25/06/23 - rorschach

sometimes i feel like a walking rorschach test.

it's really interesting to see how varied people's assumptions about me are, and i've begun to think recently that i'm so ambiguous looking that it really says more about the person i'm talking to than it does about me.

i'm currently living in north africa, and when i meet new people i've gotten everything from being automatically greeted in english or french (assumed to be a foreigner, of various origins) to being assumed as local with a foreign parent, to full local.

back when i lived in japan, it was similar - i got everything from people thinking i looked "different" because i was from okinawa, to assuming i was half japanese, to american, and even occasionally being assumed to be fully japanese.

it's odd - as a mixed kid, i had to figure out my cultural and ethnic identity for myself. it took me years, and when i finally decided on a way to define myself, i was initially fairly sensitive about it.

if people questioned the validity of how i defined myself, and the labels i had chosen, it would bother me for months. there are multiple interactions from years ago that i still remember clearly to this day.

yet now, having grown more comfortable with who i am, i've rather lost interest in my own identity altogether.

i've gotten to the point where i really don't care much how people see me.

maybe it's just a symptom of being more comfortable in my identity, and more confident.

to an extent though, i think it also has to do with people being so unfamiliar with culturally mixed people that it eventually became an exhausting chore to have to explain myself to every new person that i meet, and so it was simpler and easier to just accept anything.

a person's identity is a complex thing. i don't believe (for the most part) that there are incorrect ways to self-define. pushing for the comprehension and acceptance of others is a worthy, but often futile effort.

contact me at: tsukaj@tilde.club