"What does this mean to you? Dig deeper!
Numerous people in my workshop wrote this comment on my story about developing breasts and being tormented by their ginormous size and then undergoing breast reduction surgery (if they bothered to give me back my paper at all, which one person did not, but that is another story). It vexes me because in many cases I don't say what the situation means because it means (or meant) nothing.
For example, I talk about how breasts have not worked out so well for the women on my maternal side. My granny is a short women who walks around stooped over, maybe partially from the two watermelons stuck to her chest. On the other hand, my mom is a woman of average height with a very small frame who had two small boobs until she lost one to cancer when I was 4 years old. The people in my class wanted to know what I thought about her scarred chest when I was growing up, and the honest answer is that I didn't. It was just a fact of life that I accepted. My mom had cancer. They had to cut off one of her boobs. The end.*
The point is that this made me realize two things. First, I am not a deep person. I really do often accept things for their surface explanation. This is not entirely true, as I also analyze certain things that happen until I've beaten the dead horse to a bloody mixed metaphor, but still - I'm shallow. The second thing is that I am lazy. I'm probably not as shallow as I claim (see dead horse metaphor), but digging deep means extra work and maybe even painful revelations, and I'm not going there. Sometimes I just want to tell a funny story. Why look for the underlying pathos just to make the story more literary? It's all very distressing to think about.
*Now you know the truth, so if I ever do write a best-selling book about puberty and there are paragraphs describing how I didn't want to get boobs because I was scared of cancer and blah blah blah, you can all go to the tabloids and say that I am a liar just like James Frey. And then I will have to lie and say that I had recovered memories in the process of writing the book and blah blah blah and it will all be very scandalous. If you do sell me out, I hope that the tabloids pay you good money. Then you can take me out for afternoon tea and we can laugh about it.
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suzanne, i have many times thought about how 'shallow' i am & i'll probably think about it many times in the future. i really don't dig into things either. perhaps that's why one of my former roommates in college told my other roommates that things wouldn't last between me & the deaf guy i was dating because i was too superficial & cared about what people said. (in reality, he moved back to canada after college)
ReplyDeleteanyway, that was a nice digression. i can see how you were too young to give it much thought & i doubt the subject was brought up that much about your mother's experience. seems like something you'd all do your best to avoid. i hope you didn't take my suggestions as being harsh. i loved your story without the focus on the cancer aspect.
If you can write a story that makes people have a physical reaction -- like laughing out loud, then in my book you have dug deep. We don't have physical reactions when we aren't touched in some way. I think I've read a version of this story on Myspace? It's a good story and I laughed out loud. Screw them. You aren't shallow.
ReplyDeleteMy word verification is "turnity," which also, for some reason, made me laugh out loud.
I know what you mean. I'm 47 and my dad has always had a big ole port wine stain over at least one third of his face. People always freaked out about it but I kept forgetting that he had it. He didn't mind little kids asking about it and would make up a new story about why his face was "bloody". Train wrecks, horrible fights, dueling accident, and my favorite "What blood?"
ReplyDeleteHe never really talked about how it made him feel, he just carried on with his life. That was a better example to me than all that feely talk ever would have.
Don't worry Mar - you were not remotely harsh and I think that it makes sense to suggest that I dig deeper. I'm not finding fault with the criticism. I'm more thinking about whether I can dig deeper and if not, what that means.
ReplyDeleteAs a BIG tit bearer myself, I can say that boobs suck. Unless I get these bitches cut off, I'm sure I will live on strong, strong, strong narcotics in my golden years due to the ridicules pain from carrying these bitches around.
ReplyDeleteWell, there's obviously depth there given what you write. You don't have to go there all the time - like some of us do. I think you have the potential to go there.
ReplyDeleteI think your classmates are assholes. What was the fascination with wanting to know what you thought about my scarred chest when you were growing up? Was it the scarring, or your reaction to it that fascinated them? I am very annoyed.
ReplyDeleteNo, I don't think they mean it that way, Mom. I think they wonder how your surgery impacted my feelings about developing breasts and don't understand that I just accepted it as a fact of life.
ReplyDeleteyour classmates should stop taking themselves so damn seriously and just let it be. many people have questioned how growing up with a handicapped sister made me feel, but you know what, i didn't really think about it as a kid. just accepted her as is.
ReplyDeleteMaybe that's why I like you so much. I am shallow and lazy! No, really. I do hate to mull things too much. It just seems to take the fun and mystery out.
ReplyDelete