When I left school the head of English waved me off into the freedom of summer holidays with two après collège recommendations to pique my errant interest. #1. Suttree: Cormac McCarthy’s chronicle of a down and outer fading to insignificance on a houseboat in Tennessee. I was enthralled and strangely inspired although I think it might have been intended as a warning… #2. Hejira: Joni Mitchell’s haunting ode to the roads she hitched across the States. Perhaps more than any other, this album resonated with my peripatetic impulses and pushed me out the door on the first of many hitch hiking adventures. I adopted ‘Refuge of the Roads’, the album’s closing track, as my anthem, turning the prosaic lines over in my head as I waited curbside for a ride. Like the best books or albums, the end point of a good journey is secondary to the experience itself; to set out with no particular destination in mind is, for me, simultaneously terrifying and liberating.
I listened to that album a lot during my time in hospital. As I was wheeled from one operating theatre to the next, shuttled between wards barely able to sit up without my head spinning, I would plug in and zone out, once again roll Spain-wards in the passenger seat of a stranger’s car with no idea where I would be that night. Of course, with “obs” (observations) every four hours, it was never long before my nostalgic reveries were interrupted by a thermometer in the mouth and a blood pressure gauge wrapped around my arm. This clockwork routine ensured that any escapism was short-lived. But in spite of the interrupted daydreams, uninspiring décor, and flavourless meals, my NHS immersion set the scene for a journey of far greater spiritual depth than any of my previous continental oscillations. I know, that sounds pathetically sentimental (two weeks pissing in bottles seems to soften you up) but when the external surroundings were so monotone, introspection seemed the obvious distraction[1].
Perhaps it’s unsurprising that my “spiritual” revelation occurred in a trauma ward, far from the byroads and sleepy towns typical of my summer treks. For years I’d been kidding myself that I was somehow impervious to what went on around me and would throw myself at any situation without much reflection. I’ve learnt the hard way that we’re not made of stone (although I have now acquired a fair bit of titanium) but are, in fact, sensitive beings keenly receptive to minor environmental/emotional fluctuations. Now, I’m not that bone-headed to have been utterly unaware of this fact; it only takes the closing scene of Forest Gump to remind me of how easily externalities, however trivial, affect our inner state. But that didn’t prevent me from doing my best to ignore this delicate relationship. I’m certainly not alone in this respect: that quintessential English trait – the stiff upper lip – epitomises this attitude. Yet I realised in hospital that the façade we all put on sometimes runs deeper than blustering British bravado (a favourite of unconvincing politicians). Beyond this the best part of our personalities is also a front: part self-expression, part reaction to what goes on around us. Of course, we rarely recognise our identity as being self-created and remain unaware of its fragility.
To a large extent, our personalities/identities are constructed around the idea of control. Grenville Kleiser succinctly expressed this notion when he wrote that ‘by constant self-discipline and self-control, you can develop greatness of character’. In this phrase the Canadian author articulates the power we have as individuals to influence and shape how we are perceived. Whether this is in a physical sense (changing our bodily appearance) or a social sense (altering how we interact with those around us), how other people think about us or behave towards us is, largely, down to us: screw around with people and they’ll quickly write you off as a jerk; don’t and they won’t. Yet this process by which we make impressions upon others also leads us to see ourselves in a certain light, be it straight shooter/funny fucker/[insert your own descriptor]. Our reputation – how other people see us – is linked intrinsically to our sense of ourselves; a fact much exploited by Iago, if Othello is your bag. But the more secure we feel in ourselves as we cultivate our characteristic attributes, the more oblivious we become to a separate and unpredictable part of our nature.
For want of a better term, I’ll call this the ‘primal’ self. It rarely rises to the surface of our character, nor does it need to. Instead, it lingers in the background, buried beneath the personalities that we develop in day-to-day existence. This concealed part of us is responsible for self-preservation (and probably the whole gamut of Freudian urges that must be suppressed). Like a fight-or-flight mechanism, the primal self passes us by ignored and uncalled-for in our ordinary lives. Yet when exceptional circumstance demands, this other part of us kicks into action with alarming force. Remember the public speaking competition you had to do aged 13 when your voice cracked up in front of the whole year group and you started sweating uncontrollably? Or the scene in Titanic when those upstanding gentlemen, faced with a watery demise, forgot themselves as they forced past women and children into lifeboats. Shell shock or mortal threats can cause our self-image to dissolve and reduce us to shuddering shadows of our former selves. No amount of “get-a-grip” or “pull-yourself-together” will restore your confidence.
Strangely, a week of fairly intensive surgery following what was apparently quite a large blow didn’t itself tear away my self-identity. The emails I wrote during those first few days of general anaesthetic and blood transfusions document a morbid sense of humour in overdrive, determined to persuade friends and myself that I was fine. It was the post-op comedown that really blew apart my sense of self. Just when I was expecting the elasticity of youth to pull me back to my feet, I instead found myself passing out, seizing up, energy levels crashing, not even able to wash myself or go to the toilet. In a couple of days the Orlando that I’d been building up most of my life was exposed as a veneer, a cut-out of what I thought I could be and how I hoped people regarded me. This is a scary realisation for anyone and perhaps hit me particularly hard since I tend to hold myself with an iron grip, going to almost ascetic lengths in the effort to better myself. Urges or thoughts secondary to the task at hand had been suppressed or channelled in another direction. Not now.
Suddenly the Orlando I knew was flapping in the wind and this primal side was bending and contorting me in ways I could neither predict nor resist. The analogy of a tree struck by lightning, bark riven from the trunk serves as a good metaphor for this split. To compound the problem, I was surrounded by people who I loved and respected and wanted desperately to be strong for. At times I couldn’t keep it together and felt pretty ashamed and pissed off with myself. It was uncomfortable being seen like this. I myself didn’t even know this part of me so for others to see it put me on edge. Of course, this loss of control isn’t an unusual experience and is the body’s natural response, like a self-imposed recovery mode. But in spite of the reassurance and unwavering support of friends, family, and medical staff, it was hard to get over the shock of seeing myself in such a state. Now that I’m on the mend I can again put on my normal personality. There are some franken-scar souvenirs but that primal side has receded. I’ll do all I can to avoid exposing it again but must be thankful that it’s there.
[1] Technosaur that I am, I don’t have Netflix.
ALL HAIL THE ALGORITHM 