Why am I Windowing Shopping for an Identity?

Two things happened in the last seventy-two hours or so.

1.) I got a not fantastic grade on a paper and started rethink my entire future plan and my identity. As my dad would say, I am pathetic. But seriously, I am rethinking my future and my identity right now. This person right here? Is open to suggestions.

2.) I talked to somebody awesome I know who is slogging through one of those obnoxious periods of indefiniteness that engenders crises of identity.

I have to go write four essays (and hopefully ace these ones--crossed fingers appreciated), so this will be short, but I've been thinking--

Why do we even have identities?

What, on earth, is the point?

Why do we have to have ways of thinking of ourselves? Why can't we just go through life without thinking about who it is that we are? What practical use has your identity ever been to you? I really am asking, guys.

Because right now I'm thinking of scrapping everything. You know, once I figure out what everything even is. Mostly my identity makes me upset (when I don't do well at things I'm supposedly good at) and restricts me from doing things I might enjoy (like water skiing).

What's the point of identities? The only thing I've been able to come up with is that identities are mental short hand. We perceive ourselves as a certain kind of person so that we don't have to re-make decisions every time someone asks us a question.

Do you want ice cream?

I don't have to think about whether or not I'm really hungry, or anything else. I am the kind of person who like ice cream. I will take the ice cream (unless I'm really full, or it's strawberry) because I am the kind of person who likes ice cream.

My identity tells me that I am likely to like that person over there, tells me that I don't enjoy math, that I am much more likely to have fun reading a book than going to a party, and I probably won't ever change the world, or go to Scotland, but I will revert to dreams of both things when I feel small.

I don't really have to think through these things--do I want ice cream? do I like that person? do I want to do math for fun? should I go to the party? shall I change the world/go to Scotland?--because they are part of my preconceived perception of myself.

Is that good?

Are identities just cognitive laziness? And, if they are, is that bad? What if my preconceived perception of myself is totally bogus?

That wasn't a rhetorical question. I actually want to know. Is this good? Or bad? Is there an alternative?

Thanks for your thoughts, and your crossed fingers, and, you know, sticking with me through my professor's-kid breakdowns.

Camel Humps

I've developed a sort of fascination with my finger joints. I mean, look at yours. They're a few pieces of bone sewn together with skin and cartilage. And they move so easily! Without squeaking! Which puts them at a definite advantage over many of the doors I've encountered lately.

This is what happens when I go to college. I can't decide if it's because I get so tired that I'm a little fuzzy in my skull or if college pokes the monster that is my curiosity and the beast doesn't like being approached. So I get curious, and interested. In everything. Maybe it's a self-preservation mechanism. I'm being fed all this information and my mind is like, well, as long as it's here...

Listen, say there is a landslide, right? And there are some houses on the land that slid. So House A slid down onto to Land B where House B used to be. Who is responsible for removing the house? Most of the people I've asked roll their eyes at me, especially when they find out that it's purely hypothetical.

Was the Star of Bethlehem literal, or is it a methaphor?

Did they build my school at the top of a hill for the metaphorical value (you know, a city that is set on a hill cannot be hid), or was it just general cruelty?

What are camels humps made of?

*http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/mammals/dromedary-camel/

I'm Not a Cat

My understanding of football is sort of like my understanding of calories.

With football, teams want to go to the opposite end of the field. It can, apparently, get more complicated

But that's the basics. (i also understand there are fouls. which i can't really comprehend in a tackle sport, but whatever.)

With calories, more is bad. At least, as far as I can tell.

So... that's good right? Twenty-five is good?

In both cases my ignorance is purposeful.

I'm not sure what I'm protecting myself against with refusing to comprehend football (long conversation with football nerds? having to go to games? actually liking it?), but I think my motivation for not understanding calories is pretty obvious.

For example, when I'm drinking chocolate milk (the chocolate milk that everyone has spent the past four months telling me is delicious, the one i bought even though i don't really like chocolate milk, the one that helped me discover... i really don't like chocolate milk). And the girl sitting next to me tells me not to look at the nutritional facts until I'm done (in that same warning voice everyone uses when i say that i'm enjoying the coolish temperature and everyone says, "just... you... wait"). I can look at the nutritional facts right then with relative composure, feeling pity for the girl who understands them and not thinking about my rapidly expanding thighs.

So I'll have to agree that, to a certain degree, ignorance is bliss.

But just to a certain degree. The degree that covers understanding football and calories, but misses the incredible quirkiness of Doctor Who, the crunch of bell peppers that came off the plant ten seconds ago, and the fact that scarves are not fashion statements. They're actually useful.

There are things I don't want to know about. Probably. I can't think of too many. I actually want to know about most things. I want to know about black holes (did you know, they aren't actually holes? they're objects of such incredible mass that their gravity draws everything to it. you can't hit a black hole, but if you get sucked to close you'll be falling infinitely towards it, because its gravity is so insanely powerful that it bends time). I want to know about how to fix cars (there isn't a class for that at my college, can you believe that? i mean considering the seriously weird college courses available, i fell like a car fixing course wouldn't be too out of line). I want to learn about the ideology behind horror movies, and how to make apple sauce, and...

Curiosity killed the cat, but I'm not a cat, so I should be OK, right?

(plus, didn't the cat have nine lives anyway?)