One Out of the Box

There once lived a man whom thought himself wise, but turned out to be no match against the wisdom held by collective thought, well, so they thought. To them, he was considered a misfit and nicknamed ‘one out of the box.’ They refused to understand his differences and he was forced to the outer, where he eventually found happiness in a place called, ‘Whatever Land.’
But let’s return to the town of ‘Wherever’, where his life began. ‘Wherever’ was a place where ‘up’ was ‘up’, ‘down’ being ‘down’, ‘in’ being ‘in’ and ‘out’ being definitely ‘out’. In his youth, he couldn’t help but to relish in all the opposites of ‘ups’, ‘downs’, ‘ins’ and ‘outs’, often discovering there was more to life somewhere ‘in between’.

Others couldn’t understand his plight, nor did they want it followed. To them he became that unwanted square peg, the eleventh green bottle that could only be filled with envy and deemed to never flourish without fitting inside one of the boxes they had first set aside for him. Unlike the rest, without whipping him into shape, he would be shown the outer and for the sake of the rest - on the outer he’d have to remain.

Although at first he was scared, the world seemed so much bigger and brighter on the outer. He could try his hand at almost anything; see things he never dreamt possible or even knew existed. There were big boxes, small boxes, square boxes, rectangle boxes, coloured boxes, dull boxes, loud boxes, silent and musical boxes. Boxes with movement, stillness, darkness and boxes that beamed with light to welcome anything a heart desired.

Every individual box soon became like the workings of one giant carnival, dazzling with colour, reflecting individual uniqueness but always shining the light on acceptance and understanding.

From time to time, youngsters from the place ‘Wherever’ stepped on the outer demanding to know everything he had seen at the carnival. They begged him to share his knowledge, tell them about the people he had met and they were especially interested in knowing the kinds of activities and events that went on beneath the distant lights. The more he revealed, the more they feared that they too would be put on the outer if they were caught knowing anything different. Eventually they stopped visiting him.

The further he journeyed on the outer, the fewer boxes he noticed anywhere - the horizon seemed endless. He often thought of his friends and the life he once knew in ‘Wherever’, trying to work out why he had been considered such square peg and why other’s needed to find a suitable label and fit him neatly into a box. Could it have been his hair style, his choice of clothing or even his creative and poetic flair that went against the grain of the straight boxes? Thus confirming their collective thought that he would never flourish and would always be a misfit, misunderstood and unwanted.

Well, I guess all stories must come to an end, but in ‘Whatever Land’ stories never seem to stop quite anywhere. ‘One out of the box’ naturally lived happily ever after. For still etched on the outer of the tallest green tree remains the word that defined his life…’Whatever’ – for he had come to learn that on the outer he could do whatever, be whatever for whatever was always going to be…for when he reached whatever, then whatever he could happily be…