Deja Vu

      While flipping through my book in pursuit of memorable quotes, symbols, and the like, I came upon a quote that I really relate to. The quote in question, "It doesn't bother him that his name is never an option on key chains or metal pins or refrigerator magnets," brought me back to my own childhood when "Kaleigh" also never appeared on such things and, unlike Gogol, this always bothered me (67). I remember reading this quote weeks ago and having the same recollection, now that I have a blog I would like to revisit it. I am not sure why this bothered me so much; after all, it is not as though I really wanted a tacky plastic keychain with my name on it from every gift shop I ever visited. But still, I can remember five year old, seven year old, ten year old Kaleigh searching through countless displays of tacky plastic keychains, searching the "K's" and then the other letters-just in case it was misshelved- and coming up empty handed every time. At first this was a source of genuine disappointment, I even remember resenting my brother when I inevitably found the "Kyle" keychains. Later, it became a sort of game to see if I could ever find my unusual name, and to this day I still find myself searching through those keychains, looking for it. Even more elusive than the "Kaleigh" keychain is the answer to the question, why do I care that it isn't out there? It turns out I am much better at analyzing literature than my motivations for obsessively searching through gift shops for my name. Thus, I do not have a conclusive answer for that question. The best thing I can come up with is that I liked the idea of being in a strange place, away from home, and stumbling upon a piece of yourself, even if it was only your name printed on a cheap piece of plastic.