Identity #2: Thumbprint

So, yesterday we had my social identity, today we have my physical identity.

Biologically determined, mine from the day I was born until the day I shuffle off. Just mine. Permanent. Unchanging.

Unchanging? That's not true, is it? Even something as objective as a thumbprint changes because of what happens to us during our lives. It's obscured by the ink in the clearer print, but if you look at the fainter print, just to the left of the centre, you'll see a disturbance in the pattern. This was caused by a collision with a wall at primary school, when I was running around a corner and swerved to avoid Michael. Michael was several years younger than me and small for his age. Michael stopped suddenly to avoid me, fell backwards and hit his head on the playground and had a huge nosebleed. We'd have been better off just running into one another.