Yesterday we had a little girl's birthday party at the house. It was kind of sad; nobody else showed up. It was just our two families. I don't know that the little girl noticed. She turned four.
I am co-writing Torii- it's myself and my inner child. I haven't felt this in touch with my inner child since going through therapy. My inner child has very definite ideas on how her character behaves. She does not mind when I must portray her weaknesses as well as her resiliency and earnest desire to please.
I can put myself into the story that intimately by telling myself that I won't publish it. It's a bare faced lie; I see right through it. I know that I will try to publish it. But I tell myself I won't, when I have pretend in order to write what I know I have to write.
Which makes me think of perhaps my favorite quote of all:
"And by the way, everything in life is writable about if you have the outgoing guts to do it, and the imagination to improvise. The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt." ~Sylvia Plath
I admit, I love it partly because she uses awkward English- writable about? But also because she said much better what I tried to say earlier.
I've written over fifty pages of Torii and all of them are just setting up before the story goes out, over the lip and plunges into the darkness ahead. But it must have that much set up; the wrenching hardships ahead require that the characters form a strong bond of trust and familiarity, or else when it comes time to face the truth Gilly will drown, unable to face what she must.
My ideas on the plot line ahead continue their natural, slow evolution. Gilly cannot completely conclude her business the first trip in Kagamihara. She simply can't; she won't be able to take back her own power until she's an adult. Children are powerless by nature and are handicapped by their dichotomous minds.
I think the first trip down, she will face the truth, and Tenshio will destroy it for her. Which is not a permenent solution- it will regenerate. Evil actions on the Kagamihara must be dealt with by the individuals primarily concerned with them. But this will allow her to begin the healing process once in school. She won't destroy her abuse until she goes back into the Kagamihara as an adult.
She will be pulled back into it by the necessities of Tenshio's overarching plot line. Which has a kind of poetic symmetry, because it was the same plot line that pulled her into the spirit realm in the first place. The story will begin and end with Tenshio's plot, but Gilly's will be the heart and the weight of it.
She will destroy the abuse by releasing it. Which is beautiful, I think. And true. The spiritual power of her conscious release of the abuse will reverberate all through the Kagamihara, and destroy all of the enemies of the Daitoku-mina.
I framed the pictures of myself as a child. I have three. One is of me in my baptismal gown, in the woman's bathroom in the cellar of the Sanctuary. Every time I look at my face, with my hopeful, eager expression, my hands nervously clasped, my hearts spasms with love and horror both. How desperate I was to be washed clean!
How I longed for absolution, for belonging, for validation. Poor little girl. Life had to tear me apart before I could be put together again, free of all the broken pieces, like jagged glass, that were, at that very moment, in that picture, tormenting me from the inside out. They never allowed me to believe in the things I longed for, no matter how good a girl I was. But even then, Christ was laying the ground work for the healing that would come later.
In the other picture I am only three. The picture is dark and I can hardly see my face. It's a hazy picture, as though I am fading into the background. I know that at some point, either before or after that picture was taken, my abuse began. So it is as though I am fading away. Pieces of me are being leached out. I don't look at this picture too often, it's too hard to look at.
The last picture is one of myself and my mother at Christmas. I think I am about six or seven. I am curled up in the recliner with her, chewing on my fingernails. My eyes look out from over my hand and they are shinning with contentment and some secret amusement. This picture is for my comfort alone and I look at it the most.
I recently found the song "Jewels," sung by Alison Krauss, and I listen to it... I don't even know how many times a day. At least a half dozen. It's so incredibly soothing.
It didn't used to be: when I was a child, all I felt when hearing it was anxiety, since I didn't think I was a pure child. I thought I was a dirty, shameful, bad child. I would sing the song with some kind of desperate hope that in some way, I might get squeaked in with all the other children who were surely better suited to be jewels.
Now I don't feel that cloying sense of dismay and doubt. When I hear the song now, all I think about is how deeply and truly and faithfully Jesus loved that little girl in the baptismal gown. He had plans for her that would extend the length of her life. There would be no escaping His love.
Jewels
When He cometh, when He cometh
To take up his jewels
All his jewels, precious jewels
His loved and His own.
Like the stars of the morning
His bright crown adorning
They will shine in their beauty
Bright gems for his crown.
He will gather, He will gather
The gems for His kingdom
All the pure ones, all the bright ones
His loved and His own.
Like the stars of the morning
His bright crown adorning
They will shine in their beauty
Bright gems for his crown.
Little children, little children
Who love their Redeemer
Are the jewels, precious jewels
His loved and His own.
Like the stars of the morning
His bright crown adorning
They will shine in their beauty
Bright gems for his crown
