Ever wish you were someone else?  I don’t think a day goes by where I don’t think that at least once. Today I was talking to my sister-in-law-to-be, and of course I was ranting about how I wanted to cut off my hair again...girls always do this.  We get even the slightest itch and we want to get our hair cut.  Haircuts are the answer for everything if you’re a woman.  It doesn’t matter what the occasion.  Bad day?  Haircut.  Going out Friday night?  Haircut.  Need an oil change?  Haircut.  This is a natural response, even for us tomboys.  Anyway, we’re talking about my hair, and she says she loves it (once again, a girl’s natural response when another girl says they hate their hair), and all I can think is how much I want her hair, how I’ve always wanted hair like hers.  You know, long blondish-brown with the perfect natural wavy curls?  That’s what I’ve always wanted.

So then I realize that really it’s not the hair.  It’s so much more than that.  Like if I had my choice of who I could be, I would have a really cool unusual name, like something long and flowing that could be shortened into a really cool nickname.  Then again, since I’m changing my name and my hairstyle, then why not have me be born way back when, like in the days of the Pirates of the Caribbean, or like in the time of a fantasy book.  Yeah, that would be more like it.  Then I’d be the daughter of a blacksmith in a bustling town.  At night I can stand on my humble home’s front stoop and see the King’s castle looming in the distance, like a dark yet mysterious foreshadowing of things to come.  And being the blacksmith’s daughter, I’d be a master with the sword – yes, I'm still a girl – and be a little taller and thinner, but damn, those swords are heavy, and I’m quick with one so I’d have to be stronger as well. Then one day something happens and suddenly I’m thrust out into that strange world outside my town, in the woods with my sword and an odd crew of people including this really handsome guy from my town that looks strangely enough like Orlando Bloom, because I’m into mixing fantasy books with pirate movies.  So then the whole adventure takes off and it all ends well.

I think this is what writing does for me.  I can disappear from my life for a few hours a day into this world that doesn’t exist.  A world that has fictional people in it that have their own problems...and since their problems are always a little bit worse than mine, it’s a nice place to disappear to.  These people don’t judge me because my hair wants to stand on end every morning, or because I don’t always say the most clever thing, or because I make mistakes like every one else out there. 

You know, I started this rambling out with the intention of saying that we should all be happy with who we are and we shouldn’t change for anyone, but that’s really bullshit, isn’t it?  That’s what we tell ourselves when we’re not happy with what we’ve become, and we’re not willing to try and change. Sure, there are some things we can’t change.  That’s a fact of life.  For instance, I’m shorter than I’d like to be, and there's no such thing as a stretchy machine to change that.   But, I can wear thicker soles or use a chair to get what I need out of the top cabinets.  And never in a million years will I be a blacksmith’s daughter.  But I can sign up for fencing lessons.  Adapt and adjust.  That's the only way we can truly change the things we otherwise can't.

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