THE SHRINKS NEXT DOOR — BARBIE

I love a good nightmare. 

DR. BRYANT | 10AM MONDAY | GROUND FLOOR, BACK | CLARA “BARBIE” WRIGHT

Jan the receptionist said Dr. Bryant will see you now Miss Wright.

Something about the way she walks click! click! click! obviously in Barbie heels, remember the little feet always tippy-toe-ready for high heels. I imagined her – that’s half the fun of doing this – with painted-on Barbie eyes, a stiff blonde do like who’s that star from The Birds, her pink plastic van parked on the street maybe a door swinging open those latches were always shit.

I know where they’re going so I move the glass off that wall rush through the kitchen to the den where pictures of my parents and grandparents hang and it’s funny when I’m working in this room it’s as if I am eavesdropping on them, my parents and grandparents I mean, and not the shrink next door who as I mentioned is Dr. Emmett Bryant, a name requiring precise diction when said aloud.

There are chalk circles like bubbles on the wall indicating the most sensitive areas. I quickly choose my sweet spot, pull up the pouf and then like a jackknife put my pad of paper on my knee, take the pen from behind my ear, place the glass and lean in ready to catch every word.

This is Miss Clara Wright’s first appointment so before they get into it there are introductions, I know Dr. Emmett’s style, first they decide what to call each other, where to put her purse, where she should sit or if she should lie down like in the movies, like the Dr. Penfield, I smell burnt toast one or what was that one about Eve?

He doesn’t offer anything just gets right to it like he’s a surgeon.

It’s always trauma of course nobody’s going to sit there and get their brains cut open for anything less. I mean sometimes they offer it right up, show him where to make the first incision if you will, but other times it’s more insidious and requires exploratory surgery and that’s the kind I like.

Tippi Hedron!

Much of the trauma is the childhood kind which I enjoy.  

It takes a while for things to get going next door, for the blood to flow and tongue to loosen. It’s quiet for a few minutes so a bit of time to tell you what I’ve been thinking about since Clara arrived with those clicks.

You are going to think I am obsessed with Barbie, but it’s just that after picturing Clara as Barbie in Barbie clothes it made me think of all the Barbie clothes my mother made for me and my sister. She was the real thing, my mother, an actual seamstress and our Barbie got miniature versions of whatever she was making with the leftover fabric. They were beautiful, those dresses, so intricate, real darts and everything, cinched waists, very girly! She added lace to some, other embellishments too, she even sewed a pearl necklace on the long blush satin number. She knew we’d change the clothes all the time – our Barbies were busy bees! – so each snap had four bundles of stitches since we weren’t careful although not as reckless as she predicted.

Childhood trauma means different things to different people and is perhaps too common, too overused a term, a catch-all if you will because what some think is trauma is a walk in the park for others. I mean take Clara for instance she said her father never paid attention to her blah blah blah. What I thought was more interesting was right away the shrink asked about her mother, you know, did she get attention from her mother which in my opinion doesn’t matter when she clearly felt she was neglected by her father. 

It’s like saying I’m thirsty and somebody saying take a bath.

It’s always the same after the first flutter there’s more silence I think it’s how trust develops.

I don’t know how she did it my busy mother you know with us and my brother and my dad out of town most of the time and she didn’t drive but marched us all to the grocery store and the laundry mat, etc. yet she found time to fiddle with elaborate dresses so small she could fit them on her hand which she did, placing the knuckles of her first two fingers where Barbie’s tits would go so she’d get the darts right and I’d die laughing inside.

Usually with women they are unable to love the right kind of man due to absent fathers blah blah blah. They cry about being ignored and the shrink’s no help he doesn’t say oh for chrisssssake don’t be such a baby.

This is his livelihood after all. So instead of dismissing her nonsense, he says further appointments are necessary. Dr. B calls Jan in and together they figure out the time and date which I scribble down as neatly as I can. 

It’s the cruel mothers I like – wait don’t get me wrong – I don’t mean the Sybil kind of cruel, but the others, the ones whose twisted behaviour is tinged with a certain kind of love although toxic producing daughters the shrink next door pokes and prods with question marks like scalpels. 

Eventually the spewing starts – it’s fascinating – I can’t write fast enough and shorthand doesn’t cover those phonics.