...and another thing...
I'm currently reading James Frey's "A Million Little Pieces" which I wanted to read before it was picked for Oprah's book club. God love her and all, but everything loses some coolness points once it becomes a selection. Anyway, I was going to read it when I saw Frey on the cover of Poets & Writers magazine and read the story on him. My thing is memoirs, personal essays, creative non-fiction, etc. so I am always interested to see what other people are up to in this regard. Plus, I honestly like reading memoir, as well as attempting to write it.
So anyway, here is my assessment: at times his style is utterly maddening. I really don't like his whole -- "I walked in, and pulled out a chair and then I sat down in the chair. He walked in and he pulled out his chair, and he sat down in it. yadda yadda" That is fucking annoying. That is not a direct Frey quote, but a stab at his style. However...the other stuff, when he's not writing like that, is powerful, raw and honest.
I came to a serious conclusion about myself while reading it too. This conclusion is not one I haven't come to before, but it's one that is prickly to put it mildly, and often likes to make it's way under the carpet with some help from me, kicking and shoving it into the darkness where it can no longer be seen. I'm even drawing out this explanation. I'm stalling. Avoiding. Of course. The fact is: I am an addict. I don't know how long I've been an addict, but more than half my life for sure. I have been addicted to different things like Frey is addicted to alcohol and drugs. I've been addicted to food, to sex, to s/m, to a particular person, at times, when I let myself, it was easy for me to start becoming addicted to substances, but I always cut those off when I felt them pulling on me, as if food is better, when it's ruined my life just as much. I've suffered horrible consequences from some of the other addictions as well, things I can't even bear to speak of. They have all been self-destructive, just not in that searing, obvious way of alcoholism and drug addiction. I have sometimes wished my demons were closer to the surface, so well-meaning friends would put their hands on my shoulders and say the stock phrases: "Will you please get yourself some help?" So they'd look at me with doe-eyed concern and sympathy, stage last ditch interventions on my behalf. Instead, I walk the world with hidden pain, killing me slowing and secretly, but still, killing me.
Frey describes some of his time in rehab without drugs and alcohol and how he turned to overeating, just to be full, to fill up the emptiness, to abuse something, to make himself sick, and I saw myself. I thought about it tonight when I sat on my couch itching with a nameless need for something. Anything. But I wasn't hungry. Not physically anyway. I decided to wait until I got hungry so I could have something. I'm not even sure I even made it to hungry before I thought of something good to make. I cooked and ate the whole box of what I made. I thought maybe I'd leave some for leftovers, but it tasted too good, and besides, part of the point is to do it till it's no longer right, no longer normal or okay. Afterwards I felt full. I felt silenced. The gnawing dread was gone, replaced by shame, disgust and sadness. I'm not sure if I made it to regret, well aware that somehow I need this to dull the pain right now. This is why I never got truly addicted to alcohol or weed, because both are depressants, and with my depression, they only make me feel worse before too long, whereas food soothes me, calms me down, comforts me. Yet at the same time, I know when I overeat, there is a side of me that is using it to punish myself. I remember what I confessed to the best therapist I ever had, a number of years ago, I told her that if I made too much food for myself, and I got full before it was done, I'd force myself to finish it, even if it became very physically painful...it was like I was intent on punishing myself for the hunger, or the initial impulse to eat emotionally, and I was determined to make myself pay for it. I know somehow, in some way, this relates to the child rape and psychological abuse I endured from my perp, but I can't delve anymore, because when I get to this door, I just want to stop, turn, and run away, and I do, and I am.
So anyway, here is my assessment: at times his style is utterly maddening. I really don't like his whole -- "I walked in, and pulled out a chair and then I sat down in the chair. He walked in and he pulled out his chair, and he sat down in it. yadda yadda" That is fucking annoying. That is not a direct Frey quote, but a stab at his style. However...the other stuff, when he's not writing like that, is powerful, raw and honest.
I came to a serious conclusion about myself while reading it too. This conclusion is not one I haven't come to before, but it's one that is prickly to put it mildly, and often likes to make it's way under the carpet with some help from me, kicking and shoving it into the darkness where it can no longer be seen. I'm even drawing out this explanation. I'm stalling. Avoiding. Of course. The fact is: I am an addict. I don't know how long I've been an addict, but more than half my life for sure. I have been addicted to different things like Frey is addicted to alcohol and drugs. I've been addicted to food, to sex, to s/m, to a particular person, at times, when I let myself, it was easy for me to start becoming addicted to substances, but I always cut those off when I felt them pulling on me, as if food is better, when it's ruined my life just as much. I've suffered horrible consequences from some of the other addictions as well, things I can't even bear to speak of. They have all been self-destructive, just not in that searing, obvious way of alcoholism and drug addiction. I have sometimes wished my demons were closer to the surface, so well-meaning friends would put their hands on my shoulders and say the stock phrases: "Will you please get yourself some help?" So they'd look at me with doe-eyed concern and sympathy, stage last ditch interventions on my behalf. Instead, I walk the world with hidden pain, killing me slowing and secretly, but still, killing me.
Frey describes some of his time in rehab without drugs and alcohol and how he turned to overeating, just to be full, to fill up the emptiness, to abuse something, to make himself sick, and I saw myself. I thought about it tonight when I sat on my couch itching with a nameless need for something. Anything. But I wasn't hungry. Not physically anyway. I decided to wait until I got hungry so I could have something. I'm not even sure I even made it to hungry before I thought of something good to make. I cooked and ate the whole box of what I made. I thought maybe I'd leave some for leftovers, but it tasted too good, and besides, part of the point is to do it till it's no longer right, no longer normal or okay. Afterwards I felt full. I felt silenced. The gnawing dread was gone, replaced by shame, disgust and sadness. I'm not sure if I made it to regret, well aware that somehow I need this to dull the pain right now. This is why I never got truly addicted to alcohol or weed, because both are depressants, and with my depression, they only make me feel worse before too long, whereas food soothes me, calms me down, comforts me. Yet at the same time, I know when I overeat, there is a side of me that is using it to punish myself. I remember what I confessed to the best therapist I ever had, a number of years ago, I told her that if I made too much food for myself, and I got full before it was done, I'd force myself to finish it, even if it became very physically painful...it was like I was intent on punishing myself for the hunger, or the initial impulse to eat emotionally, and I was determined to make myself pay for it. I know somehow, in some way, this relates to the child rape and psychological abuse I endured from my perp, but I can't delve anymore, because when I get to this door, I just want to stop, turn, and run away, and I do, and I am.
posted by scribe at 10/07/2005
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