If you were to walk into my apartment right now you might say to yourself, Oh my goodness, this place has been ransacked. “Ransacked” is one of those words I have to look up immediately after I’ve already used it. I do that sometimes. Not for the sake of spelling—of that I have always been most confident. If the spelling of “ransacked” was something I might have been uncertain of, I would have chosen a different word. But that almost never happens. In fact, I’m probably the best speller you’ve ever met. That’s assuming we have met and you already know me, maybe we’re even friends, in which case the word “ransacked” wouldn’t even cross your mind. Maybe when you’re in my apartment all you do you just shrug and with a knowing smile say, That’s typical Molly for you. Or maybe you sigh and roll your eyes, muttering something snooty behind my back like calling me lazy or sloppy, of which I am neither, so it turns out you don’t know me as well as you thought you did in the first place.
This is the kind of shit I think about in the morning when I’m driving. I am a good driver, reckless but safe. People trust me. I drive a green ’99 Taurus. But that’s not why people trust me. People generally tend to trust people who drive green sedans. Do you know any evil people who drive a Taurus? You don’t. I’m actually on my way to a class where we once had to make a list of our top three favorite personal qualities or traits and Trustworthiness was number two. Numbers one and three were tied between Spelling and Good Posture.
I try to maintain good posture in my car because, even though this is a neighborhood I’m unfamiliar with, I still worry I might be spotted by some of my coworkers or ex-husband, Richard, and I once read somewhere that good posture can instantly make you look thinner, taller, and happier—all things I wanted to list in my top personal qualities but had to omit. We could only pick three. Nevertheless, I mapped out an alternate route to downtown so the chances of potentially running into these people are less likely, but better safe than sorry. So I sit up straight, suck in my stomach, and all of a sudden remember that I’m in the bad part of town. The part of town where people might misinterpret my great posture as offensive.
I think about how sad my friends would feel, what my poor ex-husband, Richard would say when he reads about my unfortunate death in the newspaper, or whether or not my boss will establish an anti-violence charity scholarship memorial fund in my name. I imagine an inner-city youth smiling on his graduation day, being photographed on a stage while accepting a plaque with a really great airbrushed photo of me in it. Someone will announce my name and say something loving and honorable about Molly Bushard, who was tragically and unmercifully gunned down when she found herself caught up in the midst of gang crossfire on the bad part of town. She was Trustworthy. May she rest in peace.
And then I start thinking of my apartment again. Immediately I regret not rinsing out the coffee pot before leaving. When I’m dead, I hope whoever is the one to collect all my belongings isn’t a judgmental asshole. I wonder if there are arrangements I can make or some sort of final testimony I can draw up to make sure that this person isn’t a friend or family member but a total stranger. Someone who will look at all that I’ve left behind and say, Gosh this person must have been interesting. Because some of the most interesting and brilliant people I know have lived in rooms like this. They don’t have time to sort laundry or put dishes away because they are too busy being brilliant. Yes, it definitely needs to be a stranger because my friends and family wouldn’t know an interesting person if it slapped them in the face. Except for me of course, but by then it will be too late and I won’t care because I’ll be dead.
We do a lot of guided meditations and inward focusing bullshit in my class. I figure that's what is going on when I walk into the Community Center fourteen minutes late. About twenty people are currently being introduced to an exercise I will soon catch on to. This one has to do with positive self-examination and "loving yourself". I watch as one person stands in front of a giant floor-to-ceiling mirrored wall, while another person stands directly behind them acting the role of the "guardian angel" or support figure. The individual in front places both their hands on the mirror and examines their own soul, taking inventory of all the negative influences and rejections they've ever encountered that could have possibly contributed to low self-esteem or feeling of self-inadequacy, depression, etcetera. We are then instructed to vocalize a personal mantra out loud. Very loud. For example, "I AM GOOD ENOUGH!" or "I AM DESTINED FOR SUCCESS!”—these were among the most common. Then the guardian angel person behind them echoes these mantras back to the poor individual, "YOU ARE GOOD ENOUGH! YOU WILL BE SUCCESSFUL!"
What in the fuck. I quietly set down my bags next to a stack of folding chairs and shuffle over to the group leader, who is partnering everyone up. I never trusted him from the get-go. He is a smiley, tall, bald man in running shoes with a shiny head. But that’s not why I don’t trust him. He winks at me, and straightens his tie. His ties are outrageous. I am all at once nervous and flooded with anxiety. I do not necessarily hate myself, but am confused about what it means to "love yourself". If everyone could just be in love with themselves, why would we need other people to do it for us? I can say to me, "You are the greatest person ever," and maybe even mean it, but who cares. It's like sending yourself flowers or nominating yourself for the prize. It doesn't count unless someone else does it. And in this moment I decide that none of the idiots in this room will qualify.
I wonder then if any of these people have ever loved or been loved by another actual, living, breathing human being. I think about my ex-husband, Richard, of whom I haven't spoken to in eleven years. He loved me, of this I can be sure. However, when we first started dating, I thought Richard was dull and my mother made me promise not to marry him or at least not get pregnant with him because he had red hair and she said she'd never find it in herself to love a red-headed grandchild. But Richard loved me. He bought me dinner and touched me a lot, even in public, but that's not how he loved me. He told me I was the most beautiful thing he ever laid eyes on and on good days would say, Molly, I can't live without you. We moved into a wonderful little condo outside of the city.
Thinking about Richard and our condo reminds me of our first walk-through of a house we almost bought, closer to the elementary school on the West side. It was nice, although I don’t remember much of it. I do remember there being three bedrooms, a fireplace and lots of windows. Two people owned this house, a man and a woman. They had gray hair and lived with their daughter who was younger than me but who I recognized from high school.
"Hello," I said to her. She smiled at me, and Richard squeezed my hand. This was in the good days when Richard liked to hold hands, and people on the street or in the store would smile at us.
"Let me show you the bedrooms," the old woman whispered to us. We followed her upstairs. "The smallest one we use as a nursery, but it’s big enough to be an office or study." She cracked open the door and held a finger to her lips, "He's sleeping."
This, on the other hand, I remember very well. I could see it from the door. Asleep on its stomach with its face toward the wall. He was in a white wooden crib with yellow linens, which accented the curtains and sunflower wallpaper. For some reason, this made me horribly uncomfortable. Not the wallpaper, but the baby. It made me sad and sick at the same time when I saw Richard’s face soften and he approached the sleeping child with a warm curiosity I did not recognize. I stood in the doorway mesmerized by the rise and fall of its back. Terrified.
Needless to say, we didn't buy the house. Also needless to say, after the good days came the not-so-good days. Days he wished I would dress nicer, put more effort into my appearance, stand up straight, try not to look so unkempt and miserable. And shortly thereafter, the not-so-good days were followed by the worse days. On worse days he will tell me how everything he fell in love with has disintegrated, that I bring out the worst in him and how he wishes I was dead. Again, this makes me think about the current state of my apartment and I make a personal promise to myself not to die today because I left my underwear on the bathroom floor. My bathroom. The medicine cabinet stocked with prescription bottles, and not even enough of them for me to appear afflicted in a glamorous, artistic kind of way should anyone come across them in the untimely circumstance of my death.
I'm not fooling anyone. Not the people close to me to or those I have been close to and certainly not my moronic "guardian angel" who is all sunshine and smiles, nodding encouragingly as she presses my palms to the glass.
So here I am indignantly lined up with the rest of them, my clammy hands on the mirror, in not much more than my pajamas, repulsed at the corpse looking back at me while everyone around me is shouting things to their reflections like, "I AM A STAR!" and "I AM NOT FAT, I AM BEAUTIFUL!" Their guardian angels repeat these as affirmations and the room swells with newfound confidence. Tears are streaming down their faces, fists slam against the glass and they cry out, "I AM DOING MY BEST! I AM SPECIAL, I AM GOOD ENOUGH! I AM LOVED!” Meanwhile, they get so lost in this exercise that no one notices the guardian angel next to mine pass out.
At first, the only thing out of the ordinary is her face in the mirror, her complexion alarmingly pale. Ghastly, even. Then she begins to slowly rock like a pendulum, her knees and shoulders trembling. I watch her eyes widen and glaze over as she loses consciousness and collapses on the hardwood floor. I look around for someone to come assist her, but they are loving themselves still. Assholes. "YOU ARE A BRIGHT SHINING STAR!" they continue to shout, "YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL!" And all the while this woman’s body lies rigid and contorted on the floor, twitching sporadically. Her eyes are unnaturally wide open, staring at something horrific that isn't there. I wonder what her name is, I wonder what color her car is. More importantly, I wonder what her apartment looks like right now. There is a deep pang of something, pity or empathy, and I know I should probably be doing something right now but I am frozen. So I kneel next to her, I awkwardly pet her hair. I lean in close and whisper, "You are a star."
Then a swallowing, almost comforting, wave of guilt. Envy. Longing.
"You are special and wonderful and everyone loves you."
