In the last couple of days, though, it’s occurred to me that I have a major piece of literal thinking that derails me time and time again: I take people at their word. Or, to put it another way: When people say things, the picture that their words paint seems so real to me that the image takes on a reality of its own, even when I know that the words aren’t true. And worse than that, I believe that other people will be taken in by these words. That’s when I start to worry, big time.

Part of the problem is that I don’t really understand deception. I don’t understand why people would say things that are patently false. I can come up with all kinds of reasons for this phenomenon, from self-deception to outright cruelty, but viscerally, I feel a deep loyalty to words and what they represent. Just as I would never use a saw to cut an apple, I’d never use a word to signify something that I know isn’t true. I can’t fathom why other people don’t see it that way.

But what really gives words their power over me is that I see them spelled out in my mind when people speak. When someone tells me his or her name, for instance, I see the name spelled out in my head. Multiply this example a few million times, and you’ll get a good picture of how my mind sees information on a daily basis. It’s as though the words themselves, because they are so vivid in my mind, have actual, living substance, rather than being inert, disposable objects.

This way of seeing trips me up in a couple of ways. For one thing, it can make me very inflexible. For example, when my husband says that he is going to be home at 8 pm, I see the words so clearly in my mind that it’s as though what they signify has already happened.

Time and again, my husband and I have knocked heads over this issue. He’ll tell me that he’s going to put Plan 1.0 into action, and I’ll get ready for Plan 1.0. Then, Plan 1.0 changes to Plan 1.1, or Plan 1.13, or Plan 1.13A or, for reasons I can’t even begin to imagine, Plan 5.0. I mean, how can you go from Plan 1.13A to Plan 5.0 without going through Plans 2 through 4 first?

If there is an external, objective, unchangeable reason for the plan to be modified, I can adjust—not always gracefully, but I can get there within a reasonable amount of time. After all, it’s not my husband’s fault if there’s a backup on the highway or the store doesn’t carry my daughter’s favorite brand of cereal.

But if the plan changes just because people decide that they’d rather do Plan 1.13 than Plan 1.0, I’m lost. Utterly lost. Ultimately, I throw my hands up in resignation at the desecration of all that is high and holy, wander in a wilderness bereft of logic, and send the following unanswerable question into the void:

Do WORDS have ANY meaning AT ALL anymore?

I have spoken that question so many times in my life, I can’t keep count.

Now, if inflexibility were the only problem that results from the vividness of the words in my head, I wouldn’t mind. But there is a much worse problem. When someone says something that I know isn’t true, I get so confused that I start to panic. I can adduce all kinds of reasons why a person would lie, but the cognitive dissonance causes me so much physical, mental, and emotional pain that my current context fades out, and a brave new world comes into being, hewn from the stone containing the lies, as though the previous context had never existed.

And if this entire new reality hinges on someone saying something untrue about me, dear G-d in heaven, I’ve got to clear my schedule so that I can perseverate on it for several days and drive my husband nuts with the catastrophe going on in my head:

WHAT? Oh no! How can anyone SAY that about me? It’s not fair! It’s so untrue. And here are all the REASONS it’s untrue. [Insert numerous reasons here, repeat them, increase volume with each repetition.] And oh, yeah, I just thought of another reason. [Add new reason, repeat entire sequence, increase volume with each repetition.]

This is bullshit. How can anyone say SAY such things?

Oh. My. G-d. Maybe they’re right. Maybe everything they’re saying is true. Maybe the sky really is red at noon and we all walk on our hands to the store on Tuesday. I mean, if it wasn’t true, why would they say it?

And maybe it really is all my fault. Maybe the sky was blue and we all walked upright until I came along and fucked it all up.

No, no, no. It’s not my fault. I know that. I know it, I know it, I know it. [Insert numerous reasons here, repeat them, increase volume with each repetition.] And oh, yeah, here are twelve more reasons.  [Add twelve more reasons here, repeat entire sequence, increase volume with each repetition.]

But no one else knows it’s not my fault. Oh, crap. Everyone’s going to believe that I turned the fucking sky red. My life is toast.

It goes on like this until I get a migraine. Then, somehow, if the Sumatriptan kicks in fast enough, the hard drive with all this crap on it melts like the wicked witch in the Wizard of Oz—except that the flying monkeys scoop up some of the best bits and bytes and scatter them hither and yon into my poor, tired brain. After all, the witch must be avenged. 

At that point, I figure, I’d better keep busy and have some ice cream. So what if dairy isn’t good for me? Holy shit, the world is ending, and it’s all my fault. Give me my chocolate.

© 2009 by Rachel Cohen-Rottenberg

There were some older boys at the end of the block who liked throwing sticks at our tires. I couldn’t understand why. What kind of fun is that? I figured that whatever their reasons for this absurd game, they’d get sick of it after awhile. So Debbie and I just kept going around the block, gamely riding through the gauntlet of flying sticks, until it was time to go home for dinner.

But the game continued, day after day, and showed no signs of stopping. I began to feel frightened—frightened not by the boys, but by my inability to understand what they were doing. When I told my parents what was happening, they became upset and told me that the boys were trying to knock us off our bikes. When I heard that, it was hard for me to fathom. It was the first time I’d ever experienced another child being cruel to me, and it just made no sense.

I am still that way today. I have been through so much cruelty in my life, and yet, any kind of cruelty shocks me. In fact, the shock is worse each time. The revulsion I feel is physical.

There was another boy who liked to scare me while I was riding my bike. He would stand out in the street and say “Stop in the name of the law!” So I stopped. Why? Because he said so. Literal me. I wasn’t any better at understanding deception than I was at understanding cruelty. I just took him at his word.

Once I’d stopped, he’d say “Can I see your license, please?” When I told him I didn’t have one, he’d say, “Well, then the police will come and throw you in jail!” I’d be so scared that I’d run into the house, shaking.

The game went on for a few weeks before my mother figured out a solution. She got a key chain with a replica of a small license plate and told me, “Next time he stops you, show him this.” So I did. And it worked. He never bothered me again. I was quite pleased.

But I still don’t understand. I don’t understand any of it. I’ve heard every explanation in the book, but I’ll never be able to feel inside me why someone would try to knock a six-year-old kid off a bike, just for fun.

© 2009 by Rachel Cohen-Rottenberg