I’m not sure what it is that caused my deep-rooted intolerance for cliches.
Once upon a time I was in a situation that could have been straight from the script of an idyllic teenage romance movie. I was standing on the deck of a beautiful ship that was headed away from shore and the city lights. It was night, and the clouds that were strewn across the dark sky looked as though God had taken some extra time in creating their mystery. The moon was high, as was the boy that stood with me. (That part isn’t so much like an idyllic movie.) He looked into my eyes and smiled a little as he told me that I was the prettiest girl in the world.
My response could have been a little more gracious.
Instead of feeling my heart race or being caught up in the romantic and cinamatic perfection of the scenario I found myself in, all I got caught up in was logic.
“The prettiest girl in the world?” I asked, “REALLY? You haven’t seen every girl in the world. I’m may be pretty, but go look at every girl in the world and get back to me as to whether I’m the PRETTIEST or not.”
(Girls, this is NOT a ladylike way to receive a compliment. Boys, don’t do drugs, as they do not lend to your credibility when you try to compliment a girl.)
The conversation spun into more ridiculous side streets from there, but the moral of the story is that even in the most glamorous of circumstances, cliches always tear me up a little bit inside.
My boyfriend and I recently celebrated our “sixmonthaversary” or whatever it’s called. By “celebrated” I mean we sat in a hotel bar commenting on the news until his grandparents got back to their hotel room, after which we spent a few hours listening his grandfather tell us stories about he and his fellow pastors, and the funeral one of them conducted for a man’s sliced-off toe. And you know, it felt like a fitting way to actively not celebrate our “sixmonthaversary.”
Valentine’s Day. A man on a horse. Landmarks. Fancy dinners. Expensive jewelry. The best hotel planet earth can provide. A man that will throw himself in front of a train for you. *cough*BrunoMars*cough* Mentally I can reason why it is that women equate things like this with romance, but emotionally I can’t relate.
For me personally, anyways, very different things qualify as romantic. Like shoe shopping and the way he keeps pace with me so we can hold hands even though I like to skip when we cross the street sometimes. Rocks shaped like chairs, ridiculous and unattractive faces, and how he recites French poetry in far too loud a voice as I laugh too loud and the other people waiting for the elevator begin to stare at us.
I don’t know what my issue with cliches is. I tried not to mention too many things that I consider exceedingly cliche in this post, lest I unintentionally offend someone, as I surely would have. But regardless of WHY I find cliches so intolerable, it is nice that God gave us the ability to love and find value in so many different things. There is nothing cliche about beauty, and the fact that we each see it in such different ways is, in and of itself, beautiful.
When I was about eleven years old I went to summer camp for the first time. Before my sister and I left, my mother talked to us about something. She explained that we needed to mindful of our behavior at camp, not only because it is important to be kind and respectful, but also because we would be a representation of both our family and Christ to the people around us. That stuck with me. Now, with so many of us daily browsing and posting to social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, and blogs such as this, our representation is no longer limited to the people we are around in person- it is far-reaching, even global at times. It is certainly a far more widespread representation of yourself to post on the internet than it is to say something in person; on the internet, the dozens or hundreds of people you are connected with may see it. That is an enormous audience. I feel very strongly that we need to be mindful of that audience, of that representation,
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