Certain words can change your brain forever and ever so you do have to be very careful about it.
my public apology to katniss everdeen
i honestly think that my biggest flaw on this platform is saying a very obvious thought/concept about the hunger games but feeling like it is the most profound idea ever. a proper response to this vice is that i would think twice before posting. however, i just feel too much about this idea right now, so hold on tight. here i go again.
i am taking a basic psychology course to fill out my schedule and i just had to do an assignment where I had to choose which type of amnesia (retrograde or anterograde) i would prefer to have (obviously, it would be preferable to not have either, but for the sake of the assignment i had to choose one). basically, you would have to choose whether you would want to lose all of your memories before the brain injury (retrograde) or lose your ability to form new memories (anterograde). i immediately chose to retrograde because it sounds like hell to not be able to remember new experiences and form new relationships. to be stuck in time essentially.
but then i was talking to my husband about how i would want him to remind me of my love for him if i lost my memories. and he responded that it might not work because there is a very real chance that i wouldn't want to be with him. that i wouldn't find him attractive or see all the qualities that i have learned to love in him. and that was like a punch to the gut.
it is like peeta mellark crept into my thoughts saying "you're not very big, are you? or particularly pretty?" as he totally forgot why he could possibly be in love with the girl in front of him. i am sure that people were trying to convince peeta of his love for katniss, but he literally couldn't see why he loved her. all of the memories were gone. at this point, he didn't see the point in trying to love katniss again, despite the many readers' (including myself) attempts to scream through the book for him to remember.
and, so, after thinking about what it would be like to lose my memories, my mind shifted to think about what would happen if my spouse forgot his memories of me. if he wanted nothing to do with me. if he couldn't even see why he even loved me in the first place. and i was immediately struck with a sharp pain. it is a pain that i can only imagine is a fraction of what it would feel like to see the person who loves you so unconditionally forget all of the memories that bonded you together and then just discard you. to have your other half severed from your soul and despite your efforts to sew them back on, they don't want to be paired with you anymore.
when i first read mockingjay (and many times after, tbh), i was always so angry at katniss for just leaving peeta and not trying to help him. i would be so frustrated that she was missing peeta the entire time they were apart, but just left him when hijacked! peeta returned. but i guess i never extended my empathy for peeta to katniss. i never tried to think about how unbearable the pain would be. i never thought about how between having to choose to interact with your other half who has been changed to not want you and running away, i would choose to run away. i would choose to run away if it meant that i didn't have to feel my soul shake with suffering every single time i interacted with my loved one who didn't even really want me around. i would run.
because it seems better to try to run and use other obligations to smother the constant heartbreak and grief rather than live in a constant hell where your heart is going to keep breaking anyway.
so, in short, this is my public apology to katniss everdeen for ever being angry that she tried to run away from peeta after he forgot that why he could ever love her. because girl, same. i sure as hell wouldn't be stronger than her. i would run to try to escape the extreme pain of seeing a stranger who does not want anything to do with me when i look at the face of my lover. in. a. damn. heartbeat.
