The first of many wounds Normal People's young Irish couple inflicted on each other during the course of the limited series on Hulu was studly Connell's refusal to declare to his friends he fancied and was sexually involved with the lovely but acerbic Marianne, whom his scruffy pals seemed to disdain. He had too much self-regard, and she, by consenting to the boy's mistreatment, valued herself too little. Gradually, beautifully, in my estimation, it is revealed that theirs were different but equally pitiful motives -- they'd each suffered emotional abandonment.
What makes this story of four tumultuous years in the lives of two damaged and damaging people so compelling is how honest, ironically enough in this instance, their actions seemed to be, that is, how true to the world as it exists off of the page of novels or off of the screen of streaming series.
We failed and failing people -- often with ironclad, clear-eyed reasoning -- will do the most hurtful things to one another -- none more painful than what might be called Simon Peter's sin, refusing to admit affiliation or support, to deny, to say "I don't know him!"
Race and privilege make for a pernicious pair in this regard. They undermine our attempts to build cross-racial alliances because we fear losing favor of those who, frankly, don't deserve it. Black and white folks of my generation, members of that first post-desegregation wave, may have memories of being denied by other-race friends with whom they'd thought to have had a mutual friendship. "I DON'T know him."
As time progressed, the denials have become less stark -- "We're teammates." "We're co-workers." -- but delivered the same message. "I don't KNOW him." And when Facebook made "friendship" a tool for commerce or stealth, it became "I don't know HIM (he knows me.)" And the age of BLM is sorely testing alliances. "I KNOW him but ... "
A friend once shared, with what I felt were the most charitable of intentions, that I was not very open and that puts others off. I accepted the observation as it was intended, without defense or explanation, knowing it was true. "Yeah, I need to work on that," said I. My work has been to try to accept that people will be what their formations have created -- much like what life experiences created in Connell and Marianne -- and, understanding that, own those who own me and deliver the rest to the universe without bitterness. As the Buddha says, disappointment comes not from the actions of others but from our expectations.
In the end, the young Irish couple owned their failure to be friends. They owned the harm they had done to and invited from each other. In short, they owned each another but were prepared to move forward, separately or together, having grown and become wiser.
