Atalanta

by Jennifer Saint

I needed to remember who I was, who I had always been. A woman who was unafraid.

I didn’t have to be an obedient follower of Artemis, jumping to serve her every command; I didn’t have to be a hero in the mold of Jason or Heracles or the angry boar hunters at Calydon. I wasn’t going to try to shape myself to be like one of them, a ruthless, self-serving, glory-seeking man. I was something different from them all.

The oracle warned that I would lose myself, but the opposite is true. I am more myself than I have ever been. I am wild, I am free. I am Atalanta.