On the Shelf

“Was I ever crazy? Maybe. Or maybe life is… Crazy isn't being broken or swallowing a dark secret. It’s you or me amplified. If you ever told a lie and enjoyed it. If you ever wished you could be a child forever." 
                                                              -Girl, Interrupted 

Girl, Interrupted is my favorite movie. Angelina Jolie, Winona Ryder, Whoopie Goldberg. It's sensational to me, but most people think it's weird and don't like it. It scares some people, but not in a horror way, but a worrying way, like because I'm emotionally attached to this movie, I'll suddenly want to kill myself or I'll go crazy and go to a psych ward. Like being crazy is contagious. 

Is it?

Backing up... Girl, Interrupted is a 1993 memoir written by Susanna Kaysen, a woman who in 1967 at the age of 18 was sent to a psychiatric facility for two years after trying to kill herself (to her, the attempted suicide was metaphorical, she was trying to kill an aspect of her personality.) She didn't find out what illness kept her there until 25 years later. Borderline Personality Disorder was the final diagnosis.  

As I'm reading, I completely rationalize with her, which scares me more than a little. She's a completely rational, extremely intelligent woman. How can she possibly be crazy? I notice that I have some of the same tendencies as she did. Her process of thinking is scary similar to my own process of thought. 

Am I crazy? 

This is the constant question in my head though out my reading. I want to say, "Obviously not. I'm a normal person," but I know deep down I am. We all are, aren't we.

Kaysen says, “Was insanity just a matter of dropping the act?” 

Is it?

She recounts her experiences in the working world after her release. She could tell people were questioning their own sanity while talking to her. They saw her normalcy and wondered about their own state of mind.

"A person who doesn't talk to herself or stare off into nothingness is therefore more alarming than a person who does. Someone who acts 'normal' raises the uncomfortable question, What's the difference between that person and me?... If you're crazy, then I'm crazy..."  

We're all crazy. There's a thin line. Sanity is mostly chemical, a malfunction in the brain between neurons and neurotransmitters. Right? 

How can we differentiate between the sane and the crazy when the lines become more blurred everyday. "Crazy" people run countries and religious groups and are influential people, but are they really crazy? 

What's the definition? Is it the ability to be rational or rationalize actions. Susanna Kaysen is perfectly capable of rationalizing her actions. She's a fully functional, health adult, she's written best selling books. How did she earn two years in a loony bin? 

It makes you wonder about the lines we draw. Sanity isn't black and white. It's all grey. 

Insanity can be contagious after all.