So, I’ve been driving a mini-van for a week now, and I love the dang thing! It’s a sweeeeet ride!! Seriously! Tons of room, good mileage, headroom and doors that open themselves. It was snowy and icy when I picked it up, but the front-wheel drive yanked that sucker through the slush, no-problemo!

Anyway, I really do enjoy weird stuff like that. I mean, it must be weird to enjoy a mini-van’s practicality and versatility and function, because the few people I told about this epiphany, were not impressed whatsoever. They laughed at me and made fun. When I mentioned it could get some mud tires I felt isolated and alone on a little deserted isle with my opinion, when I shared it around… so very sad…

So WHAT!! I dun’t care! I like LOTS AND LOTS AND LOTS of stuff, that not everyone likes. That is why my blog is titled weirdforgood.com, and that is why I get to say what I want, and what I like, or don’t, here in this space. A quiet place where I don’t have to physically hear the opinions of others. Sorry. I probably prefer that sometimes 🙂

Anyway, there are things that turn me on, and things that grip my attention. I want to share that here this week. I want to express, that it’s a great thing, to have an opinion opposite of the ‘group’! If you have them, and I’m sure you do, enjoy it! It’s wonderful to see and appreciate what inherently is interesting to you alone. I’m sure there are millions enough fans of the latest bands to go around. I have found my favorite, they aren’t on mainstream radio. Not everyone would like them. However,  I have a personal connection with their music. I just prefer them over all others. Bar none. And I even like the experience of ‘not everyone liking them.’

Maybe they don’t. They probably work too hard, and make too wonderful of music to still not be mega-millionaires, like a few less talented teenage stars do.

So, I don’t have cable TV. I don’t have an opinion on sports. I don’t looooove any one team, or haaaaate any other team. I will watch a game and get excited. Nothing in my life will change because of the outcome though. Not one thing. They don’t know me, I don’t know them. I didn’t go to the school… maybe that’s the difference. Flint Hills Technical College barely had a co-ed softball team, let alone Division 1 Basketball.

I do though love documentaries. And lots of shows on PBS. I love the new YouTube series Serious Jibber Jabber by Conan O’Brien. I love it because it is a lot like Charlie Rose. I like Charlie Rose. Wow, in-depth interviews! Sure, actors, rockers, expected people. But Conan is intensely intrigued with U.S. Presidential history. He has authors on, and knows so much detail about our former Commanders-In-Chief. His interest, interests me. I doubt it is a popular thing, to talk about this stuff. It inspires him though, he has a platform to do it, so he does. (very well I must add)

That darn mini-van is just one more thing in a loong list of stuff in my life, that I feel that I truly appreciate and yet makes me apart from normal. The fact that I even notice that gap, can tell us something though. I must yearn to be accepted. I must still want the people I interact with, to see things the way I see them. I want that camaraderie and approving agreement. I sure do. I know that I have, at other times in my life, done more to go along with the flow, and to fit in with the crowd, than I do now. Much more.

I probably won’t talk myself into buying my Mom’s mini-van. (Even though it is super awesome!) I probably will just fix the Troop and keep limping it along for awhile. I probably won’t buy a sweet Jayhawks, or Powercats tee shirt, at the sporting goods store I work at. Even if it is a great deal, on my employee discount. I don’t own one now, maybe never will.

I will still seek out those videos or shows or documentaries, where people speak about their lives, and how they got from their humble beginnings to being the master of their craft. I will always loooove the moments where they share their principals, their inner stances on life. Most of the time, they say that they learned them from a parent, or a grandparent or teacher or boss. I wonder if we do enough of that stuff now. Showing the kids principals. Showing by example. Succeeding ourselves and telling the kids, what makes it work best for us. I don’t do it enough I know.

I am weird. Always really have been. I remember the girls in gradeschool calling me weird. I took that on, as a label that was mine, no one else’s. I liked it, gave me freedom to really be anything I guess… Anything but normal…

Sincerely,

Aaron Nichols

‘True power: the willingness and ability to look into your own mind and to decide what is appropriate – or not.’ – Dusan Djukich