Notes from the Underground IV

Lost files finding new life

“But isn’t that a betrayal of your soul?”

I just heard someone spell their name, omitting a vowel to make it easier to spell. I felt betrayed. A complete stranger with a rather strange spelling of their name betrayed me, and all I could think was, “Is this not a betrayal of your soul?” It wasn’t just the vowel they left out. It was something more—a small, almost imperceptible giving up of a piece of themselves. Chipping away at their name, the very basis of identity, to fit into a mold the world expects us to fit into.

I am conflicted when it comes to identity. On most days, I believe that identity should be malleable, not fixed in stone. It is not a piece of stone that remains the same no matter how long-time passes. It is like liquid metal, willing and ready to be shaped into whatever you want it to be, and with enough heat, shaped into something else. It’s not a script you’re acting out, something you do because that’s how it’s done.

But then, some days, I find myself wishing for it to be fixed. To be the one true constant in a world where everything changes. To look at myself in the mirror, knowing that today, tomorrow, and forever more, I will always be the same.

Some days, I revel in the freedom of being fluid—able to change, to become something new, to leave old versions of myself behind like discarded skins. But on other days, the idea of a fixed identity feels like comfort. The oversized cardigan I slip into whenever it is cold. A shelter. It’s a strange push and pull, this dance between wanting to shape-shift and wanting to stay exactly who I am.

They tell you that you know who you are, no matter how stained your hands are with the blood of different versions of you. But identity laughs in your face because it holds one true secret: you never know who you are. What you have is a glimpse into the past. You only know who you were. And sometimes, I think maybe that’s all there is—a collection of who you used to be, a series of names you once called yourself. And maybe that’s what we all are – a museum of past selves.

But sometimes, I wish to betray my soul too, by bending to the world. I wish to stand still, unchanging, like stone. To be solid in a world of liquid, just for a while, even if it means losing the freedom of change. Do you feel it too? The pull toward both? The desire to mold yourself, and yet to stay as you are?

I wonder: Is it possible to be both? Can I be the liquid metal, ever-shifting, and still keep some part of myself that remains untouched by time’s hands? Perhaps that’s why we cling to names, to identities that we carve out and reshape. They’re the anchors in the storm of becoming.

But maybe identity isn’t about choosing between fluidity and constancy. Maybe it’s about being both, burning bright through the shifts and the stillness. Flickering and changing, but still the same at the core.

You might not see the stars again, but you can still see the Sun. And the Sun is a star.