I am a Rock-- a memory of Missy
I just remembered something.
The other day I downloaded some new songs to my iPod…60’s and 70’s stuff. I was just listening to them while I was exercising, and the last song was Simon & Garfunkel—“I am a Rock”.
Oh my gosh, I can’t believe we had forgotten all about this.
When we were…well, it was Junior high, so probably 14. .. that was like Missy’s own personal theme song. She was around ALL the time in 8th grade. It was…a really hard year…we had gotten messed with by this boy, and stopped talking for a year, and then after that Missy came around, and threw herself into books and studying and being all intellectual and (I personally thought she was being a snob, but, I guess no one else thought so, or at least said it to her face, because she had friends…of course, everyone in our Gifted class was just like her, so of course that’s who her friends were, so they were all these little intellectual snobs together, who read poetry and talked about world politics and history, and for “fun” played the violin and the piano in recitals. This was their whole life. They were not kids. They were little adults.) So Missy… I think we had a cassette tape…no, it was Mom’s old record, and Mom’s old piano book, of Simon and Garfunkel songs, from when she was a teenager. And Missy would play “I am a Rock” over and over again. I can picture her at the piano. It’s like watching from down a long tunnel.
I can remember Missy sitting there, memorizing the words, repeating them in her head over and over, these phrases especially: I’ve built walls/ A fortress deep and mighty/That none may penetrate/I have no need of friendship; friendship causes pain/Its laughter and its loving I disdain./ I have my books/And my poetry to protect me/ I touch no one and no one touches me/I am a rock/I am an island
And I remember her saying it over and over to herself, and making her heart harder. Like…making herself into a colder, meaner person by listening to that song and picturing her heart get colder and blacker. Only I was watching from so, so far away, you know, it’s like watching someone else do something, that you have no control over, because it really is a different person, so you just have to sit back and watch and let them do it.
I just don’t remember WHY she had to do all that. I don’t know any of her reasoning behind it. Missy HAD friends—lots of them. So why would she be memorizing some of that? I don’t understand at all. (Now I can’t get that song out of my head.)
It bothers me that I don’t have a clue what would have gone on with Missy that would have made her that way or given her that attitude. I don’t. Caroline either. None of us really know Missy at all actually, which is fine with her and fine with us. She doesn’t want us to know her, and there’s obviously no love lost there. It’s just kind of weird that all of a sudden I can remember this, but no one has any idea what might have gone on with Missy, especially back then, like that year, or even ever at all. I’ve been wracking my brain, and I just don’t know.
Posted by pilgrim | Filed under:
Hi Pilgrim?
I saw a calendar page today saying:
"God can mend a broken heart but he first needs all the pieces".
I don't believe in God and I don't really believe this saying even as a philosophical one. I think you can start to heal before you have all the pieces.
You can love the one who though she had to turn herself to stone (I used to think I cried so much I would turn into one of those ugly stone gargoyle faces, unable to look pretty) before you know why she did it.
Did you manage to stop from cutting yourself (no judgment if you would rather not tell)? I hope so.