Episode One of the 2016 round of “fascinatingly questionable ideas I have had” – revisiting the source of a recurrent nightmare and learning some interesting things about myself in the process.
First, a little bit of context. The source in question is a book – Life As We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer. It’s a pretty standard apocalyptic YA novel, ended up being the first in a series (the rest of which I have not read), and was published in late 2006. That would’ve made me 13 when I originally read it, approximately a year before my mother stopped censoring what I brought home from the library. (That’s another story and a post I am still several years and probably several hundred miles from writing.) For the purposes of this post, what you need to know is that paranoia was heavily involved at the time and I wasn’t allowed to read anything that might “corrupt” me in any way shape or form. With very few exceptions, that ruled out the wonderland of hellscape girl-centric YA.
And yet that book was an exception, and it was the first book I ever read in that category, and it messed me up big time. Again, I was 13 and very sheltered and had a very active imagination. This combined with a frighteningly realistic portrait of a world falling apart, written in the form of journal entries by a girl several years older than I was at the time (and therefore the height of cool), led to a nightmare that I still have about once a year. It’s always vague enough that I don’t remember details afterwards, but it’s vivid and I’ve accepted that it’ll be a ghost in my brain for a very long time to come.
A normal person, upon accepting this, would stay the heck away from whatever had caused that scenario. I, on the other hand, decided that it’s been nine years and a reread was in order because how could that possibly go wrong.
Answer – in so many more ways than I thought.
I like to credit the aforementioned genre of hellscape girl-centric YA – a term I use to describe dystopian and post-apoc novels alike, since both fit the necessary criteria – for a lot of my formative development as a person. That’s what kept me alive during high school, and looking back I can see that most of the results were positive. Okay, so I never quite figured out how to be rebellious while still being the person I generally am in my core, but I tried. I didn’t let anything get to me. (I also learned to emotionally isolate myself and put up thorns, but I’m unlearning that now. Slowly.) I needed role models, and being the Right Age just as my ideal type of YA fiction was becoming a THING basically saved me.
But there’s a twist to it, of course. It’s me, there always is. In this case, the twist is my fear of the unknown.
Let me put it this way – if the world ever does go to complete pieces, I have a suicide plan. I’ve had said plan since somewhere in my early teens, since before my depression became something I was aware of and as something completely separate. On my self-destructive days, I’m fascinated by the idea of drowning. The end-of-the-world suicide plan? Completely different, and that’s all I’m gonna say.
I’ve watched a lot of post-apoc shows (it always seems to be TV shows for me, never books, that have the unpretty emotional impacts) and women like me never survive. At least, not in good condition or not for long. I’ve found most of my role models as an adult in that one little genre of media, but I’m not delusional. If shit happens, I’m not taking that risk.
I am not brave.
I used to think I was, when I was a little bug who didn’t have any idea where her life was headed. I think all kids have that delusion, but mine was less physically reckless than most. I wasn’t a risk-taker back then, just pretty convinced of my own awesomeness.
Then the Bad Thing happened, and then the horror of high school era, and then the emotional upheaval of my late teens. At that point in my life, bravery wasn’t a choice – it was a requirement, period. I was not allowed to fall down. I had to fight, if not for myself than for what would happen to my mother’s reputation if I fell. I had to fight because Good Girls don’t get their hearts broken (Good Girls don’t have hearts to break), Good Girls don’t want to die (Good Girls never get to live), Good Girls survive. And rebellious as I was, I wasn’t stupid.
But this last year or so, I’ve learned some unexpected things about myself, and one of the main ones is that I’m a pretty fricking terrible lone wolf. Sure, I’m great at isolation and barriers and all the stuff people do when they don’t want anyone to get close, but on my own? On my own, I’m borderline useless.
I am not brave. I am only a survivor because that is what has been required of me. It’s time for me to admit those things and move forward and continue finding my softness again.
And as for the nightmare, well… someday that’ll go away too.
Hurricane Girl Strikes Again 