My name is a burnt, golden orange kind of color, like honey dripping fresh from the bottle. It’s the kind of color you see everywhere during the crisp fall months. The color of the sky as the sun sets on a warm summer day. A golden retriever’s fur. A color of joy and sophistication.

The busiest, fastest worker bee in the hive. Doing all it can for it’s queen bee. The most golden orange bee. Producing the best, sweetest honey of all the hive. Honey drips faster and faster from the bottle. That’s my name. The finest of all the hive. Trying harder and harder to be the best. 

The vibrant, green leaves fading to new personalities. From yellows to oranges to browns. The trees. The eerie looking trees and branches when they begin to lose all of their warmth. Even the atmosphere and the air surrounding you feels like this color. It’s like memories of carving pumpkins and going to apple orchards. Amber. Amber is fall.

It’s one broken down leaf. Smooth. yet imperfect. One broken down leaf in the middle of a dark, vibrant forest. No people or buildings to be seen within eyesight’s radius. Just trees, lots and lots of trees and leaves and wildlife everywhere. 

And then the one leaf. The broken, butwhole leaf. That’s me. That’s my name, imperfect, broken, but somehow whole and together. That’s me. standing in the middle of the forest, no people or buildings in sight. Just me. Me and my name. 

They saw my name on a tv show and decided that was the one. That’s all my name is. Some random girl who won a survival show. Sometimes I wish that it meant more, that it was some royalty up in a long lost castle, or that it was my great grandmother’s name. And sometimes, I wish that I could add more meaning to it. So that’s what I do—I give it meaning.

To me, my name is like a hyena. It can be so courageous and stubborn and strong. But at the same time it’s also careful. careful to not take the wrong step and get mauled to death by other  predators. But powerful enough to go after its prey, always looking for what’s going to happen next. 

It’s hard to create a meaning for a name when you can’t find an attachment to it and it doesn’t feel right. I could be Ace, like the number one and like the card from a card deck. Or I could be Skye, named after the limitless sky above our heads with no expectations of what it will be. But then I think again about my name, and how I shouldn’t replace it. Instead, I should give it meaning. My name might not mean much right now, but it will. Just give me the time. Just wait and see.