Verity-Ann... see how she haunts me
May. 20th, 2005 01:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chaletianOK, I started writing this after I wrote an article for FOCS about Verity-Ann Carey, then decided it was all going a bit mad. But, in continuing with my so far honourable tradition of dumping everything that's non-work-related sitting on my hard drive, I will add it here.
Why?
Why does he call me Verity-Ann? I haven’t been called that in years: not since we became seniors at school and decided that it was childish. Just Verity-Ann, of course. Mary-Lou wasn’t childish. I remember her face when someone suggested she should make it just Mary! And yet I was to be Verity. I got used to it; you do. But he calls me by that name, when no-one else does.
It’s a silly question to ask, though, because I know the answer. It’s because it’s a child’s name that he uses it. It makes me small. Not that I’ve ever needed much help with that, but I mean small in a different way. I cannot be trusted: I am too silly, too simple-minded. I must be cushioned and cosseted and controlled.
I blame Mary-Lou. That’s a little harsh, perhaps. Maybe I blame her because deep down I know it’s my own fault: I let this happen to me. And who wants to accept that about herself? That I brought it on myself? No, I prefer to blame Mary-Lou.
I don’t know when I first became known as a dreamer. I don’t know how it happened. It was so gradual, so slow, like a great glacier creeping down a mountain, until before you know where you are, it’s too late. Does that make sense? It’s funny, because I was never one for dreams. I have no imagination: I remember that Miss Linton told Dad that when I was about eleven. I was mildly offended, but knew it was true. I can’t help and, to be honest, I don’t really mind. Sometimes I think imagination can be a curse.
But I didn’t dream. I wasn’t a dreamer. But somewhere, somehow, during my time at the Chalet School, it’s what I became. I don’t think anyone ever knew that it wasn’t dreams.
It wasn’t anything.
I should feel regret or anger that I spent so much of my youth in a grey daze of nothingness. But I can’t drum up that much passion. Resentment is as much as I can manage, and not the fiery, vengeful resentment, just a bad-tooth nagging resentment, grumbling away in the background.
And this is why I blame Mary-Lou. Because until I met her, I was me. Insofar as you can at the age of ten, I knew myself. I knew what I thought, what I wanted, what I believed. Gradually, day by day, year after year, she took that away from me. And I let her.
When Dad came back I was so happy: the happiest I think I have ever been in my life. Now I had the chance for a real, proper family, like everyone else. I loved my grandfather, but he was a busy man and, though he loved me too, he was not always comfortable around children. I sometimes saw other girls with their parents, and I envied them. But now was my chance for all that. And when, eventually, he and Doris decided to marry, I didn’t mind. In a way, I was glad. It was more family: I wouldn’t be an outsider in the Trelawney home any more, not the way I had been during the holidays. Mary-Lou and I would be sisters – we would share our parents, our families.
It didn’t happen that way. Mary-Lou is… Mary-Lou. A rather circular description, I know, but if you’d met her, you’d understand. You can’t ignore her, you can’t subdue her. There’s just something about her that makes people pay attention – she can’t help it. I can’t blame her for that. And I don’t know why, not really, but she didn’t want a sister. Or rather, she didn’t want me as a sister. It’s hard to admit that. I admired her so much when we first knew each other. I really did. She is an admirable person. It’s hard to face up to the fact that she didn’t feel the same. She had friends: Vi, Lesley, Hilary… all that crowd. She even had a sister: Clem. I really was superfluous to requirements. An unnecessary adjunct to Dad.
I don’t think she minded her mother marrying; I don’t think she minded have Dad as a father, not that he was there a great deal after the first couple of years. She got on really well with him.
And, God help me, that’s why I hate her. I could tell, you see. I could tell that she was what Dad wanted in a daughter. He understood her. I don’t think he understood me. And after a while, I don’t think he even cared. They used to joke, he and Mary-Lou. About my first term, about how I refused to speak German out of lessons. What a silly thing I was! How stubborn. How foolish.
Didn’t they realise how much I hated it when they did that? That when I was alone, I cried? Or maybe they just didn’t care. All right. It was stupid, I can see that now. But I was a child. I was ten years old and we had just come out of war against Germany, a war that, as far as I was concerned, had lasted most of my life. It’s all very well for people like Jo Maynard and Miss Annersley to see how wrong it was to believe in the Germans as monsters, but they were adults who had seen the reality of the situation. I was a child growing up in a small English village: what did they think I grew up hearing?
But all that’s beside the point, now. It was a long time ago. Where was I? Ah yes: family life. Dad was in hospital so much, and so often ill when he was at home, that life continued much as it always had. The Trelawneys had their family. And I sat at their table: a stranger.
...
There was more to come, but I can't remember any more. Didn't seem worth putting on the CBB.
Why?
Why does he call me Verity-Ann? I haven’t been called that in years: not since we became seniors at school and decided that it was childish. Just Verity-Ann, of course. Mary-Lou wasn’t childish. I remember her face when someone suggested she should make it just Mary! And yet I was to be Verity. I got used to it; you do. But he calls me by that name, when no-one else does.
It’s a silly question to ask, though, because I know the answer. It’s because it’s a child’s name that he uses it. It makes me small. Not that I’ve ever needed much help with that, but I mean small in a different way. I cannot be trusted: I am too silly, too simple-minded. I must be cushioned and cosseted and controlled.
I blame Mary-Lou. That’s a little harsh, perhaps. Maybe I blame her because deep down I know it’s my own fault: I let this happen to me. And who wants to accept that about herself? That I brought it on myself? No, I prefer to blame Mary-Lou.
I don’t know when I first became known as a dreamer. I don’t know how it happened. It was so gradual, so slow, like a great glacier creeping down a mountain, until before you know where you are, it’s too late. Does that make sense? It’s funny, because I was never one for dreams. I have no imagination: I remember that Miss Linton told Dad that when I was about eleven. I was mildly offended, but knew it was true. I can’t help and, to be honest, I don’t really mind. Sometimes I think imagination can be a curse.
But I didn’t dream. I wasn’t a dreamer. But somewhere, somehow, during my time at the Chalet School, it’s what I became. I don’t think anyone ever knew that it wasn’t dreams.
It wasn’t anything.
I should feel regret or anger that I spent so much of my youth in a grey daze of nothingness. But I can’t drum up that much passion. Resentment is as much as I can manage, and not the fiery, vengeful resentment, just a bad-tooth nagging resentment, grumbling away in the background.
And this is why I blame Mary-Lou. Because until I met her, I was me. Insofar as you can at the age of ten, I knew myself. I knew what I thought, what I wanted, what I believed. Gradually, day by day, year after year, she took that away from me. And I let her.
When Dad came back I was so happy: the happiest I think I have ever been in my life. Now I had the chance for a real, proper family, like everyone else. I loved my grandfather, but he was a busy man and, though he loved me too, he was not always comfortable around children. I sometimes saw other girls with their parents, and I envied them. But now was my chance for all that. And when, eventually, he and Doris decided to marry, I didn’t mind. In a way, I was glad. It was more family: I wouldn’t be an outsider in the Trelawney home any more, not the way I had been during the holidays. Mary-Lou and I would be sisters – we would share our parents, our families.
It didn’t happen that way. Mary-Lou is… Mary-Lou. A rather circular description, I know, but if you’d met her, you’d understand. You can’t ignore her, you can’t subdue her. There’s just something about her that makes people pay attention – she can’t help it. I can’t blame her for that. And I don’t know why, not really, but she didn’t want a sister. Or rather, she didn’t want me as a sister. It’s hard to admit that. I admired her so much when we first knew each other. I really did. She is an admirable person. It’s hard to face up to the fact that she didn’t feel the same. She had friends: Vi, Lesley, Hilary… all that crowd. She even had a sister: Clem. I really was superfluous to requirements. An unnecessary adjunct to Dad.
I don’t think she minded her mother marrying; I don’t think she minded have Dad as a father, not that he was there a great deal after the first couple of years. She got on really well with him.
And, God help me, that’s why I hate her. I could tell, you see. I could tell that she was what Dad wanted in a daughter. He understood her. I don’t think he understood me. And after a while, I don’t think he even cared. They used to joke, he and Mary-Lou. About my first term, about how I refused to speak German out of lessons. What a silly thing I was! How stubborn. How foolish.
Didn’t they realise how much I hated it when they did that? That when I was alone, I cried? Or maybe they just didn’t care. All right. It was stupid, I can see that now. But I was a child. I was ten years old and we had just come out of war against Germany, a war that, as far as I was concerned, had lasted most of my life. It’s all very well for people like Jo Maynard and Miss Annersley to see how wrong it was to believe in the Germans as monsters, but they were adults who had seen the reality of the situation. I was a child growing up in a small English village: what did they think I grew up hearing?
But all that’s beside the point, now. It was a long time ago. Where was I? Ah yes: family life. Dad was in hospital so much, and so often ill when he was at home, that life continued much as it always had. The Trelawneys had their family. And I sat at their table: a stranger.
...
There was more to come, but I can't remember any more. Didn't seem worth putting on the CBB.
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no subject
Date: 2005-05-20 01:40 pm (UTC)It's a very powerful piece of writing. Poor Verity!
And please carry on with it, I'd love to read more!
no subject
Date: 2005-05-20 02:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-05-20 04:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-05-20 10:50 pm (UTC)