Process of Discovering the Beauty of Individuality

“You gotta be who you gotta be and no body has the right to tell you other wise,” quotes, my professor of Christian Ethics second semester of my first year in college. Every teenager, especially those who are in junior high or high school want to fit in. Being part of the “cool crowd” is every girl and boy’s secret desire. As we grow we come to realize that doing what everyone else does, does not make you more liked, but rather simply followers of the imaginary term “cool.” In “Corsage” and “Wild Geese” the main characters, like myself, began to understand the value of individuality and how being yourself is a person’s prize possession.

The first day of high school was one of the most terrifying experiences I have ever had. The large buildings, the mass amount of students, the cliques the students formed and everything else made my stomach flutter with uneasiness. It was the first day of high school and I had no friends, no one to walk with in the halls and get lost with. There was no one to make me look less of a loner. Each class was not as bad as I thought; the worst part of that first day was lunch. Questions such as, who am I going to sit with? Should I get lunch? Where should I eat lunch? Should I sit with that girl I met in first period, raced through my head as I walked toward the cafeteria. But as I entered what people called the quad, I saw three girls that I just met during water polo practice in the summer. It was at that moment that I felt the need to be “accepted” by those girls. The same need and desire that Christina felt toward Baby Annie in “Corsage.” I began hanging around them after that day. Wherever they went, I went, whatever they did, I did; it soon got to the point where our coach and friends beg...

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...nd whining,” it was he, the guide dog who saw her with value and not “nothing at all.”

Today, I understand the real meaning of true friends. I understand that my true friends are those who will accept me for who I am, and I am glad to say that I have found a handful of them. I am glad to have figured out that being simply Jeanne is enough. Not only do I understand the value of individuality, but thousands of other teenagers are beginning to do as well. We understand that it is okay to be ourself, “the world goes on,” the sun will shine, everything will be okay, if we decide to do the things we want to do. I am currently in college and am about to complete my first year at State College, and still I am learning the beauty of individuality. I am still learning to understand that “you gotta be who you gotta be and nobody has the right to tell you otherwise.”