Your prompt for #JusJoJan and Stream of Consciousness Saturday is: “out of the box.” Write about the first thing that comes to mind when you think “out of the box.”
I live and have always lived “out of the box”. To me that means living without bending to the usual constraints of social norms. That sounds awkward but it SoC and that’s what came out. You know what I mean.
My first thought about how I turned out this way is a memory of a favorite English teacher. She was from the Beat Generation, wore leotards (females weren’t allowed to wear pants to school in those days), turtle necks and corduroy jumpers. She introduced us to writers who thought outside the box. And musicians; she brought in a turntable and record album and played Woodie Guthrie’s ‘Little Boxes’.
And, boy, could I relate! We lived on the 10th floor of an apartment building which stood alone in a middle-class suburban neighborhood. I could go out on the balcony and look down on the houses and their back yards. Winding roads of little boxes.
And I lived in an even tinier little box! Little tiny boxes all stacked up!
Being a teenager in Toronto, I was very familiar with the transit system. Out in the ‘burbs, we had a fairly long walk to a bus stop. Took the bus to another bus that took us to the subway. Sometimes then even taking a street car after that.
Coming home after a night of getting stoned I would walk up a long hill, through warm happy middle class homes, to the big high rise on the top of the hill. I remember looking at it seeing it like a big filing cabinet and the balconies pulled out like drawers: pull out a drawer and look at the family.
My parents were also ‘out of the box’ kind of parents. They scoffed at middle class. . . bourgeois. . . its SoC, you know what I mean. Maybe not the best parenting but they loved us and I’m glad they weren’t what they call “helicopter parents” nowadays. They made sure we had food and were looked after but they more or less co-existed with my sister and I.
You could say I live, breathe and eat ‘out of the box’. And I don’t mean boxed food! LOL! I’m vegetarian but believe me, I wish I had some ‘Box’ to go buy boxed food when I don’t feel like cooking! My last trip to TOWN I was going to come home with something delicious already made. Nothing. I have to cook.
But now I’m spinning off topic. I will go get Woodie Guthrie’s Little Boxes. A good teacher can have such a great influence on us. I think her name was Miss McLellan but it was so long ago I could be wrong.
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