My Autobiography of Carson McCullers: A Memoir

by Jenn Shapland

At the time, of course, I thought I was in love. I didn’t know it was a form of evasion. But it occurred to me years later that this was a convenient way to avoid ever actually dating anyone, or thinking seriously about my feelings. I didn’t realize I had feelings for another woman until my first girlfriend in college pursued me, and I had to come to terms with what I felt. It’s possible that, without her, I never would have allowed myself to desire anyone with awareness and serious intent. It takes the right circumstances, the right person for our own desires to out us to ourselves.

When I read Carson’s fiction, it is clear that empathy is a choice a person makes, moment to moment, in how they approach other people. On the page and off.

No love exists in a vacuum, no matter how much it feels like it does. It is filtered by all the loves we’ve ever read about, witnessed, watched, lived. Its definition is given by use (to nod at Wittgenstein). Love changes in each phase of a relationship, each day, even. As we, too, change constantly. Nor can love be proven. It’s more complicated, harder to see than a ring, a marriage license, a description of any physical encounter.