Marcus Jeffrey's photostream  

"Describe yourself!" the Flickr profile editor demanded.

It was a dreary sort of day, and the clouds hung heavy in the sky. I had just returned home from an unsuccessful journey downtown, and decided to spend some time updating my various internet personae.

"Hmm," I murmured. "Who am I?"

This was, perhaps, the millionth time I had asked myself this most difficult of questions. It is, undeniably, near-impossible to diplomatically describe oneself to an anonymous audience. Facts can easily become skewed, and personality traits overemphasized.

Maybe I was still feeling the effects of a long, bar-hopping night, or maybe it was my brain's way of telling me to separate myself from my brand new iPod, but I had the most uncomfortable of headaches. It was the kind of headache that rendered ineffective all my attempts at intellectual exercise. It was the kind of headache that raised questions about my sanity.

As I struggled to clear my foggy mind, the smell of damp denim reached my nose. There had been puddles of opaque, brown water in the city centre, and I - in my haste to escape the coming rain - foolishly stepped in one. The dull, but unpleasant odour distracted me, and only served to worsen my throbbing head.

"Who am I?!" I pressed. "What do I do? What are my interests? What are my goals? Who do I love? When will I grow up? Where am I on the long and unpredictable path of life? How will I become the man I want to be?"

These were, I soberly decided, the only pertinent questions to be answered.

Several minutes passed.

When my consciousness finally regained focus, I realized that I had been listlessly staring at my Wacom tablet. The black piece of plastic technology had become the defining feature of my university life.

When I first began my foray into post-secondary education, I found myself inexplicably drawn towards artistic expression. Comics quickly became my outlet, my way of tracking personal development, my grounding wire.

"I'm no artist," I quietly grumbled. "I can barely draw stick-figures!"

This had been a common theme in my life: wanting to be something, but lacking the natural talent to succeed. I was an athlete, a musician, a photographer, an author, a student, and an outdoorsman, yet I found myself unable to feel truly competent in any one field.

"Ah, screw it!" I barked. "I'll type this up later."

As I moved my mouse to the 'Save It' button, a final thought walked onto my imagination's stage.

It tentatively stepped to the centre of the well-lit performance area, glanced from side to side, shuffled its feet, cleared its throat, and spoke thus:

"It doesn't matter how good you are at what you do, it doesn't matter what other people think of your work, and it certainly doesn't matter how sporadically you update your profile! All that really matters is that you enjoy and take pride in your activities."