it's complicated if i'm to be honest with myself.

As a grown man - everything i belief in, i feel i have a well thought out approach to - on things both personal and worldly.

But.. i gravitated towards things as a youth that shaped who i am today, purely because of going against the grain. I didn't have a better solution that what was offered me, but i knew there were aspects of culture and life... i despised, and sometimes i despised them for really immature, short sighted reasons. But these things provided the basis for who i am now.

Without going too terribly much into my repressive home life and a home life that didn't understand my.. introverted nature, and without going into too much of the narcissistic abuse i got my father, my sister, and to some extent my mother who has developed those traits as a means to protect her own self esteem from my father - a gigantic part of my teen years ,college years ad even after college were had my rebellious nature at it's core. Whether it was acting outwardly, or even if it was just in my head.

I've been at war - so to speak - with my family, my environment, my community for so long, i don't know how else to be. I don't know how to be anything else but the minority, the black sheep, the outcast.

I dress nice, i have a nice job, i know when to shut my mouth. I've learned to manage my family and keep them at a health distance. I have a nice wife with a relationship that could be better. But I'll never feel i'll fit in.

We've visited places like NY City, Portland, Seattle, Ashville,NC, etc.. I've lived in big cities for a time like Atlanta. And i dunno - it's so foreign to me it doesn't feel natural.

I, also, find myself finding people like me who never knew the environment(s) i know - so how they got to things, their views and tastes seem to show that. It's easy for me to see "portlandia"-esque delusions and feel like they're the opposite side of the coin that they too, can't smell their own bullshit. Ya know?