I'm done. Finished. At my wit's end. Tired of banging my head day after day. Time to move on. But to where? I don't want to be anything anymore. I just want to wait it out unseen and unknown until the pale rider comes. I miss her too much to do much anything else. Berlin is not really a destination. It's more like a giant airport lounge where you get wasted while your flight is delayed. You know sooner or later you have to get out but in the meantime...you simply devolve, trapped in a nihilistic time warp. It's the perfect place to be nothing. People like to drop their masks here. Even those with a facade seem to do so with a knowing wink. So I'm not troubled by a need to be pleasant and liked as in America. Yes, it's wrong to fade away - but here I've got numbers on my side. The food sucks. It is, in a word, heavy. I'm constantly seeking out the lighter fare. I don't like any old world food, truth be told. And they take all the fun out of sex. If nothing is forbidden, where's the fun? It's like how do you know you feel good when pain does not exist. It's all yin with no yang.
Speaking of the old world, I still feel disturbed terror deep in the Rhineland surrounded by dark Germanic forests. Takes me back to the times of wallowing hopelessness, living in Dark Ages squalor. We wondered why we even went on. What was there to live for? I admit, hidden deep inside was a wild streak of optimism of undiscovered magic in the world that even wretches like us could find. It turned out to be true and the Renaissance times I still hold dear. But Europe finally became a smell I could no longer endure. It still stinks to my nose whenever I return. I don't go to the infamous clubs, but I drive by and wander around them to absorb the vibes. Sometimes I think I'm hearing a heart whose beats are getting farther and farther apart. Even under the golden rays of summer Berlin has a blue-gray tinge to it that suits my present mood. In winter times like now, it simply drowns in it. Nighttime makes it terrifying. I'm trying not to think too much. Some things need to unfold and here I can do it in complete privacy even in public. I want to cry, mourning my life. From afar, America seems like a red hot boil spitting up acid reflux, too self-involved to ponder her fate. It is certainly a relief to be out of that though highly frustrating I can't make every American feel this perspective. So I sit and wait...for nothing. It's amazing the depth of blackness here. Late night on my bed I think of the bars and clubs I passed by before, imagining myself inside, losing control, reaching the limits of the universe. I don't have to beg permission or stand in line to get in like the others. Just knowing I can do it is enough. If they ended the clubs it would kill me even having never stepped a foot inside. In the quiet moments my heart is pounding. Bourdain said there are ghosts in Berlin and I feel every one of them. I wonder how the locals live with them. Maybe they just become part of the fabric of existence, in the background of everyday life. I know very little German so I'm not distracted by voices. In fact, the one mental exercise I sometimes do is to guess people's meaning just by their tone and inflection. Rest of the time the voices are like a distant soundtrack I can turn off and on as I please. I feel very fragile. I bought a monk's robe to keep my frowns hidden. Everything is set up for me to relax but if I give in that...I can't help but feel a thousand intrusions will come crashing in. It's like having the weight of the world on you and if you relax for even a moment it crushes you. I'm a wight in this world. Where will this lead? Who can move forward in life waiting in an airline lounge? One thing has dawned on me is of the pointlessness of so many of my "goals". They are goals that don't actually achieve anything. Yes, getting a good drunk on every once in a while can be a good thing but to make that your goal... "Stay distracted" has become my mantra over time. I see how ridiculous that is as a goal, but I don't want to face anything either. I just want to stay on this anonymous German bed for now. It's when no one can see me I need you to look at me the most.
I knew who she was. I mean, I didn't know her name, but I knew her. Pretty blonde talking nonstop on her pink encased iPhone about her latest social media conquest and how the universe is her oyster and blah, blah, blah. Hard to believe I'd be the only who'd want to kill her.
It was just us two at the rail station. She completely ignored me which is what I wanted but then again I didn't. Shoving her out onto the tracks in front of that oncoming train was just a reaction inside me, a murderous impulse whose single purpose and desire was total annihilation and destruction - just like a Trump voter. It's like, how long can you ignore an itch that needs to be scratched? That was my first reply anyway.
"This is a serious thing," inquisitioned Lt. Bertrand in an incredibly boring interrogation room. "You think this is a joke, you got another think coming. You know how many years you're looking at?"
For some reason, the more serious a situation, the more flip I become. I wanted to say, "More years than it will take for you to get hair back on that bald head of yours." Instead, I toned it down. "I'm serious. It was like an itch I had to scratch."
"And you're telling me you had no previous relationship with Ms. Miller."
"Never laid eyes on her before. She was just yapping on the phone about that blog of hers."
"What about her blog, then?"
"I don't know. Just sounded real annoying. Dallas hot spots and shit like that. Do I look like I got money for all that?"
"So basically, you heard her talking about her blog, got angrier and angrier, then finally pushed her off the platform. Is that it?"
MAN PUSHES WOMAN TO HER DEATH DUE TO HATING HER BLOG!
"Some men just can't stand to see a successful woman. Sexism, pure and simple. Bet he'd have killed himself if Hillary had become President!"
"I just found his blog and it's nothing but complaining about how nobody reads his crap. Loser!"
"He never would have done this had it been a man on the phone! Men are supposed to be successful. Nobody gets mad when they brag."
Day Two:
"OK, OK, it was more than just her blog talk. She was really cute and had that jogging outfit on just like this girl I knew, Terry, who used to wear that exact same thing. It was the last thing I ever saw her in. I screwed up real bad. I'm ashamed of it to this day and it kills me. I guess because I had Terry on my mind it triggered something. I didn't want anyone to know how monumentally stupid I had been."
MAN PUSHES WOMAN TO HER DEATH DUE TO REMINDING HIM OF HIS EX!
"What's wrong with men? They just can't let go! There's, like, tons of guys who never got over me."
"It's the obsessive compulsive nature of the male ego that brings on these moments of peak psychological torment aggravated by a starved libido in a competitive society."
"I'd call this the ultimate #metoo moment. Killed just for being a woman! Know your worth, ladies!"
Day Three:
"You guys keep searching for a connection. You're wasting your time. I can't tell you the real reason because you'd never believe me so may as well make something up."
"Tell us anyway. You won't get any peace until you do."
"It was her yellow clothes. Wasn't just any yellow, you see, it was that right exact shade I can't stand. I just snapped. What can I say?"
"You're right. I don't believe you."
MAN PUSHES WOMAN TO HER DEATH DUE TO HER WEARING YELLOW!
"This is what it means to be a woman in today's society! You're not allowed to be yourself! You have to wear men's clothes and men's colors or you literally get killed!"
"I think we need to start a yellow clothes wearing protest movement showing we are not afraid to stand up to these kinds of bullies. Yellow power forever!"
"Whole world is going to hell. We need armed guards 24 hours a day on every public platform to keep us safe. There's no other way or we'll all be dead for no reason!"
Day Four:
"Look, dildo breath, I did it because I'm dying inside and I need help. No one will listen to me! It had to be someone everybody liked. Nobody would have cared if it'd been some homeless dude or something. It was a cry for help. I'm sorry."
"We saw you on the videotape leaning over the edge after you pushed her off as if you were saying something. What exactly did you say?
I'm standing on the balcony of my second floor apartment, leaning over the railing, holding a loaded gun I've never fired, with two arms outstretched aimed at two men, one tall and burly, the other short and slender, talking with their backs to me below. And at this point, whether I do or do not shoot them both, my life is truly fucked.
-------------------
It all started earlier that day in the morning, mired in my usual weekend pain, when I was out walking around in the aimless wandering I sometimes do when I'm hurting. There are some empty grassy fields still undeveloped I drive to where no one traverses. It's there I feel safe with my splitting head and were I to die in this moment it would not be the worst thing that could happen. When I say No they say Yes. When I say Yes they say No. I just cannot connect.
I admit I was pretty wrapped up in myself and it was an unpleasant shock to force myself back into the world when I noticed a commotion in the distance. Two men had grabbed a blonde girl in a yellow dress, dragging her away in an apparent kidnapping. Behind them is a row of trees that defines the edge of the field and provides cover from prying eyes from the country road beyond. Only a lost fool like me would be found in such a useless location.
Instinctively I begin to shout and wave my arms causing the two men to pause and look over at me. As I start to walk towards them they abandon whatever plan they had and disperse to the other side of tree line. I run to the yellow dress girl but she is fine. Yet when I ask what is going on she shook her pretty head and refused to answer. I was confounded. Situations like this only happen in movies and I was surprised at my expectation that momentarily something would come along to illuminate and give me context.
Without a pre-written script, I had no idea what to say. I'm certainly not anyone's idea of a movie hero. Looking back, maybe I was in a bit of shock with this intrusion into my isolated life. I was like Chance the Gardener trying to change life's channel with a TV remote. God, did I feel inadequate. Was I supposed to challenge her and force the truth out? She was visibly upset and when she started to stumble away I could only look on in a hapless sort of way, tortured by the idea of what a responsible adult would do.
"Am I a hero?" I kept thinking how the local news trucks would show up with their camera crews wanting to interview me and I'd finally get my 15 minutes of fame. Yippee! But they'd ask too many questions and why I didn't do more and they'd get that look on their face people always do when someone gets to know me: that look of losing all interest. Then they'd pack up and drive away and I be captured on film forever as a fraud. Alone again, naturally.
Of course, I was thinking about how I'd blog about this and with all my bullshit stories this would sound like just another one and no one would be the wiser. Maybe in the retelling I'd add in a little Rashomon factor and play myself up more and leave out a few inconvenient facts. Wouldn't be the first time I've parsed the truth. Then I noticed an object on the ground, square, about an inch and half in size, with metal prongs sticking out of one end. Definitely an electrical device.
"Those men must have dropped this. The fuckers!" They were up to no good and this is turning into a Simon Templar adventure. Except that he would have stuck with the girl giving aid and comfort instead of staring longingly at her legs as she walked off. Anyway, those two guys were assholes and I deserve this little perk whatever it is. A hero's reward! Maybe I can pull this con off after all. I was starting to feel righteous. Idiot.
It was quite a hike back to my car parked to the side of the country road. I was clutching hard the electronic device in my hand, musing on what it could possibly be. Probably nothing, but the greater its value the greater my story - and my worth. So I wasn't giving it up for nothin'! But I felt a presence behind me and when I turned around the big burly guy from before was walking behind me, his eyes dead straight on me.
"Give it back!" he demanded in a thick European voice. "Give it back or I kill you!"
Now, if my head had been in the real world instead of thinking I was in a movie I'd have dropped the damn thing and got on with my worthless life. But I was a hero and the star and if I drop it I can't advance the plot. It bugged me at the time I was thinking that way and putting it down now in black and white makes it look absolutely fucking insane - but I clenched my fist and started running to my car.
"It's mine! Give it back!"
He started running too but if there's one thing I have experience in, it's running. I tore away in my car, smiling at his exasperated face in my rear-view mirror.
"Shit. Maybe this is something after all."
I started to feel excited, my mind racing with the possibilities of this being some sort of high tech device but, good Lord, how cheesy and obvious of a plot line is that?? Still, those guys were trying to drag her away for a reason and maybe it wasn't just because she was hot. My head was spinning! Just the idea my life could be remotely interesting for once, that I could do something worthwhile - and I did save that girl even if I was unable to follow up on it. That just had to be the right thing to do - and I done did it!
I pushed aside the nagging voice that wondered where that little guy had been. Maybe he was...nah, I got away clean, too clever by half. Things always work out for the good guy! I'm too integral to the plot for anything to happen to me. I decided to celebrate and stopped at a Sonic to splurge on a Coney dog. I was so freaking excited to share my news I was the star of my own show and a hero and had an international electronic device worth millions and probably sought after by governments the world over like in "Sneakers". But I couldn't explain all that to the car hop so I just had be satisfied on my own.
I got back to my dingy apartment full of feelings I never had before. Jesus, what a feeling to be somebody instead of a nobody. It was like I'd written a hit song, on top of the world. I never realized how badly I'd been craving that and what hell life was in the vacuum in which I had been entombed. Hardest part would be to keep from giggling! Who's the asshole now??
I was turning over the device in my hands, looking for any clues I could find, when I heard a whiff of the heart-sinking sound of the oversized European's voice outside. I ran to the window, peering through the blinds. They were searching the side of the building, then turned to look at my car in the parking lot.
"Shit! Shit ! Shit! Shit! You fucking idiot, look what you got yourself into! Goddam you thinking you were something more than what you are!"
I ran to my bedroom closet and pulled out my suicide gun. Forgot where I put the bullets but found them right away, though it felt like an hour. I crouched back to the patio door, opening it slightly ajar.
"Do we have to do this?" asked the little fellow.
Mumbling, then: "He saw us with the girl too," definitively replied the tall guy.
I could barely hear them but I understood loud and clear. My head suddenly cleared as I thought through the immediate logical scenarios. Even if I ran them off - even by using the police - they could wait outside forever to ambush me. Just a matter of time. What can I do? What can I do?
The only way to handle this was to handle it myself. No one can help or protect me. I just had to be stubborn and hold onto that device, didn't I? "Fuck, nothing is worth this!"
My heart was racing but I knew to wait until later to be scared. Right or wrong, I stepped out onto the patio. The minute they turned around and I saw their eyes - removing all doubt - I'd shoot them down like dogs. It was them or me. No Way Out.
There's got to be another way! I can't do killing. This goes against every fiber of my being. Do this and you're defeated for life. It's the no-win situation you swore you'd never find yourself in.
Then it hit me. I rushed back inside and got my old 35mm camera. The daggers in my heart fell out and at last I felt truly confident in what I was doing. "Hey!" I barked out, causing both men to swing around. I took several quick shots in a row then held up my gun.
"These pictures are going to the police, the internet, and anywhere else I can think of. Anything happens to me, they'll know exactly who did it and hunt you down like dogs. You can have your stupid device, just get the hell out of my life."
My tabletop isn't far from the patio so I was able to quickly grab it and fling it down to them. The short one picked it up, the tall one kept his eyes on me, unwavering in his inspection with his questioning gaze. Then I saw the inevitable look of disinterest I always get as they turned to walk away, my world reverting to what it's always been.
EPILOGUE: I'm haunted and hounded by the idea that device really was my worth and I literally threw it away. Part of me argues I was sensible and mature in what I did. At least I didn't shoot the fuckers. But I couldn't shake the idea I'd failed in the Big Moment every life receives. I really, really, really wanted to get to the truth of that device. My instincts yelled out "Yes!" to keeping it. Perhaps something bigger was driving me, though. Maybe I was simply driven by the need to cry out, "This is what my life is. I can't change it - can I?"
In the 16th year of the Genroku era [1703], Kenichi sat in the darkness of his spartan samurai house. Though he couldn't directly see it at the moment, he could not escape the presence of the sword mounted on the wall. Its name: Rice Merchant [swords were often named after a victim].
Rarely a day passed that Kenichi didn't think of the day of that Fatal Event. Was he right? Was he wrong? One thing he knew for sure: he had fought in anger. Now it occurred to him that knowing full well he'd win, he should have walked away. That's what a strong man would have done.
This sword that everyone praises...is more of an embarrassment every day.I was weak. Soon they will figure this out and I'll go from hero to coward. If so, I'll not be able to refute it.
The rice merchant's widow, Hisaka, she knew. Sure, her loudmouth husband had been stupid to pick a fight with a samurai, and merchants were considered the lowest class in Japanese society, but he did not deserve death. Hisaka knows the truth, but no one will let her speak it. She'd be derided from all sides. She's as trapped as I am.
In his imagination, Kenichi dreamed of smashing the blade, melting it into a plow, never able to mock him again. But he also knew that to destroy the blade was to be defeated by it. No, he should be able to be free regardless of its existence. But how could that be?
Legally, he was home free. Samurai have the right to take a non-samurai life at will except in the most egregious of circumstances. Kenichi was immediately praised for killing the obnoxious merchant, the city populace surrounding him with congratulations. Yet when his head cleared, he realized his extollers were his captors.
For him to even hint at a morsel of regret, Kenichi was resoundingly shouted down: He didn't know what he was saying. He was being weak. He must not betray. Betray what?
It was something he'd never wanted to face. And until he acted on it, Kenichi too would have behaved as those who supported the killing, exalting violence as a solution. But guilt drove him onward to the truth he needed to stay alive. In this, Kenichi found that to question his killing was same as questioning the favored Japanese tenet of violence [not unique to Japan but Japan was all he knew].
Yes, he surmised, a very known but not fully conscious faith in violence ran in a constant undercurrent to everyday life. Now that he was looking for it, he saw it everywhere. In day-to-day speech, in mandates from the Shogunate, even in the play of children. One day this violence will consume us if we don't reject it and Japan will trigger a great and terrible war. I fear that outcome and for our very survival.
Kenichi was in the unenviable position of having to "come out from among them." That was the price he must pay for his hasty strike, to give up the shadow world life of the samurai. He knew no one would be more mocked than a samurai for renouncing violence. True, there was a history of warlords renouncing the world and entering the Buddhist priesthood when politically advised. But rarely did they rid violence from their hearts.
Kenichi would certainly lose his place in the clan, perhaps even having to return to his home village to be a farmer. His life would be over. Just like the rice merchant's.
As expected, came anger, rejection, and bitterness for Kenichi's newfound awareness and renouncement of the killing. While filled with fear when he hid in the dark, Kenichi found these reactions quite amusing as he stepped into the light. Why do they concern themselves so? I cannot grant them absolution. They scatter like cockroaches before me. So bitter!
Also, the day came when he was finally able to face Hisaka, walking directly to her upon sighting her in the pathway street.
"I don't see how I can ever ask for your forgiveness. But I wish to tell you, that in a way, your husband saved my life. I realize the error of my ways. Should you wish to take vengeance on me it is yours to take. Set me free."
"Up until this moment I wanted you dead and to suffer harshly. But I only felt emptiness when I heard you lost your station with the clan. And your words just now have quenched my fire - and for that I am grateful. Who among us is free from moments of rash anger? Certainly my husband was not when provoking you. Neither am I. Perhaps for us to survive we must face the fact we cannot marry violence to these inevitable lapses."
Later, Hisaka composed a haiku before embarking on a new life.
"Ah, so Omi and Otsu are together now. A good match, each equally ambitious in their own way. But if one were to break the oath of ambition the other would break their bond with haste!"
Young lord Oda Nobunaga laughed at his own observation as his retainers sitting in a semi-circle in front of him in the war room smiled in polite response. If Oda noticed the heavy unease in the air, he did not act as such. He wanted to hear more.
"Tell me what else happened today," he eagerly implored. Forced to comply, tidbits of various information were set forth: a favorite horse came up lame, a good forecast had been given for the rice crop, old but beloved Oshige had become ill, signs of a thunderstorm for the morrow.
"Thunderstorms, eh? Interesting!"
Then the lord retired for the night. Hayato and Shiro stayed behind in mutinous disgust.
"He's too young to rule! We are doomed."
"Not one word of the two castles we lost today. As surely as the sun rises, the Hojo will finish us off tomorrow."
"At least he knows the weather forecast!" sneered Hayato.
"We are samurai and we must face death as is our due. But there is no honor in our lord and we'll die in shame. That has been my greatest fear for as long as I can remember."
"I feel the same way. It's too much for me to die on the field having gossiped like an old hen the night before."
"Has not our lord always preached to follow the star that guides us above all else?"
"Indeed. And despite his age, he is the most stubborn sort I've ever come across. As much as I wanted to bring up the invasion I could not speak a word, almost as if I was in a spell. My head said I have to say something but my instincts said let it go. Now that he's gone for the night I could kick myself for being so weak!"
"We will not be weak tomorrow. We shall follow our own thinking like the standing order says. We are trapped, with no other way out."
"Agreed. We will not let history mark us as fools, our lord's so-called destiny be damned."
For whatever reason, the human creature finds good fortune difficult and even impossible to accept. "Why me and not him?" We become ensnared in a web of negativity, hoping to hide our lack of fealty to our truth. Both Hayato and Shiro felt the wondrous feeling of inspiration given off by Oda, that they were on the verge of a rise to the stars. Each wanted to believe it more than anything in their lives, a dream of dreams.
But Owari province was small and weak, impossible to have a future when dozens of stronger provinces surrounded them, allying themselves together, and Owari's forces outnumbered 10 to 1 by the day's invading army. To think that young lord Oda and the hilariously weak Owari had a future was to be self-deceived and marked an idiot. Yes, instincts are to be trusted - but not this far! Their lord's failure to even broach the subject of the lost castles was the last straw.
The morning light brought no relief. Nobunaga made no preparations for war, heading instead to Zensho Temple. Hayato and Shiro looked at one another, confirming the plans they made the night before.
"The time is nigh!"
Leading a light brigade of 300 precious men, they rushed the Hojo army only to be swallowed up and slaughtered. In this way they had hoped to have honorable things written about them for posterity.
But Lord Oda was a man of destiny. And in a way, the deaths of his two head-strong retainers had served a purpose. Seeing the silliness of the Owari resistance with its futile charge caused the Hojo army to relax and fall into a defenseless state. By opening himself up to let the universe play out as it will, Oda had the wind of destiny at his back, feeding him opportunities for success in the final drive for unification of Japan.
When he heard the news, Oda sprung. "This is the moment I've been waiting for. Our enemy is like a ripe plum ready to be picked. He is tired but we are fresh. He seeks only himself but we seek the nation. Behold! He is defeated by thinking he's already won!"
In the most legendary battle in the Era of Warring States, the Oda forces stormed out of an afternoon cloudburst to upend the Hojo camp, cutting the head off the snake by cutting off the head of Yoshimoto, the clan and army leader.
Oda Nobunaga went on to do the impossible, setting the stage for final unification before being betrayed by a misguided general (who was cut down shortly after). Believe in the universe and its conspiracy to save you, however remote that may seem.
Among the maxims on Lord Naoshige's wall there was this one: "Matters of great concern should be treated lightly." Master lttei commented, "Matters of small concern should be treated seriously." Among one's affairs there should not be more than two or three matters of what one could call great concern. If these are deliberated upon during ordinary times, they can be understood. Thinking about things previously and then handling them lightly when the time comes is what this is all about.
Now, how can I resist a headline like that? First reaction was: "Welcome to the club!" Second one too. We're a dying planet, honey, and you won't find the answers here in the world. Dem days is gone. Anyway, I'll post her whole story (as she sees it) below followed by this Polly chick's (major head-rattling) reply. Then, of course, I'll give the proper reply after that (free of charge, as always).
Hi, Polly,
I feel like a ghost. I’m a 35-year-old woman, and I have nothing to show for it. My 20s and early 30s have been a twisting crisscross of moves all over the West Coast, a couple of brief stints abroad, multiple jobs in a mediocre role with no real upward track. I was also the poster child for serial monogamy. My most hopeful and longest lasting relationship (three and a half years, whoopee) ended two years ago. We moved to a new town (my fourth new city), created a home together, and then nose-dived into a traumatic breakup that launched me to my fifth and current city and who-knows-what-number job.
I used to consider myself creative — a good writer, poetic, passionate, curious. Now, after many years of demanding yet uninspiring jobs, multiple heartbreaks, move after move, financial woes, I’m quite frankly exhausted. I can barely remember to buy dish soap let alone contemplate humanity or be inspired by Anaïs Nin’s diaries. Honestly, I find artists offensive because I’m jealous and don’t understand how I landed this far away from myself.
Also, within the past year I’ve had a breast-cancer scare and required surgery on my uterus due to a fertility issue. On top of that, I’m 35 and every gyno and women’s-health website this side of the Mississippi is telling me my fertility is dropping faster than a piano falling out of the sky. Now I’m looking into freezing my eggs, adding to my never-ending financial burden, in hopes of possibly making something of this haunted house and having a family someday with a no-named man.
I’m trying, Polly. I am. I’m dating. I’m working out and working hard. Listening to music I enjoy and loving my cat. Calling my mom. Yet I truly feel like a ghost. No one knows who I am or where I’ve been. I haven’t kept a friend, lover, or foe around long enough to give anyone a chance. What’s the point? I don’t care for my job. I’m not building toward anything, and I don’t have the time or money to really invest in what I care about anyway at this point. On top of that, society is telling me my value as a woman is fading fast, my wrinkles require Botox (reference said poor finances), all the while my manager is asking for me to finish “that report by Monday.” Why bother?
My apathy is coming out in weird ways. I’m drinking too much, and when I do see my friends on occasion, I end up getting drunk and angry or sad or both and pushing them away. And with men I date, I feel pressure to make something of the relationship too soon (move in, get married, “I have to have kids in a couple of years”; fun times!). All the while still trying to be the sexpot 25-year-old I thought I was until what seemed like a moment ago.
I used to think I was the one who had it all figured out. Adventurous life in the city! Traveling the world! Making memories! Now I feel incredibly hollow. And foolish. How can I make a future for myself that I can get excited about out of these wasted years? What reserves or identity can I draw from when I feel like I’ve accrued nothing up to this point with my life choices?
Haunted
She said she makes friends easily
Dear Haunted,
Art isn’t something you need an outside license or a paycheck to pursue. It’s a way of life. It’s a way of adding up what you feel and where you’ve been and what you fear and what you can imagine. It’s a way of seeing your life through a lens that makes everything — good and bad, confusing and clarifying, uplifting and depressing — valuable.
Shame is the opposite of art. When you live inside of your shame, everything you see is inadequate and embarrassing. A lifetime of traveling and having adventures and not being tethered to long-term commitments looks empty and pathetic and foolish, through the lens of shame. You haven’t found a partner. Your face is aging. Your body will only grow weaker. Your mind is less elastic. Your time is running out. Shame turns every emotion into the manifestation of some personality flaw, every casual choice into a giant mistake, every small blunder into a moral failure. Shame means that you’re damned and you’ve accomplished nothing and it’s all downhill from here.
You need to discard some of this shame you’re carrying around all the time. But even if you can’t cast off your shame that quickly, through the lens of art, shame becomes valuable. When you’re curious about your shame instead of afraid of it, you can see the true texture of the day and the richness of the moment, with all of its flaws. You can run your hands along your own self-defeating edges until you get a splinter, and you can pull the splinter out and stare at it and consider it. When you face your shame with an open heart, you’re on a path to art, on a path to finding joy and misery and fear and hope in the folds of your day. Even as your job is slow and dull and pointless, even as your afternoons alone feel treacherous and daunting, you can train your eyes on the low-hanging clouds until a tiny bit of sunlight filters through. You are alive and you will probably be alive for many decades to come. The numbers on your credit-card statements can feel harrowing, but you can take that feeling and keep it company instead of letting it eat you alive. You can walk to the corner store to buy a newspaper and pull out the weekend calendar section and circle something, and make a commitment to do that one thing. You can build a new kind of existence, one that feels small and flawed and honest, but each day you accumulate a kind of treasure that doesn’t disappear. Because instead of running away from the truth, you welcome it in. You don’t treat what you have as pointless. You work with what you have.
That doesn’t mean it’s easy. It’s not easy for anyone, no matter how many deep roots they might’ve nurtured. I find it very hard, even now, to do the hard things that I need to do in order to feel good. I slip into bad habits easily, without noticing, and my worldview suffers for it. I know exactly which good practices will fuel me and make me wake up to the world around me. I know that, when I’m feeling ashamed and sick inside, I have to stand outside of that feeling and examine it and treat it like a fascinating artifact, something useful, something to build from, something to treasure, even.
Let me be more concrete: Promoting a book — which is what I’ve been doing since my new book came out last month — is fun and exciting. You get to travel and meet new people. But there are aspects of it that feel a little corrosive. Too much focus on the self, on presentation, on sales numbers, on whether or not your work matters. Right now I’m reading the novel Less, by Andrew Sean Greer, and I love the way it captures exactly how insecure writers can be, and how much the world will magically transform around them in order to manifest that insecurity and then torture them with it. But Less is also a story about shame. When you carry around a suspicion that there’s something sort of embarrassing or pathetic about you, you find ways to project that shame onto completely innocuous things. You find ways to tell yourself that everyone is laughing at you behind your back somewhere, possibly at a party where they are serving beautiful tasty drinks but you weren’t invited. You’re too old now. You’re no longer exciting or important. You don’t matter. You never really did.
Shame creates imaginary worlds inside your head. This haunted house you’re creating is forged from your shame. No one else can see it, so you keep trying to describe it to them. You find ways to say, “You don’t want any part of this mess. I’m mediocre, aging rapidly, and poor. Do yourself a favor and leave me behind.” You want to be left behind, though. That way, no one bears witness to what you’ve become.
It’s time to come out of hiding. It’s time to step into the light and be seen, shame and wrinkles and failures and fears and all.
I’ve had to step into the light myself lately. I’ve had to admit that I was building a new haunted house out of my imagination. But my mistakes and experiences and choices brought me to this moment. They might make me sad or embarrassed or regretful, but they’re precious because they give this day its unique mood. When I drag them into the light, I feel better. This is where I can begin. Today, I have countless chances to reinvent and rework and reorder myself and my experience. You do, too. I can figure out some way to make one true connection, to do one hard thing, to savor one moment. So can you.
I know you’re trying. I know you’re working hard, and you’re tired. You don’t like your job, but you don’t feel like you can quit. You wish you hadn’t lived the way you’ve lived. You wish you’d made closer friends and built more lasting relationships and stayed in one place. You feel like you have very little time left. And maybe you don’t even care that much about the time you have left, right now.
McKayla's trying too!
But your concept of yourself makes no sense. You got it from a rom-com. Age 35 is not an expiration date on your beauty or your worth. It doesn’t matter if every single human alive believes this. It’s your job to cast this notion out forever. I’m 48 years old and I’m determined not to tell a story about myself that started in some beauty-product boardroom, among unimaginative corporate marketing professionals. I fail at this quest often, but I’m still determined. I’m going to choose to embrace narratives that make me feel more alive and able to contribute whatever twisted crafts I can to this world, while I can.
If you want to build a life with a partner, and have a more satisfying career, and maybe have children, you need to treat yourself like a treasured child starting today. If you had a daughter who was 35 years old and felt like all of her traveling and moving was a giant mistake that embodied everything BAD and shortsighted about her, what would you tell her? You’d tell her she was wrong. You’d say, “Your life is just beginning!”
Learn to treat yourself the way a loving older parent would. Tell yourself: This reckoning serves a purpose. Your traveling served a purpose. Your moving served a purpose. You’re sitting on a pile of gold that you earned through your own hard work, you just can’t see it yet. You can’t see it because you’re blinded by your shame.
It’s okay to be in debt and worried. It’s okay to feel lonely and lost. It’s okay to feel tired of trying. It’s okay to want more and wonder how to get it. You’re just a human, this is how we feel a lot. It’s not irregular or aberrant to feel despair. This is part of survival. Your shame is forming your despair into a merciless story about your worth. Don’t let it do that. Build something else from your shame instead.
What will you build? Only you know that. What is shame worth? You’ll find out once you start digging in.
I’ll start for you. My shame is enormous: I keep seeing that lately. It keeps me online, interacting with ghosts, making meaning out of my pointless little broadcasts and pronouncements. It keeps me scanning the horizons for improvements. My shame keeps me fixated on novelties, on the future, on some exciting version of me that’s only a purchase or a breakthrough away. “You can be better than this,” my shame whispers in my ear. “You need to try harder. You need to hide the scary things you carry around. You need to act like you’ve arrived, even though you’re so inadequate and broken that you never will.”
When I’m hiding from my shame and also viewing my life through the lens of that shame, I get fixated on WHAT NEEDS FIXING. But nothing needs fixing, actually. I need to come back to reality and live there instead. Living in reality means becoming a scientist of shame. It’s an investigation. I can look at my shame, consider it, lament it, celebrate it, treasure it — how it changes the atmospheric pressure, how it makes it possible for me to reach out, to other people, in the hopes of making some connection, how it opens my eyes to the beautiful little awkward minutes of this day. My shame is the fuel that keeps me writing. My shame is the fuel that makes me exercise. My shame gives me a lens for understanding my husband and my kids. My shame makes my work possible. My shame — when I invite it in and forgive it — builds my empathy for others.
Treat yourself well and look closely at your shame. Are you supposed to stay in a job you hate as punishment for your debts? What if you ate baked potatoes and beans and rice for a full year and tried out some new career paths? What if you reached out to other people, and friends, and family, and let your shame into the room with you? What if you simply experimented with being who you are, out in the open, even as that feels difficult and awkward and sad?
What if you just decided that you’re an artist, today, right now? You’re sensitive and erratic, maybe. You’re maudlin and also expansive. What would it look like to own that identity, as a means of making art, sure, but also as a means of owning your FULL SELF? You wouldn’t feel as angry at other artists. You would recognize them as kindred spirits. You might notice how your shame matches theirs, and fuels all of you. You might feel proud of your small creations and you might start to see how every single thing you’ve done, every place you’ve been, every town you’ve lived in and left, every friend you’ve gotten to know and then forgotten, they all add up to a giant pile of treasure.
You are 95 years old, looking back at your 35-year-old self, and this is what you see: a young woman, so young, so disappointed, even though everything is about to get really good. She doesn’t see how much she’s accomplished, how much she’s learned, how many new joys await her. She doesn’t know how strong she is. She is blindfolded, sitting on a mountain of glittering gems. She is beautiful, but she feels ugly. She has a rich imagination and a colorful past, but she feels poor. She thinks she deserves to be berated because she has nothing. She has everything she needs.
Speaking of which, I went to go visit that 93-year-old woman I met on the plane, the one I wrote about a few weeks ago. She had told me her birthday was coming up, so I brought her a birthday card.
But it was difficult. It made me feel dumb to show up at her house with a card. I felt embarrassed for some reason. I even felt a little stupid calling her earlier today, asking if she needed anything. I don’t have a ton of free time. I have a long list of things I should be doing. It feels dopey to call someone new, someone who is much older and probably has other things to do.
But this woman, I like her a lot. She is extremely interesting. She tells long-winded, wild stories. She plays poker and has a lot of friends. She even sang me a song that she wrote in 1968. She grew up during the Prohibition, motherfuckers. She’s had a lot of experiences and she’s made a lot of mistakes, and she doesn’t mind talking about them. She’s a very honest person.
Before I left, she gave me a porcelain cat with a grumpy expression on its face that was sitting outside, covered in dust. She’s getting rid of some of her old things, she said. I’d be doing her a favor by taking it. “I don’t need anything from you, trust me,” I said. “I just like your company.” “Take the cat anyway,” she said.
As I opened the front door, I turned around and told her how nice it was, talking to her. She smiled. “You’re a human being,” she said. “A real human being.”
“I am,” I said. “I wasn’t a few years ago. But I am now.”
All you have to be is a human being, Haunted. That’s success. When you’re a human being, life feels satisfying. Everything adds up. Every little thing matters. Look at what you have. This is where it all begins. All you have to do is open your eyes.
Gawd, did anyone make it through Polly's reply/novelette? Not I. Laughed my ass off at Haunted's self-description as being a creative person. Enjoying God's special curse, are we! No one gives a fuck about your gifts if you can't monetize them. Become a hitlady, make tons of money, repent, then spend rest of your life painting. That's today's formula for success. But what she's really asking for is permission to fail, to which I promptly reply: "Go ahead, you're right, put a bullet through your head." [Which caused a sudden change of Haunted's heart - surprise, surprise!]
