June 17, 2020
Does it matter?
Well, yes and no.
Yes, because to embark on a project of self-discovery, find something new and interesting, and then stop feels a bit insincere, does it not? Even if I am not changed in the process, even if the end result is that, yeah, I am a singlet, that you are me, that me watching depressed Madison is dissociation, was it not worth it to at least reach that moment of understanding? Would it not be something of a disappointment to refuse to consider?
And no, because it doesn’t feel particularly actionable. My life will not change substantially with this knowledge, no matter the outcome, will it? I will keep living my life, I will keep talking with you, I will keep dissociating when depressed, and whether or not these actions involve simply myself or some…other does not necessarily change them, right? I will still need to work on the dissociation, I will still interact with you.
Yes, because by virtue of making this project public, by virtue of interacting with you in so visible a way, I have made it matter to others, even if only as a thought experiment. Rax talks about it. Those in the comments of the original post talk about it. The replies to the tweet talk about it. It’s useful for others to engage with the project in this sense, and is that not reason enough for it to matter? Does that not mean that I must consider it? I must seek to answer that question?
And no, because there has to also be a distinction between what others read and what I feel. It is death of the author as adopted by the author, is it not? By writing a memoir, I am showing you, the audience, a portion of myself. Not the whole of me — after all, is there not an encrypted page of the site? — and by being only a portion of me, it must perforce be a front-stage version of me. In this sense, you are a literary device and nothing else. Whether or not you actually, or, well “actually” are anything else doesn’t matter. You are a character in this drama.
So, do you want to know the answer?
I don’t know.
It is strange that you sound unsure.
Why?
There are twenty-two questions on the previous page. Twenty-five if you count mine — and I suppose that whether or not we are to include those is the crux of the issue. If that is not bemoaning the lack of answers, I do not know what is. It is strange that you would be unsure whether or not you want to know the answer.
I don’t know. I suppose I do, but at the same time, I suppose my hesitation is borne of trepidation. Never mind what I do with the answer, never mind any of that concreteness, what does that mean for me? On an identity level, what does knowing the answer to my questions around plurality mean for my perception of myself? What does it mean for Madison? What does it mean, in retrospect, for Matthew? Who am I if I am more than one?
More questions.
Yes, and no more answers than I went in with.