I sometimes feel like a ghost in my own life, a shadow that doesn't quite match the body it inhabits. It's an odd thing, to spend decades looking in the mirror and seeing a stranger, or at least, a stranger that everyone else seems to recognize as me. My parents, bless their hearts, did everything they could. They raised me with such love, immersed me in their world, their traditions, their very particular way of seeing things. And I loved them for it, still do. But there’s always been this quiet hum beneath the surface, a dissonance between the person I am, the person they made me, and the person the world expects to see when they look at me. This isn't about blaming anyone, not really. It’s more about the strange, unyielding reality of being a human being, how we strive to belong, to be understood, and sometimes, those two impulses just can't reconcile. And here I am, sixty-eight years old, and this feeling, this quiet yearning, hasn't faded. It’s only grown more insistent now that the children are grown, the house is too quiet. I spent all those years being a mother, a wife, pouring myself into the lives of others, finding my identity in service, in the domestic sphere. And there was profound joy in that, truly. But now, with all that external purpose lessened, the internal questions have amplified. I find myself looking at my hands, my skin, and wondering about the hands, the skin, that came before mine. Who were they? What stories did they carry? It feels almost selfish to even want to know, like I’m betraying all the love and effort that went into raising me. But what is it about us, as humans, that makes us so desperate to connect with our origins, to see a piece of ourselves reflected in a lineage we don't even know? It's a primal thing, I think. It’s not just curiosity, you see. It’s a deeper need, a quiet ache that has been with me my whole life, a feeling of being untethered in some fundamental way. I don’t belong fully here, in the world I know, and I don’t belong there either, in the world I can only imagine. It’s a constant state of in-between, and it’s exhausting. You spend a lifetime perfecting the art of fitting in, of camouflaging that difference, only to realize, when everything slows down, that the camouflage was for everyone else, not for you. And now... now I just want to see if there’s another piece of the puzzle, a different kind of belonging out there somewhere. Is that so wrong, after all this time, to want to feel truly, deeply… home?