He's lost everything.
And his own story
begins in earnest.
--Carl Phillips
Most of what we tell ourselves are lies. We do love this way again. We do care what others think. If we have everything, we have no story. And stories keep us alive. Not what we think does: the daily commute, annuities, superficial wounds. Not being read to, of being born to a severe post-partum mother, of experiencing other childhood trauma led to my own narrative dysfunction. It surprises people that I can stop watching a movie or book where I choose. I allow no one to create endings for me. What I could say is not what I usually say. Chronology keeps most of us sane. Someone with narrative dysfunction lives in a parallel universe of sorts. He or she cannot assume there is a listener. No one to say, "No, it was like this..." All stories lead to the same place. Just not in the same way. So our versions are solipsistic stabs at the real story. Or is there such a thing? Time always an estimation. Order difficult to manage. But with hearts always hoping to be heard. With faith there is someone out there.
I start anywhere.
Any ending does fine.
With practice I could have before
and after.
A beginning.
After story and teller is one,
after a thread in the telling
leads all the way back to me.
