Slippery

The Trickster is a character in various mythologies whose job is to make fools of us. He is a Coyote or a Rabbit or a Satyr, merrily inviting us to dance while leading us, with wide grins, straight for the open pit. The meaning of the Trickster, if such a simple thing can be applied to a slippery character, seems to be "Life isn't fair" and "Nothing is what it seems" and "Follow the rules, or else."

In University I met a person who recounted to me with great glee a story of a fellow neo-pagan who had made a ritual to Loki, a classic Trickster. Within a short time her car had exploded and she'd lost her home and job and relationship, but as the recounter chortled, what do you expect when you ask Loki for help? There are some people and, yes, some gods, you simply do not take seriously, you smile politely and watch your step and check any offered gifts for evidence of tampering. That's just the kind of creatures they are.

Personal blogging is, I think, like Loki. You dip in a toe and the water's fine so you throw on a suit and jump in. And over there is the flashing tail of a merman, inviting you to swim deeper and deeper. He points the way to rewards just ahead, though what those rewards are is never made clear. Friendships, maybe. Approval. Accolades. Something worth it. And then, when land is out of sight and your arms are beginning to tire and you'd like to crawl out on the shore, he whispers in your ear, "Just try." What began as a way to vent and think and process with a small group of friends becomes a performance art. As more people read, there is less you can say.

I wonder if this is more a problem for women than men? Part of a woman's role is managing the relationship, fostering the emotions and bonds and occasions and gifts and Special Moments (tm) of everything from friendships to marriage to the in-laws, a role which clashes directly with discussing that relationship honestly with any group beyond one's closest friends. It's why women bundle up their resentment and buy the fucking presents for their god-damned forgetful husband's critical and overbearing mother again, even though they swore last year would be the end of it. It's why they spend two months harping on their beloved to remember to buy the card the card the card the card the card it's your sister's birthday tomorrow did you remember to buy the card? No? Guess I'll do it then. It's why they smile and pretend to be nice to people they would rather stab with a poisoned stake and can recite, off the top of their heads, their children's friendship histories back to the age of two along with the toy and colour preferences of their current playmates. It's our job, part of the modern femininity project, to manage the relationships, all the relationships, all the time. And blogging starts off as this safe little corner to bitch and moan about it, until people start reading it, at which point the bitching and moaning become a direct threat to one's ability to manage the relationships and, typically, cease in abrupt fashion.

Thenceforth the marriage, the in-laws, the children, the friends, the ex-boyfriends from highschool, are subjected to critcism of only the most tepid and flavourless and opaque sort. "I knew someone once who" and "I'll call her M" and "I won't tell you his name because I don't want him to google this." And "let's just say" and "in other words" and "to make a long story short."

When I read the entries of a new blogger, the honesty and immediacy shock me. They aren't scared yet. They aren't thinking about so-and-so finding that entry and figuring out who wrote it and what they were talking about.

Dear Readers, I have not been sleeping well since September. It comes and goes, as it always does. I have a bad night, then a good one, then a bad one, then it's Saturday and I get to sleep in. I never catch up but, as I keep telling myself, at least it's not as bad as it was when I was 24 and getting one or two hours a night, the pounding of my heart like a jackhammer on a titanium slab such a constant course of adrenaline that I could hardly even close my eyes even when I was too exhausted to stand. Except that it has been like that, lately. Last Tuesday night I lay still in bed and stared at the ceiling until four o'clock. I was exhausted, but my heart would not stop beating. And I know why I'm not sleeping, but I can't tell you.

I couldn't even tell myself until recently. Acknowledging the cause of my insomnia would involve Making Decisions and, as anyone who has known me for more than five years can attest, I am terrible at making decisions, especially where there are no good choices.

I alluded a while ago to a recent trance (you read a witch's blog, you take the flakey with the profound, my friends) where, instead of finding the forest I usually do, healthy and green and crawling with life, I found a charred and blasted clearcut, the landscape so dry that even the riverbed was cracked and fissured. For the non-witches in the audience, aka most of you, water is the element of emotions. And it was as if a fire had raged through and evaporated even every drop of groundwater. It was frightening; considering what I thought was going on, it was also extreme. When I found a river I followed it to a waterfall with a cave behind it; the cave was like a geode, inside all amethyst crystals so sharp they cut my feet to ribbons. (I have not figured out why my feet were bare.) There was a scrying pool in the middle, and I smoothed out a patch of stone beside it using a file and a hasp. As I did, the rocks bled. The rocks bled, and soon my hands and feet were slick with it.

Once I had that patch smoothed and could sit without pain, I determined to stay there until I had seen whatever it was that had caused this. I think I have, and I wish I hadn't.

People have from time to time admired my stoicism, and while I think this is hilarious given my ability to cry at Hallmark commercials it is true that I can be an unemotional person when the situation seems to require it. Or even if only I require it. I will let you in on the secret: distract yourself. Practice over and over the words you have to say until they are meaningless sounds and you can repeat them without emotion. Stare at a spot on the floor and count to ten, over and over. Be aware of what your facial muscles are doing so you know when they are betraying you. Learn how to force them into passivity, or better yet, a smile. Keep something in your hand. Don't look people in the eyes. Cross your arms over your chest, or put your hands in your pockets (the latter seems less defensive). Stay busy. Read a lot. Visualize the pain as a physical injury. Fidget. Never just sit.

I have become so proficient at this that even I am not always aware of what it is that I am trying not to feel, which is why I need back-door tricks like trances and tarot cards. Sometimes only over the course of weeks or months or years do I become aware of a pattern of behaviour, something strange I am doing that I can't explain. Something like, I'm not sleeping. Something like, Why can't I look him in the eyes? Something like, He only asked you how your day was, Andrea. Something like, The rocks are bleeding. And then the monster is out of the cage and won't go back in again.

This is cryptic and confusing and you are all, I know, drumming your fingers on the table and thinking "Out with it!" I wish I could, but even this has all my internal censors screaming. I am risking too much, but I can't talk, and without writing I can't cope. So this is both not enough and too much.

This monster is familiar, but I am not yet ready to look directly at its claws or teeth or yellow eyes. I was so sure that if I just kept walking around that cage it would starve and die, but it hasn't. And I am so ill equipped to deal with this thing, so resistant to the idea of relationship wrangling, so uninterested in taking primary responsibility for what should be a two-person job, so tired of having the same conversations over and over and in the first place so revolted by talking about feelings and so disgusted by the sight of tears (my own included) that I think I would rather poke out my own eyeballs with a rusty fork. Which explains why I had no conscious idea that the monster was still sitting in its cage.

But now I know, and it knows that I know, and the questions is: What am I going to do with this thing? Can I live with it? Because it has proven itself too adept at survival for me to believe it is going to die.

Posted by Andrea at December 6, 2006 7:07 AM under Me , Web

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