The Blue Light in Town

At this moment when Maura, Narcissus and The Other have an extended break from the world of academia, some of them are currently in towns that bespeak past memories, and in the case of Maura, maybe even past identities, which led her to wonder...if identity is not merely just composed of interactions with others...is it also composed of landscapes? And moreoever, can it be utterly dependent on interactions with certain others?

Currently, as Maura plans to pack up her traveling case to come visit the arid lands of her dear friend she has lately been heavily entrenched in the dry, crisp air, torrential downpours and sunny days that constitute the land in which she grew up. While entrenched in this land, thoughts of the past, and of past individuals with which she had seminal interactions, Maura has found herself missing her Jimmy, not merely for the more obvious reasons, but also because it seems as though living up to her best potential as an individual is greatly aided by Jimmy's presence.

When Maura left her seaside hometown (both the historical Maura and the metaphorical one), she left behind individuals who did not wish her absence. But with stubborn focus, Maura insisted until she realized and moved forward with a new adventure, leaving the town of Galway to the fishermen and their wives. Once she was settled in her new life and had established an independent but co-existent relationship with another, she realized how much the very presence of Jimmy, even a silent presence, was in fact necessary for her to speak sweet words and leave the self-encasing and self-prohibiting persona that can be her own skin. When she returned home for a brief stint, she also realized that the presence of some others from her small town seemed to bring her back to actions and thoughts that she seemed to have grown out of, and necessarily so since they brought moments of pain both to herself and others...yet they pulled at her, in an entirely different way than do the strings that tie us. These were more like the strings that bind us than the strings that lift us up, support us, or fling us into new possibilities.

Is it thus possible that our identities are not merely composed of interactions with others, but utterly dependent on this interactions? Once in her life, Maura would have certainly said, No, because for an identity to be strong and capable of withstanding turmoil, it must have some strength of its own. But clearly, it is all but ludicrous to deny this fact. Once these presences end, naturally or out of forced circumstances, does this identity crumble? Or does the skin go out and seek another one to depend on, in any manner of a relationship? It would seem that this is the case.

It seems natural and necessary that the absence of The Other and Narcissus from Maura's life would change Maura's own identity as well. Do we also depend on the absence of another to define our identity? Anyone who has experienced grave loss beyond the momentary lack of another in their life would probably assure Maura, that yes, this is the case. So these identities are a constantly fluxing, momentarily defined thing.

Oddly enough, all this talking about identity has made Maura give much less of a damn about the entire idea. Partially, because there are more important things to worry about with the Oirish tendency for worry, and partially because The Other, Narcissus and Maura need a new topic of philosophical musings for a bit. They can come back to this one later. Maura's fountain pen is getting a bit dry, so she is going to take a break for a bit. Signing off with sincerity - Ms. Barnacle.