Last weekend, my mom and I went to visit an decades-long family friend named Maureen, who had just finished up a garage sale and was cleaning up the last few tables as we pulled up. After quick greetings, both she and my mother lapsed into chatting about what was happening recently, jobs, and all the other stuff middle-aged women like to talk about. Having been reading Mrs. Dalloway for weeks, I've been feeling more attuned to social intricacies and the idea of what isn't said. As Maureen told us a story about her garage sale, I noticed details and came to conclusions I wouldn't have caught before.
Maureen leaned into the car window and told us conspiratorially (and slightly grumpily) about one neighborhood girl that had scored a lot of free stuff out of her garage sale. The girl had wandered around the tables, looking through antique hats and dresses before asking for one of the matryoshka dolls. [as she spoke, I watched a tweenage girl pedal on a pink bike out of the next garage around the bend.] "I mean, I let her have one. It wouldn't do any harm, and plus I would hate to be that mean neighbor, you know. So I gave it to her." She paused as the girl on the bicycle pulled up behind the car, dismounted, and came up to her. They had a brief, cordial conversation; I heard something about "the dress" and "you'll have to wait 'till later on that." The girl hopped on her bike and rode away happily.
"That was the girl," Maureen said. I asked about "the dress?", and learned that the girl had also asked to have a vintage flapper dress (for free!) from Maureen's collection and Maureen had hesitantly told her to wait on it.
She continued to tell stories of this girl and later her little brother, both of whom had skulked around the tables the whole time investigating antique silver letter openers ("which they didn't need, and I told them they didn't need"), wooden toys, and the like. They even started putting items into their pockets! At this point, I could feel myself starting to dislike this girl, this family, whose children thought it was ok to boldly ask for and pocket more free stuff after just having received free stuff. I did remind myself there was more to people than met the eye, but I was having trouble seeing it with this rude, cookie cutter couple of kids. Next door, I saw a generic-looking father-type guy step out onto the porch with a fluffy sheepdog.
"Yeah, I really like that family though." Maureen watched the man idly through the windshield as he threw a ball to the dog. "You know, the other day, it was the middle of the night, I saw an ambulance pull up to their house. There was a gurney and-- Yeah. You know, I was just sitting in my room at my window, just watching and thinking, "Who's gonna die. Who's died."
And bam, my perspective changed. That family, that looked so boring and tame on the outside to someone who might have just been driving by as the little girl pedaled out on her bike, or as the sheepdog caught the ball, had had an ambulance wailing on its curb just nights before. By looking at them, you wouldn't have any idea that his wife, her mother had been carried out on a stretcher. They gave no indication, showed no wounds, so who would know?
Now that it's written down, this seems more unrelated to 20th Century Novel than I intended, but I believe it shows a real-life example of what Woolf knew, and what we're starting to see Hemingway illustrating: People don't say everything they know when they talk, and they show even less to the world at large. Just as Clarissa put on her public face, just as Jake Barnes narrates the top 5% of the iceberg, people tend to wear and speak with a facade that masks vulnerabilities and insecurities. Had we decided not to stop at Maureen's and just driven down the avenue, we might have spotted the family. And of course, we would have had no idea of their drama! Even crazier, you could extend that logic to anyone. Like the proverb goes, everyone you meet is fighting their own battles. Maybe not everyone's mother recently almost died, but it's incredible to think that everyone you meet, or don't meet, has complex, complicated problems as much as you do.
(Fun fact: That feeling is called Sonder, according to a tumblr blog and Urban Dictionary. Trustworthy sources, but just knowing it's documented makes you feel a little smaller.)
"That was the girl," Maureen said. I asked about "the dress?", and learned that the girl had also asked to have a vintage flapper dress (for free!) from Maureen's collection and Maureen had hesitantly told her to wait on it.
She continued to tell stories of this girl and later her little brother, both of whom had skulked around the tables the whole time investigating antique silver letter openers ("which they didn't need, and I told them they didn't need"), wooden toys, and the like. They even started putting items into their pockets! At this point, I could feel myself starting to dislike this girl, this family, whose children thought it was ok to boldly ask for and pocket more free stuff after just having received free stuff. I did remind myself there was more to people than met the eye, but I was having trouble seeing it with this rude, cookie cutter couple of kids. Next door, I saw a generic-looking father-type guy step out onto the porch with a fluffy sheepdog.
"Yeah, I really like that family though." Maureen watched the man idly through the windshield as he threw a ball to the dog. "You know, the other day, it was the middle of the night, I saw an ambulance pull up to their house. There was a gurney and-- Yeah. You know, I was just sitting in my room at my window, just watching and thinking, "Who's gonna die. Who's died."
And bam, my perspective changed. That family, that looked so boring and tame on the outside to someone who might have just been driving by as the little girl pedaled out on her bike, or as the sheepdog caught the ball, had had an ambulance wailing on its curb just nights before. By looking at them, you wouldn't have any idea that his wife, her mother had been carried out on a stretcher. They gave no indication, showed no wounds, so who would know?
Now that it's written down, this seems more unrelated to 20th Century Novel than I intended, but I believe it shows a real-life example of what Woolf knew, and what we're starting to see Hemingway illustrating: People don't say everything they know when they talk, and they show even less to the world at large. Just as Clarissa put on her public face, just as Jake Barnes narrates the top 5% of the iceberg, people tend to wear and speak with a facade that masks vulnerabilities and insecurities. Had we decided not to stop at Maureen's and just driven down the avenue, we might have spotted the family. And of course, we would have had no idea of their drama! Even crazier, you could extend that logic to anyone. Like the proverb goes, everyone you meet is fighting their own battles. Maybe not everyone's mother recently almost died, but it's incredible to think that everyone you meet, or don't meet, has complex, complicated problems as much as you do.
(Fun fact: That feeling is called Sonder, according to a tumblr blog and Urban Dictionary. Trustworthy sources, but just knowing it's documented makes you feel a little smaller.)
I think this is a really interesting post. It also relates well to Hemingway's writing. It shows how somebody narrating someone else has the power to control your opinion on someone you've never even met, just as Jake does to establish his authority. I think it's cool that your anecdote demonstrates a key factor of not only Woolf's writing, but also that of a completely different author.
ReplyDeleteWow, I love finding out that there actually is a word for the feeling these novels evoke, that ordinary anonymous people have rich and complex inner lives. "Sonder" is kind of a clunky-sounding word for it, and no one will know what you're talking about if you use the word without elaboration, but at least it exists!
ReplyDeleteNice post! I like how you have connected themes of the novel to your life. I think we can also see this theme a little bit in The Sun Also Rises. A person who had just met Jake would have no idea about the physical and psychological injuries he has sustained from the war but after reading more of the book it is clear that the person he is on the outside is definitely different then the person he is in the inside.
ReplyDeleteI think it's so cool how this class is directly affecting how you see things and is changing your perspective on life. I liked how you directly connected it to the iceberg principle. I wounder if Jake would provide that part of the little girl's story or would he leave it out because he does provide some background to people's lives but he continues to add and take details as he pleases in order to describe those characters in a bias light.
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