Set your standards high ladies...

I've, over the years, had many conversations with friends about life and love; me listening, me talking, both of us crying into our beers talking about the 'ONE'.

Just this week I had another one, about trying to find someone, just a little other person (in this planet of millions) who wants to walk down the street, holding our hand, safe in the knowledge that they want us, just as we are, and we want them, just as they are. (Cue every girl in the world replaying 'that' moment from Bridget Jones Diary)

"I never want to work that hard, I just want someone that I can talk to, I want you just the way you are. I need to know that you will always be, The same old someone that I knew, What will it take till you believe in me, The way that I believe in you." (Billy Joel - Just The Way you Are)

We seem to spend our entire lives talking about this social construct, this idea that life is all about hunting for 'the one', the media, and films tell us every other weekend that romance is easy, that there is always a happy ending, but are we trying to find something that doesn't exist? Romance is wonderful, love is wonderful, I honestly feel that there is AT LEAST one person out there for everyone - sometimes, the right person is there, all along, just at the wrong time, sometimes the wrong person is there at the right time, who knows how this world really works - maybe that is why we spend some many hours and £ living our lives through the TV sets and cinema screens, hoping that for a short while, the idea of the perfect person, can exist.

When we look for someone to share our lives with, our 'sights' have been set from when we were little, we learn what we like, who we like, and the type of person we hope to meet along the road. But when we get further down the road, and that 'perfect' person just hasn't appeared, do we set our sights lower? or do we have to give in for a life of celibacy?

I haven't every really had a type, I was late to this whole idea of dating, accepting who I was and letting someone in, but I knew she had to read, had to like films, had to know that I would need protecting sometimes from the demons that appear, but for the longest time, I didn't think that person could ever love me, do the type of people we really want actually exist? Maybe.

All of my friends like different types of people, little traits that fit so perfectly with them that they make that 'whole' that consists of two separate parts, fine by themselves, but together so much stronger. But it would seem, these people aren't out there, or just aren't in the right place just yet. But what do you do when life gives you pineapples and all you want to make is Lemonade? What are we meant to do, not everyone has that little bit of hope sitting inside of them, knowing that just around the corner, if the stars align, that person is waiting for you.

In the end, maybe the best thing you can do, is not give up.

I set my sights higher, instead of trying to find someone to fit the standards I thought I wanted, I stopped, I set my sights so high that I didn't even look.

In the end, someone decided that little ol' me was worth the fight, that I was worth spending the time getting to know, and in the end, they have turned into the perfect parts of me, when I was looking, they were so far out of my league that I actually listened when people said they would never be interested, then I stopped looking, they found me, saved me, and it's now every-kind-of-wonderful about my life.

Why not stop looking, love yourself, love your friends, love LIFE... then the perfect person will find you, tomorrow? Maybe not, but if your life is wonderful, maybe someone will just fit right in!

What is in a name? The surname argument

'Names, once they are in common use, quickly become mere sounds, their etymology being buried, like so many of the earth's marvels, beneath the dust of habit.'

~Salman Rushdie

As many people do in the run up to their wedding, I have been thinking a lot about names, their meanings, and their connection to our identity. It's always the way that when something is due to change you realise your relationship with it as it exists then.

Is your surname your identity? or just just a small part of the bigger sum?

As a woman, from a young age you tend to accept that your surname will inevitably change, you might even be one of those kids that scrawls across their notebooks with the new name you would have if you settled down and married (at the age of 14) the boy you seems fascinated with at the time. I did it. I'm not going to hide from it, my pencil case was covered in every imaginable version of all my could be names. But then the questioning came along. The 'was I different', and then the names stopped. I had enough problems identifying myself for me, let alone adding a new name into the equation. Questioning your identity from the inside is an enlightening experience, and nearly 10 years on from the first questions, I like the person I have become, and my name has been along for the ride.

Even if you weren't going to become the straight woman who would marry the 'prince' names are still a huge part of your life. I stopped looking at my name as something that would change for a while, and it made it feel much more like it was part of me, a little ink scrawled across me, but for a lot of people, their name has a negative effect.

Bad childhoods, sucky parents, no parents, divorce, realisation that you are in a marriage that isn't right, realising that to become the better person you keep inside you need to change the outside, running away, starting again... all very good reasons to change your surname, but does it make you a new person? or just a stronger you?

I've often wondered if changing your name creates a new version of yourself, or just a re-labeled old copy? Maybe next year I'll be able to tell you. I bring this topic to you as a few things are starting to arrive through the mail in my new 'married' name and its exciting, but a strange concept to get your head around.

I am proud of my surname, I like the sound of it, I like the history of it, maybe that's why I am just adding stuff onto my name, instead of re-writing myself, I'm just making a new addition, and its quite calming. I don't need to be a new person, I can just have a nice new bit, all shiny and special. Other people don't change their names at all when they get married, for them I guess their name is much more of their identity. A part they aren't quite willing to give up, and I feel like that's a very brave thing to do, it's much easier to give up, instead of staying resolute in your wishes.

I've often wondered if your name becomes more of your identity as a gay woman? because it's part of you, and you're proud of the person you've become? Maybe I need to do a straw poll, find out if there are people who use their names as their identity, or their identity as their names.

"Is your surname part of your identity? Largely so,yes. Having been married b4 i came out, I immediately wanted to revert to my maiden name when divorced - felt more me.(Sarah Watts)"

Don't we judge people on their names all the time? Like we assume that we have to 'improve' our names to be famous, and we think that we could never been exciting if we have a plain name. I think it was about time that a Jane Smith, or an Adam Edwards took to the stage and changed it all. (I am fully aware that this will probably never happen and fancy names will forever be connected to fame.)

I am fully aware that this blog has no real thread, just lots of questions. But isn't that what an identity is, just a lot of questions you spend your life answering?

Names are part of your identity, it makes you want to fight for or against what it represents, but it's not everything you are, its a small part of the massive sum, its like one tiny decimal in a very long division sum. So don't let the name that you were born into shape your life, use your soul, and mind and body to shape your life, and just let your name be the tag, scribbled across the bottom corner, almost out of sight.

What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet.
~William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet