In my last post, I chose not to recount the note of levity with which Travis began our Summit: When I was coming up the walk to your house for that dinner with Helen, I looked down...and sure enough, my fly was open.
I laughed, and filled Parker in on what had happened the day before: I had been leaving Travis's place, when, noticing that his zipper was down, I warned him he'd better attend to it before he came to dinner. Maybe my mother-in-law will be more comfortable with your presence if your fly's zipped, I suggested, teasingly.
Never one to miss a comedic opportunity, Travis came up with an alternate scenario. I don't know – maybe I should leave it gaping open...and then, when I go to shake Helen's hand, I'll start pulling out all the panties you've left lying around my apartment.... (Here Travis began a pantomime, stuffing phantom panties into the crotch of his jeans and then pretending to pull them out, one by one, until I thought I was going to die laughing.)
In my last post, I also chose not to recount the note of levity with which Parker ended our Summit: after I hugged Travis goodbye, Parker sidled up to him, crab-walking, in a deliberate parody of the approach used when a hyper-masculine “from the side” hug is what's intended. He proceeded to give Travis a regular hug after all, then cracked, “Aren't guys weird?...I wonder what it'd be like to be one of them.”
I also neglected to mention the graphing exercise Parker insisted that we all do, in which we had to chart our level of interest in certain core pursuits, tracking the changes over the course of our adult lives. I didn't write about almond butter and blackberry preserves on a white plate, a broken red crayon, feeling self-conscious about my new haircut, or how Travis's place feels a bit like a bunker or a medieval church.
Why did I leave out so much of what happened during that meeting?
Because I had a specific story I wanted to tell. Three people come together to talk about how they might share a future; ironically, each person comes away from the experience feeling more alone. A true story. But not the whole truth. Stories are always, necessarily, partial.
Which brings me to the stories I want to tell today.
Story #1
Robin gave Lilianna a necklace for Christmas. Not surprisingly, given the crisis their relationship is going through, the gift was highly symbolic. Lilianna has been wearing it -- symbolism, emotional turmoil and all. A couple of days ago, she sent Robin a picture in which his gift is clearly visible around her neck. His response to this photograph was as follows: “I can't look at it and still manage to convince myself that you are totally worthless.”
Lilianna was shocked. “Is that what you're trying to do? Convince yourself that I'm worthless?”
“My life would be a lot easier if I didn't love you,” Robin replied.
Story #2
A few days before Christmas, I got a letter from Rick. He wanted to explain some things about why our relationship, his and mine, had ended the way it did. It was for his own peace of mind, he said.
I followed along as his letter dug up our shared past, exhumed the bones of our presumably laid-to-rest romance, and performed a very belated autopsy.
According to Rick, one cause of death was a feeling he'd had: he'd picked up on signals that I would “really not be okay” with him dating anyone else while he and I were in a relationship. Lilianna, on the other hand, “seemingly had no problem” with him dating – which Rick pointed out was “ironic,” since she's his wife, whereas I was only his girlfriend.
My reaction, on reading Rick's version of the factors and events that led to our eventual demise, was defensive. I immediately looked up certain key email exchanges, in which I had made it clear (so I thought, anyway) that he was free to do whatever he liked – that, while I couldn't guarantee I wouldn't have any negative feelings, a little bit of emotional processing was all I might need in order to be completely okay with him dating whomever.
I also found myself remembering every instance that might contradict Rick's claim about how Lilianna was supposedly so much better than I at not having a jealousy problem: what about (for example) the fact that every time he and I went on a trip, we had to spend a substantial portion of our time together searching for the perfect gift to bring back for Lilianna? This was her way of participating in the trips Rick and I took, her solution for dealing with the envy that came up whenever we went off together, and it never bothered me that she seemed to need this from us. Quite the opposite, in fact: I actually enjoyed the process of helping Rick select gifts for her. However, Rick's story wasn't sitting well with me, so I kept coming up with facts he'd forgotten or ignored, facts that would prove him wrong.
On some level, I want to erase his story and tell a different tale, one that suits me better.
Story #3
There's a party game in which each participant has something written on his or her back – the name of a famous person, say – and the object is to figure out your own “identity” without looking in a mirror or otherwise cheating. The only way to determine who you are, then, is to pay attention to how others treat you.
In real life, people don't always agree about what's written on your back. They're going to read what they see there, and treat you accordingly. They're telling themselves a story about you, and you're telling yourself a story about them. You're telling yourself a story about their stories, and they're telling themselves stories about the stories you're telling.
One way to get at the truth is through multiplicity: let everyone speak. Put all those competing narratives together, and the truth will emerge.
Another way: Forget about stories. Forget about language. Forget about identity. Listen to the silence.
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