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It’s Complex
If you heard my show from a couple of weeks ago or read my book, you may already know that I’m pretty interested in the idea of complex trauma. Up until a few years ago, I thought that trauma was defined as a single monumental event. Being assaulted, a car crash, the sudden death of a loved one. Trauma, I thought, occurs when something like that happens and it’s too huge to comprehend and process so the mind stuffs it away, only to have it haphazardly reemerge later.
And that is one kind of trauma. But there’s also the idea of complex trauma where multiple events occur over a period of time from the same root cause. The example I always use for this is an alcoholic parent. Sometimes it’s the parent not being home for a while. Other times they show up drunk to a school event or they don’t show up at all. Maybe the family needs to leave town quickly for some reason. The series of events coalesces into a feeling that there is no real safety in life, that you can’t count on anyone or anything.
In adulthood, that child will have a harder time forming lasting friendships and long-term stable romantic relationships. They’ll struggle more at work and school. And it’s because that’s what they were taught. They were taught to put in extra work, extra stress, extra anxiety to protect themselves from the inherent threats they see in the world. The same world that other people get to simply not worry about.
Trauma is an individual phenomenon. You and I might be in the same car crash and one of us could be mentally messed up from it and the other ends up fine. But we live in times where it benefits us to look at complex trauma. On the show a couple weeks ago, I talked about how covid is affecting our society in much the same way complex trauma affects an individual, when you look at statistics on people reporting depression and anxiety symptoms as well as the dissatisfaction among students and employees.
I would argue that the January 6th insurrection of last year, the coup attempt, and its aftermath has had similar effects on our view of government. The invasion of the Capitol building eroded the sense that there is security and safety at the heart of government, that things will be conducted soberly and with decorum within the organization that we are meant to trust. But beyond that, the response and contextualization over the past year by the Republicans has been a reinforcement of the idea that to Republicans there is nothing sacred. Politicians on the right have downplayed the invasion, implied that it was conducted by covert leftists, and refused to accept the proven reality that the election was honest.
Then there’s the fact that thus far, while plenty of the a-holes who invaded the Capitol have been arrested, convicted, and sentenced, the people who may have planned the thing have yet to face consequences. And maybe they will, maybe this is how deliberative this process needs to be, I’m no lawyer, but it all adds up to feel like a world without safeguards or sufficient stability. And that makes it complex trauma all over again.
So when I watch cable news today, featuring a hearing where Liz Cheney and Dick Cheney(!) are the only Republicans present, it hits different than standard congressional politics or cable news rhetoric.
That horror you’re feeling about 1/6 that doesn’t even feel like it’s processing? This might be it.
We’re on to a new year. When you reach a certain age, all new years feel like The Distant Future. I want a jetpack and a moon colony and a luxury apartment perilously perched on a long pole from which I can never see the wasteland below.
21 Things That Helped Get Me Through 2021
1. Joe Pera Talks With You - A very funny, humane, and seemingly simple show that’s deceptively complex. This was one of two favorite tv programs among Moe parents but not among Moe children, who find it tedious.
2. Dogs - Whether you have dogs or not, have dogs! Two dogs, preferably. No one lives in the moment better than dogs. They are role models.
3. Stir Fry - Yes, that old college staple is back but better. Use an air fryer to get the tofu nice and firm and/or use some chicken. Use a rice cooker to get the rice in shape. Maybe this item should be “helpful appliances.
4. Stath Lets Flats - An odd British comedy available in the US on HBO Max about apartment rental agents in London. Stars Jamie Demetriou from Fleabag and his sister Natasia Demetriou from What We Do in the Shadows. Classic British comedy awkwardness.
5. Evermore album by Taylor Swift - T-Swizzle gets Sad Dad Superheroes The National to help!
6. No Body No Crime - Song off same album! T-Swizzle straight up kills a guy. Only T-Swizzle song to mention boating licenses.
7. 60 Songs That Explain the 90s - Rob Harvilla’s massively enjoyable podcast.
8. No Dogs In Space - Brilliant music history podcast from Marcus Parks and pal of Depresh Mode Carolina Hidalgo.
9. Vigorous walks without headphones in order to figure things out.
10. Traveling to Walla Walla, Washington - I had occasion to drive 1539 miles to my college town and enjoyed it immensely.
11. How To with John Wilson - Reflections on life and how to live it disguised as documentary. Check the credits: friggin’ Susan Orlean is one of the writers.
12. Cocaine & Rhinestones - Lengthy episodes about the lesser known aspects of country music history. I’m not even a country music fan and I loved it.
13. How To Write One Song by Jeff Tweedy - I used this book to help with writing songs but it’s useful for anyone attempting to do creative things. Generous and insightful. I interviewed Jeff at the Wilco loft once. He pulled up in a Subaru wagon. After the interview, he played me some recordings he had done the day before with Mavis Staples. It was a good day.
14. These fuckers:
15. This newsletter you’re reading - It’s a good way to keep my writing and, indeed, my thinking in shape.
16. Peanuts - the comic strip, the name of which Charles Schulz hated. This year, I wrote something for McSweeney’s, later adapted for my stage show Wits, about (not Peppermint) Patty. And I discovered that my therapist’s office is in the building that once housed Charles Schulz’s elementary school. He might have endured 4th grade in the exact same room I sit in. I don’t read the strips but I’m forever fascinated by the deep world they inhabit.
17. Vaccines - God, of course, the vaccines. Something that made me not nearly as afraid to die of a pandemic virus is a good thing.
18. Depresh Mode Sweatpants - I’m so delighted they let us have these made as our first merch item. A joke made into pants.
19. Beforeigners - Here’s the premise of this Norwegian tv show: people from the Viking days and the Victorian era start popping up in the Oslo harbor. Then everyone just has to deal with it. It’s a parable about immigration and racism but is also just weird and Norwegian, and I am also weird and Norwegian.
20. Looking for hidden cartoons in the world - like Happy Li’l Coffee Ghost.
21. Drawing cartoons - The new Max Fun animal podcast, Just the Zoo of Us, suggested animal mascots for each show and ours was the Waterfall Climbing Fish, which spends its life mouthsucking up the side of a waterfall. I’m working on an illustration for future golf shirts.