Pity

by Twila Nesky-Newth

I loathe pity. Unreasonable, perhaps but I do. Pity is one of the highest, thickest, most impenetrable walls I know that divides the haves from the have-nots. Emotions like anger, outrage, disgust, are all motivators. They move people to action, whether positive or negative.
But pity is an immobilizing pair of cement boots and a murky river. It kills the will and allows the object of pity to curl up around a precious core of hurt, to protect and nurse its pitiful aspects. Geez! Don’t get me started.

If I were to meet myself 20 years ago, I’m sure all sorts of emotions would arise, but pity wouldn’t be one of them because pity downright hurts. Perhaps that’s why I drag my feet when it comes to telling people about certain parts of my past. If anyone were to feel sorry for me now for things that happened way back when, it would bring the hurting back to life. When I was a wild and reckless street kid, I’d be doing my own thing, maybe panhandling, maybe happily stoned out of my gourd. Then I would see it—I’d see someone’s eyes melt with sadness at the sight of me, and to see myself through their eyes made me sick.

It was worse later, when as a straight and sober single mom, someone would see me struggling with my infant daughter and her defective stroller, with the plastic loops of over-stuffed grocery bags cutting into the soft parts of my forearms and more bags looped over each handle of the stroller, altogether weighing us down to a crawl. Inwardly congratulating myself for my ingenuity, for surviving a difficult situation and getting the groceries home once again, I was often stopped dead in my tracks by the eyes of a benevolent stranger. To see and feel the most well-meant and genuine pity coming from someone when up to that moment I’d thought I was accomplishing a great thing was like having my skin peeled off—the hurt in their eyes made me feel hopeless and left me naked to the bone.

I didn’t realize how toxic an emotion like pity could be until years after I became stable; namely, after I owned a home, had a good job, a running car, and savings in the bank. One day, I happened to share with a work-friend a vignette from my past, just a small sliver really, peanuts compared to the whole of my scarier years. As I spun out the story, her eyes grew round and moist. When I was done, she touched my
arm softly, and said in a subdued, funeral home voice, “Did you have to become a prostitute, too?” It wasn’t her question that stupified me but her obvious eagerness to admire, pity, and forgive me all the more if I had become a prostitute that shut my mouth.

I’ve never seen a fortress complete with moat, alligators, portcullis, and drawbridge erected in less then two minutes, but if I had, it would have been Tinker Toys compared to the wall my friend had just plunked down between us. From that day forward, she treated me with special
deference, occasionally tried to offer me money, “In case I needed it,” which I didn’t, and spoke to me in tones that suggested a 1950’s movie where everyone has been told the lead character is dying of cancer except the lead character.

To her, I died the day I’d told her my story and was now a ghost of her former friend, an ethereal being whose current successes, deeds, and creativity were a diffuse scattering of molecules. Whenever she tried to look at me, she couldn’t see who I was in the here and now. That part was a mere mist, easily penetrated. From then on, she always peered through me, straight into my lurid past.