Dispatch from the Nut House
“Being an author is being in charge of your own personal insane asylum.” – Terri Guillemets
When I worked as a home manager at a developmental disabilities unit of the Illinois Department of Mental Health, people often asked if there was a career path. I told them that we kept advancing up the chain of command until we became patients. The same path exists for writers.
As CEO and patient, you’re in charge of your own delusions and treatment plan and the novels you write while a patient.
As CEO, I have banned all shock treatments as well as any purported “caregiver” named Mildred Ratched. For the reasons why, see the movie “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.” Shock treatments and Nurse Ratched are placed in our fiction to relight our readers.
While based on APA clinical practice guidelines, hospital treatment protocols vary depending on age, types of voices heard, and the persistence of hallucinations when manuscripts are set aside for the day. And yet, when all is written and done, the writer can only be discharged when s/he stops writing often with the assistance of Alprazolam 0.25 mg PRN.
Living in the nut house is standard practice for a writer, yet in describing it, I don’t mean to belittle proper psychological and/or psychiatric treatments for those who need help! My premise is that all writers need help and that that need is a side effect of the career. I agree with Dorothy Parker’s prescription: “If you have any young friends who aspire to become writers, the second greatest favor you can do them is to present them with copies of ‘The Elements of Style.’ The first greatest, of course, is to shoot them now, while they’re happy.”
Looks innoce
nt, doesn’t it?Writers create worlds. But they’re not powerful enough to become gods. The strain is just too much. Hence, creating worlds often leads to the nut house, i.e. the Bellevue in their neighborhood. At best, the creation of worlds and characters is an exciting roller coaster ride. At worst, it’s a flight over the cuckoo’s nest. Either way, the trip might be an illusion.
Here at the nut house, we get “three squares a day,” access to the best Jungian therapists, and a warm bed to sleep in. Yes, there are bars on the windows and doors and visitors are limited, but that’s all for our protection–or so they say.
If you’re a reader, no need to worry. We’re behind these bars for you and, I guess, because living this way is all we know.
Malcolm R. Campbell writes magical realism, paranormal, and contemporary fantasy stories and novels.
