Identity Crisis

I realize that everyone goes through periods of life when they are struggling to discover who they really are. There are times that we all find ourselves striving to be who other people expect us to be, and times that we feel that we really are being true to ourselves. What I think is sadly too common is the feeling that we need to somehow apologize or feel embarrassed of who we really are. I have no doubt that everyone goes through this, regardless of gender or age, but it bothers me that this is something that I still struggle with at my wise old age of 35.

I grew up as the youngest of three children, with two older brothers. Because of this, there was never a lack of boys in my home. I understood how they talk, some of how they think, and all of that jazz. Being around boys has always been comfortable to me; it has also gotten me labeled as a big flirt. Of course, I kind of am, but that's a different issue entirely. Being the youngest, I always wanted to be involved and included. I didn't want to be the annoying little sister, it was a role that birth order and genetics had given to me. I wanted to be part of the group and accepted, just as pretty much everyone does.

If my brothers had been different people, this might have meant that I was really into sports, or mechanics, or getting dirty or something. However, my brothers are delightfully geeky, theatrical, imaginative, and intellectual. I'm not saying jocks can't be intellectual, don't read more into this than is intended! So in my house, this meant that I got into role playing games, drama (the kind on stage, not the type you try to avoid), fantasy books, and science fiction. Now, most of this feels completely natural. I genuinely like all of these things, perhaps not quite to the extent my brothers do, but they do feel organic to who I am. It's just not all of who I am.

Take that beginning, then add in the fact that I'm a real-live girl. Much to my mother's dismay, I never cared about my clothes, hair, or make-up in high school. Sweats, scrunchies, socks, and Birkenstocks were common school attire. That being said, I would not really describe myself as a true tomboy. I liked make-up and nice hair, but I didn't feel I knew how to look good with it. I always felt that if I tried to wear popular clothes or do my hair or my make-up, I was an imposter. Like I was trying to be something or someone that I wasn't, and that others would call me out for being a phony. It took me until about the last two years or so to get over that, no joke. I love cute clothes, I love feminine shoes, I adore make-up, and I want to have gorgeous hair. My heart has always longed to be that girl. You know the one I mean. The one who walks into a room, and everyone turns and looks. The one that guys all try to talk to and want to be with. For some reason I was always so confident in parts of myself, except for my appearance. But, I digress.

Now fast forward to my current life. I have a professional job, I'm a mom, and all of that feminine jazz. I can wear heels and make-up and cute clothes everyday if I want. I also have days that I can wear sweats and go make-up-less...sure, that's a word. Now I have my husband who is wonderful and sweet and accepts all of my crazy. He's really into off-roading. I mean, it is really his passion. He looks at rocky hills that I don't want to hike up, and drives his truck up them. So, as logic would have it, he has a lot of friends who enjoy doing the same crazy stunts. I really believe the entire sport of rock crawling was born from this group of crazy rednecks saying "Hold my beer, I'm going to try something." The off-roading community has become a big part of our social circle. This pulls me to feel like I need to become yet another person. I need to be hot, because, well, women always have to be hot, right? I need to be ok with being dirty, going days without a shower or clean clothes, spending vast amounts of money and time on a vehicle that breaks every time we use it, be able to hang with "the boys" and all of their crude or stupid conversation, and somehow find the strange combination of being a hot chick who isn't too into feminine things. Hm. So, this is my interpretation of what this would look like: take a model from a typical car shop's calendar, infuse her with the knowledge of how to actually work on the car she's bending over, and give her the coolest, most easy going personality imaginable. I just can't live up to that for so many reasons. What's more, it just isn't who I really am. Why do I feel the need to apologize for that? Why should I feel embarrassed about what I like and don't like? I struggled, wrote, and deleted some kind of ending sentence to this post for almost ten minutes, and I came up with nothing. I am forced to fall back on what all of my students and children love to write at the end of everything: The End.