Yearning for an imaginary friend....

I recently read Matthew Dicks' delightful, touching, incredibly creative and imaginative novel Memoirs of an Imaginary Friend. The book opened me up emotionally in unexpected ways and created quite a dialogue in my head.

My name is Budo.
I have been alive for five years.
Five years is a very long time for someone like me to be alive.
Max gave me my name.
Max is the only human person who can see me.
Max's parents call me an imaginary friend.
I love Max's teacher, Mrs. Gosk.
I do not like Max's other teacher, Mrs. Patterson.
I am not imaginary. 

There is a desire in everyone to be seen. To be substantial. To matter to those who surround you. To be able to trust your instincts and to have an awareness of that ability. I think. I think that these desires are true. The search for life's meaning is something that most sentient beings embark upon when we reach a point of stasis in our lives. I started the book with these detached intellectual questions and observations.  However, as I read it and lost myself in the world and quirky characters, an unexpected swell of feeling arose as the intellectual faded away. I started to feel a primal, visceral yearning for a friend like Budo; a friend who loves me unconditionally, one clever enough to rescue me, not from a real world danger, as Budo does Max, but from myself. I simultaneously identified with Budo. If someone could just see me, communicate with me, then I could save the other Nancy, the one is such dire straits. I could explain-in language clearer than is currently being employed-what is wrong and what she needs.  I started reading as if in school; Is Budo an extension of Max or an entirely different being? Why were certain words and phrases chosen?  What would I have written?  After a while that logical approach faded away and I just connected to it and let the story's emotions flow through me.

I often feel like two people; one watches my life and my (often questionable) choices and one makes them. One is hopeful that I will pull it together and one (currently in control) is bent on destruction. This is not a completely analogous comparison, as I think that an imaginary friend is something different than simply two sides of a self. Budo has a much broader world view than Max. He knows things that Max doesn't. Max however exists in the outside world, is the person seen by everyone else.  Of course I am being too literal, as this is a novel and BOTH Budo and Max are imagined beings. That said, what was ignited by this story is not imagined but a real, intense desire for two things: a friend like Max, who would fight for me, even when I can't or won't fight for myself and attached to that, the ephemeral desire, one that I am not even sure I admit to, of salvation; both by myself and from myself. 

Fighting depression is a daunting battle, not the least because you have to muster your will; your will to live, to engage in the world,  to nurture the physical. My will has left the building. I find that when left without the structure of work and responsibilities to others, I don't care. Working hard quiets my mind somewhat, and on long days with no breaks, I do better. Other days are tortured and endless. I don't want to talk to people, to eat, to leave my house. My mind circles around itself, in smaller and smaller spheres.  If I can break the cycle,  I do sometimes feel better. When I pull it together to have coffee with a friend or take a dance class; when I put on my mask of normal, I can follow the script for a while. Working out is the only thing that I find I do not need prompting for, which is probably due to a combination of the endorphins released and the anorexic side of my personality urging me to somehow whittle away yet few more pounds. On the positive side of that addiction,  I also feel, when running or cycling, that somehow the negative voices can't quite catch me. I stay just half a step ahead of them. In doing so, I think that I can almost hear my desire for creativity, for connection, for success and work coming through.  I can hear my desire for all of these things while running the streets both morning and night, a wanly voiced desire usually drowned out by the one clamoring for self destruction.

There is a question posed here;  What do I need to change this dynamic? This is an almost silly solution but perhaps the creation of an imaginary friend is an answer. In saying that, I do not dismiss the love and gratitude I have for my actual flesh and blood, quite wonderful friends.  I have a few dear people in my life who are begging me to take the help that is offered, who remind me that I matter. Friends with whom I can laugh and who let me cry (not that I let down my guard to do much of that....), friends who occasionally even let me care for them in return. But my need is so overwhelming that I believe that if I really let them in, the weight of it will crush them.  If I share, in the moment, how much I am struggling, how hard it is to get through each day, how incredibly heavy my heart is, they will disappear. I see the fear and pain in their eyes when they get even a glimpse. Most have already pulled away, not willing or in a more likely scenario, not able to witness or partake in this journey/struggle/insanity. To my horror, I have also found myself lashing out at those who stay. Their optimism, when everything feels so incredibly dark, feels like dismissal. When timidly asked if things are getting better or when someone says something complimentary,  I get angry and frustrated at my inability to answer positively, to absorb the praise, to let an attempt at care make me feel better on any level.

Who is this imaginary friend that I need to create? There are no boundaries on who he or she can be, look like, what powers he can possess, so mine changes at will. He is intensely masculine when I need to feel held by a partner.  She becomes soft, comforting, and envelopes me in warmth when I need to be cared for by a mother. Sometimes my imaginary friend is a cat, snuggling in just to remind me that there is sweetness in the world, sometimes a horse to help me run away. My imaginary friend is also able to help me be social and masks the unbearable shyness that often runs my interactions in public by waving a magic wand.  My imaginary friend doesn't get upset or angry at me for being broken, like real people do.  Self destruction threatens our sense of balance and world order and humans get angry at those perceived to be throwing their lives away.  Many take it as a personal affront. What gets lost in all of that concern manifesting as anger or rage is the inability of a depressed or suicidal person to control the fall.

So, you create an imaginary friend to guide you through the dark times and then what?  That is also explored in the novel.  In the story, when no longer needed, all of those loyal and loving companions fade and disappear.  The story seems to imply that their soul lives on, but I don't know.  I have a slightly different version in my head.  Assuming a positive outcome, which is a stretch in my current mindset, I think that when the need for an imaginary friend passes, it is because rather than disappearing, the imaginary friend is absorbed into the imaginer, almost like glue, mending all of the broken pieces of the soul, filling in the holes and creating strength to move forward and up, out of the dark.

Matthew Dicks' Website