I’m Thinking of Ending Things
Sometimes the thought is closer to the truth, to reality, than an action. You can say anything, you can do anything, but you can’t fake a thought.
âś»
People like to think of themselves as points moving through time. But I think it’s probably the opposite. We’re stationary, and time passes through us, blowing like cold wind, stealing our heat, leaving us chapped and frozen.
âś»
– I feel like maybe our society lacks a certain kindness, a certain willingness to take in the struggles of others, struggling with, uh, issues caused by…
– An alienating society?
– I don’t know. Uh, I guess. Yeah, it seems hopeless.
– What does?
– All of it. Everything. Like feeling old, like your body is going, your hearing, your sight. You can’t see, and you’re invisible. And you’ve made so many wrong turns. The lie of it all.
– What is the lie of it all?
– I don’t know… That it’s going to get better, that it’s never too late, that… God has a plan for you, that age is just a number. […] That it’s always darkest before the dawn. That… every cloud has a fucking silver lining!! That there’s someone for everyone.
– Platitudes all.
[…]
– And “God never gives us more than we can bear”…
âś»
– […] I don’t subscribe to that. “The mother is the cause of all psychological problems” crap. That’s misogynistic claptrap, Freudian bullshit. It is tempting to have someone to pin it on, though.
– Pin what on?
– All of it. Why you feel a certain way, why you are a certain way.
– That’s misogynistic claptrap, Freudian bullshit! (ed. not true at all, by the way; the causes are both genetic and what the parents did) A person, an adult, has to, at one point or another, take responsibility for who they are. Don’t you think? […] Mothers are people with their own pain, their own history of neglect and abuse. (ed. Yeah, and so what? It’s in fact a chain of trauma down the genealogical tree.) Yet, at one time or another, during the 20th century, every fucking childhood trait was blamed on them: schizophrenia, autism, narcissism, homosexuality. […] a coddling mother was often seen as the culprit.
– Right. It’s despicable how we label people and categorize them and dismiss them. […] I look at the kids I see at school every day. I see the ones who are ostracized. They’re different, they’re out of step. And I see the lives they’ll have because of that. Sometimes I see them years later, in town, at the supermarket. I see… I can tell that they still carry that stuff around with them. Like a… black aura. Like a millstone. Like an oozing wound.