Tabula Rasa

Tabula rasa (/ˈtæbjələ ˈrɑːsə, -zə, ˈreɪ-/ "blank slate") is the theory that individuals are born without built-in mental content and that therefore all knowledge comes from experience or perception.

Blank slate? When I was adopted in 1970, this was the common wisdom. Your baby will be a blank slate to shape as your own.  Unfortunately this is complete bullshit. There are things about us that are innate and coded into our dna. Don't believe me? Then explain how when I met my father for the first time, we share mannerisms, body movements and even personality traits. I am like my biological mother in some ways that is just down right freaky. Shouldn't I be just like the people that raised me if I was indeed a blank slate? 

God, I was so different from them. I always felt "off" like I didn't quite fit.  Every attempt to set myself apart from them was met with them being upset in one way or the other.  My mom was so distraught when she saw that I checked witchcraft books out from the library. She screamed through tears that I didn't believe in God.  My dad would dress me in ways that early on would ensure that I got an ass beating at school.  

I have so many stories to tell about my upbringing but one that really sticks out to me is the time I got my ear pierced. He screamed and yelled a lot and then told me that "I have a son, not a daughter!" and I am sitting there thinking that you don't even have that, I am not your child. To this day I am still struggling to find myself. 

Guess what I am trying to say is that no matter how hard they tried to mold me into one of them, I resisted. I resisted hard. Drugs, alcohol, theft and what ever trouble I could get into. Anything to help me feel like I was my own person.  As soon as I graduated high school I went into the military and was sent to Okinawa for two years. I was happy to be so far away.

They tried hard to make me one of them and it didn't work, I am not a "blank slate". I am slowly emerging as my own person and breaking the chains of conformity, one day at a time.

You are not alone and I hear you. -- Scott