The Center Cannot Hold: My Journey Through Madness (7 page)

Also, I was uncomfortably aware that this was costing my parents
money, and that going further with it would cost them even more.
What was the point? Besides, I felt exposed in a way I didn't enjoy—it
seemed that the only thing that people wanted to talk about over
coffee in the morning and at the dinner table at night was the inner
workings of my mind. So I went off to my third appointment with

Karen and told her it would be our last meeting.

"And why is that, exactly?" she asked.

"My parents are upset that we haven't figured this out," I said,
"and that you haven't come up with some kind of plan. Besides, it
costs them too much money for me to see you." I braced myself for her
objection, but none came.

"All right, then," she said calmly. "We won't continue. But here's
what I think: You do need help. And I just want you to know that when
you decide you're ready to get it, you can and should come back to see
me."

Nonplussed, I thanked her and quickly left the office. It never
occurred to me back then (and if it occurred to Karen, she didn't say
so), that I was taking better care of my parents than I was of myself.

At the end of the summer, I left Miami and headed back to Vanderbilt
for my sophomore year. I was actually glad to be there, greeted by the
few friends I'd made the year before, and once again excited at the
prospect of living a life of the mind. I discovered the Saturday and
Sunday open hours at the library and dove back into my books. Sadly,
the relationship with Peter had come to an end. Nevertheless, I felt
confident enough to date other people, more at ease with that aspect
of my life than I'd been before.

Because I'd begun to take graduate-level courses, I soon made a
number of friends who were graduate students—often older than I by
only three or four years. They seemed a better fit, and appeared to
accept me for who I was, with all my flaws and quirks. And this is
when I came to know Kenny Collins, who had been my freshman
English teacher and was studying for his Ph.D. in English literature.

Eight years my senior, Kenny came from a small town in
Tennessee with, as he put it, "a population of one hundred eighty-four
and shrinking." He was married to his college sweetheart, Margie,
who was somewhat more reserved than Kenny, but sweet and
welcoming. Together, they presented a picture of the kind of life I
tried to imagine for myself someday—two people who obviously cared
deeply for each other, an apartment filled with books and music, in a
community of intellectual endeavor and excellence. Kenny had a
Southerner's manners and gentility (although his Southern accent
was barely detectable), but he could be tough and demanding when
the situation called for it. He was the kind of teacher who expected
much of his students not just because he cared deeply about them, but
also because he truly loved and respected what he taught.
Hardworking and incredibly smart, he demanded no less of his own
scholarly work than he did of his students', and so he spent most of his
waking hours in the library, as did I.

True friends help us chart our course in the world, and in my
case—with the earliest mixed signals of schizophrenia beginning to
fuzz my ability to think clearly—Kenny was like a guide in a forest. If
you are walking on a path thick with brambles and rocks, a path that
abruptly twists and turns, it's easy to get lost, or tired, or discouraged.
You might be tempted to give up entirely. But if a kind and patient
person comes along and takes your hand, saying, "I see you're having
a hard time—here, follow me, I'll help you find your way," the path
becomes manageable, the journey less frightening. For most of my
college career, Kenny Collins was that person. He didn't tolerate late
papers, so I was compelled to focus and finish on time. When I was
stuck, he'd lead me—as opposed to pushing me—into discovering
what I wanted to say. As time went on, he became more friend than
teacher, often asking to read what I had written for other classes,
gently showing me where I'd strayed or suggesting another direction I
might go. Occasionally, he even asked me to read his work, and paid
me the high compliment of listening to what I had to say and actually
valuing it.

Kenny, Margie, and I often hung out together with Pat, another
grad student in English, who had a wonderful sense of humor. We
spent our days in the library and our weekend evenings either at
Kenny and Margie's or at Pat's apartment. We had dinner parties
(happily for me, the others all knew how to cook), listened to music,
talked about our studies and our friends, and mostly laughed a lot.
Beer and wine were easily available, but I quickly decided (as I had
with my brief flirtation with drugs) that I didn't like drinking. I didn't
like the taste, I didn't like the calories, and I especially didn't like the
way it made me feel, either when I was doing it or the next morning.
Besides, life at the time seemed much more enjoyable on a clear head.

I'd never been a giggly girl, but something about these people
made me feel lighthearted much of the time. And since I thought just
about everything Pat said was incredibly funny, it wasn't hard to
collapse in a fit of laughing, at which point she'd crack up, too. It
began to be a game, in public places, to try to embarrass our dear
friend the Southern gentleman. We'd be laughing and giggling, cutting
up, being anything but ladylike, while Margie looked mildly
embarrassed and Kenny's face turned bright red.

"You've got to stop this now," he'd mutter in a restaurant. "People
are staring at us. Elyn, Pat, quit it, this is not acceptable!" The more
perturbed he was (or pretended to be), the harder we laughed,
stopping only when we'd run out of breath. Being at ease and willfully
silly with good friends was a wonderful kind of freedom for me, a rare
lack of self-consciousness.

At the beginning of my senior year, Kenny (who by then had
completed his graduate work) was offered a fine college teaching
position—but not at Vanderbilt. Instead of being happy for him, I was
heartbroken. Even worse, I panicked. Pat, too, had finished her
graduate studies and was leaving campus. Although I had other
friends, although I'd found a niche in the philosophy department, the
time I'd spent with Kenny, Margie, and Pat had felt like coming home
to me—they'd become like a family, and were often more accepting
than my actual family. They certainly knew me better at that point.
And now it was all over. How could I stay behind without their
friendship, without the laughter, and without Kenny's guidance and
wisdom?

Of course, he did his calm and caring best to reassure me, saying
that I was more than capable of finishing my undergraduate career
successfully, and besides, we'd always stay in touch. Our lives would
change, but the friendship would not, and in the meantime, there
were telephones, and letters, and vacations when we would visit each
other.

In part of my brain, I heard what he was saying and believed it. In
another, I started teetering. I was frantic during the day, sleepless
during the night. Quickly, my behavior began to resemble that chaotic
first year's—I got too loud again, too out-of-control, taking stupid
dares, doing stupid things, with my laughter frequently accelerating
into hysteria. I noticed, a time or two, people looking at me with
alarm.
Let them,
I thought.
I don't care. Everything's going to hell.

The day Kenny and Margie actually drove away from Vanderbilt, I
sobbed for hours, inconsolable. For weeks afterward, I had no energy,
no focus; I kept imagining I saw him on campus, just ahead of me in a
crowd, or over there under the trees, in the shade. But of course I
knew it was a mirage. Life went on, but not easily, and that whole last
year in college, I never stopped missing him, never stopped being
aware of his absence, and the absence as well of a kind of emotional
order he'd brought to my life.

As my own graduation approached, I knew I had to make some
decisions. For four years, I'd had a perfect academic record; in fact, I
was named class valedictorian. Although I wasn't required to speak at
the ceremony, I was to be called up to the podium, introduced, and
applauded, which drew a mixed reaction inside me. Proud of being
acknowledged for what I'd accomplished, I nevertheless didn't like
sticking out, and I especially didn't like the idea of other people
looking at me. Plus, I was unnerved by the whole idea of the future
(and actually having to plan for it). A future meant change, and
uncertainty, and I had never been comfortable with either concept. I
felt a constant sense of uneasiness, as though the ground under my
feet were about to shift. Something had to come next, but what?

In my philosophy studies, I'd explored the work of Aristotle, and
continued to be enthralled by it—two thousand years ago, he was
deftly analyzing the human character and discussing the same moral
and ethical issues that we debate today. I'd taken sufficient Greek
language courses to read Aristotle in the original, and decided that I
wanted to do further study on him. So, after consulting with my
academic advisors, I decided to apply to Oxford for graduate study.
There were two scholarships that could get me there—the Rhodes and
the Marshall—but the application process for each was intensely
competitive and harrowing.

My interview with the Marshall committee was disastrous. The
meeting was held in Atlanta, Georgia, at the British Consulate, in a
large and very ornate room. We sat around a table, in old chairs with
high backs—there were perhaps ten of us gathered around the table,
and the other nine were looking at me. In an unfortunate side effect of
my increasing inattention to myself—my periodic lapses of self-care,
which always became worse during stress—my ears had become so
clogged with wax I could hardly hear a word anyone spoke.

"So, Elyn, tell us, why do you want to go to Oxford?" they began.

I delivered the speech exactly as I'd rehearsed it. "Oxford is
probably surpassed by none in its tradition of excellence in ancient
philosophy," I said. "I love reading and thinking about Aristotle.
That's one reason why I learned ancient Greek—so I could read him in
the original. I couldn't get a better education in ancient philosophy
than at Oxford. Also, it will be mind-opening to live in a new culture."

There, I thought. Every word exactly right. But my head was buzzing
with anxiety:
Am I speaking loud enough? Too loud? Did I even hear
the question correctly?

There were long silences between their questions and my
responses, then more long silences after I spoke. Our voices seemed to
echo. Someone coughed; someone else shifted in a chair, and the chair
creaked. Was I boring them?

One question I did hear correctly was an inquiry about what I
thought about my physics class. My flippant answer was an indication
of my poor situational judgment: "This physics class was a gut!"

One woman on the panel asked me, "Have there been any changes
in your life since the women's movement began?" Without pausing to
reflect or consider the histories of the women in the room—what they
might have gone through to get there, what their struggles might have
been like—I quickly replied that no, I didn't notice any changes;
indeed, I hadn't ever encountered any discrimination at all. And then,
as though I were signing a high school yearbook, I cheerfully washed
all the women "good luck in your endeavors!" Another long silence.

Evidently, we were done. There was a polite round of thank-yous
and good-byes, and then I made an awkward departure, having no
sense whatsoever of what they thought or what my chances were.
Hapless. Hopeless. Why on earth would they want to support
someone so maladept?

Happily, the interview for the Rhodes proceeded somewhat more
successfully, almost as though the Marshall had provided me with a
dress rehearsal. The questions were similar; my responses seemed to
come more easily.
I sound fine,
I thought.
I sound fine.
However,
when asked if I participated in any sports, my judgment quickly went
sideways—I quipped that my primary exercise came from lifting sixty
cigarettes to my mouth each day. I knew the minute I'd finished the
sentence that it was precisely the wrong note—rather like a loud gong
at a tea party. The interviewers later wrote that they would have
approved me for the next round of interviews except for the total
absence of physical recreation in my life.

Fortunately, neither my nicotine habit nor my conversational
clumsiness was held against me by the panel deciding on the Marshall.
To my great surprise, I was accepted to do a B.Phil., a graduate degree
in philosophy. The Marshall scholarship would pay my tuition and
give me a stipend, to be paid in pounds—and at that point, the pound
was strong. If I planned correctly, I might even have a little left over.

In August, I would go to Oxford and become a member of the
University's Corpus Christi College.

As proud as I was, it was a measure of my constant tension
between wanting to be acknowledged and not wanting to stand out
that for the rest of the summer, whenever people thought I was talking
about going off to study at Corpus Christi College in Texas, I just let
them keep thinking that.

chapter four

A
FTER GRADUATING FROM
Vanderbilt University in June of
1977,1 returned for the summer to Miami and my family.

I was completely distraught on the entire flight back to
Miami—grief-stricken about leaving Vanderbilt, terrified of Oxford,
and horrified about having to go home. Transitions were always hard
for me—I was happiest with a predictable routine that I devised and
controlled—but this seemed overwhelming. The Vanderbilt libraries,
the Campus Grill, the buildings and sidewalks and trees, the places I'd
walked each day, the friends I'd finally made, the schedule that
prescribed almost every minute of my day—it all gave a precise order
and manageability to my life, and now it was over. And so, as the
summer days went by, with Miami simmering in the heat and
humidity, and the members of my family coming and going in
routines of their own, I began to unravel.