Earlier in the chapter I quoted in my previous blog post, the protagonist says something that I found fascinating, sad, and immediately recognizable:
“I don’t let my thoughts touch the sides as I take the crowbar out of the toolbox . . .”
“I don’t let my thoughts touch the sides”: I get that; I have felt that way before.
Do you; have you?
Later in the novel All the Birds, Singing, the author, Evie Wyld, has the protagonist say something similar, expanding upon the idea:
“I walk down the corridor of my brain and don’t even look at the doors either side.”
Wow, what powerful imagery: a picture of numbness. Why doesn’t the protagonist want to make contact with the sides, look at the doors, or—God forbid—walk through those doors? Why does she endeavor to go straight down the middle, focusing only on stepping cautiously forward?
Wyld expands on this idea even further, later in the novel, but the idea is understandable even after reading just these two short passages. When something bad has happened in your past—an event, or many events, so horrifying or shameful or depressing or otherwise traumatic that you can’t bear to think of them—the memories continue to reside in your brain, whether you want them there or not. Sometimes it is more comfortable and less anxiety provoking to avoid thinking or feeling at all, so as not to risk touching upon one of the danger areas.
If you have never felt this way—felt so paralyzingly numb that you could not bear to let your thoughts touch the sides—count yourself lucky, young, otherwise blessed, or more than one of the above. If, like me, you have? Well, we’re only human.
And maybe, one day, letting your thoughts touch the sides will feel not so bad, and walking through the doors will feel not so awful, after all.
Know what I mean?
The passage from the book that you quote reminds me of a 1960’s film called “Repulsion.” The main character had trouble being with herself alone. She was repulsed!
My other thought was about the many rooms in our minds that we either avoid, ignore or keep closed. Maybe the point of life is to open all the doors and to not be repulsed by our inner rooms or the furniture in them.
Great thoughts, Jean. Interesting connections.
Totally agree. Our fears of ourselves, and of our pasts, or just our bear thoughts, which constantly bother us. I constantly find myself pace on the main roads of life, trying to feel more secure. But what a nice, delegate and gentle way of expressing it in words, using the walls and the doors as metaphors. Implicitly expressed and so very nicely put!
To connect to that idea, what immediately comes to mind was the lyrics of “Car Radio”, the popular song by Twenty One Pilots. Here are some of the lyrics:
I ponder of something great
My lungs will fill and then deflate
They fill with fire, exhale desire
I know it’s dire my time today
I have these thoughts, so often I ought
To replace that slot with what I once bought
‘Cause somebody stole my car radio
And now I just sit in silence
Sometimes quiet is violent
I find it hard to hide it
My pride is no longer inside
It’s on my sleeve
My skin will scream reminding me of
Who I killed inside my dream
I hate this car that I’m driving
There’s no hiding for me
I’m forced to deal with what I feel
There is no distraction to mask what is real
I could pull the steering wheel
I have these thoughts, so often I ought
To replace that slot with what I once bought
‘Cause somebody stole my car radio
And now I just sit in silence
I ponder of something terrifying
‘Cause this time there’s no sound to hide behind
I find over the course of our human existence
One thing consists of consistence
And it’s that we’re all battling fear
Oh dear, I don’t know if we know why we’re here
Oh my, too deep, please stop thinking
I liked it better when my car had sound
Wow Gilad – great connection. That’s a great song, and it fits so well with the themes here. Thanks for sharing!