Scaffolding II

In India, when buildings were built or repaired scaffolding consisted of bamboo poles tied together with twine, jute, probably, similar to baling twine. The buildings under construction were surrounded by imperfect squares, climbed by people wearing shorts with bare feet. It was quite remarkable, really, that these scaffoldings didn't slip, or collapse altogether. But then again, perhaps they did, for all the notice I made of them. After all, such accidents were, in a sense de rigueur.  "Sister," the servant says to me while I am eating my morning mango, "Sister, today, one bus accident. All dead." "What happened?" I ask. "One bus hit the wall. Everybody dead," he replies, his hand turning, fingers spiraling as if to say "and so it goes." And indeed it did. Indeed. Everybody dead. So, perhaps those scaffoldings did fall taking people with them.

How strange that seems, because scaffolding looks like such a fundamental structure, a structure that trusts that within in its temporary boundaries an enduring structure will be built. And yet, scaffolding will, when the building is completed, disappear. So, how interesting it is that as I watch a mind and a person dissolve, I envision the return to the beginning, that temporary structure--the scaffolding.

As Tom disappears, tearing down the past brick by brick, snatching the future and ripping the present to shreds, he becomes once again, the scaffolding with which he began. All so different from the man he was.

The difficult part is that his scaffolding was faulty, not only faulty, but so essentially flawed so rotten and diseased, chewed by termites, that while it looks intact, it is, in fact, dust. Step on those beams at your peril; they collapse, crisp and dry, leaving you waving your arms in free fall.

Ahhhh yes, but that is the family he grew up with, I begin to see, as I fall into unknown regions, feeling like each day is an archeological expedition of the mind. His is a family where a question about dinner turns into quicksand, the trap of a spider whose only goal is to suck the life out of her victims leaving a web bound shell as she moves onto the next source of nourishment. And that spider was, oh, yes, and is, his mother. A spider. An empty creature, existing only to prey and suck the life out of everyone around her so that she can realize some measure of existence. But she doesn't really exist, and can't, so there is always a void to be filled, and another victim needed to fill it. And thus is the scaffolding of his life. He has become his mother.

Last week I watched a spider in my window. A fly was caught in her web, buzzing and struggling, becoming more and more entangled with each wing beat. The spider danced down toward the fly, darting at it, moving away as it kicked its legs and became more entwined. Again and again the spider danced down, and again and again the fly fought its restraints, only to find that they became more secure with struggle and complaint. But still she taunted, that spider, pushing for total entrapment so she could fill herself. I imagined her laughing, her smile wide with the prospect of the fly's demise. And so it is with Tom's mother, and so it is with him. He stalks me, as he was taught, oh so well, and dances, and cajoles, and entraps with innocent sounding comments and then, grinning like a creepy ventriloquist's dummy, heads in for the kill, for the lonely pleasure of destruction. What they want, these empty creatures, is to fill themselves, leaving trophy shells entrapped in their webs, testimony to  only their hollowness and perceived triumph.

But the thing is, I won't go. I watch carefully for those rotten beams that look so sturdy and trust none of it. He is left to his scaffolding, but I am not climbing. Bricks are coming down one by one, the once-building a pile of rubble now, and his scaffolding teeters above and around it. But I am not taking a step; that scaffolding may fall, but I won't be on it. And certainly, most certainly, scaffolding does fall, but I am not going down with that mess, and I wonder if I will even notice when it goes, or who is taken with it. Deaths are easy, and scaffolding temporary. "All dead, sister, everyone dead."
Not me, though, not me. He's not going to take me down with him, even if I have to learn to stop beating my wings for a while.

Scaffolding

Just short--There is something interesting about dealing with someone--on a daily basis--who is mentally ill. The convolutions are so inexplicit; where there appears to be reason none exists, and the pitfalls are many. When I consider this, stepping away from it, I find that what is faulty is what I refer to as the scaffolding, that inner or outer mental framework that allows the rest of the structure to be built. If that is off kilter, or placed on an unstable ground then what is built inside it or around it will be similarly skewed. But then, it all looks so stable until one takes a step...more on these thoughts later.

Wrung Out

So here it is: Whatever I say is returned as something  I didn't even think, much less say. A whole world is endlessly constructed around me like an intricate web, or scaffolding, any refutation rejected outright. And with each piece I try to tear down reconstruction begins all over again. The same conversations are played over and over and over and any alternate version denied, and I am denied because I am told what I did what I thought and what I said. No matter what I do say I am told I said something completely different. I have been told things about the past that are complete fabrications about what the experience was, effectively dismantling the past brick by brick by brick, and when the dismantling is done the past is rebuilt and recounted in a way I don't recognize. The future I expected not long ago has been taken from me, but so has the past. And so I find small, concrete things, like a child's favorite stuffed animal and try to imbue those things with a memory I can go back to and hold on to. Literally.

It is hard enough to be the sole repository of memories, but when the one person who could and once did also remember reconstructs those memories into an unrecognizable fiction the very basis of the past becomes slippery and hard, if not impossible, to hold onto. This is an exhausting process, living with someone who has literally lost their mind. He thinks he is fine, that his thoughts are intact, that it is me who needs to be helped. Through most of it he sounds rational and calm, but the pieces don't fit, and the logic is faulty. At the end of these endless conversations in which all words enter a black box and come out as something else, and are irrefutable, I feel as if I have been wrung out, rolled over, flattened and plastered to the floor.