I am a benevolent doppelganger. Antithetical and amorphous, but quite obviously harmless. Step into my shadows, flashlight in hand, and examine me for yourself. I am a little bit of everyone I've encountered in the last nine years. I'm even a little bit of you.

And as I acquire new pieces, the part of me that is who I might have been at one time fades. I feel like an over-edited carbon copy of a carbon copy, weighed down by clumps of white out and paste. A trail of discarded identity litter fans out behind me: snippets of characteristics, ticks, stats, idiosyncracies, leanings, aversions. I can no longer discern those I was born with from those I've stolen. Just a lot of recondite debris.

There are times I'd like to sort through the mess. Flatten the soiled scraps of paper, lay them out in some organised fashion. Gather those that I know are not me, the ones I remember acquiring, when, and from whom. Burn them. I don't want to be a xeroxed, patch-worked paper doll of everyone you've ever known. I want to be the archetype!

I don't always feel that way, though. Status quo has grown so comfortable, so dependable in its constant vacillation. I do not know who I am, and I've grown plump and lazy relying on that as my excuse for every occasion. I'm so tired of worrying about it, I've very nearly convinced myself it doesn't matter whether this trait or that was actually mine to begin with. After all, if you possess something long enough, doesn't it, by default, become yours?