Introduction

Allegory (as I understand it) is a way of talking about something indirectly. For instance, I have a teddy bear named Rumpelstiltskin. Because he belongs to me, I might use him as a symbol of myself. You and I could have a conversation using him to represent me.

I might say, “Rumpel is happy to see you.” You would understand this to mean that “I” was happy to see you.

You might say, “How is Rumpel today?” as a way of inquiring how “I” felt.

In the same way, the allegory that I have written/am writing involves many things standing in for or representing something else. Sometimes the association is clear. Sometimes the association is not clear – even to me. This is not necessarily deliberate, well, it is deliberate but not conscious.

The things I have written of are painful. I began to write them as a way to tell myself about what happened to me. The dilemma was that while I wanted to know, I also did NOT want to know. This is why I say that some things remain hidden, even to me, maybe even particularly to me.

When I shared a short excerpt from the allegory with one of my writing instructors, she was dismayed that there was no concrete description of the character. The same excerpt was read to a writing group which oohed and aahed over the power of the scene and conflict. To my mind, the group brought to the piece a desire to “read in,” to become a part of the narrative. The instructor wanted it presented as a finished something to observe or assess.

I mention this because I cannot seem to do what she asked – to describe the character. Unfortunately, it is the main character! I wrote about myself, using the Rumpel-technique described above. I could not even bring myself to use first-person but describe myself as “she.” I picture her/me as having the body of perhaps a twelve-year-old. I suppose that would be easy enough to describe.

But the difficulty lies in the fact that the twelve-year-old in the narrative is simultaneously myself at age twelve and the sixty-year-old woman that I am now. The story I am telling is mine after all! The portrayal of this pre-teen may strike you as more like that of an very young child, say a child of four. I can only say in my defense that we unconsciously shift ages depending on the situations and I hope that you keep that in mind.

In writing the story I have been forced to find a way to represent what happened a very long time ago to a child that I do not know nor do I recognize as I write – even though she is me. I know how the story turned out; I know some of the things that happened along the way. I do not know the “why” in most of the instances, so I have made guesses. Perhaps some of them are true.

At the request of one of my former mentors I created a Key which may or may not help you understand what I have written. You’ll find it at the end of the story.