tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27612445.post4182534836469371245..comments2024-03-23T12:05:23.537-05:00Comments on The Wild Reed: Growing StrongMichael J. Baylyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03087458490602152648noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27612445.post-31174008786867511672010-06-17T18:57:05.920-05:002010-06-17T18:57:05.920-05:00Thanks for sharing that Michael. I can relate to ...Thanks for sharing that Michael. I can relate to a lot of it and it made me think of how I was when I was young.Mareczkuhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13122584421854834046noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27612445.post-4677551538848287692010-06-17T17:30:37.390-05:002010-06-17T17:30:37.390-05:00Thank you Michael for this post. I have always su...Thank you Michael for this post. I have always suspected throughout certainly my whole adult life that the particular experience of not fitting into the dominant paradigm fed my innate sense of independence and continual self inventive expression and heightened spiritual sensibility. When I was in second grade, all I did was draw, draw, draw pictures of dinosaurs, horse, antique cars and beautifully dressed women. Surprisingly, the nuns just let me do it if only because they were flabbergasted by how way beyond a "normal" second graders capabilities they were. Of course, they held me back a grade and made me get back to business the next year. In order to survive my high school years I pursued the French Horn and music with an adolescent and lonely passion. When all the other kids were listening to AC/DC, I was entranced with Mahler, Dvorak and Shostakovich. Listen to the second movement of the Shostakovich 5th symphony and you may get my drift.<br /><br />This passionate aesthetic approach to life has sustained my throughout my life and am now filled with gratitude for the trials that I have endured in always having been gifted as other.<br /><br />I too wonder if, as we mainstream into cultural acceptance, gay people may loose some of the creative edge; but I suspect that this edge will only diminish somewhat - never totally. For we will never be more than between 4-10% of the population always overwhelmed in some sense by the dominant paradigms. We will, thus, always have to venture forth and create ourselves anew in each generation. I believe this in-between place and this always otherness is intrinsic to the territory that we inhabit. It is shamanic and our special gift to offer to the world. An Eversohappy Pride to you.jamezhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12910320855332238203noreply@blogger.com