This is a true story. I wrote it in third person, because I felt it had to be written in third person. I was dissociating the entire time, (another kind of defense.) Little did I know how useful my psychology class this morning would be towards what would happen in the afternoon...
Again, this is entirely a true story. I write my thoughts as they happened during that long, long hour...
It was just a party. Only a party. Then again, it was the kick-off party for the workers of the religious retreat. So it had some significance.
He had been to the kick-off parties before. He didn’t attend the local high school, so the discussion that would be made there involving the local teachers’ eccentricies didn’t appeal to him too much. But he had to go, since he loved working on the retreat itself.
The party had enough significance that he skipped anime club to go to it. He had to get home early, so that he would be able to print out mapquest directions. The original directions had him take the highway, but he moved the route so that he would take familiar roads through town. It was just on the other side of town, how hard could it be?
He thought of staying at school for anime club. But that wouldn’t do. He HAD to go to the party.
With that, he set off. Lopez knew that there would be some people he knew at the party. Perhaps he would see Katie and Max. He would have seen Mark, but Mark wasn’t out of the hospital yet. Hopefully he would come later.
The directions were pretty direct. Take this road, and that road, and this road, and he would be there!
He left a little bit late. He had told them he would be late, anyway. It was better than arriving early like he used to. The awkwardness as he helped the hosts prepare for the arrival of teens was something he just couldn’t handle again.
As he pulled onto one road, he noticed that the sun gave off a beautiful reflection behind his car. By the time he would get there, the sun would probably be fully down.
He didn’t follow the route exactly. Who could? It was dark. He went to where he thought he should end up.
But something didn’t feel right. He pulled into a parking lot. For a sleepy town, there were sure a lot of cars on the road.
He turned the light on in the car and checked the directions. They said to get on Main St., then get on 106. But where was main street? A police car drove by.
No, he was just doubting himself. He had to be on the right road. He drove on.
The road went into a road that had a long line at the streetlight. That couldn’t be it. He turned right. If he had followed the general idea of directions, he should be going right, anyways.
He remembered for a bit what his mom said a long time ago. A study was done on men and women drivers. The conclusion was that women primarily used landmarks for guidance, while men used spatial reasoning.
Dang right Lopez used spatial reasoning. The study also said that men were better at getting back on track after becoming lost. He would get back on track in no time.
Besides, Lopez liked being lost. It was an adventure. He would get there eventually.
The road kept going, and going, and going. That’s how it is all over New England. You could drive for days on minor roads and never get anywhere.
But he wasn’t lost. He had a general idea.
He reached a huge intersection that was a four-way stop. A sign appeared that directed him towards to highway
He saw a police car. Really? What was it doing?
Wouldn’t you know it! The highway! He found it! He knew he was going in the right direction.
He didn’t have directions from the highway (since he changed the mapquest,) but he had his map of the general area. He could remember where that route took him to get to his destination.
Right?
Of course right.
He turned onto the road. Now, he just had to look for the final road. There were only two turns after he exited the highway.
So he drove. And drove. And drove some more.
He was back at the four-way intersection. Another police car drove by. What were they all doing? They were everywhere. Why?
He should turn back and drive the other way. That must have been the correct way.
But he hesitated. Something was wrong.
Firstly, why the hell wasn’t he following the directions? It was because he liked wandering around, since being lost gave him a sense of adventure.
What the hell?
Why did he get a sense of adventure from being lost?
Maybe he wasn’t lost. He knew exactly where he was going. He was NOT going to the party.
That was it! He wasn’t going to the party!
That was why he didn’t use the GPS that was sitting on top of the microwave at home! That was why he altered the mapquest directions!
He was trying to subvert himself.
He learned all about this in psychology that morning. They were talking about Freudian defense mechanisms. If the mind sees a stimulus that it wishes to avoid, it will create mental barriers in order to stop the stimulus.
He never wanted to go to the party. He said this to himself earlier.
So now, his unconscious mind was trying to subvert his goal of reaching the party. By being “lost”, by changing the directions from the easiest route, and by not using the GPS, it was all a ploy to prevent him from reaching the party.
But he HAD to go. He was a respected member of the religious retreat community. He always showed up on time, sometimes even early. And he was always the last one to leave.
He was an hour late.
He was going to find Main St. And he did. It wasn’t too hard. Then, he would get onto 106, like the mapquest directions said.
Just because his unconscious was trying to subvert him, didn’t mean that he couldn’t fight back.
He fought back by following the directions.
He did. He got onto main, then onto 106. Sure, there were 7 more turns (wow, his unconscious sure did a good job of making things difficult,) before the end, but he was following directions. He could do this now.
He followed 106. He would probably be going north on 106. He had to go north, right? That was what the map said.
He followed the map.
And kept going, and going, and going. He did see another police car.
What the hell?
He KNEW that he should have gone south. The directions said turn RIGHT, not LEFT.
Lopez could not use spatial reasoning for this. His mind was working too hard against him. He needed to start from the beginning.
Right. He turned around and went back to Main. From Main he would go right onto 106…why the hell was he in the middle lane? He turned on his blinker and shifted over.
Lights began flashing. Red and Blue. Why were they not reassuring?
It was his first time. A moving violation. He knew what he did wrong. Was this one of the police cars he had seen earlier?
As he pulled over, turned on his emergency flashers, and turned off the radio, he became a bit annoyed by the bright light that the police car shined directly into his rear-view mirror. He had to redirect his mirror to prevent it from blinding him.
Then, he waited. Lopez began to grow bored. What was taking him so long?
Was he waiting for him to turn off his lights? He tried that. Still, nothing.
He turned off his whole car. It was taking the police officer forever to get out of his car and ask for license and registration.
Eventually, the police officer came. He was young; he couldn’t have been much older than Lopez.
“You know why I pulled you over, right?”
“Yeah,” Lopez replied.
“You were in the middle lane, and when you pulled over, you cut that car off.”
“Oh.”
“Didn’t you see him?”
“Not really.”
Why did he say that?
“I’m going to have to ask for your license and registration.
He pulled out his wallet and shuffled through the cards. Card after card. Eventually he found the right one.
Then, he opened up the glove box. He had never seen his registration before. He looked through file after file. Tire repair, emissions test. The officer must have seen that he didn’t know what it looked like. Why didn’t he help him?
He pulled out a folder that was official-looking. He found a file entitled, “Contact Registration.”
“Is this it?”
“No.”
He looked back down at the pile. The police officer eventually pointed to the registration. Lopez handed it to him.
As the officer walked away, he noticed that he walked sort of slow. That would mean more waiting.
Wait, what the hell?
He had practiced this. He should be thankful that the police officer pulled him over! He was driving dangerously! He could have hit that other car!
He learned about this in psychology, too. He was being “Passive-aggressive.” He wasn’t being openly hostile towards the police officer, but his way of answering, his tone of voice, his anger at the officers’ slow rate, it was all from his unconscious.
At this point, Lopez declared all-out war on his unconscious.
He was HAPPY to be pulled over. He was THANKFUL towards the police officer! He was going to smile, dammit!
He had to smile! Dammit!
When the police officer came back, he told Lopez that his registration had expired. He should find the new one and place it in his car. Of course, Lopez knew this already, too.
“I’m letting you off with a warning. Be more careful next time, okay?”
As the police officer returned to his car, Lopez knew what he had to do.
He had to go home. He just couldn’t fight with his unconscious anymore. He could analyze it all he wanted, but there was always another layer that he would have to uncover. It would never end.
Because he didn’t want to go to the party, anyway.
