The Things We Carry; Thoughts On Story-Truth

For those of you who are familier with Tim O'Brien's work, the concept of story-truth is not a new one. For everyone else, this may be a good thing to keep in mind when reading about my experiences visiting correctional facilities.

I am a (relatively) unreliable narrator. I don't want to be. As I said, everything that I write is as true as I remember it to be, but sometimes my memory doesn't act the way I want it to. Here's a conversation I had with a group of students while I was still a freshman.

ME: Jeremy Travis is coming to this event today.

THEM: I don't even know what he looks like.

ME: You'll know. He's really tall.

THEM: Okay. I'll keep my eye out.

JT: *approaches* Good morning, everyone.

US: Good morning.

THEM: ...He wasn't tall at all.

ME: Oh. I guess he's not that tall.

In my defense, I'm 5'1. Everyone over 5'5 is tall to me. JT is a powerful man. He seems tall.

But I remembered him as taller than he was. The way I pictured him, he might as well have been a giant. He was scary, so he was tall. I exaggerated his height without even realizing it.

Alternatively, sometimes I make things out to be less significant or uncomfortable than they are. Sometimes I'll be in a potentially frightening situation and I don't have a visceral reaction. This is a small example; here is a conversation I had once with a client of a syringe exchange program. At this particular program, the room I'd been taking clients in had a door that locked from the inside. This meant that once the door was shut I was shut out from the rest of the building; I was trapped inside with a client.

ME: In the past three months, have you experienced any violent tendencies?

HIM: Yes. Sometimes I get very angry, and I lose my temper. Then I get violent.

What if he became violent? (He didn't.) People told me about their violent tendencies all the time. I wrote it down without a word. People told me their conviction histories, their health, and their lives. What I've written about above is a very mild example. I learned things about the clients that I'd never want to think about again. I couldn't think about that in that situation, though; if they were right in front of me it was my job to keep my face neutral and my demeanor friendly. I couldn't take the risk that the authority in front of me might stop answering my questions, or that I'd develop a bad reputation among clients, or in my organization altogether.

I saw things that others would have balked at. I endured things that I hadn't been trained for; some more uncomfortable than others. I couldn't think about it in that situation, though. I had to remember it later, because later meant I wasn't in the situation anymore. Later meant that now I have the chance to process, after a score of things have happened. Later meant the thing had happened and I stood tall, but fifteen minutes later I was shaking. Later meant a clouded memory.

Here's another thing that floats through my memory. I was visiting SRO's late at night to work with a particular population; one that I had to work my way up the ranks to make contact with. I hadn't even stepped foot in the building when this happened.

HIM: *on the steps* You have beautiful eyes.

ME: Thank you.

HIM: Do you wanna go smoke some weed with me?

ME: Ohh.

HIM: *starts to pull drugs out of his pocket*

ME: Oh, no, no thank you.

Between you, me, and the lamppost, this was not entirely unexpected (after all, I was deliberately entering a world of active drug users), nor was it even close to the most challenging thing I faced in doing that late-night work. It's a funny memory for me now but at the time I was worried. What if he followed me into the building and kept asking? What if he got more aggressive in his requests or his compliments? What if my supervisor shows up and thinks I asked him for drugs or this particular brand of attention? What if he was one of the people I was supposed to be interviewing and now I've gone and insulted him? What if he tells other people in the building about me and they think I'm some kind of narc; oh my GOD what if they think I'm a narc - I look like a fuckin' narc - why else would I be here holding this big binder and wearing a sweater in the middle of July?

At least, these are the things I remember that I remember thinking. It's been a while since that summer. I might have painted myself or him differently in my memories. I can't remember what he looked like or what he was wearing. Who says I can properly remember what he said?

My stories are my incredibly biased perception of what happened; what happened to me, to the players in my memories, and the people I told. I am an advocate. I tell stories from an advocate's perspective. I am a feminist, and I will give you my memories with a feminist mindset. I am working to be a psychologist, which consistently governs my headspace. I am young. I am White. I am a woman. I am a person whose memory is not pristine.

I am a person who, sometimes, is trying to forget.

I am all of these things. And in some ways, I tell stories. But I don't lie.