we find ourselves collecting dolls, but what do we do with them?

“You know, she said, I don’t really know you at all … She was simply expressing a desire to get to know me better, to get invited inside the walls of my invisible fortress, the one I’d be building my whole life. The thing was, the whole point, was that no one was invited in. I might refer to this or that rough patch from my little box of tragedies, hold them up like slides to a lightbulb — poof — but that was just to get whoever was listening to hold me tighter. It had nothing to do with them getting inside. Inside this fortress a man was wrestling with his own shadow, muttering that he’d never let himself get surprised, not again. Muttering that he’d never again let himself be tricked into getting so close to someone that he might risk missing her.” – from The Ticking is the Bomb, Nick Flynn

This passage put my heart on pause. There was a time when I thought I had all that I wanted. Coins sputtering out of my mouth like ticker-tape, shelves overflowing with the right books, subscriptions to publications that contemplated the existence of obscure animals and suicidal artists, learned friends, a serious literary magazine. I contemplated meter, the vivisection of the line. We were the kind who were always on the verge, on the precipice of something, although I was never quite sure what that was, or if it mattered. Never did I consider if these people, my friends, these projects, these things, made me happy.

My heart became a house with all the lights burned out. After years of giving myself to others, I was left confused, angry, and used. I felt talked about, like I was someone to know, or possibly I was no one to know at all. I would walk into rooms with my friends, wondering if I belonged, if anyone really wanted me there, or whether I was simply a warm, breathing body. Occupying space. A head-count.

I started to realize I didn’t like many of the people I knew and I suspected that they really didn’t like me either. Years ago, I remember collapsing into the street, body heaving, face wracked with sobs, yelling into a cell phone that I had no one. I could feel myself breaking. And my friend sighed and said that I was a wall, this impenetrable fortress. Everyone was held at a remove, because I was safe that way. I could compute and collect friends that way. I would never truly know anyone that way.

There is no trespass into this dark country.

And I think about Susan. A lone, lithe girl who irritated me beyond measure. A mouth filled with armaments. She was determined to chisel, to break, to kick down doors, and for years I wouldn’t bend. You would not break me. I needed that one foot poking out from under the covers, poised for flight. But she was determined, and soon I began to feel this thing called love, which at first was much like burial. How do I explain that love always involved loss, tragedy, the dull ache of longing? But she was determined (how did she know I would pay off?!), and I would sit on floors catching hammers and hacksaws as they soared above my head. Soon I forgot my doll collection and thought about what it would feel like to meet someone half-way. This was a math that was possible to compute.

And then I found myself racing to turn on all the lights in this dark house, because I wanted more of this. I was tired of brick walls, doll collecting, life composing, and the business of sedation. Sometimes when I consider relapse, what it would feel like to have that one drink, just like I used to — that sweet flush of numb — I think about Susan, my friends, and how this one drink would break them. I’ve come to realize that this is what love is, the desperate need to save your friends from hurt.

Recently, I rejoined Facebook and learned that an old “friend” had “unfriended” me. I was momentarily pained, as we had planned literary events together and ran in very close circles. But on that same evening I found myself in a new friend’s home marveling over the fact that we shared affection for black and white movies, The Twilight Zone, and reinterpreting the English language. She doesn’t read Harper’s or the latest “big book”, but she’s honest, hysterical, kind and I’ve never doubted her affection for me. Our friendship is based on what we cultivate, harvest, rather than what is exchanged. Lately, I’m feeling less of those transactional, she’s good to know friendships, and more of a supportive, strange patchwork of a family, who doesn’t mind that I’m incredibly strange, have a penchant for speaking loudly, and perhaps could use a filter.

It feels good to throw away the dolls and fall in love with people.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 5th, 2010 at 11:26 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.