What's the deal with the Black Sheep?

If you happen to come from a family that has more than one child.... well, no. Lets try that again. I know there have been many occasions in my own life where I stated in the retelling of my past how being the "black sheep" in the family was the cause to my hurt, separation, mistreatment or misfortune. And since I am such a small piece to the whole of humanity, I am quite certain many others can attest to using the same quote. But why is it that the "black sheep" carries a personality trait of the outcast? When I pondered on this, I decided to track back where I first became aware of the lonely misunderstood and misrepresented creature entered my psyche. Which leads back to the childhood nursery rhyme we all one time or another stood in class and proudly sang along to the "Three bags full." But what about this view of a black sheep, has brought us to the understanding of wrong doings or negative experiences in family units? When did we as a society determine the role of a particular individual was deemed as "not like the rest of us?" Causing a member of the family to feel as if everything they did were wrong, or unacceptable. To feel forced to live close yet separate by some normal set of required character traits they seemed to not display in like manner.

Well, I tried to do some digging into where the idea for the rhyme generated. Some articles attempted to portray a connection to slavery, I must say as a woman of distinct color by name and skin. I would have to say it really didn't fit there for me. I never felt as if this was meant to be a slave response to someone. Let alone, who would have even questioned a slave about possessing black wool? It would of been regular knowledge and not wondered upon who it belonged to. Then I located other articles from a further past stating the connection to this rhyme into the 1700s when the king required ridiculous taxations for their misdoings and required more out the patrons.

Even under that backstory, I still have trouble seeing the negative connotation that it carries. I mean someone who works and then relinquishes their source that could provide them with clothing, warmth, merchandise to make their own income. But hand it over to a ruler, they're partner, and either giving their last to a little boy or unable to have enough for a crying kid in the streets. None of these representations express the image of bad or unacceptable behaviors.

This is where my realization of how wrong I have been to feel less valued or less important than any other member in my family. Yes, I may be wilder, more livlier, yes I may have travelled the less travelled road and experienced things that other members would not have dared, or thought upon and not executed. But in that lies the value, the ideas of others close to us who have pondered upon the what ifs of life. We, the willing to do what we do to help the ones before and after us to know, safely witness and judge from the sidelines. A taste of what they should be glad they didn't go for, or provide them the courage to step out of their barriers and put there hands into the dirt to help mold the future they only dream about.

No longer will I allow the hard work of the black sheep to be shamed and carry the weight of anything other than some of the baddest, bravest, most caring , loving, thoughtful, selfless people, I have encountered. They are willing to sacrifice what they have for others and feel such sympathy for those they are unable to help.

Thank you to all the Black Sheep. Dance at the dinner table, Sing while you are supposed to be focused. We were not meant to conform to one way of movement. In the fields we are free, to be brave and to be safe within our fenced environment to live alongside the ones that lay around and observe the life altering , exploration of you. The Black Sheep.