Who am I?
June 29, 2005 at 9:28 AM
by Ashleigh
Looking back through my blog, I feel it doesn't really represent who I am. A lot of it is veneer, the stuff we show other people when we don't want them to know who we really are. Now and then there's a peek at the real me, but its rare.
But who am I really?
Am I a mom? Mother of two, failed mother of one? Mother of boys or mother of two boys and a girl?
Am I a wife? Or a remarried divorcee? One failed, one still going? What makes me one and not the other?
Am I a needlework enthusiast or a fibre artist? Is there anything that makes my work different or extraordinary? Why is it so important to me and what void does it fill?
Am I a writer, or someone who records?
Who am I?
Am I a 31 year old with an recovering alcoholic mother, who went to a private school, had a teen pregnancy, married at 18, divorced at 22, remarried at 23?
Am I an expatriate who has lived in four countries and can't settle in any?
Am I a person who feels confined by motherhood and wifehood?
Or am I an earth mother, giving up work to stay home with my kids?
I need to find some kind of balance. My entire life has been about re-inventing myself situation after situation, from A grade student who lived with her gran 'cos her mom couldn't take care of her, to disinterested teen, to wild child, to teenage mom, to teenage wife and mother; to suicidal teenage mom, to career girl, back to wild child fascinated with the internet, to divorcee with one child, to remarried, to expat, to mom dispossessed, to mom of two boys.
My whole focus the last five years has been a panicky turmoil of trying to ensure happiness for my kids, at whatever cost. Combine this with immense fear that something will go wrong, that they will hate me when they grow up, that their childhood won't be happy ...
Sometimes I think the price is too high - can I ensure their happiness while ignoring my own?
I have been thinking over the instructions my driving instructor gave me for dealing with the traffic. I think its a great analogy to life in general:
When you drive a car you have to trust that all the other drivers on the road are obeying the rules, that they will give you priority when they should, stop when they should and go when they should. In turn you should do the same. If you worry constantly about whether or not they are going to do what they're supposed to you'll go insane (and never go out on the road).Maybe I need to stop worrying that other people will do what they are supposed to do or obey the rules and just get on with doing the right thing myself. It'll take a shift from pessimism to optimism, from disbelief to the hope that things will go right. I hope I can make it.