[b]Harlan Coben,
There is the old catch-22 line that a mentally unstable person can’t know, as per their illness, that they are unstable. But that was wrong. You can and do have the insight to see your own crazy.[/b]
I sure as shit know that I am.
Sometimes the loudest cries for help are silent.
And sometimes others don’t even hear them.
So basically your plan is to flail about helplessly.
Or, at any rate, the backup plan.
I used to wonder why Lucy liked those songs so much. You know what I mean? She sits in the dark and listens and cries. Music does that to her…I didn’t understand for a long time. But I do now. The sad songs are a safe hurt. It’s a diversion. It’s controlled. And maybe it helps you imagine that real pain will be like that. But it’s not. Lucy knows that, of course. You can’t prepare for real pain. You just have to let it rip you apart.
Besides, not all pains are created equal.
We get mad at someone for cutting us off in traffic or for taking too long to order at Starbucks or for not responding exactly as we see fit, and we have no idea that behind their facade, they may be dealing with some industrial-strength shit. Their lives may be in pieces. They may be in the midst of incalculable tragedy and turmoil, and they may be hanging on to their sanity by a thread. But we don’t care. We don’t see. We just keep pushing.
Let’s call this “the real world”.
So basically, that entire theory is blown to hell.
Not basically, Win corrected. Entirely.
Basically, yeah, entirely.