Miriam Toews - All My Puny Sorrows

Okay, I said, interesting. And then how does it go?

Read it yourself, she said. I can’t believe you haven’t read it. Maybe instead of poring over the Hobo Museum newsletter you could revisit an old classic.

I told her that it seemed like we were having some kind of Karate Kid conversation here, was she trying to impart wisdom or something? You’re still lecturing me on what to read, I said. That’s good. Elf told me her throat was sore, she couldn’t talk anymore. Yeah, okay, sure, I said.

You don’t believe me, she whispered.

Yeah, yeah, of course I do.

We were quiet. Elf drifted in and out of sleep or something resembling sleep. I sat on the chair next to her. I imagined running headlong through the glass walls and shattering them to smithereens. The day before my father died he dreamed that he had somersaulted boyishly through concrete walls. Over and over and over and over and out!

I had my manuscript with me, still in the plastic Safeway bag. I took it out of my bag and wrote A Life Time of Resentment on the cover. Then I crossed that out and wrote A Devotion to Sadness (which according to Chateaubriand in his The Genius of Christianity is “the noblest achievement of civilization” so take that Mennonite busybodies who tell me in sanctimonious singsong and with bland pat-a-cake faces that my father’s suicide was evil ) then Smithereens , then Untitled . Then Entitled . Then I crossed it all out and sketched Elf in her bed.

I watched Elf sleep and I watched the nurses scurry around and laugh with each other behind their desk. I knew they couldn’t stand having Elf there, a failed suicide. A nutcase. They were terse with her and no doctor ever came to talk to us. I went to the counter and asked if I could speak to Elf’s psychiatrist. They told me that he had been called away to an emergency. I left the room and went downstairs to find my mother and my aunt and to text Nora in Toronto. I couldn’t find them in the cafeteria and Nora wasn’t texting back. I went back up to Intensive Care and there was Elf’s doctor. He was standing at the nurses’ desk. He was wearing a visor, like a jeweller. He was wearing ankle socks. He was the psychiatrist. I walked over to him and introduced myself and asked him if he had talked with Elfrieda lately.

I tried to, he said, but she wouldn’t speak.

Sometimes she doesn’t, that’s true. But she’s willing to write things down on paper.

I don’t have time for reading while I’m on the job, he said. He smiled and two of the nurses giggled like they were standing next to Elvis in Girls! Girls! Girls!

Yeah, I said. Ha. But I mean—

Look, he said. I’m not interested in passing a notebook back and forth between us and waiting while she scribbles things down. It’s ridiculous.

I know, I said. I understand. It can be laborious but I’m just, I mean, you’re a shrink, right, so you must have seen this sort of thing before?

Of course I understand it, he said, I just don’t have time for it.

No? I ask.

Look, he says, if she wants to get better she’ll have to make an attempt to communicate normally. That’s all I’m saying.

I know, I said, that’s … But she’s a psych patient, right? I mean isn’t she supposed to have some eccentricities? I mean doesn’t she — isn’t it challenging for you? I mean, like, in the field of psychotherapy. Wouldn’t you welcome this opportunity to really apply all of your studies to—

Excuse me, you’re who again? he said.

I told you. I’m her sister. My name’s Yolandi. I honestly believe that her silence is a way of her unfitting herself for the real world, do you know what I mean? You can’t take it personally. It’s her way—

Of course I know what you mean, he said. I’m not sure that I agree with you but of course I understand you. I’m telling you that I don’t have time for a silly game that—

Silly game? I said. Sorry, I said, but did you just call it a silly game?

He was walking away from me. Wait! I said. Wait. Wait, wait. A silly game? The shrink stopped and turned to look at me.

After just one visit with her you’re refusing to help? I said. You’re some kind of esteemed psychiatrist. You’re just fucking dismissing her out of hand right in front of her? My sister is vulnerable. She’s tortured. She’s your patient! She’s begging for help but wants to assert one small vestige of individual power over her life. Surely even a first-year psych student would understand the significance of that stance. Are you not … do you not have any professional curiosity, even? Are you alive or what the fuck?

I’ll have to ask you to keep your voice down, said one of his nurses from behind her bunker. She aimed a semi-automatic machine gun at my head. The shrink spread his legs and folded his arms and stared at me while I ranted. He smiled at the nurse and shrugged and appeared to be enjoying himself, like I was a giant wave he was really looking forward to surfing later in the day after pounding back a pitcher of margaritas with his buddies.

Are you so hostile and impatient and complacent that you won’t even let her communicate with you with words written down on a piece of paper? I said. Why can’t you just do your job? I don’t want to argue but I mean are you honestly telling me that you won’t listen to her?

Listen, said the shrink. You’re not the first family member to take out your frustration on me. Okay? Are you finished? I’m sorry. He walked away, down the hallway and into a room.

Because, I shouted after him, if you won’t help her then who will?

I apologized to the nurses for causing a scene. I’m so angry, I said. I’m so desperate. I’m so terrified. I’m so angry. I don’t know what to do. I repeated these phrases. The nurses nodded and one of them said yes, that’s understandable. Your sister isn’t co-operating and—

I cut her off. I said no, please. Please don’t blame it on my sister. I just can’t bear to hear that right now. She’s not evil. I was whispering. I willed myself not to raise my voice. I can’t take that right now, I said. I didn’t say she was evil, said the nurse, I said she wasn’t— I put my hands up around my head like I was trying on a new pair of headphones. I had lost my mind. I thanked them for their something or other and left Intensive Care.

I walked down six flights of stairs but on the second one my cell rang and I said hello. Hey Yolandi, said the voice on the other end. It’s Joanna. (Somebody from the orchestra.) I just wanted to tell you how very sorry we are about Elfrieda and I’m wondering if there’s anything we can do. I’d like to send something. I just don’t know what. Flowers?

Imagine a psychiatrist sitting down with a broken human being saying, I am here for you, I am committed to your care, I want to make you feel better, I want to return your joy to you, I don’t know how I will do it but I will find out and then I will apply one hundred percent of my abilities, my training, my compassion and my curiosity to your health — to your well-being, to your joy. I am here for you and I will work very hard to help you. I promise. If I fail it will be my failure, not yours. I am the professional. I am the expert. You are experiencing great pain right now and it is my job and my mission to cure you from your pain. I am absolutely committed to your care. (At this point I could hear Joanna saying Yolandi? Yolandi?) I know you are suffering. I know you are afraid. I love you. I want to cure you and I won’t stop trying to help you. You are my patient. I am your doctor. You are my patient. Imagine a doctor phoning you at all hours of the day and night to tell you that he or she had been reading some new stuff on the subject of whatever and was really excited about how it might help you. Imagine a doctor calling you in an important meeting and saying listen, I’m so sorry to bother you but I’ve been thinking really hard about your problems and I’d like to try something completely new. I need to see you immediately! I’m absolutely committed to your care! I think this might help you. I won’t give up on you.