Identity subject to change.

A dream helped me let go of the people that aren't me.

For years I have been dreaming of an apartment that isn’t mine. It is in a city I no longer live in, full of things I no longer need. My sleeping self is perplexed. Shit I forgot about this place. How have I been paying two rents? Do I need this — any of it? I wander around the unit I seem to know, but don’t recognize. I find things I forgot I had, but don’t remember. There is furniture in places they once were. My sleeping self tries to decide — do I keep this? Is this my home? Do I sleep here?

The me that is in my body wakes haunted. The fog of an apartment I don’t know the address to follows me around for my first waking moments. How could you forget about a whole life? You can’t afford two homes! Which one is it? It feels like a guilt I can’t trace. Buyer’s remorse but I didn’t sign the cheque. 

Almost three years ago, my body left a city that was home. I packed up over ten years in one life, and moved it to another. I didn’t know what exactly was next — only that this version of life had stopped working. The identity I had formed for myself didn’t feel mine anymore. She was a distant memory right beside me. 

The list of careers and identities I have tried since this move continues to pile up: design professor, masters student, potter, artist, writer, bookstore owner, creative retreat host, creative coach, woman who speaks to the moon.

Each time a new possibility arrives into my life I explore it with fire. I dive deep and do the research. By the time a domain has been purchased and a call with someone who knows someone is on my calendar I begin to feel, again, like this can’t be it. Not right now. Add it to the list for a couple years from now? It gets hard. It gets messy. I don’t know how. 

I start to search again but my heart has begun to tap on the window. It’s trying to get my attention, pointing in a general direction beyond me. I keep getting pulled back into my words. They’re in google docs, in journals, on scraps, and in apps. I compose while I drive. I stop on a walk to write a sentence that seems to have fallen from the sky. I write and write because I must. The tapping is so loud that I must. 

Again and again I dream of different forgotten apartments with items I don’t need anymore. I will feverishly check my account on my dream phone — have I paid this rent yet? I’ll stand and look out the window trying to decide — is this home? Does it feel right? Or rather, is it okay to go? If I go, do I need the mattress? How could you forget?

Last week, in another of the same dream — the apartment was bigger than ever. I could see the shape of the rooms, touch the remaining pieces of life. My dream self, however, was now ready. I was gathering garbage bags and emptying drawers. My uncle moved from behind with boxes. “Did you get everything in the closet?” I asked my sister. The apartment seemed to grow as we cleared. I kept finding more. Another bedroom with a lone dresser full of clothes. A bathroom full of old sunglasses. I was ruthless with my garbage bags. I kept only the things I remembered the story of. My sister passed by me with the last mattress and I jumped to my feet. “That one needs to come with us!” I wrote PRIORITY on tape and stuck to its edge. 

My dream self moved outside and watched the sun over the spaces I just cleared. I watched with joy and told everyone how wonderful this home was. I gathered everyone for a photo in front. I wanted to remember all of this joy.

My dog's paw taps my temple as myself in my body returns. The lingering warmth is still with me, like my heart is holding the polaroid we just snapped. On my way to free my dog’s bladder I walk past my studio. The sun streams into the space that houses an easel. The same studio I keep bags of clay, bins of pottery tools. It was in that very room I taught as a design professor and bought a handful of domains for various possibilities. Slowly, but all at once, they’ve all been left behind.

As my dog and I settle on the couch, I welcome the tapping. The earliest and quietest moments of my day are often also the clearest. 

“I need to fix my website” I text a friend. 

“I’m a writer.”