FREE ESSAY ON ORDINARY PEOPLE

ORDINARY PEOPLE

Ordinary People Ordinary People by Judith Guest is the story of a dysfunctional family
who relate to one another through a series of extensive defense mechanisms, i.e. an
unconscious process whereby reality is distorted to reduce or prevent anxiety. The book
opens with seventeen year old Conrad, son of upper middle-class Beth and Calvin Jarrett,
home after eight months in a psychiatric hospital, there because he had attempted
suicide
by slashing his wrists. His mother is a meticulously orderly person who, Jared, through
projection, feels despises him. She does all the right things; attending to Jared's
physical
needs, keeping a spotless home, plays golf and bridge with other women in her social
circle, but, in her own words is an emotional cripple. Jared's father, raised in an
orphanage, seems anxious to please everyone, a commonplace reaction of individuals who,
as children, experienced parental indifference or inconsistency. Though a successful tax
attorney, he is jumpy around Conrad, and, according to his wife, drinks too many
martinis.
Conrad seems consumed with despair. A return to normalcy, school and home-life, appear
to be more than Conrad can handle.Chalk-faced, hair-hacked Conrad seems bent on
perpetuating the family myth that all is well in the world. His family, after all, are
people
of good taste. They do not discuss a problem in the face of the problem. And, besides,
there is no problem. Yet, there is not one problem in this family but two - Conrad's
suicide and the death by drowning of Conrad's older brother, Buck. Conrad eventually
contacts a psychiatrist, Dr. Berger, because he feels the air is full of flying glass
and
wants to feel in control. Their initial sessions together frustrate the psychiatrist
because of
Conrad's inability to express his feelings. Berger cajoles him into expressing his
emotions
by saying, That's what happens when you bury this junk, kiddo. It keeps resurfacing.
Won't leave you alone. Conrad's slow but steady journey towards healing seems partially
the result of cathartic revelations which purge guilt feelings regarding his brother's
death
and his family's denial of that death, plus the love of a good woman. Jeannine, who
sings
soprano to Conrad's tenor... There is no doubt that Conrad is consumed with guilt, the
feeling one has when one acts contrary to a role he has assumed while interacting with a
significant person in his life, This guilt engenders in Conrad feelings of low self
esteem.
Survivors of horrible tragedies, such as the Holocaust, frequently express similar
feelings
of worthlessness. In his book, Against All Odds, William Helmreich relates how one
survivor articulates a feeling of abandonment. Did I abandon them, or did they abandon
me? Conrad expresses a similar thought in remembering the sequence of events when the
sailboat they were on turned over. Buck soothes Conrad saying, Okay, okay. They'll be
looking now, for sure, just hang on, don't get tired, promise? In an imagined
conversation
with his dead brother, Conrad asks, 'Man, why'd you let go?' 'Because I got tired.' 'The
hell! You never get tired, not before me, you don't! You tell me not to get tired, you
tell
me to hang on, and then you let go!' 'I couldn't help it. Well, screw you, then!' Conrad
feels terrible anger with his brother, but cannot comfortably express that anger. His
psychiatrist, after needling Conrad, asks, Are you mad? When Conrad responds that he
is not mad, the psychiatrist says, Now that is a lie. You are mad as hell. Conrad
asserts
that, When you let yourself feel, all you feel is lousy. When his psychiatrist questions
him about his relationship with his mother, Calvin says, My mother and I do not connect.
Why should it bother me? My mother is a very private person. This sort of response is
called, in psychological literature, rationalization. We see Conrad's anger and
aggression
is displaced, i.e. vented on another, as when he physically attacked a schoolmate. Yet,
he
also turns his anger on himself and expresses in extreme and dangerous depression and
guilt. Guilt is a normal emotion felt by most people, but among survivors it takes on
special meaning. Most feel guilty about the death of loved ones whom they feel they
could
have, or should have, saved. Some feel guilty about situations in which they behaved
selfishly (Conrad held on to the boat even after his brother let go), even if there was
no
other way to survive. In answer to a query from his psychiatrist on when he last got
really
mad, Conrad responds, When it comes, there's always too much of it. I don't know how
to handle it. When Conrad is finally able to express his anger, Berger, the psychiatrist
says to Calvin, Razoring is anger; self-mutilation is anger. So this is a good sign;
turning
his anger outward at last. Because his family, and especially his mother, frowns upon
public displays of emotion, Conrad keeps his feelings bottled up, which further
contributes
to depression. Encyclopedia Britannica, in explicating the dynamics of depression
states,
Upon close study, the attacks on the self are revealed to be unconscious expressions of
disappointment and anger toward another person, or even a circumstance..., deflected
from their real direction onto the self. The aggression, therefore, directed toward the
outside world is turned against the self. The article further asserts that, There are
three
cardinal psychodynamic considerations in depression: (1) a deep sense of loss of what is
loved or valued, which may be a person, a thing or even liberty; (2) a conflict of mixed
feelings of love and hatred toward what is loved or highly valued; (3) a heightened
overcritical concern with the self. Conrad's parents are also busily engaged in the
business
of denial. Calvin, Conrad's father, says, Don't worry. Everything is all right. By his
own
admission, he drinks too much, because drinking helps..., deadening the pain. Calvin
cannot tolerate conflict. Things must go smoothly. Everything is jello and pudding with
you, Dad. Calvin, the orphan says, Grief is ugly. It is something to be afraid of, to
get
rid of. Safety and order. Definitely the priorities of his life. He constantly questions
himself as to whether or not he is a good father. What is fatherhood, anyway? Beth,
Conrad's mother, is very self-possessed. She appears to have a highly developed
super-ego, that part of an individual's personality which is moralistic..., meeting the
demands of social convention, which can be irrational in requiring certain behaviors in
spite of reason, convenience and common sense. She is furthermore, a perfectionist.
Everything had to be perfect, never mind the impossible hardship it worked on her, on
them all. Conrad is not unlike his mother. He is an overachiever, an A student, on the
swim team and a list-maker. His father tells the psychiatrist, I see her not being able
to
forgive him. For surviving, maybe. No, that's not it, for being too much like her. A
psychoanalyst might call her anal retentive. Someone who is fixated symbolically in
orderliness and a tendency toward perfectionism. Excessive self-control, not expressing
feelings, guards against anxiety by controlling any expression of emotion and denying
emotional investment in a thing or person. She had not cried at the funeral.... She and
Conrad had been strong and calm throughout. The message of the book is contained in
Berger's glib saying that, People who keep stiff upper lips find that it's damn hard to
smile. We see Conrad moving toward recovery and the successful management of his
stage of development, as articulated by Erikson, intimacy vs. isolation. At story end,
his
father is more open with Conrad, moving closer to him, while his mother goes off on her
own to work out her issues. Both trying to realize congruence in their development stage
(Erikson), ego integrity vs. despair.