Snapple Fact #101: About Half of All Americans Are On a Diet On Any Given Day

I was working on a piece that seemed like it should be easy. It's about rebellious teenagers, and as a normal teenager living in a normal place with a normal family and a generally normal life I should know a two or thing about being rebellious. But this piece was just sucking, and I couldn't figure out why. (I know, I know, as a "good" writer I should be able to write about anything I want to, but you write what you know... right? Write what you know, draw what you see? So If I don't know anything, I can't write anything...right?)
Usually I delete the stupid chain emails I get from my younger sister, but because she decided to write me a cute little note on the top I decided to read it. Apparently, Ghandi himself wrote it, and if I didn't email it to twenty people within the next 96 hours my life would not improve drastically and everything I have ever dreamed of would not take shape. Anyway, in between corny lines about respecting other people and striving for world peace there was this little sentence, the smallest in the bunch. "Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly." That just stuck out. I started to think about being in middle school, muddle school, and trying to be such a rebel. It pissed me off that I couldn't think of any good ways to get in trouble without being so drastic because I was too afraid to misbehave. I didn't want to be punished. At this point, after deleting the email from my inbox and moving onto one promising me a vacation to Aruba, I had an epiphany.
The reason I am having so much trouble writing a story about an outcast is because I have no idea what it is like to be different. Compare me to anyone and I'm sure you'll find similarities, even ones so inane like we both have purple linens. But I am no different from anyone else. I can't be a rebel because I have nothing to rebel against. Everything that is rebelable has already been done (rebelable, not a word, you know what I mean) and I wouldn't be much of an anarchist if I copied someone else would I? Rebels are independant, free of all constrictions and inhibitions, ground breakers and earth shakers. I'm the most sane person I know.
I guess that's why I am having trouble writing about someone with an interesting personality. So that's the epiphany of the day. I can't write because I'm not a rebel and I'm not a rebel because I'm too behaved a person. It sucks to be nice.


P.S. I hope this counts as mailing this to twenty people, because I could really use a boyfriend. One with a motorcycle and a mohawk and piercings in unspeakable places.