My life (memories/family)

Being a rebel without the “drug factor”

This is a story “in my life”, one of the many that everyone has in their lives. When I was fourteen years old I was kind of a rebel. I started to have nonconformist behaviour and ideas (and ideals) of my own. It was the year of 1988 and in those days the secondary school “playground” was divided into “Betinhos”, Punks, Vanguards and “Heavy(s)”. My dilemma was: where do I fit? I decided to choose something between Punk and Vanguard. But curious enough this all began earlier when I started to listen to my mother’s Pink Floyd records, I guess I have them to blame with their album and film “The Wall”. When I adopted the “dress-code” according to my “style” and music preferences I immediately started to hear the occasional depreciatory comment. The one that I hated the most and made me completely angry and sad was the allegation that I was a “junkie”. For me it had nothing to do with drugs, it was all about music and trying to be different from the mainstream culture that ruled twenty years ago.
Most parents didn’t approve at all that kind of rebellious behaviour, but I was lucky, my mother was different, she supported me in every little “crazy idea” that I had, she even went with me to the hairdresser when I said that I wanted to cut my hair into a “Mohican” hairstyle. She stood proudly beside me when people yelled out some “rooster” noises as we passed by on our way home from the hairdresser! “Don’t mind them” she said.
In 1988 there weren’t many Punks here in Lisbon. I knew a couple in my secondary school. In Bairro Alto there was this little club named Juke Box (hence my choice of nickname for our class!). It was an “underground” club that many thought of as “scary”, but it was a place where I felt safe and where one could listen to bands like The Clash, Dead Kennedys, The Sex pistols, Siouxsie, Joy Division just to name a few. And in the end, for me it was all about music, discovery and the feeling of freedom that I felt being “me”.
I have my mom to thank for letting me be the way I wanted to be, for letting me hear the music I wanted to hear, and for letting me dress the way I wanted to dress, and of course for trusting me…she gave me freedom to explore and to know myself. Little did I know that this was to take a huge part in my own personality!
It is a good thing to be allowed to grow as a person, having a good education at home and at the same time having the liberty to choose. It teaches us to be tolerant to have our own thoughts and not to be judgemental. And for me this applies to several aspects in life…