What Do We Seek to Be?

What Do We Call Ourselves?

The instructor went around the room with a fistful of cards. Each participant was to choose one card from the stack she held in her hand, spread out like a fan allowing us to view the choices. The intent was to use the card - the quote, the artwork, a single word printed on one side - for inspiration. A prompt. To write.

The cards were stiff and new, clinging to one another, not wanting to leave the comforts of the stack. Carefully I selected a card slightly to left, not dead center, out of the stack. It contained the quote:

We call ourselves not only what we are but what we seek to be.

Silently, pensively, I pondered the words. I know who I am, what I am, simply by “being,” descriptors already put into place by virtue of my birth. I am a baby, a daughter, a sister before I even leave the hospital. These roles were chosen for me. These are the roles I live by. But there is more.

What do I seek to be?

I am a girl, a niece, a goddaughter, a cousin, now an aunt. Even a great-aunt. At one time I was a granddaughter, but no more. I am a friend, a neighbor.

I am a girl with choices.

As I grew up and out into the world, I begin to define myself on my terms, looking at choices available to me, honing skills suited for my success, and proceeding. For years I was a student, then a student-athlete, a teammate, a forward, an outfielder, a captain. Eventually I was a college coed, a sorority sister, a vice president, a waitress, an intern, a woman.

I am a woman with choices

Upon graduation, I became a working girl; thought I would work forever. A career woman who wore cheap suits and Reebok sneakers on the train. Then I quit. Became a student again. A serious student this time around with no distractions. Graduate student, student teacher, teacher.

Sometimes I was a girlfriend, finally a fiancée, then a wife, an in-law, a partner for life. Thirty years later, I am none of these.

Fortune found me. I sought to be a mother, a mom, a caretaker, a nurturer, and so I am. This was the role for me. Working mom, stay-at-home mom, pet mom, soccer mom. Life outside of the house lead to school volunteer, gala co-chair, new friend, tennis player, captain again, chairwoman, divorcee, graduate student once again. Still a mom. Forever a mom.

What do I seek now?

An evolution.

I’ll write my own story. No rush. I’ll figure it out. Turn the pages of this tired tale, end the chapter, close the book, create something new in its wake. Yes, writing. Cathartic, cleansing, closure. Writing a new narrative as I move forward.

A writer thoughtfully wrote…we can be what we seek to be.

I seek to be a writer.