EMOTIONAL WHIPCRACK
by Renee Penny

(WATCH OUT WHAT YOU WISH FOR...)

(DREAM MATE/FANTASY MATE)

CONTROL

He has no training in mental health care, but has come to the conclusion that this one word ("control") is a key to life both for adults and children

ADULTS

He had always a feeling of disdain for adults who would mouth platitudes when subjected to a perceived wrong

"What goes around comes around" was one of his favorites

He now realizes that such platitudes are a technique by which an adult copes with an unpleasant situation over which she/he has no control

A lack of control of one's life is chaos and is as terrifying for an adult as for a child

He has never been in jail but intuits that the lack of control in that life-threatening environment tests the limits of a human's ability of endure

A term of imprisonment of indeterminate length creates a situation which human should not be required to face.

Lack of control of one's life with the certainty that that lack is to be for the rest of one's life is beyond words but the certainty allows for closure, after a fashion

CHILDREN

Children learn how to live from parents

Children cannot distinguish between parents who lead healthy lives from those who don't

A child who, at home, experiences situations causing her/him fear must too develop defense mechanisms in order to survive

That child will use mental devices other than the repetition of platitudes to cope with the terror of lack of control such as the creation of make believe friends and lives, obsessive cleaning, becoming a workaholic, etc.

Nevertheless, that child, in adulthood, will live her/his life according to the example set by the parents

He (the he of this story) has had the misfortune of finding himself in a series of in such situations both as a child and as an adult

As a child, he was daily an unwilling witness to his mother's endless, limitless criticism of all things and all people, especially his father, and at times, he himself.

His father would react by not responding

His father and he learned that this was the least unpleasant manner to cut short his mother's diatribes

Not surprisingly, his marriage was, to him, unsatisfactory, since his attitude towards marriage mimicked that of his parents

It seemed to him that marriage consisted of a life in which control is surrendered to another person

In addition, since he had never received emotional support from his parents as a child, he was incapable of providing such support to his spouse

Not surprisingly, she become frustrated and discontinued the support which she had been providing and to which she received no return

His reaction was to remark to himself that he would never remain in a relationship like that of his parents

He left his wife

His wife responded that she opposed a divorce but would not contest the action nor argue about money

Having received these reassurances from her, he was overwhelmed by the endless frustration of dealing with that supposedly uncontested divorce

It seemed to him that everyone involved in the matter including all the representatives hired by the parties (except, interesting, his wife's lawyer) caused months of needless delay

Even the court delayed its final decision for approximately three months longer than usual

All of these delays were horribly stressful because the law provided for no time limit and no recourse for him existed other than to take drastic action in court (in his cynical moods, he wondered if the purpose of the court system was not to decide cases but to delay them for so long that the parties, in desperation, would settle for almost anything simply to get away from the court system)

When he would complain to his spouse about these delays, she would reply "what's your hurry?"

All of the above is by way of background for what follows-a situation in which he has no control

What follows is a tale of an emotional burden which indeed confirms the truth and accuracy of the comment of the assassinated (speaking of unfairness?) United States President John F. Kennedy: "life is not fair"

He has made no study of the question but has often wondered how many people have ever met the incarnation of a fantasy

He did, at perhaps one of the most vulnerable periods of his life (see above), meet the woman of his dreams, his fantasies

And, ironically (the word does not even approach the emotional suffering he has endured since the day he met HER)

Every day since he last saw her is exactly like the one before

Filled with a crippling emotional pain unlike any other

As heartworm in a dog increases in size and strangles the heart of the dog, so does his ("heart": how appropriate) worm of unfulfilled emotion increase in size and ruin his life

To be unable to have any relationship whatsoever with the only woman he ever met who provided total fulfillment of his emotional, intellectual, psychic and physical needs, because of her emotional baggage and that of those around her is to suffer the tortures of the damned

To know that he will die one day, perhaps as much thirty years from now, having met this unique woman, and to know that fulfillment and emotional peace will never be his, unless he meets another such woman, visits upon him a feeling of total despair during all his waking hours

Prior to the electrifying moment when he first met her, he would not have believed that the woman existed who could have such an effect on his life

To have learned that such is possible (but will never happen) has discouraged him almost totally

Each night at the moment he retires, she is the only thought occupying his conscious (and, he supposes, his unconscious) mind and his sadness multiplies exponentially

Though a native English speaker, he feels that his vocabulary is insufficient to describe the emotional frisson which exploded through his being when they met

To say that he was stunned, hammered, out of his mind is not hyperbole. In the time that it took for his neural synapses to transmit her physical image to his brain, he suffered an emotional concussion (he was "out on his feet" as is said in the "sweet science"[he has never been able to understand that nickname]) and was physically hers

There was simply no measurable time delay The words of the band the "Hollies" play an endless loop in the compact disc of his being:

"She was a tall, cool woman in a black dress

Just one look and I was a bad mess." (Tall Cool Woman)

Then followed a quarter hour of desultory conversation with this diurnal, emotional succubus (he was not asleep, but was unconscious) during which she completed her assimilation of his whole being

For the next five days, he accomplished nothing resembling work

He merely followed her like a newborn puppy, reciting her attributes: high intelligence, college education, positive attitude, eagerness to work, and, beauty which rendered him helpless

Unintentionally, she had not only taken his body prisoner, but also his mind

She had deleted from his brain all that made him him, downloaded and installed herself, and, as a part of this "one off" (a boating design expression) maneuver, inserted the necessary software to prevent him from ever deleting her

The software that was he had been deleted from the soft, vulnerable receptacle of his emotional "hard" drive

She then installed herself and he became her

The installation program she used permits no uninstallation, deletion nor shutdown

A restart simply acts as a reminder of all the pain which has gone before

No physical consummation ever took place, except for a single hug in which nothing but their shoulders touched

Her original schedule was to work in his office for two weeks

At the end of the first week, she called and said that she would not return for the second

On Thursday evening, the fourth day after they had met, at the moment of retiring, he began to cry as he thought of her

The crying continued every night at the same time for three months

During that three month period, he visited Berlin, including East Berlin, which was an emotional experience for him, since he had grown up in the early 1950s when the United States feared that the Russians/Communists planned to take over the world

On the night he slept in (West) Berlin, he cried as hard as a baby sometimes does, breathlessly, as a result of the combined stresses

Now, eleven months have passed but his misery over her has not waned

In fact, it now seems to him that he is doomed to never speak to, and meet, her again

This realization is absolutely excruciating

To have serendipitously met the woman who is flawless, an absolutely perfect mate, the woman who precisely fits the mold of his mental, emotional and physical needs, but the unremitting agony of knowing that absolutely nothing further will ever happen between them causes unbearable frustration and despair

That pain is relentless and does not ease

The image of being enveloped in her arms, naked, and feeling the essence of one another flowing into the other's soul overwhelms him; stretches and rips at his ability to survive

He weeps for himself at the unfairness of having been allowed to meet this person who is a perfect match for him and who he most probably never see again, much less share a conversation, share a caress of the lips, share the most exquisite communion of body and spirit of which two loving humans are capable

There is no lasting anodyne for this psychic pain

The attention of another woman might briefly distract him, but, as he readies for sleep, the spasms of his stomach muscles begin, followed by the tears

Psychiatrists will say that he weeps primarily because she is a reminder of the absence of emotional support during his childhood

This is a remarkable concept: she fulfills perfectly the emotional void in his life while, simultaneously, reminding him of the basis of that void, and finally, saddens him because he sees that same void in her because she too suffers greatly from emotional flaws

It amuses him that he, Mr. Sophisticate who has met hundreds of people during his life, been involved in dozens of hobbies, traveled in scores of places in North and South America, the Caribbean, Europe and the Pacific Rim should be staggered, no stunned, taken prisoner emotionally, every facet of his being assimilated by a tiny (4 feet 11 inches tall, 85 pounds) little kid (well: 21 years old) from an economically depressed foothill community of fewer than 300 residents

Why is it he who has in real life met this vision, this awesome, stunning overpoweringly desirable human who has pushed all of his emotional and physical buttons

Why she, this wonderful, unknowing, unassuming human, who has more serious emotional problems than he, who, to the best of his knowledge, is unaware the effect she has had on him; does not know that she has insinuated ("insinuated" is too mild a term and has undesirable connotations. In actuality she exploded into every cell of him with the power and light of a supernova) herself into his very core; does not know that she has assumed the ineffable sweetness and tenderness of the spoon position at the center of his emotions

What has the Supreme Being accomplished by this pervasive cruelty of destroying his life by allowing him a glimpse of a human supreme being knowing full well that no relationship will ever come to fruition?

If there is a god, and if this monumental cruelty were intentionally caused by that god, she/he could in all truth be classified as a subscriber to what are the two lowest forms of humor: the put-on and the practical joke, neither of which require the slightest intelligence or imagination

The joker simply observes the butt of the joke until the joker sees a sensitive spot and then that spot becomes the tool by which the joker causes maximum embarrassment and discomfort for the butt

Whatever the terminology, he aches with what resembles an endless, relentless ice-cream headache throughout his body, his life

He makes reference after reference to the pain which has been caused him, but his pain makes him frantic

Frantic because he cannot function effectively when he hurts so much. Frantic because his life has become the plot of a horror story

He, having lived a lifetime and who, frankly, is quite cynical, knows that most humans do not live "happily ever after"

She, the only person he ever met who filled the void in him for what now seems to have been a few mere ticks of the clock, will never again do so

The agony is intolerable

Pogo may have seen the enemy, and learned that it is us

He (of this tale) has seen emotional fulfillment after a lifetime without, and then had it taken from him almost immediately

Would that they had not met

The intensity of the pleasure he felt when they first met and the whip first cracked was no less than an emotional orgasm

The loss of his life's meaning when he, for the second time heard the crack

of that whip (after learning of the seriousness of her emotional difficulties and also that she would not be returning) has left him in a permanent emotional condition ever so much worse than that under which he struggled, labored, subsisted, day after endless day, before they met.

He without reluctance admits that he has suffered and continues to suffer greatly over the loss of a woman

In terms of his emotional contentment, however, she is not A woman-she is THE woman

(The tears do not fall upon the page but rather onto the computer keyboard.)

He knows the pointlessness of hiding behind macho behavior

Such awareness provides little relief, though

Perhaps, no, without doubt, his pain is multiplied exponentially because never before had he received sympathy or understanding from a woman after expressing an opinion, fear, joy, interesting item or emotional support

Certainly not from the most embittered, belittling, negative female possible...his mother.

All he had learned from her was to never speak for any word spoken was a trigger, a springboard to a repetition of one of her themes of venom

With respect to many subjects, he even knew the exact words she would use in her tirades

Interestingly, she employed a variation of a technique long used by politicians when questioned: the trick being to not answer a volatile question

The politician will say "I'm glad you asked me that", and then go on and speak about any subject she/he wishes

O God but he aches

He has received emotional support, which is like a magic potion to him and fears he will never experience it again

She, one day, had told him that she did not want to forget the things which he had said because they struck a resonant chord in her

Imagine the effect a statement such as this had upon him

He who had never received such a response from his biological mother.

O God, but it made him feel whole, to have a woman sincerely listen to his thoughts and fears, without likelihood of belittlement or humiliation

The pain of unsatisfied physical attraction is in itself cause for despair in a most basic form, for the making of love between persons having a loving attitude towards one another magnifies the biological sensations of the act

Moreover, the lovemaking is communication on a most basic of levels because there is no intervening speaking of words, listening to words, ink on paper, reading of letters or messages, etc.

However, when heaped upon this absence of physical closeness is the life-threatening pain of being forced to come face to face each day, and especially each NIGHT, with the certainty that any satisfaction derived from their emotional symbiosis is never to be

And if his own pain is not enough, to that is added the helpless pain caused by his knowledge of her emotional suffering

The effect of this pain is to rob him of his desire to function; to drain him of his energy so that he merely slumps in his chair (symptoms of depression, yes)

This feeling mimics hammer blows to the emotional solar plexus, except that the blows never stun the nerve ends or cause unconsciousness

Rather they simply add to his agony

And, unbelievable as it may seem, she is he in another way

As mentioned above, the emotional pain that she suffers is essentially (not exactly) the same as that suffered by him in his childhood, so to look at her is to look in an emotional mirror

This factor is the primary cause of the crying to which he is subject

He cannot repress these feelings when they are sucked out of his subconscious by this vision of a woman

They are torn from him

She is accomplishing the goal of Freudian psychotherapy, without years spent on the couch; she is ripping from him, without anesthetic, the repressed feelings and attitudes of his childhood simply by his looking at and listening to the mirror which is she

Once again, the apposition of two factors makes the situation more difficult

The rapture stimulated by her flawless (a gross exaggeration: she has one small chicken pox scar beneath her lower lip) beauty is accompanied by triggering the recall from his subconscious of one the worst, most insidious and most pervasive problems which a parent can cause a child-failure to provide emotional support

Her physical beauty, her physical perfection cause him to wonder about the mental processes triggered by what has happened to him

To quote Robert B. Parker in Death in Paradise (2001, G.P. Putnam's Sons, New York):

Objectively, Jesse knew there were other women as good-looking as Jenn. But that was, at best, a factual conceit. At the center of his self, Jesse knew that she was the most beautiful woman in existence.

Parenthetically, the reason why the death of a beloved pet is so terrible is not the fact that the pet represents a child

It is because the pet provided unconditional love-love without condition. That is what is lost when a pet dies

All his mother provided was unconditional bitterness, negativity, humiliation and lack of support

He is frantic

He knows not what to do. His whole being, his whole physical, mental and emotional self longs so to be wrapped in the comfort of her body; that body of absolute perfection

He longs so to tell her why he is he and also that she is he.

He knows not what to do

Pure chance allowed them to meet

Pure hell has followed

This is not what Jean Paul Sartre meant when he said that "hell is here on earth, and it's other people", but the effect is the same

The complex emotional situation in which she is, in effect, imprisoned, means that, practically speaking, they will never engage in a relationship

It is theoretically possible, but would require both of their lives being torn away from their respective roots and begun again at a distance

He cannot even contact her in any way for fear of causing her further harm

If only he knew her wishes

If only he could tell her his feelings

And if she had no interest in him, then, closure could begin

Every night upon retiring he feels that dreaded whipcrack once again as it lays bare anew the raw, burning, ultra sensitive core of his emotions, of his empty life

He cannot stop him self from uttering those words of despair as have so many other humans as they are about to lose their lives needlessly: "Oh God, Why Me?"

Once the involuntary muscle spasms in his middle and the sobbing subside he asks himself a second question: if there is a purpose in life, what part of that purpose does the above situation serve

Who is at the handle of the whip?

And, lastly, returning to the first few lines written above: Will she/he come around after going around?