Monday, July 28, 2008

The Truth About Being Wild


There are two types of girls in this world: those who are the perfect, timid matriarchs born only for marriage - the bread-and-butter kind of girls who carry family photos of distant cousins in their wallet and will do everything in their power to avoid an argument - the girls who sit crisscross applesauce on their twin-sized bed and daydream about wedding dresses and first kisses and plastic pink dollhouse homes. There are these small-town girls with their quiet smiles and television dreams, and then there are those who are wild.

While the small-town girls are daydreaming about Tupperware parties and joining the PTA, these concrete goddesses are taking off their heels and jumping carelessly into public fountains. They are dancing wildly to live music, whether it be pulsing trance or cafe jazz, and wearing hand-strung popcorn necklaces as crowns. These swinging cafe-au-lait kind of girls belt out karaoke standards without missing a beat and scribble little crumbs of encouragement on bathroom walls - they slip in and our of our world, cart-wheeling and backflipping through life, and the tragedy is that sometimes we only notice their presence when they're gone. Sometimes they fall into our laps as best friends and curious strangers. Sometimes we are those wild girls.

We are the ones who will always sing, even when nobody's listening. We are the ones who will never hesitate to ride loop-de-loop roller coasters, no matter how daunting they may seem. We are the ones who will never be afraid to speak our minds, and we will do whatever it takes to change the world. Others may never understand us - the simple girls will stare scornfully, scratching away our encouraging graffiti with a manicured nail, but these shortcomings never seems to faze us - until it comes to the matter of love. When beautiful boys are involved, boys who thrill us and chill us and yet could never begin to comprehend us, the whole world begins to slow.

These boys with their expensive watches and stunning punctuality, they are afraid. They see who we are and what we have, all of our madness wrapped up neatly in lace and tulle, and they realize that they could never tame us. They know that we, with our ever-changing nail polish, would never rear their perfect Oxford child - that we, with our dreams of baking cupcakes for notorious authors, could never settle to be part of a conventional family. In us they see instability and calamity - they fear the fact that we will never submit to their American dream. And so they run. Even those with love in their hearts still run, tumbling towards unwed sweethearts in Lily Pulitzer sweaters. And these silly boys settle down with sleepy girls that we will never understand. And we are left standing barefoot in pubic fountains. Or star-struck on that karaoke stage. Or staring blankly at a bathroom stall with pen in hand. We realize that love has eluded us, tricked us, shattered us with its fickle sense of humor, but maybe we are the ones who have been doing the eluding. Are we wrong in our slam-dancing ways? Have we become too much to handle? Somewhere along the highway of life, have we made a wrong turn and somehow forgotten to change lanes and become simple?

When did love begin to dictate who we are and not the other way around? No matter how lovely or sweet those dashing boys are, sometimes we just have to accept that we are too wild for them - too complicated and untamed. At the end of the day we have to ask ourselves, is it better to be loved or free?

We may be unconventional darlings, or gothic prom queens, or mysterious concrete conquistadors, but we know what we have, and we will always embrace it, no matter the heartache it may bring us. Because we are wild. We are free. And we are not afraid.

Always,
Penelope ♥

22 comments:

Anonymous said...

I love this :) Been enjoying your blog, darlin.

Kayla Ice said...

To be loved or free? Goodness gracious, that is indeed the million dollar question. I am struggling right now baby-doll with that exact thing. But i am thinking i can be both!!! It is just learning to juggle and find that special someone who can love you and let you be free!!

WE ARE WILD AND WE ARE WONDERFUL!!!

Anonymous said...

we are wild!!! we are free!!! amen to those words penelope!!! huzzah!!!

My Stifled Laughter said...

^^ Sing it! Silly boys... you can't tame wild horses.

Hug and loves for you, Penelope! :D

Anonymous said...

Oh my.

My fiance left me 7 months ago now.

Reading this post just now is the very first time since that happened that I've actually honestly felt and thought - his loss!

Very well said. And thank you.

Anonymous said...

Thank you for this.

Anonymous said...

Wow does this post strike a chord! I think lots of women have had the experience of declawing themselves (so to speak) in order to be somehow acceptable to someone else. It's sad, and history shows that I'm not exempt.

Rachel Moore said...

oh my god, that was beautiful.

i am printing this & putting it on my wall. i've been in a funk the last few months over how the world reacts to my spontaneous random weirdness that i don't find so weird at all, & i need to remember to just say FUCK EM!

i'll live my life my way. i only have myself to answer to.

you are a brilliant writer.

Cassandra Thuss said...

Ah brilliant!
Your writing is so gorgeous & you're such an inspiration.
This article is so great :)

Kristen said...

You are wonderful.

Anonymous said...

To all of the beautiful girls who have commented:

I am so incredibly happy that this has struck such such a chord with everyone. I really thought that it was a topic that needed to be addressed because so many times wild and lovely women have had to face rejection (in more ways than one!) because of who they are. It's something that I'll never understand, and I don't think the other victims understand it either, but you know what? To borrow a few short and sweet words from Rachel, fuck em! We're marvelous, we're sassy, and if nothing else, we have each other! I think it's incredibly comforting to know that there are other girls in flesh and blood in the same predicament and it just goes to show you that life does not end when love does.

You girls are fabulous - you know that! You're the most incredible people, and even though I don't know you all by name I'll believe that until the day I die.

Stay beautiful, angels. Stay wild.

Always,
Penelope ♥

WOLF Q said...

i think that's a vast over generalization of the female population. i would say that i'm both of your 2 types of girls & i know a few girls who are neither. & i know very few girls who are a perfect match for either of your two categories.

i believe it was in a tom robbins book that i read it but...there are 2 types of people in the world. the type that think there are 2 types of people & the type that don't.

Anonymous said...

Erin:

It's meant to illustrate a point. I'm perfectly well aware that people come in all shapes and sizes and I know better than anybody else that most girls are so complex that trying to categorize them is like shaking up the snow-globe even more. But how interesting, and relevant, would that be if included?

These two types of girls are the figureheads for every woman that has had to face any kind of rejection for who she is, wild or not. They're the yin and yang - the juxtaposition. Even if you don't fit into one of these two categories, if you're left for someone else, the idea is still there.

I wouldn't read too much into that aspect of this post - as far as I'm concerned, there are much more important issues here!

Always,
Penelope ♥

Anonymous said...

So inspiring and so true. Kudos my dear!

a girl said...

I LOVE this. I really needed to read it today, too. Ugh. I think I'm going to print it and stick it on my bathroom mirror!

Sydney Hell said...

Wow,
I really like this.
You have a great blog!
-Hell

Anonymous said...

Great post, Penelope. One thing though: rather than aspiring to bake cupcakes for notorious authors, should we not aspire to be those notorious authors ourselves? ;)

Anonymous said...

Haha, I love this! Penelope's blatantly read stargirl. It reminds me of the rolling stone's Wild Horses. But it is a sad thing for a spirit in freedom to have her freedom stifled of love. Is that really freedom? Finally somebody's put this down though so I don't have to wrack my mind wrought with confusion. I like boys so much; they're endless fun. But this is so true.

kat said...

I'm not sure if I quite agree..

On another note, would you mind removing my picture from this post please?

Anonymous said...

Kat - Of course! I'm sorry you don't agree.

kat said...

Thank you Penelope. I do like your writing.. it has a nice flow to it.

Anonymous said...

I'm not sure if it's all that important to you, but I found this on someones myspace. After I had just found someone elses poem on there, uncredited as is this one. She even 'edited' it as if it were her own words. Replacing "we" with "I". Whenever i've seen your beautiful words posted anywhere else, they've been credited to you, so i just thought you might like to know.