No one has ever flat-out told me I wasn't normal. But the staring, strange looks and bewildered faces tell me otherwise.

It's not how I look. I've got very normal brown eyes and brown hair. I'm not tall or short for my age.

And yet from the time I was very young, I noticed something was different.

"Let's climb a tree," I would ask my siblings. They'd shake their heads and start wrestling instead.

I never really knew my father, but that isn't so strange. Most of us never really get to know our dads.

But your mom, you expect your mom to accept you no matter what. 

"Mom, am I normal?" I asked her one day. She didn't answer. She simply stroked my head and gave me a kiss. I needed to hear her say it.

Finally, it got to be too much. I couldn't take being ignored. I could not longer tolerate being ostracized. I struck out on my own.

I found a nice little plot of ground just outside of town. I kept to myself, I didn't really know the neighbors. They seemed like nice people though.

I tried to venture into town one day to get something to eat. Some people just stared, others literally bolted inside when they saw me. I returned home disappointed.

Mostly, I just wish I understood what "normal" really means. Isn't it just some arbitrary set of standards people apply? How can anyone say I'm not normal when they won't even talk to me?

After a few failed attempts to reach out to the people in town, I decided I was going to do something about my situation once and for all.

I marched over to the neighbor's house, figuring it was finally time we got to know each other. I knocked on the door, but no one answered. I figured maybe they used the other door, so I went to the side of the house.

I knocked, again no one answered. Silly me, I didn't see the doorbell. I rang it.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the curtain in the window near the door move. A middle-aged man was holding a cell phone, taking a video of me. I pretended not to see him and rang the doorbell again, determined to get an answer. 

I paced around a little on the porch, waiting for the man in the window to finally decide to answer the door. A minute passed. Nothing. I rang the doorbell for a third time.

The cell phone was still pointed out the window, but the man's wife and children had now joined him in staring at me. As hard as I tried, it was impossible to feign that I didn't see them.

My head whirled in the direction of the window, staring down the neighbors I so badly wanted to meet and befriend.

"I know you're in there!" I raged. "I can see you in the window!"

The man's mouth dropped open and he stared at me in total disbelief.

"Holy shit!" he yelled. "A talking bear!"