The woman doesn't look up. It's as if she's deaf. Maybe she is. Maybe she's like the Cambodian women I've read about, the ones who witnessed so many atrocities that they have willed themselves blind. Maybe that's what you have to do sometimes to survive. You kill off part of yourself, your hearing or eyesight, your capacity for hope.
Interpretation
The quote illustrates the survival mechanisms people develop in response to trauma.
This quote reflects on the deep psychological impact of trauma, suggesting that some individuals may subconsciously shut down their senses or emotions as a coping strategy to endure extreme suffering. It hints at the idea that survival often comes at a cost, leading individuals to sacrifice their ability to perceive joy or hope in order to navigate through harsh realities.
In practice
In a discussion about mental health, this quote can illustrate the effects of trauma on perception.
She realized that being starved for words was the same as being starved for food, because both left a hollow place inside you, a place you needed filled to make it through another day. Rachel remembered how growing up she’d thought living on a farm with just a father was as lonely as you could be. (130)
Short fiction is the medium I love the most, because it requires that I bring everything I've learned about poetry - the concision, the ability to say something as vividly as possible - but also the ability to create a narrative that, though lacking a novel's length, satisfies the reader.
It struck her how eating was a comfort during a hard time because it reminded you that there had been other days, good days, when you’d eaten the same thing. Reminded you there were good days in life, when precious little else did. (268)
No great deed, private or public, has ever been undertaken in a bliss of certainty.
I've participated in many demonstrations since I was a child. When I was at medical college, I was fighting King Farouk, then British colonization, against Nasser, against Sadat who pushed me into prison, Mubarak who pushed me into exile. I never stopped.
Part of me wonders if I had worked with more female psychologists, nutritionists and even coaches, where I'd be today. I got caught in a system designed by and for men which destroys the bodies of young girls.
We have gone forth from our shores repeatedly over the last hundred years and we've done this as recently as the last year in Afghanistan and put wonderful young men and women at risk, many of whom have lost their lives, and we have asked for nothing except enough ground to bury them in, and otherwise we have returned home to seek our own lives in peace.
Nothing fosters courage like a clear grasp of grace... & nothing fosters fear like an ignorance of mercy
I was repeatedly told that there isn't an African American woman who can open a show on Broadway. I said, 'Well, how do we know? How do we know if we don't do it?' I said, 'I think you're wrong.'
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