I'm going to start with this: I am a very fortunate and privileged person. I won't even begin to list the ways which exemplifies the truth of this statement; the list would be crazily, ridiculously long. However, borne of this fortune and privilege is the ability to consciously formulate an identity and think about what that means to me and its impacts on how I see myself and subsequently how I project myself to the world.
Ted and I have now been in Boston for a solid 2 weeks. In that time, we've found an apartment in Cambridge, opened a bank account, applied for credit cards, attempted to apply for social security numbers (we can't right now because the American government has been shutdown for a week and the two parties are at a stalemate), and started to shop for furniture and supplies and all those good household items. So far it's been a lot of fun and a good exercise in budgeting as well as 'dreaming big and whittling down'. :) There were a few moments when Ted and I felt pretty certain we heard our parents' voices coming out of our own mouths. The horror. :)
But, I digress. During the entering of the U.S. and the renting of the apartment and the signing of the lease and the opening of the bank account and the application for the credit card, I was reminded over and over of our situation. Ted was being "sponsored" into the U.S. through his work, and by extension, so was I. Thus, I am currently an extension of Ted. Even my entry visa puts me as "Spouse". Ted is the primary signatory on most things as he has the entry visa that confirms he is employed and will therefore have an income. Before we came to Massachusets, I willingly decided to change my last name and changed my passport accordingly. I was now Alexandra D., no longer Alexandra T. It was sort of strange at the time but not a big deal. Had we remained in Vancouver, I think I would have still had a solid sense of who this Alexandra D. person was: a young, hard-working CP social worker with many interests (chief among them: food and wine), financially independent, a home-owner, and newly a wife. I had a healthy and active social life that allowed me in-person, face-to-face access to a solid network of family and friends who are similar and therefore confirmed my sense of who I was. I might have had an easier time figuring out who Alexandra D. is since many other aspects of my life would have remained recognizable. Now, having moved to a city on the opposite coast with a different surname and where I'm noted as technically being a dependent and where we know only a handful of people, my sense of who Alexandra D. is has started to become something more difficult to grasp, which was inevitable, I suppose. The neat thing is that this is a great opportunity to try something quite different from what I was doing before. The truth is, it's sometimes an unnerving feeling and process and I think it's ok to acknowledge that. I'm young and at a new stage in my life. These shifts in my identity were going to happen regardless, but with so many changes happening all at once, I sometimes get overwhelmed.
This post isn't a complaint and I hope it won't be read as such. I make my choices willingly, happily and with great excitement of the possibilities ahead and am also secure in the knowledge that I am in a position to be able to make these choices. But I share the process I'm going through because I also think it can be a normal part of all this.
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| How many Canadian references can you spot? |
So for now, as I take the time to explore my neighbourhood,
I know that part of what makes up who I am is "Canadian".
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| Best. Snuggie. Ever! |
And maybe on some evenings, Batman --because who wouldn't want a chance to be the greatest superhero ever?
