My folks lovingly tolerated my fascination with Dracula. All that Vaseline in my hair was pretty hard to wash out, but it was worth it! I certainly wasn’t conscious of it at the time, but there was something about this dark, hypnotic, dominating masculine figure that must have struck a chord with me. Dracula routinely wreaked havoc on normal society, and even if he was destroyed in the end, he was just doing what came naturally to him. Was he appealing to me because I innately knew I was different as well? My Dracula obsession branded me a weirdo, which was good preparation for becoming comfortable with my own difference. I got a head start in accepting my own outsider status, and I found it empowering to be considered a bit of a freak among my peers.
