Bare

My name is Valerie Haskin. I am the youngest of ten children. My parents raised me to be honest, and my siblings raised me to be myself. I am 25 years old. I have a cat and two best friends. I am painfully single and still going to school to get my Associate’s degree. I work as an accountant at an engineering firm, and I teach Sunday School once a month. I have a crush on a guy in my English class.
Do all of these things define me? No. Everything may be equal to the sum of its parts, but are these the only parts of me? Hardly.
I am strong. I have opinions and ideas that are all my own. I normally keep them to myself: lock them away for safe-keeping against people who would try to steal them from me. I will stick up for those who need a louder voice, and occasionally, I’ll even stick up for myself.
I am wise. You wouldn’t know it to look at me, but I have seen more of the world than you think. I’ve had my share of difficulties: death, heartbreak, abuse. And I’ve learned to rise above those experiences, to study and philosophize them until my wounds were healed. I understand pain and rejection and being misunderstood, and I’m not afraid of it anymore.
However, I am fragile. It doesn’t take much to break me. Maybe this is because I have been broken so many times before. Maybe because I allow myself to break. Whatever the reason, my defenses are thin, but my reserve is endless. No matter how many time I have been broken, I still recover, and quickly too. I have a bottomless barrel of miracle drugs in my system that heal all wounds. This is my saving grace.
I am complicated. I reserve the right to change my mind at will. I may feel like sunshine today and rain clouds tomorrow. I have a strong sense of who I am, yet I am easily persuaded. I have seen the world and what it can do, and yet it hurts me everyday. I am often happy and sad at the same moment. I am a walking contradiction.
So after all of this, can I say that this is who I am? This is all just a bunch of fluff. Strip all of that away from me, all the self-declarations and the silly facts and what is left? Just me. Just a girl who is trying to make her way in the world, who is scared and alone and a little unsure. A girl who, despite of all of this, is determined to make it through with flying colors…however long that may take.