I’ve been thinking about the stories we tell ourselves – the stories we let define us, the stories that shape how we relate to others and the world. As a writer, I am particularly interested in the power of storytelling, not just as a form of entertainment but also healing. I believe our words and thoughts have power, and the more conscious we are of them and their effects, the more empowered we are to be the creators of our stories and not just some hapless character waiting for the Author to dictate our fate.
With that in mind, I’m going to share an excerpt of a story based on a true event from my teen years. In my Library of Memories, it would probably be shelved under “Utter Mortification” or “Things I Can Laugh at Now but Subconsciously Still Tell Me Who I Think I Am.”
I’m sitting cross-legged on the couch, trying to solve for sin(A) while Mom cooks dinner. She’s still in her work clothes – sweater, slacks, and sensible heels – with dangly earrings in her favorite seafoam green. She’s a one-man band, chopping vegetables and folding crescent rolls while the pot roast in the pressure-cooker hisses to its own staccato beat. Hank’s snoring upstairs – he got up early to install toilets in some new subdivision, so he’ll be down for the count until Mom gets him up.
On TV, a reporter from Entertainment Tonight debunks Mick Jagger’s claim that he never met Madonna. I glance up, more interested in celebrity gossip than my trig problem – only to find Mom striding in from the kitchen with that determined look on her face.
“Tombstone’s playing tonight,” she says, opening the cabinet housing our VHS library. I already know this because I scour the TV Guide every week, circling all the movies I want to tape. Mom’s into Westerns, and she’s got a crush on Sam Elliott, mostly on account of the moustache. I’m not into Westerns, mostly on account of being sixteen.
“We’re out of blank tapes,” I say.
“I’ll find an old one to tape over.”
“Okay, but ask me first.” I’m still mad at her for recording Steel Magnolias over Spaceballs. The logic defies explanation.
I go back to wrestling with my trig problem. I might be in the running for valedictorian, but I did not inherit the math gene from Dad. Times like this, I actually wish he was around, even though he’d probably give me a three-hour explanation going all the way back to Hipparchus or whatever.
“What – what is this?” says Mom.
I look up, and the pen drops from my hand. Mom blinks in confusion as we watch Drew Barrymore polish off a glass of champagne. She moans with pleasure, all teenage siren in bright red lipstick and a low-cut sequined dress – then the camera pans down to show Tom Skerrit’s head between her legs.
Oh no. No no no no no.
It’s the sex scene from Poison Ivy. I can’t believe I forgot – I tacked it onto an episode of Moonlighting for some late-night masturbation. I figured if I picked a mediocre episode, she’d never rewatch it. Big mistake. You tape over the movies you don’t want to keep.
My mind goes blank as I grasp for a reasonable explanation. I can’t blame it on Hank. He doesn’t know how to work the VCR, and I doubt she’d believe it was a programming error. Research for an essay? No. Remote sabotage from the KGB? I don’t think so. I’m preparing to put myself up for adoption to some other family when the video cuts to a cheesy erotic thriller featuring teen heartthrob Corey Haim. He grabs a girl in a white bikini around the waist and backs her up against the wall. “Rip it!” she growls. And he does – he rips off her bikini bottoms with his teeth.
My heart hammers in my chest. The situation has become painstakingly clear: I taped together a string of softcore porn scenes off HBO and Skinemax. And now my mother is watching it.
I want to die.
“What is this?” Her question repeats like a tape loop in my mind. I open my mouth but nothing comes out. All the air vacates the room, refusing to bear witness. Even the mounted deer heads on the wall look mortified – if they could avert those glass eyes, I bet they would. I squirm in my seat, wishing for something to come to my rescue – a tornado, an alien invasion, anything. This must be how the deer feel when they got shot. Nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide.
Let’s press pause on this story. We’ve arrived at a moment of Resistance.
Resistance, says Eckhart Tolle, is “an inner contraction, a hardening of the shell of the ego. Whatever action you take in a state of inner resistance will create more outer resistance.” That action could be as simple as mumbling an excuse, or running out of the room, or maybe just putting up an emotional wall (some combination of these having happened in the real version of this story). Whatever the case, it will encourage – even justify – more Resistance in the future. But there’s another possibility. “When you yield internally,” says Tolle, “when you surrender, a new dimension of consciousness opens up. If action is possible or necessary, it will be in alignment with the whole and supported by creative intelligence, the unconditioned consciousness which in a state of inner openness you become one with.”
Surrender is not easy for me – or at least that’s the story I’ve been telling myself. And oh do I have plenty of evidence to back it up, like the “clench” that comes with pelvic pain, or all those nauseating nights wrestling with Ayahuasca, or my seeming inability to relax enough to enter a state of hypnosis. But I’m tired of this story – I’d like to rewrite it. So imagine with me, if you will, our young protagonist hitting the edge of her Resistance, and just as she’s about to shut down, something within her – perhaps her Older, Wiser Self, the one who’s narrating this story – gives her the courage to yield instead. She softens, opens, accepting What Is, allowing herself to be held by something greater and more loving than fear or shame.
Can you feel her presence? Her aliveness? I can. So from that place, let us return to our story, and reconceive the ending.
“Mom,” I say, lifting my head, un-hunching my shoulders, “those are sex scenes. I taped them. I thought they were hot.”
She pauses, taking this in. The pressure cooker hisses, and my palms condense with sweat. I wonder if I’ve gone too far – but there’s no backing out, not now. I take a breath, exhale, and look Mom in the eye.
After what feels like an eternity, she smiles and hands me the remote. “Well,” she says, “I’m glad we’re getting our money’s worth from cable!”
As she returns to the kitchen and liberates the pot roast, I feel a swell in my chest, a possibility of the adult I hope to become. A homecoming to some part of me that was always there, that will always guide me down the right path if I’m brave enough to listen.
And….scene.
This is amazing work Bonnie! Omg, I laughed and had so much empathy for 16 year old you. I'm also impressed by your ability to work a VCR to such advantage, especially during the dark ages, although not as dark as mine 🤣. Your reimagining of the ending was so awesome, just the right note for me to land on just before bed on this Sunday night. 🥰
This is great. I hope I would have reacted similarly to your mother. As I was reading I thought she might have asked if she could borrow it😂