Walking the Wall

I just finished reading Ann Packer’s The Dive from Clausen’s Pier,
and while I think it was a very well written book and set out to make
some very valid and interesting points about grief and trauma and how
they affect people’s lives in different ways–I think that it fell
short in the end in some way I haven’t quite put my finger on and won’t
try to dissect here and ruin the ending for anyone. I think the most
important point the book made, for me, was the question of whether our
actions define us–or do we define our actions:

“People have this idea that what they do changes who they
are. A married man has an affair and he thinks, Now I’ve become a bad
person. As if something had changed.”
    “Meaning he already was a bad person?”
    “Meaning bad isn’t the issue. Meaning you do what
you do. Not without consequences for other people, of course, sometimes
very grave ones. But it’s not very helpful to regard your choices as a
series of right or wrong moves. They don’t define you as much as you
define them.”
. . .
“You could just as easily have stayed. But that wouldn’t make you a
good person any more than leaving makes you a bad one. You’re already
made, honey. That’s what I mean.” (p. 154)

I’m not sure I agree with this fully as I’ve always
thought that we become who we are by the choices that we make, little
choices, big choices, and everything in between–that if we make our
world so small and so perfectly attuned with what we agree with–we
take away the chance to make choices and don’t ever grow or change. But
what I do agree with, is the notion that labeling choices as good or
bad is really not productive. People make choices for so many reasons
and unless you are there, in their skin, you may not fully understand
why and so judging them is very chancy at best. Sometimes in life
leaving (while it may look like taking the easy way out) is really the
hardest road to go, but necessary–transversely, sometimes staying
looks like a cope out, but is also the hardest thing to do.