One Lifetime, Many Names

The weight of history, the ache of transformation, and the triumph of self-definition.

“All day, all night, Mary Ann  
Down by the seaside, siftin' sand.  
Even little children love Mary Ann  
Down by the seaside, siftin' sand.”

(Originally written by Roaring Lion, 1945, later popularized by The Easy Riders.)

That old song trailed me through childhood, drifting into rooms before I did. Strangers, teachers, even family members would sing it with a knowing smile, when they saw me, expecting me to light up in recognition.

‘Mary Ann’ was playful and sweet—an easy melody for a carefree girl by the ocean.

The thing is—I never felt like the girl in the song.

The Weight of a Name

Losing my father last October made me think more deeply about the weight of a name—the way it carries history, expectation, and belonging. After he died, I found myself questioning not just who he was, but who I had been, and who I was becoming without him. In his absence, I saw more clearly that a name is not just something we inherit; it is something we shape, something we grow into—or out of.

The Name They Gave Me

In the 1960s, two young parents named their third child Mary Ann, conjuring an image of a dark-haired, olive-skinned, girl with big brown-eyes, sifting sand at the shore in her little white dress. Born at the tail end of the baby boom, I was given a name rooted in the past, tied to small-town values and predictability. Yet, I grew up in a world that was already shifting—counterculture rising, gender roles evolving. It was a world that demanded more than just quiet obedience, and I could never fully be the name they called me because I was stepping into something far bigger than the expectations placed upon me. The edges of tradition were fraying, and women were beginning to rewrite their stories.

Mary Ann was sweet. Sun-kissed. Obedient.

A girl meant to belong, to blend, to be one of many.

Mary Ann was a good girl who fit neatly into their world. She did not run ahead of herself. She did not question the shape of things. She did not break the pattern. She fell neatly into line.

Mary Ann was meant to be easy, agreeable—a girl who knew her place. A girl who followed the rhythm set before her, who did not stir the waters or push against the tide.

The One I Tried to Be

For years, I tried to be Mary Ann. I tried to be that good little girl sifting sand, the one all the little children loved, the one inside the name my parents had given me. I tried to shrink myself into the tiny, confined space it allowed.

But I have come to know I am not the sifting-sand type. I do not sit, patient and content, letting grains slip through my fingers into a bucket, my white dress unruffled.

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The One I Am

 I Am

I am both the wave and the undertow,
the windblown salt on sunburnt skin,
the stillness before the storm, the crash when it comes.

Unpredictable, yet steady.

I am the riptide, the wild current pulling
against expectation, the wolf howl in the night,
feet rough with dust, pockets lined with river stones,
the echo of something older than words.

I have always been more
than the name I was given—rooted, yet wild.
A contradiction.
A storm in bare feet,
lightning splitting the sky before the rain falls.

I am the scent of rain,
the fire that smolders long after the last ember fades.

Nameless.
A collection of selves, shifting, shedding, becoming.
Cedar ash under fingernails,
a crow’s feather tucked behind my ear,
hands pressing against the earth, listening.

I am not one thing.
I never have been.
I never will be.

M.

The Ones I Might Have Been

Had I been given a choice, I might have named myself:
Raquel—bold and untamed, the kind of woman who wears red lipstick and never explains herself.
Margaux—sultry and enigmatic, sipping espresso at a corner table in a Parisian café, draped in linen, reading poetry and smoking Gitanes.
Jane—the quiet observer, hair pinned up in a bun, black round glasses slipping down her nose, sipping ginger tea between pages in a bookstore.
Maile—the island girl with round hips and long dark hair, standing at the ocean’s edge, listening to the tide, barefoot and belonging.

The One I Have Created

A name is not always a mirror; it does not always reflect who we are. The wonderful thing about being a writer is that I can become anyone. I can slip into different skins, borrow voices, live a thousand lives between the lines. The self is never singular—it expands, contracts, reinvents, and writing is the door through which I enter them all. Some days, I am 'Raquel', setting words on fire. Other days I slip into 'Margaux', resplendent in her mystery, lingering over a glass of red wine, drawing slowly on her smoke, watching the world unravel in front of her with a half grin on her face. At times I am 'Jane', structured and precise, waiting to get home and rip the tight bun out of her hair and have wild sex with a stranger I meet on an airplane. When I let the wind carry me, I become 'Maile', toes in the sand, hand on heart, listening to the tide. Perhaps that is why names have always felt both too much and never enough - too heavy to carry, yet too small to contain all that I am.

I sign 'Mary Ann' beneath my work and on legal documents, but my soul does not answer to just one name. I have spent my life slipping between selves—between the 'Mary Ann' name that they gave me and the untamed versions of myself that I have always carried.

I have lived as Raquel, Margaux, Jane, and Maile, embodying each when the moment calls for them. But none of them, alone, contain me. So lately, I smile and call myself Maraquelia (Mar-ah-kell-ee-ah), a name of my own making—one that holds all parts of me, woven together into something entirely my own. Even this name may not last forever. I am always shifting, always expanding—rewriting that tired old song, as I always have.

Maraquelia

All day, all night, Maraquelia 
hips like the tide, hands full of sky. 
Down where the salt wails,  
where the moon bends low to kiss her,  
where the wind gusts with longing,  
wraps around her like a lover.

She is not stitched in lace and bows,  
nor pressed into neat pages.

She’s not tamed, not tethered.
Not a whisper, but a wild wave, rising—
loud, alive, unshaken.

Maraquelia, Oh Maraquelia,  
the stars tilt their gleaming heads,  
the ocean calls her by name.
Breath of jasmine, bone of stone,  
she does not ask permission to belong.

She arrives, unbridled, unbowed—  
answering only to the wind, the tide, and herself.