CHASING A WHISPER

CHASING A WHISPER

BY John Tuft

She grew up thinking that she was the most beautiful girl in the whole wide world. After all, her daddy always said so and as for mother, she grudgingly came around as time went on. So it was with Bridey. She won the genetics lottery in the beauty category, along with intelligence and wit. Maybe she was the most beautiful girl in the whole wide world. Such things are best not left up to storytellers. Bridey grew into her beauty until she wore it casually and confidently. She did not lack for admirers as she set out to make something of herself in a world of skepticism. She had a good job and her choice of men to date. She experienced heartthrobs and heartaches though no one actually believed that she felt such things. After all, she was the most beautiful woman in the whole wide world. Funny thing though, everyone felt that they knew what was best for her. Bridey could not open a magazine or a social media app without coming across someone saying how she should be.

With great beauty comes the skewing of expectations. If she looks that beautiful, the thinking of others seems to say, she can’t also have an abundance of other qualities: intelligence, business acumen, piety, humility. All she has to do is smile, the thinking goes, and men will fall all over themselves to give her whatever she wants. And to a certain extent, that can be true. If there can be guilt by association, why can’t there be good will by association? In a world that associates beauty with the divine, the elevation in thought and practice of a beautiful human being appears natural. Invoking the axiom of “beauty is in the eye of the beholder” is a prayer into the darkness trying to challenge and overcome our own predilections. Beautiful equals good. Good is what we aspire to. Worship beauty and we worship the good. At least, that is what we tell ourselves.

It started subtly at first. She would leave a room and then feel the urge to go back and make sure she had turned out the lights. Halfway down the stairs the uneasy feeling would strike again and back up the stairs, open the bedroom door. The lights were most assuredly out, but just to make sure she would flip the switch on, then off. It was just a silly thing. But then Bridey noticed the same uneasy feeling when she didn’t put all the pillows back on the bed in the morning in just the exact same way each and every time. She would spend up to fifteen minutes arranging and rearranging them to be just right or that feeling of unease would be impossible to shake.

Bridey thought of these new behaviors as just so much nervousness at getting older, or something like that. She did not confide to her friends about how these weird ticks were taking over her life in bigger and bigger chunks. After all, they were her friends because she was the most beautiful woman in the world, right? They wouldn’t understand her having the problems of a perfectly average person. It finally got to the point where it took a half an hour for Bridey to pull out of the driveway whenever she wanted to leave the house. She would start the car and then the panic would hit. Back to the front door, unlock it, go through every room making sure the lights were out. To the kitchen to make sure the gas stove was turned all the way off. Back to the front door. Pull it closed. Turn the key exactly four times to make sure it was locked. Back to the car. Press the ignition. And the whole cycle would repeat itself. Had she left the water running somewhere in the house? Soon enough, it was easier to just not go out at all.

By the time she sat down in my office, the obsessive/compulsive behavior had completely taken over Bridey’s life. It did not take long to establish when it began. Her husband had left Bridey for a younger woman. Maybe even a younger version of the most beautiful woman in the world. Who’s to say of such things. Anxiety is a signal to ourselves that we need to cope with some stressor. But temporary coping can turn into a general sense of unease, unease that we are losing control. So, we try to enforce control to keep unease at bay. We lose confidence. In Bridey’s case it was a loss of confidence in how she saw herself. If she wasn’t the most beautiful, who was she? If she didn’t have that, what was there to hold her together?

Her journey to wholeness and balance began with the simple question: Are you chasing a whisper? Whispers are softly spoken sounds. Muted tones, murmurs. Sotto voce sighs. Yet they are notoriously difficult to hear, to pinpoint, to chase down. Whispers are not life goals, life defining foundations. Being beautiful is a marvel, not a wonder. And it is wonder that defines a life. Bridey faced the challenge of moving her life from coping to creating. It is the challenge of every life, not just writers and artists. Whispers are so tempting. Chasing them can turn out to actually be a weight on our lives though. The whispers of easy riches, unchecked passions, fading beauty. In this season of change and political choices, the whisper of “be one of us” can be most beguiling of all. Deciding if one is chasing a marvel or a wonder can be the most consequential of all…

Words are magic and writers are wizards.