Chapter 6.4 - The Unconscious

Like all of us Claire had many selves: there was the granddaughter Claire, the artist Claire, the practical Claire, the Claire at life’s crossroads, the friend Claire. One could try and peel off one layer after another in order to find her real self and keep at it until there was nothing left: it was the sum of all of those reflections that came closest to approximating her soul, like a giant collage that would never be completed.

As she advanced in age, she kept adding and reshuffling layers until some of the aspects of her self became so deeply buried they didn’t seem to matter anymore, but they were still there, all of them. Somewhere near the center of this onion of selves was the most hidden Claire of all, the little five year old in the dress with the ribbons, the one who had seen her shadow for the first time.

So much of who we are stays hidden, like footpaths in a dark forest. Some of those hidden paths we acknowledge to ourselves, but most we don’t even know exist and are shocked to see them revealed in the light of day. Claire had wandered those footpaths in the dark her whole life, they were her domain, her safety, and in the absence of light she’d learned their footholds and their stepping stones by touch alone. She’d learned the fragrances of the dark, and its sounds, and they were all familiar and comforting, those harbingers of her inner world.

Artist Claire had allowed her hidden footpaths to lead her out of the dark and the layers of the ‘Claire onion’ suddenly revealed themselves in her paintings. Just as suddenly she didn’t understand who she was anymore, she couldn’t recognize this reflected self who stared back at her from every canvas and whose subtle personality suffused the message in all of them. 

Her dark forest looked kind of beautiful in the light of day, but strange and alienating, and those feelings she could now identify and understand felt like they belonged to another person. You can’t shift perspective on reality and expect it to still feel like home, nobody can. One is naked in the light; naked, vulnerable, ashamed and afraid. All the splendor of the world can’t drown the humiliation of being exposed just the way you are, just the way you’ve always been, and found lacking. Everybody is found lacking, nobody is ever good enough for the harsh blaze of the truth.

We make up for our inadequacies, best we can, and pretend we don’t mind being stripped of all of our defenses, though we do, and we go on, naked and afraid, both faker and more real than before, because we don’t have a choice. 

There is a devastating quality to this revealing light which annihilates everything you thought and felt about yourself and makes you uncomfortable, an impostor in your own life. Everything about you that is not broken recedes into the background while your inadequacies bask in full glory, and the worst part about this is that even in its unrepentant cruelty the rest of the world feels more genuine than you.

“I don’t know what it is about this canvas, bebelle, but I can’t take my eyes off of it. I…don’t even know if I like it,” Grandmother stared at Claire’s finished painting, frowning.

“This is it,” Claire thought. This was the feeling that had been haunting her since she was five years old, the feeling of staring into the unknown with fascinated apprehension. Just like the shadow it looked dark and empty, but in her heart of hearts she knew that it was not, she knew that a part of her soul that was precious and vital was waiting for her there and she missed that piece of her soul deeply, though she had been so afraid of it that she had labored her entire life to put the whole world between them so they would never meet.

“You know,” Grandmother finally managed to dislodge her gaze from the mesmerizing image, “you scare me some times.”

“I scare myself sometimes too,” Claire thought, then responded. “It’s art, maman. It’s supposed to make you feel stuff.”

“Just don’t keep it in the bedroom, alright? It will give you nightmares.”

“What’s that?” Grandfather intervened. He had overheard the last part of the conversation and all he had gathered from it was the word ‘nightmares’.

“Maman doesn’t like my art,” Claire joked.

“What’s to like?” Grandfather looked at the canvas, eyes widened and trying in vain to untangle himself from the visual grip. “That thing will haunt you in the afterlife!” He drew closer to the painting to get a better look. “What is it?” he asked.

Claire fussed, aware that she should have an answer to this question, if not for her grandfather at least for the people who would eventually visit her exhibit. 

“Me,” the answer came, almost without thinking.

“She finally went off the deep end,” Grandfather turned towards Grandmother, outraged as if it were her fault and then turned back to Claire. “You know what? Produce needs picking. Grab a basket and get to it.” To serve as an example, he grabbed a basket himself and walked out the door mumbling something inaudible and shaking his head. “You coming?” he turned to Claire from the doorway.

“Yes, Grandfather.”

“And stop doe-eyeing the produce, it’s unnatural.”