I cut the label off from a towel I took out of the dryer this morning. I noticed the label while I was folding the towel and recalled what the person that had used it said about label tags, she did not like them, did not like corporate advertising attached to the things that we personally own. Things that are ours, not theirs nor theirs to attach their names to as if they had some rights to continue their to assert some aspect of their prior ownership of the item they may have created but now is mine.
A label on a towel is a small thing. However, I went to the kitchen, got my scissors (stamped in the plastic handle: Fiskars, USA) and cut off the label. An act of rebellion or statement that this is mine, entirely mine!
After 10 years I bought a new van. Before selling the old van I took off the navy shield that had been my cap device on my navy uniform cap. I had taken off the big "H" symbol (Honda) on the hood of the van and replaced it with the cap device. I put the big H back on when I sold it and put the cap device on the front of my Miata. The new van now has a big round gold medallion on the hood and an Ironman finisher medal on the back. Both had been sitting in a drawer for a long time.
My vehicles belong to me now, not their makers. I put whatever I want on them. Just a symbolic statement that they are mine!!!! Double exclamation point! I do not owe anything to the maker. It has no claim on me. I may express my satisfaction with the maker or dis-satisfaction as the case may be but there are no ties that bind me.
We are so bound by so many ties, strings and labels that come with real and conceptual things that attempt to connect us to their origin when there is no real connection that binds us to them except some label that continues to be attached to them. A label that really means something but is always there to remind us as if it did really mean something, still carries something from a time when the object, a real thing or a thought was not ours. When we did not claim or assert ownership.
Clipping off the label is cutting the claim. An assertion of ownership. It may have been created by another but it is mine now. I may have been created by another but I am mine now. That other has no claim on me. I only place upon myself those claims, obligations, associations that I choose not those chosen for me and attached to things that are truly mine. Things that are made mine because I choose to clip the label they once had and maybe replace it with my own label of choice!
We talked about changing names. A friend changed her first name to match her married last name although she has chosen a different last name now and nobody would know unless she told them the story of how and why she changed her name. Good for her to change her name if she chose to do that. A name is also a label that comes attached to us.
It is a strong sign of independence and ownership of self identity to change your label or the label that came with the thoughts and things that we have.
It is good to make a symbolic statement to cut the label off a towel.
While we carry the same name given to us, we create new names for ourselves when we choose a screen name which is so often required now for personal access and anonymous identification on the internet. Choice of screen names that I see on the internet frequently interest me. They are creative and expressive and perhaps express more than we may realize when we choose them?
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