More body-groups the lower, the closer to the water you get. Coming your way. Something just ended. This route, ‘to the pier and back.’ Same one mama would take D on, growing up, except to a different pier. Higher up the coast. But same ocean. One slightly ahead of the other, D humming along with sunglasses, a big-ass sun hat on, head up-tilted slightly, basking in the breeze. Dog-out-the-rolled-down-car-window-like. Going Move, in her robot-voice deadpan, to stragglers in her way. Her chair’s engine like a Tesla’s how quiet. Just joystick-whipping. All sorts of bags and drinks and extra clothes strapped to her chair’s back, real compact like. Mama carrying her curled-up body into bed before plugging in her chair each night to gas it up. D’s body the same as any body just more curled up. Like a bud blooming, bursting, only stalled out mid-burst. Her speech, too. Uttering, starting to, before stalling out mid-utterance. So instead of trying to say more than she could, just thinking about a single thing to say, for longer than others, then saying that one thing. An observation. A jab. A cutting shot at someone who needed to hear it. No. One. Cawes—cutting off lil sis self-importantly lamenting middle school gossip gripes. No YOU. Awe. Cwazy—shutting down the ole man righteously venting about politicians, America, the Media. Then cackling gleeful like hik hik hik. Like suffocating but enjoying it. Before choking, forgetting to chew, that she’d been chewing. Then gagging, eyes watering, mama stepping in like Oh oh oh, oh-kay, gotta chew, back-patting and mouth-wiping with her bib-napkin. Each one of D’s words taking its own amount of exertion to release, and so only shooting em off if necessary. If urgent. Not wasting others’ bandwidth / her own breath saying anything other than exactly what needed to be said.

But there was a second-tier level to this, this remaining silent.

A meta level.

Why it took Knausgaard so long to get to addressing what he knew he had to, was inevitably gonna, but was nonetheless apprehensive to.

He was apprehensive to bc society dictated that, about these considerations—finding Mein Kampf (1933) in his late ole man’s closet, considering how there were aspects of Hitler’s bio he felt contained secrets to understanding himself—he was to remain silent.

There were things about which one mustn’t speak.

About which it wasn’t right to.

Shameful thoughts.

Things deemed—and understandably / not wrongly so—taboo.

Taboo for understandable / not wrong reasons.

But that didn’t mean people didn’t have these thoughts.

Didn’t mean repression was the way.

Repression and shame were what created monsters.

School shooters.

Suicides.

Were what, lowkey, created Hitler.

Now that there. A sizzling take, I know.

But writing.

Writing was one way to even start tackling repression and shame of taboo thoughts/impulses and unspeakable traumas.

Writing wasn’t speaking.

Wasn’t ‘saying.’

Writing was a silent thing.

Was ‘remaining silent.’