jump in and make it a really clean house, but wouldn’t it be more fun to do something out of character today? Like pull out paints and brushes and let the kids make a mess. That would totally be out of character for the me I am now. I might just do it. I might pretend I’m an Italian art professor while I’m at it…or should I be French?
Italian. Mostly because I would love to go to Italy but you can be French if you’d like 🙂
Hmmm, my house is almost always semi-clean. I suppose I could step out of character and make it really clean…but what fun would that be? Although it would likely make my husband really happy and he’d be completely shocked…which makes it a little more tempting because I do love a good shock factor 😉
My French accent is much more consistent, but I failed at both today. Too much paint threatening my home to stick with the accent. I DID let them paint. Now they are eating lunch and I can’t wait to put them down for naps. It went really well and they enjoyed it, but stepping out of character makes me tired.
…and my house is still semi-clean. I’m okay with that though.
I love to keep people guessing about just what I might do next 🙂 It’s so much fun, isn’t it? Hooray for paints and hooray for messes!
Sometimes “out of character” just becomes a part of your character you hadn’t discovered yet.
True Tisra. Very true. Proving we are capable of change.