Her Bad Mother

Sunday, April 16, 2006

Bad Mother auf Naxos

So, some of you, it seems, would like to hear more about the soap operatic drama that was the Incident in Greece.

But first!

GRATUITOUS BABY PHOTO


Back to the story. It's not a story that I particularly enjoy telling. For one, it's not the most pleasant thing to re-live. For another, it tends to provoke one of two reactions: that it can't possibly be true (var., that I've undoubtedly exaggerated the story), or that it had to have been brought about by my own actions. So I tend to begin from a defensive position in relating the story, which makes me uncomfortable.

But my defensiveness is not just indignation at being doubted. I'm defensive about the story because the suggestions that the story might be exaggerated, or that it was somehow my fault that the incident occured, touch a nerve. Because I've asked myself those same questions over and over since it happened. From the moment I got on the plane out of Athens I've been asking myself whether what happened really happened, and whether I understood correctly what happened.

The rough details, as outlined in the comment that I appended to that post:

It's really not all that interesting - I wasn't snatched off the street or anything. It was just the result of some bad decisions. I'd met Creepy Creepopolous on a flight to Europe from Vancouver - tho' he didn't seem remotely creepy and anyway, I thought he was *gay,* I really did - and we hung out in Amsterdam for a while and then kept in touch over the following year. When I ended up between paying gigs the next summer, he said that he could get me a job on Naxos (where his family lived and ran a number of businesses, incuding the island radio station). When I got there, there was no job, my passport was taken from me and locked away in the same room as the telephone, and I acquired a thuggy Greek 'bodyguard' who got between me and any and all English-speaking persons. Creepy declared his love and spent days insisting that I would really be happy living on Naxos rather than in Barcelona and that I just needed to give it a chance and refused to let me a) contact anybody, and b) leave. The lock-picking, window-leaping escape I noted in the post; I'll save the descriptives for another day. Nothing happened to Creepy that I know of: the Greek authorities weren't interested in anything other than ensuring that a 'tourist' be able to get off the island; Interpol couldn't really do anything without the co-operation of the Greeks. I was told that it was almost certainly a sex-trade slavery thing, but I really think that Creepy was just that - creepy. And lonely.

The facts are what they are - the false pretenses concerning the job (which were admitted to shortly after I arrived), the withholding of the passport and travellers checks and any and all means of communication with the off-island world, the bodyguard, etc. - and they all add up to BAD. I absolutely was held against my will. But it seems so fantastic and weird and unlikely that anytime I think of the story, I have to go through the facts like a checklist, just to make sure that it really happened the way that I thought it did.

The second issue - was it somehow my fault? - is trickier. This is, I'm told, a totally normal response to certain kinds of trauma. But still: I was barely 20 years old, trotting alone around Europe, heading off to the Greek islands for a phantom job on the word of some guy that I barely knew. (One note in my defence - I let everyone know where I was going and, on the advice of my parents, who were not at all keen on my adventures, I checked in at the Canadian consulate in Athens when I arrived to inform them that I was there. These actions later proved crucial.) But, again, I might have exercised more prudence. I know that I didn't 'ask for it,' but didn't I expose myself to the risk?

And. I suggested in my comments to the post that if Creepy really was infatuated with me in the creepiest way, I had no idea. But this is another thing that I have interrogated and re-interrogated over the years. Did I know? 'Cause if I did, wasn't it irresponsible of me to treat that so lightly? I've said that I thought that he was gay, and this is true: when we met - well before the age of the metrosexual - he was all 'girl, I love your clothes!' and 'is that a BCBG skirt?' and full of stories about how he had been working in a hair salon on Robson Street in Vancouver and full of compliments about the style of my hair (which, yes, still had the bangs, but this was the early nineties, people, so sue me.) No straight male of my acquaintance at that time could tell BCBG from GWG, nor would they ever say anything more about my hair than 'grr, argh, pretty:' noting that the BCBG skirt was really an Azzedine Alaia knock-off and that my hair had razored layers would have been unthinkable. So, I identified him as Safe Male. No Sexual Threat was virtually stamped across his forehead.

But, but... I knew that he was a big fan of mine and I liked that. His letters were always full of praise for how smart and cool and funny I was. I liked that because, hell, who wouldn't, but I also liked that because I was really quite miserable at the time. I was infatuated with a beautiful Catalan boy who I knew, knew, was chronically unfaithful, but I couldn't quite bring myself to end that relationship for once and for all. So, so banal, in retrospect, but at the time, so, so painful: there were countless lamentations - written and sobbed - of 'why why why can't he love only me?' I knew that I should pack it in and move back to Canada and go back to school but I just couldn't do it: my parents had just divorced and I was confused about what I wanted to do with my life and the only things defining me at that moment in time were my (crap crappy angsty) writing and that god-forsaken relationship (which was fueling the crap crappy writing. If Simone de Beauvoir could be all existential about love, then so could I.) So when this other person, Creepy-who-was-not-yet-creepy, this person who thought that I was fan-fucking-tastic and super-cool and just the smartest girl ever offered me an out - come to Greece! work on an island! make new friends! - I thought, yes. (And also? I'll show that cheating lying boyfriend. Eat. my. dust.)

So I went. And when Creepy declared his love - confessing that he regularly laid roses on the westward point of the Temple that was said to be the place where Ariadne had, according to local mythology, committed suicide over the faithlessness of Theseus, and that he had placed them there, facing Spain, for me (ew, ew) - my thoughts were, in this exact order, complete with curses: you're fucking kidding me; ew, lame; seriously?; ew, ew, ew. And then: well, at least someone fucking loves me. And finally: figures that it would be a psycho freak. (He'd already started being weird: I didn't have the bodyguard yet, but he had already taken my passport, etc, and had locked the phone away. So we skipped the whole, um, that's sweet, but I'm just not into you that way thing and went straight to are you fucking serious? and that's when things got bad.)

Years later, I saw Strauss's Ariadne auf Naxos at the Met, and when Zerbinetta performed her coloratura about how the only way to get over a man is to fall in love with another, I shuddered. I did go to Greece to get over Catalan Boy; did some inner part of me seek out being adored, to make that process easier? And if it did, did that put me at fault, in part, for the incident?

So it is that the whole thing came to represent a whole host of insecurities and issues that I wish I'd never had. Had I been a more together, self-assured girl, I used to tell myself, I would never have gone to Greece. Nor, not incidentally, would I have languished in that miserable relationship in Spain and tormented myself about perceived deficiencies in my lovability. And so it is that I don't much like talking about it, and that I have never considered 'writing' about it in anything other than a personal journal. (Because, too, hello? Banal. The torments of romantic youth leading to High Drama? Been done.)

My prevailing thoughts about the whole thing now tend, not surprisingly, to the maternal. How do I spare my daughter from the insecurities that sometimes lead women to do silly things? Can I spare my daughter from those insecurities? My parents raised me well, and loved me well. A surplus of love throughout my life to that point was not enough to provided me with a bullet-proof self-esteem. I know, I know - no self-esteem is bullet-proof, nor should it be. Humility, fragility and vulnerability are necessary parts of a good person, and I want my daughter to be that. But I want to protect her, too, and provide her with the means to protect herself: there's a part of me that wants to ensure that she has the toughest outer shell, so that she'll never get her heart broken, get hurt, or - god forbid - feel unloved or unloveable. Again, however, I know that that's not possible, nor really desirable.

So that, I suppose, will be the test of my motherhood, and, of course, of Husband's fatherhood: providing all the love and nurture that are necessary to build a resilient shell; to create every opportunity for our daughter to be both soft and strong (gah, tissue commercial cueing up here...), for her to be both fully secure in love and yet open to the storm that love can be.

And to keep her off Naxos.


Love and be loved well, WonderBaby.

And kick the asses of all others.

19 Comments:

Blogger Unknown said...

Ok as a victim of date rape- or not even date rape- I can't even figure out the correct way to describe it (acquaintance rape maybe?) I can tell you that no matter WHAT you did, it was not your fault that you were held against your will. Period. Stop partially blaming yourself. So you trusted someone you shouldn't have. We've all been there, but that still doesn't give someone the right to take advantage of our trust.

12:43 PM  
Blogger Redneck Mommy said...

Such a story. After reading this, the only thought I had was "Thank God she's ok." I don't believe you are to blame, I think you were deceived and you trusted a nutjob. The key word in that sentence is he is a NUTJOB. Therefore, how can you be held accountable for trusting someone who pretended to be something other than what he was: A NUTJOB.

All in all, I am glad you are ok and I hope that you heal. Enjoy your family and when you are teaching Wonderbaby about the whackos of the world, maybe she will listen. Cuz mommy really does know what she is talking about.

1:14 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The story is amazing - and you tell it well. I don't second guess you for a minute, as I've had my own share of doozies (that was an ultra doozy IMO) myself.

Your clarity is uncanny - particularly your desire as a mother to prepare your child for what lies ahead - namely, making good choices for herself.

You can't fault yourself for making a choice that was good for you at the time. We all have rebounds - not just from relationships - but our experiences mold us and perhaps make us more vulnerable.

I have worked with some nutjobs and know that generally, the nuttiest ones don't really seem that nutty. Perhaps his ploy was to come off as fun, gay, and safe for a straight woman. It certainly doesn't sound like he was an idiot - and quite frankly, either were you.

You can equip your daughter with everything possible and she still may make "bad" decisions - I think the only thing you can do (this is what I think about a lot as a mother of a daughter) is hope that she will know she can always come to you for guidance and support. I try to model that (as I'm pretty sure you do now) with my own great decision making, coping, problem solving, and love.

She will make mistakes, but your hope is that they will be small and that she will learn from them.

I don't "know" you but I feel as though you are a kindred spirit - and your daughter is quite fortunate to have you.

2:14 PM  
Blogger MrsFortune said...

Wow, I can easily see how you ended up in the situation, and I know that I probably would have followed much the same course of action had someone been so infatuated with me. And like you, I just want my kids to be free of those insecurities and feelings of inadequacy that would cause them to behave in such a way. God knows I didn't escape them...

Thanks so much for sharing this.

2:22 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

You were intentionally duped. You can't possibly be responsible for that. That person intended for this to happen. You did not. As for your own child, you do the very best you can and then you send her out into the world knowing you armed her with love and strength and knowlege. That's all you can do. It's probably one of the hardest parts of parenting...letting them go and hoping they make smart choices.

7:02 PM  
Blogger Christina said...

I agree that there is no blame to be put on you. It's not like you met him that day and decided to go with him to Greece. You had developed a relationship with him through letters and conversation, and during that time, you had deemed him to be safe.

I think in that situation most of us would have acted the same way. You had no way of knowing he was not the person you thought he was. Had he told you about the roses before you got to the island, I'm sure you would have written him off as a freak job and cut off contact.

As for our daughters, I think all we can do is love them and teach them about the world. Generally people can be trusted, but we as parents are responsible for making them aware of the dangers of the world. If you tell your daughter this story someday, it may serve as an important lesson to her, so she will be extra careful in considering situations such as that. I'm not saying to make her scared of everything - just more aware.

And sadly, like you I've found that some of the hardest lessons to learn in life can only be learned by living through them. We come out of it stronger, though.

7:52 PM  
Blogger Chicky Chicky Baby said...

There are a lot of things that we do in our early twenties that we really can't be held responsible for - or beat ourselves up over. Hell, the part of our brain that controls judgement isn't fully developed until we're around 22 or 23 years old. It sounds like you followed what you thought was a good opportunity. The thing that gets me is the thought of that guy still running around the hills of Greece duping unsuspecting young women. Scary.

A very well written post (as usual) about what must be an amazingly difficult subject for you. I hope this helped you. I've always said (about mine) that blogs are cheap therapy!

8:30 PM  
Blogger Jezer said...

Eight weeks after the most heinous breakup of my life, I hopped on an airplane and headed to California to spend the weekend with a guy I barely knew. So, yeah, I can totally see how that happened.

I'm so glad that you got out of there!

9:33 PM  
Blogger Mom101 said...

And this is why I'm very hesitant to judge the Monica Lewinsky's of the world. We ALL did stupid shit at 20. Even when we knew better, or when we couldn't possibly have. Now I just hope that we are giving our daughters enough common sense to get into less of it than we did ourselves. Sounds like you managed okay yourself. Wow.

11:48 PM  
Blogger Annie, The Evil Queen said...

Wow. I saw your comment on Mama Tulip's page and loved the shirt your daughter is wearing in her photo and checked out your profile. And landed here in the middle of your harrowing story. This is a terrifying story to read, I can't imagine how terrifying it was to live. It will be, I hope, an extremely effective cautionary tale when your daughter is old enough to hear it. As others have said, judgement is an iffy thing in the early 20's. Thank God you had the resourcefulness to save yourself.

By teh way, that is one gorgeous kid you've got yourself there. I wish I could pull off a hat like that. :)

2:10 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

First of all, your daughter is GORGEOUS and that hat? Well, I wouldn't expect anything less from the Mom who put her in the coolest onesie ever!

I can also totally understand how this happened and all of the questions that nag at you. I think it is similar to when women question themselves on being raped. Of course, it is never their (or your) fault, but they second-guess so much.

7:44 AM  
Blogger Sandra said...

Wow. Thanks for sharing that story. It must have been a terrifying experience. We've all been 20 and made spontaneous, crazy choices but your trip to Greece did not in anyway give permission for what transpired. You are absolutely not to blame - no woman who experiences any form of abuse is.

What you took from your experience is inspiring as is the strength you will pass on to Wonderbaby. She is one lucky little girl to have you as a Mama.

11:32 AM  
Blogger mamatulip said...

Wow. That's quite the story. Makes me think of the old saying, "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger." I'm glad you managed to get out of that situation.

Your daughter is BEAUTIFUL. Just beautiful. :)

4:32 PM  
Blogger Suzanne said...

What a scary experience. I too fear the decisions that my daughter (and son, too) will make before she reaches an age of reason. Thanks for sharing your story, and thanks for stopping by my blog the other day.

6:02 PM  
Blogger GIRL'S GONE CHILD said...

Fuck, dude. I'm so sorry. Same thing happened to me. I was fifteen on vacation with my parents in Hawaii. I met a lifeguard. He was hot. I went to a party with him. Etc. Etc. I hate Hawaii now.

And by the way, your daughters hat? Perfect.

9:19 PM  
Blogger Her Bad Mother said...

Thanks, all, for the lovely and supportive comments. I long ago realized that it wasn't my fault, strictly speaking. But it's a fine line between fault and responsibility - the question, 'could I have avoided this?' is a tricky one, because the answer is probably yes. BUT... if I lived my life avoiding every situation that could possibly lead to trouble, I would have lost out on so much else. I could have avoided the situation by not going to Europe, not traveling alone, not having, um, romances, not having adventures... but then I wouldn't be who I am now. So there's the trick... I want my daughter to have the fullest, richest life possible, but I also want to wrap her up in a completely safe, hermetically sealed bubble so that she never gets hurt or scared or lonely.

Not possible? Gah. Maternal love is gonna be a bitch.

9:41 AM  
Blogger Kristi said...

Glad you realize that you are not to blame. He had definately schemed and plotted the trap and yes, what a wacko.
I'm glad you had the ability and state of mind to escape. Alot of people wouldn't be that strong-willed.
Thanks for sharing your story.

11:16 AM  
Blogger Bridgermama said...

Whoa, you could seriously make a movie or write a book about this. The sad thing is that this could have happened to me when I was 20. I was freakishly insecure and relied on the attention of males to make me feel good about who I was. I think this is the case for so many young girls. The important thing is that you got away, realized it was not your fault and learned from it.

I am scared to death of having a daughter. I want so badly to instill in her that she is her own person and to be comfortable in her skin. I also want her to realize that learning to love yourself should always take precedent over love and attention from a man. I did the opposite. I fell in love first and because of this entered a 4 year abusive relationship.

I ended up leaving the bastard, but fell prey to him for the same reasons you got involved with "Creepy."

I believe that these experiences will help us to raise our daughters. It is actually comforting to think that perhaps something good can come from them. Our little ones will, hopefully, never have to go through anything similar to what we did!

2:30 PM  
Blogger Unknown said...

it's my first time visiting, but what a powerful entry to read for a virgin like m'self.

in terms of seeing it as a bad decision, based on some sort of low-self esteem issues--i would say that making a decision like that is also completely ballsy and indicative of a very strong character. (which, obviously, sums you up!) how could you know?

i have a story that is slightly similar (only without the abduction part). when i was sixteen, a london policeman became very enamored of me when i was staying at my grandparents, and so decided to find out where i lived (80 miles from London) and stalk me each day after school. he was a *policeman* for chrissakes. (and 32, EWWW).

yes, i know i am being naive, but somehow london coppers just seem like *good sorts.* well, unarmed, at least.

i might post on it myself one day. but thanks for this--best bit of literature i've read all day.

3:45 PM  

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