Letting go...

For a few months, I have been stewing over a hatchet job written about me, by someone I once (long ago, now) respected.

It is here. Yes, it laments the loss of a lot of things and the disappointment of many expectations. But she blames me.

She is not a stupid person. She is not without influence, either. As much as it was all old territory we'd been over many times before, I had food for thought.

Not that I responded, of course. But I considered it, a lot.


At 2am this morning I woke up to speak to a friend I had thought long lost. And I asked for, and was given, reassurance that yes ... the author of the above is completely delusional. The people who I still valued, the people who really mattered, have always been able to see what I truly meant and what I intended, and what effect it really had.

I still don't know how soon I will be able to get over it, though. My darned obsessional personality.


It seems this is a year for re-evaluating who I really am, from the outside in.

I am not just a precocious learner, I am not just the angel Jean, I am not just an Australian, I am not just a nerd, I am not just a doctor, I am not just a woman with a mental illness ...

And at the same time as discovering that I am more than the labels I have attached to myself, there are so many things I would like to be, that I may or may not become. Scientist, writer, lacemaker, musician, philanthropist, teacher, mother, champion ...

We will see. For now, I am just me.

Even I don't know who that is.