Born a Curmudgeon

As soon as I was self aware, I started asking questions.  Mostly of my family because, duh, those were the only people I knew.  

I questioned values mainly and then not my grandparents because they spoiled me, gave me ice cream, homemade bread and blueberry pie. So that left my parents.  They were 25ish years old when I began asking questions.  They had never ventured beyond the confines of their small town upbringing so were ill equipped to answer this little shrill voiced child they were trying to bring up. 

I was brought to church, one of those "Jonathan Edwards, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" sort of churches.  We were hollered at by an old white man behind the pulpit who convinced us to hate everyone who was not like us and not think all that much of ourselves either. 

As you can imagine, that brought questions.  The haranguing just made no sense to a curious, questioning 6 year old.  And no answers were forthcoming. And by the way, they still are not.

I managed to make it through high school in Grand Haven, MI, the town of my birth and get a scholarship to Michigan State University.  Whew, that was my escape from that hidebound conservative town and my exposure to the rest of the world. At least the one Michigan State offered.  That was 1959. I finished school 10 years later at University of Chicago in philosophy and still there were not answers. 

In a couple of years, I was involved in women's rights, civil rights, sit ins and starting my lifelong and continuing battle for equal rights for everyone.  The battle were hard fought, but I still think that the generation who came of age in the 60's changed the country for the better.

I never had a job.  I always supported myself by doing something I wanted to do and was good enough at to convince people to pay me to do it.  I still have never had a J. O. B, only self employment through all these years.

I would love to explore these alternative lifestyles my future blog posts. And the way my life has changed as a result of my disability. And because of that, how my rallying for a cause has also changed.

Are you a social activist?  What might make you one?

   

Do you follow your parents' rules? Or your own? Or maybe they are the same.  Let's talk.