Breaking down the walls

In the New York Times Magazine, there was a long feature on Jeannette Walls, the author of a few novels that are based on her own personal experiences in her nomadic childhood with her alcoholic father, bipolar mother, and unstable family life. The feature is entitled, "How Jeannette Walls Spun Good Stories Out of Bad Memories," and rightly so, because Jeannette Walls has allowed these experiences to build up her character and morals when they would have torn most people to pieces.

The Walls family changed their address 27 times in a single year and there was hardly time to settle down and spend time with each other. They didn't appreciate one another nor have the ability or time to care about one another. Although it did make her more independent as she grew up, Walls resolved to never have children of her own.

Her relationship with her mother never became as close as the average family's mother-daughter relationship is, but some wounds did heal and Walls does still feel an obligation to care about and protect her. Walls claims she has learned to accept things she cannot change and learn to adapt to the circumstances. This is what allowed her to view her past as something that could shape her and not hold her back. Sure, it sounds easy. But in reality this is a lesson that takes a lifetime to fully embrace.

It's not that easy to let go of a pain from the past. It remains a stain upon our hearts. They say time heals all wounds, but even a slight trigger can take us back to a memory that was particularly painful for us, and even after decades, we still prefer not to think about it because there's still that slight uncomfortable inner pinch.

It really is all about attitude. Walls had optimism when most people in her circumstances wouldn't have had any. She found ways to take matters into her own hands and refuse to give into self-pity. She is a tigress on the inside, a strong, independent, optimistic, bright woman who experienced injustice but chose to let it build her character.