Not many people know this about me, but there is a Mr. Hyde to my Dr. Jekyll. Or it could be the the other way around, depending on how you feel about my usual personality. . . What I’m saying is that I have an alter ego. Her name is Crest, and she was created my sophomore year of college.
It began when I wanted to go to Whisco. For anyone who isn’t familiar with the Providence area, Whiskey Republic is a very mediocre club that hosts different colleges on different weeknights. Despite the interior design resembling a restaurant where you would eat baked macaroni and cheese with your family, after ten p.m. on Wednesdays, it transforms into a sweaty dance scene for Brown students. Whisco is where you go to DFMO with a football player who doesn’t know your name. Unless you are a football player, in which case I suppose you could smooch one of your teammates, or a different athlete? I can’t say for sure.
At this time I had never been to this mysterious place. The issue holding me back? Caitlin Dorman is a dirty hipster. She wears baggy sweaters and top knots. She doesn’t PDA unless she’s ten shots deep, and she only dances provocatively if she is being ~ironic~. She sure as heck would not be caught dead at Whisco after the second week of freshman year.
You might be wondering, “Aren’t you, the author of this article, Caitlin Dorman?” Or, “Caitlin, are you developing multiple personalities again?” Yes, and maybe. I am aware that my name is Caitlin, but Caitlin Dorman as she pertains to Brown is also an entity in itself.
When we go to a new place, we create an aesthetic for ourselves. Most days, I like wearing boots and baggy jeans. I like that no one expects me to dress up, or succeed in my romantic endeavors. But aren’t we all more multifaceted than the personas that we promote? Sometimes I like to wear a tight dress, show off my boobs & butt, and dance the night away. I think the problem with a small to medium sized college is that we get stuck in the niches that we carved out for ourselves.
Back to that fateful night in 2014: In order to not overthink defying expectations, or the possibility of people judging me, I crafted an alter ego. Originally the name was going to be Colgate, but that didn’t roll off the tongue, so I switched to a more accessible toothpaste brand. Why I did I name my alter ego after a dental hygiene product? I don’t know, and frankly, Crest doesn’t answer to condescending questions like that.
Crest puts on make-up and high heels. Crest likes to get drunk and flirt with basically everyone. Crest has no arbitrary rules that she made up for herself at age 18 as a way of categorizing her identity into neat boxes. In fact, Crest has no rules period! Crest is a much dirtier, less classy version of Cinderella. When the clock strikes noon (of the day after), she transforms back into Caitlin.
Maybe, if I have the urges to explore the different aspects of my femininity, I shouldn’t need an “alter ego” to excuse behavior that I shouldn’t stigmatize in the first place. Or, maybe everyone else should also get a sexy, trashy, hot-mess alter ego who is named after a toothpaste. Probably the latter.
Image via Caitlin Dorman ’16.