“Some things in our lives can be mysterious and private...you can keep your secrets secret.” This was the opinion of one of the two friends who met ever year just after Christmas. They had been playmates in the deep past and one of their most deeply shared convictions was that everyone, but themselves in particular, needs to have some “mysterious and private” time during the darkest days of the year. Partly restoration and partly housekeeping, the “overnight” hours were respected by everyone who knew them, but none of those people ever knew what was said.
“That’s a strange attitude for a therapist to take,” laughed M. “So much of what we do is to search for the hidden dynamics that are tripping people up when they can’t figure it out alone!”
“We’re not shrinks,” insisted J. “We’re only garden-variety social workers trying to keep order in the great and problematic public across this country. I wouldn’t have any idea what to do with a Woody Allen kind of dude. Most of my work is just ordinary folks who are ragged and worn out by modern life.”
The two women had rented a “lodge” this year, a place in the foothills that supplied individual cabins meant to be comfy but seem sort of rough and rustic. They had pulled the big squashy cushions off the sofa in front of the fireplace so they could sit on the floor with their backs against the sofa, their bent knees holding up woolly blankets though the crackling fire was warm enough. J. had brought along her new puppy, destined to be a “therapy dog,” and it was busily demolishing a chew stick on the thick rug.
“Seems like there were a lot of men this year. It’s been rough on them with both the political scene and then this storm of accusations about guys being hasslers and rapists.” M. was always sympathetic with the men, very politically incorrect.
“Ironic when the client who has troubled me most is so gormless he can hardly bear to deal with a bank cashier.”
“Gormless? You been reading English novels again?”
“Never stop.” She reached out a hand to ruffle the puppy’s fur but he paid no mind. He was a very single minded pup, at least when it came to chewing. “It’s like dealing with a marshmallow. I can’t get much out of him about why he’s even there, except that he claims life is meaningless. He’s so exasperating that I feel like slapping him just to get a reaction. But then I begin to suspect that this is his strategy in life, to force other people to do all the acting out so none of it would be his fault.”
“Makes you wonder what his mother was like.”
“For once, there IS no mother. He was raised by an elderly uncle. I suspect the uncle was abusive, resentful at having to raise a kid, and that’s where the blank presentation comes from. He’s dissociated or something.”
“I never really understood dissociation.”
“The claim now is that it’s not a split personality, but a sort of second identity where everything is safe because it isn’t perceived as reality. Just gray time passing. But not a psych thing — an actual neuron re-organization of some kind.”
They sat in silence for a moment while the puppy gnawed and the fire burned enough for logs to crash together.
M. shifted a bit. The two women had done this for many years and age was beginning to make them ache if they sat in the same position for very long. In previous years they’d indulged in hot chocolate, but this year M. had brought a bottle of very good Scotch. They only sipped it a bit. They were not ordinarily drinkers of alcohol, but this was an occasion to let their guard down.
M. said, “My most troubling client is the opposite of yours. He’s a survivor of just about every dramatic adventure a man can have except for war: punk life, beach living, San Francisco in the plague years, even a reservation where he was a cop.”
“HIV? AIDS?”
“Yeah, but it presents in a very modern and surprising way. Medicine has been able to keep up with his virus, so that he gets sick but then gets pulled back from the edge. He fights hard. Sometimes I think it is his passion that is his survival secret.”
“Why is he coming to you?”
“Why would he pay for an old woman in a small town clinic to sit there and listen? Good question. I hardly even get a chance to say anything.”
“What DO you say? What is there to say?”
The puppy shook himself hard which made his ears flap comically.
“I just listen. He’s so full of hatred and rage . . . he needs to vent. I’m a little afraid. What if he tells me he murdered someone? Raped? I mean, I don’t care if he robbed a bank, but a crime against other persons would be different.”
“That must be hard for you.” Now that the puppy had begun to explore, J. reached out to rescue her Scotch.
“I’m doing a lot of reading — trying to keep distance with theory — but the most unexpected thing is that . . .” M stopped. The puppy had a grip on the edge of her blanket and was towing it off her knees, growling fiercely.
“What? What’s surprising you?”
“I’ve fallen in love with him.”
There was a long silence before J. said anything. “Geez. Talk about countertransference.”
“Yeah, but then what was the original transference? Who does he think I am? Who from his past prompts him to tell all these frightening and tragic things? What does he expect from me? What happened in the past that’s unfinished, insoluble? Am I adequate to guide this?”
Another long silence except for puppy growling over his blanket edge.
“Sometimes you can’t do anything but stay put and see what happens. Not everyone can be helped. I mean, you know I’m a good Catholic — which is probably why I believe in the total confidentiality of the confessional. But we aren’t priests who have their scripts for response.”
“My client was molested by priests.”
“Omigod. I see why you feel over-matched. Where was God?”
“Yeah. Not in the Confessional on those days.” She poured them both more Scotch.
“Do you think it was abuse that made him the way he is?”
“No, actually I think the priest fell in love with him, the same as I am. He’s extraordinarily intense. A magnetic dark star.”
“That’s blaming the victim, my friend.”
“Yes. I think I should find a backup therapist for myself, but I don’t know anyone I could trust. I’m too much the atheist for a confessional.”
J. stood up. “It’s late. We can’t solve this tonight. We’re a little drunk. We can only name the Devil.”
“Let’s take this puppy for a walk before bedtime.”
It was the deepest velvet part of the night and they were at a high enough altitude to see many stars, but the trees were too thick to see the lights of other buildings. Snow had fallen since they drove up and the puppy joyfully scuffled up clouds of it, then flopped over to roll in it before leaping up, yipping with energy. Lifting his leg here and there, he left scribbly marks along the path.
The two women walked slowly. Instead of looking for their jackets, they had simply thrown their lap blankets over their shoulders, so that they looked classic in the way of women over many millennia in many places. “Maybe we should just get each of these guys a puppy!” They laughed out there in the dark under the stars and bumped shoulders in solidarity.
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