I was recently discussing with my therapist just how much I think, and speak, in metaphor. Anyone who knows me (or, by now, anyone who has read even a little of my writing) notices that I can’t seem to get through a conversation (or a blog post) without employing at least one metaphor or simile or analogy or set of symbolism to put a picture to the topic at hand. I had been talking with her about how processing pain is simpler for some than it seems to be for me – and then without even a blink I carried on with how for some it might be like stepping through a puddle, while for me it’s swimming in the ocean…and then I leaned into it and suggested that it’s maybe more so a lake, nowadays, something not as deep or far-reaching, with clearly defined edges to it… Finally I stopped myself abruptly and asked her, “Why do I do that?!” If I could give myself a stern expression, I would have done so – you know, like that emoji with the one eyebrow raised…hm. That’s thinking in pictures yet again, isn’t it?

My therapist told me there isn’t a psychological explanation, per se, but essentially, it seems to be how I learned to cope from a young age. Some people with trauma turn to substances like drugs or alcohol to escape their pain; some people turn to sex, or food. Still others lean into things that society deems less innocuous, like video games or television or shopping, or any number of other possibilities. For lack of better language to describe it, she suggests I may have more or less gotten my brain addicted to imagination as a way to escape my reality. This explains my tendency to devour books (which was especially habitual when I was a child and teenager); any other world was preferable to my own. I always had the ability to easily lose myself in stories, and when I finish a particularly good book, I always have trouble pulling my brain back to present for a couple of days afterward. Some bibliophiles – people who love reading – call it a book hangover. Sounds a little silly, but it’s true; I get drunk on books, and high on imagery. I use metaphor constantly because I need to apply a little bit of fictional reasoning to help me make sense of the actual world around me.

Another thing about thinking in pictures so much, which I thought to myself but which my therapist didn’t say in these precise words, is, well duh, you’re an artist! And this is true, of course. But this might be a chicken-or-egg situation; does my brain lean into visualization so much because I’m an artist, or am I an artist because I’ve grown up leaning into visualization so much? I think they feed into each other. And if it were just a matter of pictures coming out into words from my mouth or on the page, or paint on the canvas, that would be fine. But this…quirk?…of mine can be very interfering.

I’ve had times in my life where I’m driving in heavy traffic on the highway, for example, and see a big truck on the opposite side, and my brain will randomly think, gee, what if that truck crosses the barrier and comes head-on toward me – and then I can’t get that image out of my head. Or, I’m driving along an overpass and suddenly I can so clearly imagine my car tipping over the side and dropping down onto the road below, that I end up self-inducing a mild panic attack. Not helped by PTSD which I think now my brain was primed for, my dreams are very, very vivid. Last week I had a random nightmare that I was running for my life in a forest, wearing a bright red cloak, and I was being chased by an evil witch whose laughter frankly is still ringing in my ears days later; I was fighting so hard to escape her that I ended up digging into the dirt and burrowing deep underground to hide. If I think about it a bit I can still sense what the weight of the dirt piling on top of me felt like, and how the witch’s laughter grew muffled as I went further and further down. Now, far apart from applying symbolic significance to the elements of this dream on my own, I happened to have finished a pair of fantasy novels about a month ago which featured an enchanted forest and a woman in a red cloak (sort of a play on Little Red Riding Hood, but also Beauty and the Beast…good books, I enjoyed them). Maybe that’s where that nightmare got its inspiration, but like…I read those books weeks ago. Apparently, threads of those stories are still entrenched in my mind, even subconsciously. I don’t watch horror movies or anything with too much gore or trauma, because it doesn’t leave me. When I need to take medication, sometimes the only thing that will help me swallow pills is to bring to mind scenes from my favorite comedy TV show; it distracts my brain enough from worrying about choking that I can manage to avoid doing so.

I internalize everything, and then, for better or worse, my brain puts it on a looped display for me.

The phrase “tortured artist” came to mind for my therapist. I don’t know if that should really be applied to me. If anything, that seems like a name bestowed upon one by others, not one claimed for oneself, although I guess if my therapist said it applies to me, that should suffice. I think there’s a lot of merit to the idea in general. I think of poor Van Gogh, painter of one of my all-time favorite works, who was so troubled he cut off his own ear. I think of Beethoven, whose music in my opinion frequently denotes an almost unrivaled intensity at times, surely in no small part due to difficulties he faced in life. Even Picasso had a blue period. In more modern times, there are countless musicians and actors to whom fate has dealt a cruel hand.

I’ve been trying for days to think of a way to write about Aaron Carter without sounding trite. For those who don’t know, Aaron Carter was the younger brother of Backstreet Boys singer Nick Carter; I’ve always been a huge fan of both the Backstreet Boys and Aaron – yes, I tended to escape into music too! Anyway, Nick and Aaron had a very difficult family life, not dissimilar to mine in some ways. That sounds presumptuous for me to write, I know, but these details have been public knowledge for a long time. Aaron had significant struggles with mental health, and substance abuse, and sadly, he was found dead in his home last week. The cause of death has not been formally identified yet, but all signs point to his being under the influence and then having some sort of accident. He was 34, the same age as me; my birthday is just two months before his (and his twin sister’s). He was a very talented musician, and indeed, a young man whose pain and trauma were too much to bear, in the end. I think “tortured artist” would be an apt description for him. His death has weighed on me all week, not because I used to listen to his music all the time; when I was a child going through some of the worst times in my life, feeling lost and alone and completely defeated, somehow listening to his music helped me find hope that someone out there might care about me. Lots of people have stories like that about music and how it saves them, in a way; lots of people lament, when an artist dies, that they wish they could have somehow shared their story with the artist, as if that would have made a difference somehow. But that’s not where I am with this.

For Aaron…I wish that he could have found that bit of hope for himself, that he’d given to me. I wish that there had been something out there for him that could have been just a pinpoint of light to turn toward, and more importantly, that he could have seen it. I know people would respond to that thought with any number of suggestions for what that pinpoint of light ought to have been for him, but you have to realize that’s moot; no matter what it could have been, in the end, he couldn’t see it. Now…I just hope he can rest. May his memory be a blessing.

Many people are very talented artists. Not all artists are tortured. But those of us who are…I think our brains are wired differently. We dive deeply into different artistic mediums; we dive deeply, end of sentence. Sometimes it’s very hard to find our way back to the surface, and some of us simply don’t. Sometimes, caught far away from the harbor of dry land, all we can do is tread the water because the alternative is to drown; for some, the alternative is all there is.

(What, you didn’t think I could conclude without a tad more imagery here, did you? Par for the course, my dears!)