On being "crazy"

So I've done it. I've finally flipped the switch to "To Hell With It" and begun praying in public. We live on a busy road and I'm sure that many people have now seen me holding my hands up to the sky as I offer energy up, kissing the earth as I give thanks, or just sitting in the car with my hands up and my eyes closed as I center myself and get present before I drive with my children.

My next door neighbor appears to have noticed. She moved in last year and is not often at home, so our interactions have been few, but have all been pleasant, and my husband and I both have been quite pleased with her as a neighbor. Lately, though, she clearly regards me warily, and I can feel her keeping a certain distance when we talk across our driveways nowadays.

The reason I spent the first thirty-something years of my life hiding my prayers is for this very reason: I didn't want people to think I was crazy. Now my neighbor, whom I like and whose friendship I would have liked, doesn't want to have much to do with me and looks at me as though I'm a crazy person. And indeed, in her eyes I AM a crazy person, plain and simple. She can tell by the way I act. I'm clearly "not normal."

Our latest awkward interaction was this afternoon, and this evening, needing encouragement to stay true to myself in the face of judgement, I sang my girl to sleep to the tune of "Lord of the Dance" in the Christmas Revels, only with new words to help me remember to keep on this path:

"Stand true, whoever you may be
For we each carry part of the truth, you see.
Hold my hand, stay strong, and walk with me.
Hold my hand, walk tall, as true as true can be."

I have lots of versions flowing through my head, but that's the jist of it.

Any ideas? Other verses? The idea is to create an anthem to being who we are fully, the world be damned! Now is the time.