Sunday, October 15, 2006

"One of the things that started me on the path artistically that I've been on was because I was adopted I had no real identity. It's something I still struggle with because it's taken me a long, long time, much longer than most people I know, to actually find my own identity, because I can't really look to biology and I can't really look to ancestry and I can't look to a context I think unconsciously I wanted to fit in. My mother likes to say I was a practically perfect child, getting great grades and trying to be good all the time and being nice and cute and sweet and all that kind of stuff, and I think it just built up in me, and there was this huge sense of a disconnect between the role I was playing and how I really felt inside."

Liz Phair iTunes Original "Adopting My Own Identity"

Who'd have thought Liz Phair could sum up so well what I've been feeling lately? Go figure.

When my dad died, I felt as if I'd been flung out into space, completely on my own. It's a weird sense of not lonliness, but aloneness, once that second parent dies. It's strong... almost overpowering, and I think the fact that I was adopted made it even stronger. It was as if, somehow, what validated me as a person was suddenly gone. And this has left me, for th e last year and a half, wondering, guessing, pondering, contemplating, obsessing over who I really am. I hate that because it sounds like pop-culture psycho-babble cliche to me, but there's really no other way to say it. And I hate the fact that at 36 years old, I don't have a better sense of myself, but there you have it.

It's exhausting.

It's not an original idea, but I've been putting together my list of '100 Things About Me'. I've seen it on several other blogs, and decided it was time to put together a list of my own. Some things are interesting, some maybe not. We'll see...

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I think that in someways, we're all still trying to find ourselves.
Looking forward to reading your list. :-)

Crunchy said...

RUTH! I found you! Tag! You're it! LOL
I see you xanga'd. I have you added to my protected list so you can read all the goings on. PUH LEEZE don't be shocked by some recent issues I am dealing with. It's been a wild month around here! Love ya and that boy of yours is TOO adorable! I can see you in him.
Talk to you soon!
Heather