Message to my girl

Day Eight: Reinvent the letter format

Dear Seven-Year-Old Skye,

Take a deep breath, kid. It’s going to be a bumpy ride.

You’re in Grade 1 now and you’re already on to your fourth school. I know this school doesn’t seem too bad; you’ve already got some friends here and you’re settling in well.

You always do.

You even had an actual birthday party and were allowed to invite five friends. Your mother may have arched a perfectly shaped eyebrow at the gender ratio of the invitees, with four boys and only one girl invited, but she didn’t say anything. She just bundled you all into the car and drove you to the Pancake Parlour, her cigarette smoke curling out of the driver’s seat window and into the opened windows in the back as you all played and giggled, your ginger curls bouncing as you turned to take in the view of your friends. She watched you steadily in the rearview mirror as she turned up the music to drown out the shrieking laughter.

It was a fun day, wasn’t it? You’ll remember every detail, over 20 years later. The crystalline blue sky was a perfect backdrop to the day – your Mum seemed ok, you got to celebrate your birthday, you even got some presents. You felt like you belonged.

Hey, kid? Don’t get too settled. You’ve got another 12 primary schools to go to before your Mum will let you stay put for a while. Don’t even think about the high school years.

The carousel is about to go into overdrive. It’s time for you to assume a crash-position and just ride out the next few years.

Sometimes you’ll come home from school and the books will be packed, boxes will be strewn across the living room and Mum will have that look in her eyes. She’ll tell you that you’re all moving away, and sometimes you will. Sometimes you’ll pack up the car and move to a new house, start a new school. Sometimes she’ll work through the mania and tire of it after a few weeks or a few days and you’ll tentatively relax back into the same old routine, feeling safe that you can stay. But until then, you need to be prepared.

You’ll want to cry and protest and demand to stay. Half the time your remonstrations will be ignored, but the other half? That will be used as ammunition.

She’ll ask why you want to stay here, why you care about this town, and you will be so desperate that you’ll tell the truth. You will cite your desire to stay and finish school like all the other kids. You will say that you like it here. When the panic rises up inside you, you’ll break and say that you want to stay because you have friends here and they care about you. Don’t do it.

Never say that.

She will seize upon it and use this to her advantage. Her blue gaze will meet yours and the corners of her mouth will curl up as she accosts you with a pitiful smile, her eyes burning. “They’re not your friends, Skye,” she’ll say as she stands a little straighter, her voice sharp and full of vitriol.

Looking across at your brother, they will share a knowing look and his complicity will goad her on.

“None of them are your friends. Can’t you see that?” The edge will slip from her voice and will be replaced by a cloying sweetness. Try not to crack. No matter what you do, do not take the bait and do not let that tenderness get to you.

“You’re just a joke to them, Skye, they all make fun of you. They are not your friends. They don’t care about you.”

Don’t listen. Find a way to shut it out, to shut it off, to build a wall. Do not engage. Build up your reserves of strength and learn to ignore her when she’s like this. Don’t look to your brother; you’re not a team. You are an obstacle to him being able to move, to change, to hide from whatever problems have been created at this school, in this town.

Remember that when it comes down to choosing between working through a problem or packing up the car and heading for the highway, he and Mum are in this together and they’re always living with one foot out the door.

And remember this, kid. Your friendships will be the most important relationships you will ever have. Trust your judgement. Your friends will become your family and you will share a love with them that is safe and true.

Stay strong.

Love,

Skye from the world of tomorrow

Power in the word

In my family, logic and rationality were cause for narrow eyed suspicion. If you didn’t agree with their latest conspiracy theory, you were clearly Working Against Them and not to be trusted.

Reality was fractured and underlying mental illnesses were left undiagnosed.

The fallout from this is still being felt and writing about it and sharing stories with others is an effective way to process it all.

Writing about mental health and researching its causes and symptoms is a way to not only make sense of these experiences, but also to find the art in the story. It is a way for me to take all of these disparate threads, these bizarre interactions and half-submerged memories and create something new.

There’s power in that.

My mother died almost 17 years ago, but my brother is still here. Physically, at least.

His brain is broken; the damage is as irreparable as it is heartbreaking.

I hope that through writing about growing up in an environment so far left-of-centre and of walking the tightrope between sanity and the black cavernous despair on the other side, I might be able to make some sense of it and to find a way to help him.

Paranoiac bloodline

“Shh. Someone is listening.”

For as long as I can remember, my mother believed we were being watched. Someone was always around, listening in on the phone, driving by our house, or living in our roof. Spying on us, keeping tabs.

“Do you really think we’re alone here?”

My brother believed every word, and the two of them were vehement about hearing the ‘clicks’ on the landline phone. The receiver would be thrust into my hand for me and I would be commanded to listen, to hear, to finally agree that the clicks were there. They would both smirk triumphantly, secure in the belief that these clicks were evidence that our every word was being recorded.

All I ever heard was the dial tone.