Inappropriate

(Warning...this is a feel-sorry-for-myself post)

That word...inappropriate...has always been a hard one for me. Maybe its because I have been called it so many times - sometimes accurately, sometimes not. By people I love and by people I barely know. Part of me feels like my whole life I have been inappropriate - not right for the occasion; never quite on board with the plan. I don't remember the first time someone told me I was being inappropriate. Maybe it was the time the lady down the street dragged me back to my house by my ear reminding me how a preacher's kid doesn't say "crap". Or maybe it was earlier. But whenever it happened, it stuck with me - it made its scar and when I hear that word (even if I know its true) the scar opens up again and bleeds like crazy.

So, clearly, as you might guess, I got it tonight. In some sense, I guess I deserved it. I was being defensive and I was making other people anxious (at a Vestry meeting no less!). But I guess, when I look back at my behavior...and believe me I have been replaying it for a while...I also feel like I was trying to stick up for my decisions. Maybe I didn't do it the right way. Maybe I didn't act the way a real priest would. I don't know. But I don't think I was entirely wrong. So when I was reminded of my inappropriate behavior less than an hour following, it just felt wrong. No, it just felt bad. And I wept. And when I say wept, I am not kidding - full on sobbing and river of tears. And I felt really stupid and young and...well...inappropriate. But not for the situation, but in every situation. And all I kept thinking was, when will I be appropriate? How old do I have to be? When will what I am be okay for the situation? When will I be the thing I am supposed to be? When can I just go home and be by myself? And, of course, I cried some more...like a big baby wuss.

But the more I think about it...the more I hate that stupid word. Because I don't think its right. I don't think its right to call someone inappropriate. I don't think you can BE inappropriate. Sure, what you do and the stupid things you say can make everyone uncomfortable...but all that is coming from some scar deep inside, from some stupid thing you learned when you were eight. That's not who you are. If we believe we are made in God's image, how can that be inappropriate? Can it be? I don't know. No...I don't think so. I know it can't be. And I think that's why it cuts me so badly.

I know I may act childishly. I know that whatever I do is going to somehow make someone uncomfortable, even if I don't know it. I am overwhelmed, overtired, underpaid and appreciated and just plain tired of constantly being undermined - whether passively or actively. But inappropriate? Really? I spent a good deal of my life lying - to myself and to other people - about all sorts of things. And after my best friend died, I made a decision, I wasn't going to lie any more. I was going to be true. I was going to be myself. And it took many, many years to really try to be myself. To like myself (and it's hit or miss most days). And so, I find myself being too much myself sometimes. Too honest, too genuine, and people are uncomfortable by that. And lately, I think, I am even uncomfortable by that. But it's been so long and I worked so hard...that I don't know if I could stop, even if I really wanted to. But I like to think that I am still a good person, even if I am too much sometimes. And I like to think that if God made me, that I can't really be inappropriate - not at my core. How can God make something that isn't fit for the occasion? How can God make someone who just doesn't fit in? And how do you live into your call, if everything around you says...well, that's not really appropriate, Rachel? How can I be myself and still be okay with everyone else?

I don't know...maybe I am just trying to justify myself. Maybe I am just being too proud and stubborn to recognize when I made a complete fool out of myself. Probably. And I will probably pay for my behaviour - in some way. But for now. I just wish I could have been called something else. Anything else. So I didn't have to feel so little - so insignificant. So I didn't have to feel so bad.