Dead people see everything you do. This is what my aunt told me when Grandpa died. She leaned in close and pressed her rouged cheek against my earlobe, so close I could smell orange Certs on her breath as she whispered, so close she left a fine dust of blush on my ear. Certs smelled like the inside of my mother痴 purse, the zippered compartment for car keys and lipstick, in which she sometimes hid baggies filled with Cheerios to hand out during church sermons or long days at the hospital. We spent a lot of time in hospitals.
Grandpa is watching from above, my aunt said. If you pick your nose, he will know. If you kiss a boy, he will know. From now on, I would never be alone.
That night, when I stripped off my polyester roller skate shirt and slid into the bathtub, I felt dirty grit against my buttocks and calves, soap slime like grease between my toes. Grandpa was watching me bathe. I was not sure where to locate him � inside the lightbulb or mirror, floating on a cloud, dispersed in the air all around? I leaned over to hide my crotch and chest and wondered how I could dry off without the old man peeking.
Later, when I asked my aunt about privacy - how to feel alone when there were ghosts all around - she said not to worry. It only matters if you do something wrong.
I asked if dead people could hear us, too, but she did not know. How could they ever understand without our words? How could images be enough?
*napkin notes: notes scribbled on napkins or paper towels, usually fast and feverish
Sorry for the slow posting this week. I am packing for a move, meeting a publishing deadline, working on the magazine, and some other things I will not mention here. Posting will return to its normal pace in a few weeks. For now, new writing will be posted every several days. -K
Comments (9)
Really enjoyed this, Karrie.
Posted by Peggy | June 16, 2004 9:28 AM
Posted on June 16, 2004 09:28
Yi. That's seriously distressing.
Posted by dale | June 16, 2004 10:24 AM
Posted on June 16, 2004 10:24
Oh. I mean, the writing's wonderful and evocative. It's what it evokes that's distressing.
Posted by dale | June 16, 2004 10:25 AM
Posted on June 16, 2004 10:25
Thanks for the comments! I felt a little self conscious posting this napkin note, since it feels so raw.
Not surprisingly, this was the beginning of my obsession with surveillance. (This fragment will likely end up in the essay I am writing on that subject. Hmmm. Not sure, though.)
Thanks again ... I am catching up on all the blogs I read and cannot wait to read and leave comments. :)
Posted by karrie | June 16, 2004 10:29 AM
Posted on June 16, 2004 10:29
ps - and of course, it was not until later that I understood surveillance laws re: public spaces, and how images are allowed, but not sound ... I am interested in that intersection between a very intimate experience and a very surveiled one ... So hmm. I will need to write more on this separation of sound and image, and the importance we place on privacy of words over privacy of image, etc. etc.
Posted by karrie | June 16, 2004 10:37 AM
Posted on June 16, 2004 10:37
I've been learning American Sign Language, and participating on a dragonboat team that uses ASL as its principle language. I was shocked the first time I saw a video tape of one of our practices (made for coaching and analysis purposes) and realized that EVERY SINGLE "whispered" or private comment was clearly visible on the tape. Eep!
It really did leave me feeling raw and exposed, way more than I would have expected. Conversations are so context dependent that it's nervous-making to realize that they might be replayed in a different context, for different participants.
Posted by Sanguinity | June 16, 2004 10:59 AM
Posted on June 16, 2004 10:59
Sanguinity -
You hit on something that I have been wondering about.
Two of my nephews are deaf/hard of hearing, and I have been thinking about their privacy. How can a conversation in sign language be protected under current surveillance laws?
But beyond that -and as you say - context is everything. It is so strange to think of images ripped from their context, and recontextualized into as evidence ...
Thanks for the comment!
Posted by karrie | June 16, 2004 2:52 PM
Posted on June 16, 2004 14:52
As kids, we were told things, and we believed them. We believed the most amazing nonsense...who knows for how long, until we could do the difficult business of unlearning it, but we could never unlearn the feelings, the baggage. As adults, we are still being told things...
Posted by Denny | June 17, 2004 11:01 AM
Posted on June 17, 2004 11:01
For decades I've been wanting to write something about Tolkien's ring -- about the equation of power and invisibility showing a deep understanding of how power works in the modern world. But I've never quite been able to line up all the pieces.
Posted by dale | June 18, 2004 12:55 PM
Posted on June 18, 2004 12:55