A wrinkle in time

She is the fourth of six children, all girls.  What is worse is that, in a rhythm of brilliance, her parents decided that each girl's name should begin and end in A.  Alicia, Alexia, Aurora, Ava and the other two. it gets confusing.  But you know, things like that are not a helpful beginning.

And then, when the youngest one was about four, the father dropped dead. Also, not helpful.

About three months ago she came back to see me after an almost two year absence. 

The first time I saw her she was a real mess, just not functioning.  Her husband had left her, she was crying all the time and she began collecting things.  She was collecting things that had been discarded and was creatively finding a use for them. But she was not keeping up with the creative part.  However she could not part with any of the things she had collected.  She identified with all of them, as something of value, which had been discarded by someone who didn't see the value.

Slowly she responded to treatment, which stopped when she pulled herself together enough to get back to work. That was good.

But now she is back, and wants things to be better.  Now she is 62 years old. She cries. Things are bad and she doesn't know what she did that was so wrong, or what she can do about it now.

When you see her now she looks like an attractive, middle age woman.  She dresses well, she even carries herself well.  What you don't see was that twenty, thirty, forty years ago she was really quite beautiful.  You would unconsciously pick her out of a crowd and watch her walk by.  Many people did.  That was part of the problem.

The other part, of course is that after her father died her mother was overwhelmed, so she just screamed at all her girls and beat them down. Literally if necessary. So this woman learned to hang back, stay silent, and wait until what was expected of her was clear. When someone told her what to do, she did it, as long as they didn't get angry at her.

That made her vulnerable to people who came along,  who were attracted to her, and began to possess her and control her.  Her first boyfriend tried to keep her out of sight, as he knew everyone was after her.  When she got away from him the next one was nicer to her, but also very controlling.

Finally she settled with an older man who seemed to appreciate her.  He was wealthy and seemed to feel that she was a symbol of his success.  He took her places and showed her off.  She was well taken care of.

But then she had children and he had little time for her and them.  He was out in the world making money. She soon realized that he was spending time with younger, beautiful women too.

So she went to work, but never really felt that she was smart enough.  She had the sense that all of the doors opened for her because she was so attractive. But she really didn't think about it.  That's just the way things happened.

Eventually she was having a long-term affair with one of her bosses.  He was good to her, just like her husband was good to the women he was with. They were rich.  They sent their kids to prep school.

At some point her boss' wife left him.  She thought this was her chance to change partners and have a good, real life.  But that was not the case.  After a year or two of promises that man married another, more dynamic woman.  She was devastated. She was devastated, angry and depressed. 

She went home and confronted her husband about their marriage, about how there was no relationship, how it was really a sham.  He agreed.  She though he would want to make it better.  She was wrong.  He left.

But she still had her job, even though she tried to stay away from her boss.  But about a year after his new marriage he came to her and suggested that they rekindle their affair.  When she refused him, saying how worthless that idea seemed to her, he raped her. 

It was soon after that  I saw her the first time.  As I said, she was a mess. It took her months to tell me about the rape.

Now she has a much smaller job and has a boyfriend who is a nothing and does not treat her that well. Her kids are distant.  He ex-husband is wealthy, alone and alcoholic.  She has no idea what happened to her ex-boss, but she knows his business is closed.

But now, for the first time, after 62 years, she feels almost ready to make he own decisions.  She wants to learn how to decide what she wants to do, and not expect other people, men, to do it for her.  She wants to tell the people she doesn't like, who take advantage of her skills, charm and passivity, to fuck-off.

But she's never done that.

But perhaps now she will be able to do that.  She is not that beautiful any more.  The people who are trying to control her are not that powerful.  She may be able to set herself free.