Have you ever noticed that people living on the edges of society and are always attractive in some way. This is hard to explain. Let’s try a couple of examples.
Some people are on the edge because they are so much better at something than every one else. Sports stars, writers, A-List bloggers. This is fame.
Some people are on the edge because they do stuff everyone else thinks they could never do. Ultra-marathoners, heck marathoners. Missionaries. Mountain climbers. You can’t help but wish you could do what they do, but believe you can’t.
Some people are on the edge because they do something that other people aren’t willing to do. Normally these people are doing something everyone else considers wrong. I know a guy who makes porn movies. People are very interested in what he does. He lives in a world the rest of us don’t.
Is this just culture? Are we interested because it is a different culture than we have? Like my fascination with Japan. Or is it something else?
I wrote the above a few weeks ago, but hadn’t posted it. Now I’m making a connection with something my youngest, who will be a teen in two weeks, said on our recent trip.
“Get ready to have two kids trying their hardest to be unique while fitting in.”
He said that because he considers it a big part of being a teen. I answered that it’s still true of adults. Don’t we all want to be unique and also want to fit in? Are the things above our desires for uniqueness? And the things we don’t do are at least somewhat related to wanting to fit in more?
Something to ponder. More questions than answers today.
“Have you ever noticed that people living on the edges of society and are always attractive in some way.”
I was shocked by this statement, until I realized that the phrase “living on the edges of society” means something different to each of us.
The thing that immediately popped in my mind was street people, drifter, the homeless, bums and drug addicts. Hardly what I’d call “attractive”.
YOU are talking about the movers and shakers in society. Instead of fringe dwellers, they’re the people who inhabit the cutting edge.
I suppose they’re living on the edges of society, in a strict parsing of the phrase.
James
Good point. I meant the bleeding edge. Didn’t think edge/fringe when I wrote it.