Claiming Our Identity
Identity,  The Kitchen Sink

Claiming our identity is like riding a wave.

“Where are you from?” 

This has never been an easy question for me to answer.  My life has had many dips and turns.

But perhaps I’m not alone.  I like to think that we all struggle with finding our identity to some degree, especially considering the fact that we’re constantly growing and changing.  

Life is not static, so identity is not static.

Do you remember you five years ago, ten years ago, twenty years ago?  Are you that same you?   I’m going to guess not, at least not entirely.  We all change over time.

As a child I spent all my waking hours playing outside.  I’d create families with my little piles of rocks or pinecones and build houses and entire cities for them.  In high school I would listen to Smashing Pumpkins on repeat and wind that long telephone cord down the hallway to my bedroom so I could talk to boys with mohawks.  Then in college I was determined to change the world in chunky heels and a black woolen peacoat, and now (nearly 20 years later) I am still in that process. 

I hope I’m making my point.  Identity, like life, is not static.

It used to bother me – to not really know who I was.  It seemed sort of confusing and lonely and for a long time it was.  But the funny thing about any journey is that we learn unexpected things in unexpected circumstances.  Truthfully, I didn’t realize I was an introvert (or that this was okay) until a few years ago!

What I’m trying to say is that identity is not static, but even more importantly it cannot be given to us by anyone but ourselves.  

Not our parents, not our profession, not our children, not anything outside ourselves.  Identity is hard to pin down and “claim.”  In truth it’s less about claiming something like a piece of land, and more like riding a sea of waves.

All of our experiences: those people who have touched us, the lessons we’ve learned, the pains and joys we’ve been through.  That’s what creates an identity.  It’s not a fixed point or a destination.  It’s a process.  A never ending (and sometimes frustrating) process, and we often collect and gather all those bits under one name. 

Our name.

I’ve carried around the neat and tidy name of Kate for nearly 39 years, but I’ve never been anything that resembles neat or tidy.  No, I’m messier than that.  Less black and white and more of a matte gray.  I’m soft around the edges and most of my rigid borders have come down.

I have glimmers of countless experiences and relationships that help me find commonality with just about anyone, and no one at the same time.  I’m both anonymous and unique; soft in parts (especially my middle) and rigid in very few.  I am ever changing and I am at peace with riding the waves into the unknown.

I am Anon Gray. 

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