The version of me you meet depends entirely on the room you meet her in.

Someone asks me what I do for a living and I change my answer depending on who's asking. I have been doing this for so long that I don't always notice it anymore. It happens the way breathing happens - automatic, below the level of conscious thought, my brain already scanning the room before my mouth has decided on a single word. I read the person in front of me. I read the room. I read the energy, the body language, the subtle signals that tell me whether this is a room that will respect "writer" or whether "writer" is going to require fifteen minutes of explanation and a defense of why that counts as a real career. And somewhere in the half second between the question landing and my answer leaving my mouth, I decide which version of myself is most likely to be received without follow up questions I don't want to answer, and I lead with her instead.