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8/23/2018
The year was 2016 and I, an edgy 18-year-old, arrived at Ohio University hell-bent on being a completely different person than who I was.
I have to be cool here, I told myself while wearing corduroys in August. No one will like me me if I’m not.
I imagined OU as some sort of weird hippy oasis party school in the middle of nowhere. While I was correct about the location, I was wrong about pretty much every other expectation I had.
When I moved in, I wore clothes that weren’t comfortable, listened to music that I didn’t like and I thought my personality was cliche and inherently totally socially unacceptable.
About that, like most other things, I was very wrong. It took me a month to realize — and even longer to accept — that it’s okay to be cliche.
Here is a cliche: nothing is original under the sun. In my vain quest to be different and original, I realized I was actually embodying a much worse cliche than if I had just been myself.
I had entered into some sort of insane cliche paradox that I couldn’t escape because every way out was a cliche.
“I’m different,” cliche.
“Be yourself,” cliche.
“I’ll just do nothing,” cliche, cliche cliche.
With this realization, I began the five cliche stages of grief. Denial, I cannot cliche. Anger, I hate that I’m cliche. Bargaining, maybe I can do something to avoid being cliche? Sadness, I’ll never not be cliche. Acceptance, I’m actually cliche.
I didn’t start actually enjoying myself until I realized that, basically anything I could possibly do, was cliche. My style, my personality, my writing pretentious columns — in some way, it’s all cliche.
Don’t get me wrong, there are bad cliches. Anyone who’s watched a bad Netflix horror movie knows that. But don’t equate the “I don’t have any cell phone service!” cliche in low budget flick to your entire personality.
Those two things aren’t exactly interchangeable.
Be that person who hangs out in a coffee shop too much. Be that person who posts a photo at a party. If it’s legal and makes you happy, there’s really no reason not to do it.
It’s okay to be different, but it’s also okay to be cliche.
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This story is part of a series of specially designed stories that represents some of the best journalism The Post has to offer. Check out the rest of the special projects here.