by Tara Pierce

My defining moment with personal identity is a story of realizing you lost yourself and winning yourself back all at once.

I was working two jobs at 55 hours a week. I was engaged. He talked of duplexes, white picket fences, and two kids. And don’t forget the dog.

I dreamed of travel and adventure. I dreamed of backpacks and jungles and surf and mountains and sailing. I was always wrong. I did this wrong, I did that wrong. My ideas, my opinions, my life, all were naive and unrealistic. I should just do as he says. He knows best, he is more experienced. He knows me better than I know myself. I dare not question him. It was the life I knew. And I should give him all my money.

I was wound up so tight and so exhausted from my week it was a miracle I had time to be creative at all, never mind complete a painting. Thank goodness that art was so ingrained in me I would die without making it. Making art is what saved my life.

For a class, I did a series of self-portraits. By the third painting, I came to this piece before you. I felt quite literally like I was living in disguise. My everyday routine, my clothes, my hair, my work, my apartment; it all went against who I was and who I wanted to be, as if I’d created some elaborate secret agent cover. Even my fiancé denied the parts of myself I held dear. The path of my life and my dreams did not intersect.

Once this piece was finished, I was forced to look at myself. There I was, hiding behind fake glasses and a big nose. I wasn’t being myself, I wasn’t working toward a life I wanted. It felt like I was living someone else’s life. It was cathartic, looking into my hand-painted mirror. I had to act.

I called a friend. I packed a bag. I told him I was leaving. He cried and begged me to stay, acting like a kicked puppy; it was his best manipulation by far, pulling at my tender heart strings there was a fleeting second where I almost faltered. I turned the door knob, kissed him on the forehead, and left.

I scream-cried down the freeway. I parked. I called my friend. I was welcomed to my mother’s warm house and comfy couch. My mother was proud. My father was proud. My friends were proud. But none of them were as proud as me.

My life was suddenly light, bright, and full of possibilities. And I was me again.