#carrow narby

[smokefalls]

Each of us is ultimately alone: a discrete little being with access only to our own senses and sensations, our own thoughts, and our own fragile body. Left to fumble for meaning in our constant pursuit of imperfect intimacies. We submit ourselves endlessly to that mortifying ordeal of knowing each other, just for the chance to be alone together. Language might be the best thing that we have to bring the void between ourselves, but it will never be enough.

Carrow Narby, "Indescribable" from It Came from the Closet: Queer Reflections on Horror

[showmethesneer]

"Monsters represent our fears, traumas, aspirations, and desires. Mermaids, werewolves, cryptids, and witches all make regular appearances in works produced by queer storytellers because the monster embodies so much meaning at once, it remains a contradictory figure. It is our distorted mirror image, our secret self."

-"Indescribable" by Carrow Narby from It Came From The Closet: Queer Reflections on Horror edited by Joe Vallese

[beehaiku]

“My gender is void, the null set, nothing. But it is impossible for anyone to look at me and see nothing. I cannot make myself unseen.”

Carrow Narby, “Indescribable” from It Came From the Closet: Queer Reflections on Horror

This essay covers disability, gender, and being perceived as a “thing” even if your personhood is on some level acknowledged, especially in a hospital setting where you are totally vulnerable to what a doctor sees when they examine you. It’s really hitting home for me as someone who’s been through, and goes through regularly, the violation of self that medical interactions require. In relation to the horror movies discussed, The Blob and Society, the essay becomes a discussion of how the total dissolution of boundaries that blob-creatures achieve in combining the self with the other through absorption of the other by the self is the only way to truly be known without being perceived. I really enjoyed it (and am enjoying this whole anthology so far!) and it’s really cool to hear people like me say out loud the thoughts I have about myself. :)

[the-final-sentence]

Language might be the best thing that we have to bridge the void between ourselves, but it will never be enough.

Carrow Narby, from “Indescribable” 

[batsbooktalk]

"She is like a shoggoth trying to impersonate Divine"

- quote describing a character in the 1989 movie Society from the essay "Indescribable: [The Blob; Society]" by Carrow Narby from the collection "It Came From the Closet: Queer Reflections on Horror"

[wellesleyunderground]

Alternative Class Notes: Carrow Narby ‘11

How were you awesome this month?

I'm not sure that I have been, but that's okay.

What's on your mind?

The suffocating weight of just how much I don't want to do what I've been doing for the past several years.

This month has been

Frustrating

because...

Like everyone else, I'm navigating a lot of very heavy, very negative emotions. The world is falling apart, the bad guys are winning, and I feel deep, creeping existential despair. It's been the final straw in my constant waffling about what I want "to do with my life." I hate what I'm doing, it's just so boring and such drudgery even though arguably it's "important" work.

I wish people knew that

...it's bullshit to expect people to lock themselves into their life path at 18-22 years old.

After graduating from Wellesley, I thought I would be

...on a really clear, relatively direct trajectory toward tenured professorship, with just a minor detour into a master's degree before my doctorate because my undergraduate grades just were not very good.

but instead I am

...coming to terms with how much time I've wasted pursuing a career that I only half-heartedly desired in the first place. Academia is a crumbling industry, but even if it were doing great it's not what I've always wanted to do. I've always wanted to do something creative but I've been denying that part of myself since high school. I applied to liberal arts institutions instead of art schools. I let myself drift into grad school related to my undergrad studies instead of aggressively pursuing a creative path despite rejection.   At this point I'm still set on finishing my PhD, but after that I'm resolved to let myself off the hook about finding a career in "my field." I'll always have my education. It's pointless to dwell on whether or not it's been "a waste." I'm going to pursue work that actually interests me and makes me feel good. I've started to get back into visual art, and I've been writing fiction despite a lot of doubt about my talent or potential. I've also been proactive about spending more time with friends. I met someone new who told me that I'm "really easy to talk to," which was a fabulous compliment. People who only know me from Community might roll their eyes at that and it kind of made me laugh, but it is something I've been working on and the work has started to pay off. 

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[smokefalls]

For one thing, I am not a woman. I wouldn’t know how to correct anyone about this, though, because I am not a man either. I am not something in-between, or in some third-gender category like nonbinary. My gender identity does not have a name, because I do not have a gender identity. My gender is void, the null set, nothing. But it is impossible for anyone to look at me and see nothing. I cannot make myself unseen.

Carrow Narby, "Indescribable" from It Came from the Closet: Queer Reflections on Horror

[smokefalls]

That is what indescribable really means. Not that a thing literally cannot be described in terms of its physical properties or observed behavior but that it exists so far outside the observer’s or the listener’s frame of reference that mere description—and perhaps even direct observation—cannot render it comprehensible. The phenomenon remains inscrutable; it resists legibility.

Carrow Narby, "Indescribable" from It Came from the Closet: Queer Reflections on Horror