Transcript of psychological profiling: subject Monica Swinton/
attachment to folder MS #42
11/11/03

Jane Sutter: I appreciate you taking the time to see me today.
Monica Swinton: I'm sorry I've been difficult. You know it wasn't you, I always liked you. It's Dr. Gravem, really. She just doesn't want me revisiting things. She's so traditional. No digging through the past! Face forward! We are all in the process of becoming! Typical enviro-psych. But she's very good. She's done wonders for me.
JS: You look marvelous. Very rested.
MS: Thank you. When did we see each other last?
JS: Winter Solstice, four years ago? The Vegas' party?
MS: And you're looking lovely as ever. Only too thin. You must be working too hard. Let me have the kitchen send something up. Would you like something sweet?
JS: Thank you, no. I'm not often called too thin! How is Henry?
MS: Fine. Wonderful! Also working too hard. (Note from JS: I include this early chitchat, because of its friendly tone. In fact, computer analysis showed a level of suspicion completely undetectable without enhancement. Consider the implications of a pronounced ability to mask one emotion with another, both apparently genuine.)
MS: Now, what exactly do you want from me today?
JS: I've no intention of making you talk about anything you find painful.
MS: And I've been through enough of these post mortems to know that whatever your intentions are, I won't be told them. I don't even ask anymore! (Suspicion clearly visible now. Followed by immediate contrition.) I just -- I know how -- I can understand the impulse to blame someone. We all want to. But Dr. Gravem is afraid you may be here looking for -- a villainess? Which would hurt my treatment.
I'm not the same person I was then. Dr. Gravem says we change more than our skins every seven years. The cells from that time are already slipping from my body.
JS: No one could blame you. Of course not. That's not what I'm here for, at all. I just want to clearly and completely understand what happened.
MS: Which is exactly what you can't do. No point in trying. (pauses)
Don't you see, even our memories are written in new flesh. They're just memories of memories -- not what really happened, you know. Just what we've been telling ourselves. Two very different things.
But never mind me. Set your machines. I'll do whatever you say.
JS: All I want is some very general profiling. Calibration, association, same sort of thing you've done before. And there's absolutely no reason this has to be finished today; you let me know instantly if you begin to tire and we'll stop.
MS: No, I'd like to finish today.
JS: I'll be using standard Kressian protocols, I know Dr. Gravem favors these, too. Any question I ask you, you may also ask me; I'll do my best to answer honestly. This is entirely at your discretion. Of course, the more often I do this, the longer the interview becomes.
We'll start simple. Try to relax. I'm going to give you several sets of three words. You tell me which one doesn't belong in the set. Okay?
Knife. Spoon. Cup.
MS: Knife.
JS: Why not cup?
MS: You could play it that way, of course. I thought it was my call. A spoon and a cup hold things.
JS: Knife, paper, scissors.
MS: Knife.
JS: Why not paper?
MS: Knife doesn't belong in the game. Scissors, paper, rock. You remember. That game. With your hands. I always hated that game. This destroys that.
JS: Knife, sail, gun.
MS: Knife.
JS: Why not sail?
MS: You can have a gunboat or a sailboat, but not a knifeboat.
JS: Knife --
MS: My god! Are they all knives then? Do we play until I stop picking the knife? What is it with you and knives?
JS: Only the first five are the knife sequence.
MS: And then?
JS: The second five are the egg sequence.
MS: Knives and eggs. Oh, my. What can those possibly represent? (Sudden pronounced hostility. Dr. Gravem must be picking up on this as well. A cat climbs into her lap and begins purring loudly. The temperature of the room warms noticeably.)
JS: Is your head hurting? (MS has been repeatedly pinching the top of her nose. Of course, she must know this impacts our retinal measurements.)
MS: I have the most wonderful little candies. On a restricted basis, of course; Dr. Gravem counts them out one at a time. Dr. Gravem, may I?
JS: Is that better?
MS: Any minute now.
JS: I'm not getting a clean read yet. Let's try a different tack.
What are some of Monica Swinton's magic words?
MS: You answer.
JS: Me? I love the word "looking-glass." From Alice. A mirror is nothing but the same world flat and backwards. But a looking-glass is a door to a whole new kingdom. Like a telescope or a microscope. A glass for looking. Your turn.
MS: (stroking the cat, clearly beginning to relax. Note to self: when it can be done privately, ask Dr. Gravem what the candies contain) "Stopwatch." I suppose that's from Alice, too; I would never have thought of it on my own. But there's something magical in the power to stop time, isn't there? We have just a little of that magic when we sleep. (Voice getting softer and slower. Speech more halting, cat's purring louder.)
Sleep. Sleep -- that's a door to a whole new kingdom, too, isn't it?
But the word I like is "drowse." It has that contented buzzing sound at the end; insects in the grass. A good meal and the sun coming through the filters. Maybe you snore a little. I sleep a lot these days, but I never drowse anymore. Do you?
JS: Not so often.
MS: I have a magic word for real, of course.
JS: Your therapy --
MS: I can't ever say it out loud or it loses its power. You'd be surprised how hard it is to pick a word you'll promise never to say out loud again. Think about it. (pauses)
When I concentrate on my magic word, it takes me right to my beginning room. Beginning therapy. The place of ultimate safety. But I hardly ever go now. Dr. Gravem really is an excellent therapist.
JS: Can you describe your place of ultimate safety? You're allowed to do that, aren't you?
MS: It's not recommended. But you're a fellow professional. At least you're here in a fellow professional capacity. Is it all right, Dr. Gravem?
It's a cabin in the woods. Trees all around. Stars above. The steady sound of a stream. A cat. And always at night.
So there's another word that's magic to me. "Night." The black bird spreads its wings.
You know -- I never had that fear of the darkness that's supposed to be so primal. So universal. Not even as a child. I think of night as a very sound plan, everyone's sleeping coordinated like that. Maybe it's because I never wanted to miss anything when I was a little girl. I always wanted everyone to go to bed when I did so nothing happened without me.
JS: Tell me more about being a little girl. Tell me about your mother. When you think of her what do you think of first?
MS: Her perfume. She had a specially designed cologne. Sort of peaches and ginger. (pauses, eyes closed)
She told wonderful stories. She was a folklorist; of course there wasn't much call for that just then, but she did tell wonderful stories.
JS: Fairy tales? Fables? Myths and legends?
MS: Her specialty was captivity and revenge narratives. She was the sweetest thing; I only remember once or twice that she even raised her voice. But that woman loved a bloody revenge yarn! Never so happy as when a whole bloodline was wiped clean away.
(opening her eyes again.) She was always trying to get to the source. "It's a lovely story, but is it the original?" I remember how she always said that. She thought that the more we tried to retrofit these tales the less power they had. .
She did read me fairy tales and fables, of course. But like any other mother. She wasn't an expert in them.
JS: Which was your favorite?
MS: I don't have favorites.
JS: How about your father?
MS: My parents separated when I was four. He didn't come around much. (very long pause. MS picking at her fingernails.)
Actually -- actually -- my earliest memory of him is a painful one. (another long pause, staring at her hands.)
Very painful. He'd come to take me out and I didn't want to go. I threw a tantrum. Huge fuss! I must have been kicking and screaming when I suddenly caught sight of his face and he was so sad. Until then I hadn't known a child could hurt a grown-up's feelings.
He used to whittle. It embarrassed me, so down-country, so mid-twentieth century. He actually had some talent. He would pick up sticks on the beach and make me dolls from them. They had details, like hair and fingernails and eyeballs and he'd carve them off in a few minutes. But I never wanted to keep them. They didn't seem like dolls, you know; they didn't do anything. I used to take them home and then throw them away. He died when I was twenty-three. I hadn't seen him in ten years.
I'm not so easily disappointed in people now. I've learned to be open to whatever it is they bring. I'm just sorry I wasn't like this when it could have mattered to him. I wish I'd kept some of those dolls. I don't have anything from him.
Nothing at all. But guilt! The gift that keeps on giving! (Voice becoming even softer and slower. The room temperature drops and a minty smell pervades it. Kind of an aftershave? Maybe associated with father? Or maybe Dr. Gravem is just trying to keep her awake. Will confirm later.)
JS: I'm going to show you some pictures now. I want you to make up a story based on what you see. Something that's all yours. The longer the story the more calibration I can do on it.
(First picture shown is No. 4 in the Hnung series.)
MS: I see an ocean. Some of the waves look like horses.
JS: What's the story?
MS: The horses were on a sailing boat. The boat was becalmed for several days and the horses were thrown overboard so the people could be saved instead. The boat and the people aren't in your picture so I don't know if it worked.
But maybe that's not what you wanted. I didn't make that story up. Have you ever heard of the "horse latitudes?" It's not a metaphor. Well, it's a metaphor now, but the source is literal.
JS: How about this picture? What does it suggest?
(Second picture shown is No. 1 in the Hnung series.)
MS: There are worse things than being becalmed. Don't you think?
Now here I see a tree on a hill. A hundred years ago two lovers climbed the hill to have a picnic. They quarreled and went down the hill on separate sides without eating and never saw each other again. They left their lunch behind. It spoiled and rotted, but one seed from one apple took root. Every spring the tree is a cloud of blossoms. Pink and white.
JS: Can you keep going? I've got a partial calibration.
MS: An entire species of native bee was saved from extinction by these blossoms. The bees are farmed now and famous for their honey, which is sharp as well as sweet.
JS: What did they quarrel about?
MS: I wasn't there.
JS: Good enough. Got you! And this?
(Third picture shown is No. 15 in the Bachian series.)
MS: You do this one.
JS: A mother and daughter sit together on a couch. The mother is tickling her daughter's foot. The daughter can't decide if she likes it or not. She keeps putting her foot into her mother's hand and then taking it out again. She'll grow up to be a classical dancer.
MS: Very pretty. Do you have a child?
JS: Not in the way you mean.
MS: There is no other way. As any parent knows. I don't believe it -- that people who had children before the lottery didn't love them as much as we love ours. It's a very mammalian experience. I don't believe they were as casual about the loss of a child as people say.
JS: They could not be casual and still not feel it as deeply as we do.
MS: Anyway, I only see one woman in your picture. She's lying back with her knees up. She's just drifting off to sleep. Something is nagging at her, something she can't remember, but should have done. She's going to dream about cooking. In her dream she'll make a cake without any instructions or help from the kitchen. It will be a wonderful cake and anyone who tastes it will have a wonderful dream. She'll wake up before she can take a bite, realizing that that's the thing she forgot to do.
JS: Good. Got you again. You're very fluent with stories.
MS: I suppose that comes from my mother. It's a useful parenting talent. The-about-to-throw-a-tantrum-in-the-store story. The here-we-are-on-a-long-boat-ride story. That perennial classic, the you're-not-tired-but-I-am-so-I-want-you-to-go-to-sleep story.
I see where we made our mistake, you know. We all should have gone to sleep when he did. We couldn't afford it, of course, but it would have been so much better that way. Don't you think?
JS: Like in the Sleeping Beauty.
MS: I guess. Don't you think it was nice of the witch to put the whole castle to sleep so no one suffered through the waiting? Or aged? Or despaired.
JS: I thought it was fairies who cast the spell.
MS: A witch by any other name.
Are you sure I can't interest you in some refreshment? A cup of tea? One cookie?
JS: I thought you were a coffee drinker?
MS: Not so much anymore.
The sanatarium kitchen was just upgraded -- so much of the therapy is food related. We get the most wonderful almond crescents. Do you like almonds?
JS: All right, sure. No cookies, but a cup of tea would be nice.
MS: Are we done here?
JS: I'm ready to stop. Thanks for being so helpful.
MS: Do you like chamomile? It's grown right on the property. Of course, it's a sleepy-time tea. Maybe you think it's too early in the day.
JS: Whatever you're having.
MS: Oh, I'm not eating. I eat to schedule. Only maybe just another candy, if Dr. Gravem agrees. She can be pretty sticky about them sometimes.
Did you know there was a brief fad in the nineteenth century for edible psychiatry? The eat and rest cure. Depressed women, confined to their beds and stuffed every two hours. There is nothing new under sun. Or moon.
Oh good, here's your tea already. Don't wait to drink it. It comes pre-cooled. Isn't it good?