The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Arts
6 — Wednesday, February 9, 2022

Hot take: I hate syllabus week. 
Better known as “sylly week,” the 

first week of college classes in a semes-
ter is often referenced affectionately as 
the final week in which a student could 
condone their laziness and theoretically 
couldn’t yet be behind. For some stu-
dents, it’s purgatory at worst, party time 
at best. For me, though, sylly week (and 
its single day high school equivalent) is 
misery. Every semester, I feel as if I am 
staring up a mountain, lacking both the 
desire and proper equipment to climb.

I remember the first day of junior 

year of high school the most clearly. As 
I moved from classroom to classroom, 
one uncomfortable metal chair to the 
next, each of my teachers told me they 
“meant business” and droned on about 
the seemingly unending list of assign-
ments I would face. Each one felt like 
another stone dropped in my hiking 
backpack. By the end of the day, I hadn’t 
even begun the trek to the top but I had 
collapsed under the weight of the stones 
regardless.

I escaped to the solace of my room. 

The walls had recently been painted 
gray to cover the aqua and lavender opti-
mism of my youth and now generated 
the visual equivalent of white noise. I 
had many thoughts that afternoon, but I 
remember only one: the day was exactly 
as bad as I thought it would be. I sought 
comfort then, as I had on many other 
desperate occasions, in “The Perks of 

Being a Wallflower.” The Tumblr-esque 
film was chock-full of the aesthetic I 
so admired in my teenage years while 
excluding the excessive chain-smoking 
of the eponymous novel that so discom-
forted me before my exposure to my 
own chosen vices. 

Although my attraction was (and still 

is) to Sam (Emma Watson, “Return to 
Hogwarts”), I didn’t know yet that it 
was the soft touch of another woman’s 
lips I yearned for. I wanted to love her, 
be loved by her and, most of all, to be 
her, but it was Charlie (Logan Lerman, 
“Fury”) in whom I most saw myself. I 
felt his loneliness, his tears and I knew 
exactly what he meant when he said he 
was “both happy and sad … and trying 
to figure out how that could be.” I saw 
Charlie’s depression play out on screen, 
giving me the permission I needed to 
process my feelings, though I didn’t yet 
have a name for those feelings that we 
shared. 

When Sam offered Charlie a drink 

and said, “welcome to the Island of 
Misfit Toys,” I hoped for the day that 
I would be offered a similar sense of 
belonging. When Patrick (Ezra Miller, 
“Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find 
Them”) read aloud, “Chapter One: sur-
viving your fascist shop teacher who 
needs to put kids down to feel big,” and 
then added, “Oh wow, this is useful guys 
we should read on,” I cracked a smile — 
even on my darkest day. When Sam and 
Patrick implored Charlie to write a book 
about them and call it “the Slut and the 
Falcon,” I imagined possible plotlines 
that the book could have. When Sam and 

Charlie kissed under the fairy lights to 
ensure that the first person to ever kiss 
Charlie would be someone who truly 
loved him, I wished my first kiss had 
been so picturesque and kind but decid-
ed not to abandon all hope that my next 
could be. 

Years passed and I had not seen this 

film in a long time. Not for lack of try-
ing, but when I attempted to watch it, 
it generated the opposite sensations it 
once did. Rather than feeling like I was 
wrapped in a warm blanket, I experi-
enced the profound discomfort of an 
itchy sweater. I wouldn’t last 20 minutes. 
I started skipping over scenes, dragging 
the cursor past minutes of dialogue that 
used to mean everything to me in hopes 
that I might be able to enjoy the rest of 
it, just a little. Still, I could hardly bear 
to look, and I know why: I felt ashamed 
of the person I used to be and Char-
lie reminded me too much of her. I had 
grown enough that I no longer was that 
person, but not enough to forgive her. 
The phase of my life where Charlie was 
my closest friend was characterized by 
unrelenting self-loathing, not the least 
of which was centered around my frus-
tration at feeling such seemingly unex-
plainable sadness. I couldn’t banish 
those feelings, and I felt it should have 
been easy to do so. It wasn’t. 

I can’t really say what finally enabled 

me to watch the film. There wasn’t one 
wonderful movie therapist who changed 
my life in a session, a breakup that final-
ly woke me up inside or a rock bottom I 
hit that spurred me to change (although 
I hit many). They say that you can’t love 

another person if you don’t love your-
self, and I’m here to tell you that that’s 
not even a little bit true. Even when I 
had little but contempt for myself, the 

love I felt for the important people in 
my life never wavered. But, it is true 
that when you’re at peace with yourself, 
you can love others best. I wasn’t ini-
tially inspired to get better out of love 
for myself, but because I wanted to give 
the best love possible to the people I care 
about. I realized that as my current self, 
I wasn’t doing that. Even if you don’t 
start off doing it for yourself, what mat-
ters is that you started in the first place. 
Only once I realized that I could simul-
taneously not be particularly fond of the 
person I once was and also proud of her 

for growing into the person I am now, 
did it become possible for me to enjoy my 
favorite movie again. 

About a month ago, I tweeted (or won-

dered aloud for all the internet to hear) if 
being the same version of myself around 
each of my loved ones, even those that 
did not associate with each other, was 
self-actualization in action. In the same 
hour, I tweeted that I can’t believe Wil-
lem Dafoe is a real name, so how much 
I have matured is certainly in ques-
tion, but how much I have grown is not 
(especially because I finally put an app 
time limit on my Twitter). Today, for the 
sake of journalism, I watched the film. 
I didn’t skip any scenes; I didn’t look 
away. It felt like a hug from an old friend.

Self-Love and ‘The Perks of Being a Wallflower’

Lessons on loss: A defense of Holden Caulfield

The enormity of 17 has no space for sickness 

My TikTok feed has only ever 

dabbled in the literary subgenre 
of BookTok. I’ll get a book recom-
mendation once a month, at most. 
But for whatever reason, I get a dis-
proportionate amount of content 
hating on J.D. Salinger’s “Catcher 
in the Rye.” Some creators criti-
cize the work as a whole; others 
go to great lengths to tear apart 
its protagonist, Holden Caulfield. 
After seeing so many nearly identi-
cal angry takes, I caved. I bought a 
used copy of “Catcher” to re-read 
it and get to the bottom of why so 
many grown adults were insistent 
on verbally berating a fictional 
16-year-old.

No doubt, Holden’s narration 

style is annoying. The first couple 
pages alone left me both frustrated 
and amazed with the ratio of “god-
dam” and “hell” to all other words. 
Holden’s hypercritical and cyni-
cal scope of viewing the external 
world was also quite jarring, which 
should say a lot considering I have 
edited my fair share of Daily Arts’s 
most cutting reviews over the last 
two years.

While these hurdles were fairly 

quick to adjust to, Holden’s con-
trarianism and emotional stag-
nation made the novel lack the 
satisfaction of other coming-of-
age works in which the reader or 
viewer can witness the adolescent 
protagonist mature before their 
very eyes. It’s easy to enjoy the 

coming-of-age catharsis of high 
school students realizing the arbi-
trariness of cliques and cultivating 
friendships across them (à la “The 
Breakfast Club”) but Holden’s situ-
ation is simply incomparable. As 
I read more, though, I made it to a 
crucial scene that I hadn’t remem-
bered, and that the TikTokers had 
conveniently omitted. In a passing 
but vivid vignette, Holden recalls 
the pain of his younger brother’s 
passing before abruptly distract-
ing himself with other ideas — a 
behavior and narration device that 
quickly becomes as ingrained as his 
excessive crassness.

Holden yearns to tell the reader 

about his late brother Allie, and he 
does so sporadically through sto-
ries that always seem prematurely 
cut off. While his narration style 
can be choppy in general, these 
abrupt endings typically come at 
especially emotional moments and 
reflect overwhelmedness rather 
than merely a short attention span. 
The bulk of Holden’s coming of 
age takes place three years before 
“Catcher” does, with Allie’s pass-
ing. The novel itself reflects the 
aftermath of a child forced to deal 
with a level of trauma that can 
plague adults indefinitely. Risking 
banality, Holden came of age too 
soon.

Salinger’s depiction of loss is a 

realistic one, with the goal being 
merely surviving rather than thriv-
ing. When I read “Catcher” in high 
school this wasn’t clear to me, but 
my recent revisit came in the same 
year as the loss of a close friend. 

And I’m not ashamed to say, I saw 
some of Holden’s grieving habits 
and mentalities reflected in myself.

The role of distraction in Hold-

en’s psyche often resonated with 
me. Just as he could only remi-
nisce about memories of Allie in 
small doses, I could not linger on 
my own memories for too long at a 
time, giving his erratic recollection 
some clarity. It was not as though I 
consciously chose to stop reminisc-
ing — my brain would only let me 
produce a few moments at a time, 
perhaps as subconscious self care.

Holden’s relationship with dis-

traction in a broader sense per-
vades the novel in a way akin to 
its role in my own coping toolbox. 
Sometimes, Holden is met with a 
wave of sudden restlessness and 
disdain for his existence, and he 
decides he needs to do something 
— anything to get his mind off it. 
It could be the middle of the night, 
but if Holden needs to wander and 
look for a task, he doesn’t hesitate. 
“Night walks” have become a part 
of my vocabulary in a similar man-
ner. Sometimes that deep restless-
ness sets in when I wish I could be 
sleeping and, knowing I won’t be 
able to sleep anyway, I’ll wander 
around to see if there’s anything 
new I can notice. If there’s some 
happy thoughts I can think. Re-
reading “Catcher” has made me 
even more willing to act on these 
task cravings. Holden has his fair 
share of bad takes, but he’s right 
that it’s never good to lay and sim-
mer with negative thoughts.

In terms of his worldview itself, 

I would be wrong to omit Hold-
en’s feelings about phonies. While 
“hell” and “goddam” would likely 
rank first and second in their fre-
quency within the novel, bronze 
would have to go to “phony.” Hold-
en will call anybody and everybody 
who he is not willing to emotionally 
connect to a phony. Sure, he spins 
this as judgment and spite toward 
their interests and personalities, 
but this labeling and distancing is 
more emblematic of dealing with, 
and consequently deeply fearing, 
loss.

The depths of grief make enjoy-

ing many things unrealistic. A 
surface-level conversation with a 
friend or a cheesy comedy may do 
absolutely nothing to raise spirits 
or even distract one. Even more 
so, your friends’ inability to perk 
you up by any fraction can serve to 
antagonize you altogether. Some of 
Holden’s lowest lows came at times 
when hopeful distractions failed to 
do their job. These disappointments 
hurt. A lot. It always felt like a major 
setback when I finally worked up 
the drive to follow through on a 
plan, and it did nothing for me emo-
tionally. While I wouldn’t person-
ally use Holden’s vernacular, seeing 
other people find joy from situa-
tions that brought me none could 
feel inauthentic, phony.

The magnitude of this phony-

menon, if you will, is amplified 
through behind-the-scenes cop-
ing mechanisms. I’ve spent this 
past year feeling vulnerable. And 
below his paper-thin, abrasive 
facade, Holden is vulnerable too. 

For months I couldn’t imagine los-
ing someone I was close to, some-
one I cared about, again. And you 
can’t lose someone close to you if 
you don’t let them in or connect 
with them. As maladaptive as it is, 
it’s technically true. While I’m not 
sure if I could handle another loss 
right now, at least I’m getting better 
at re-learning how to let people in, 
and I’d like to think Holden has it in 
him to re-learn this himself.

Before I leave you to maybe 

revisit the book, allow me to para-
phrase an internal monologue that 
cements “Catcher” as a quintessen-
tial coming-of-age story, if nothing 
else does. Holden recalls his numer-
ous visits to the Museum of Natural 
History and the various exhibits 
within it. He finds deep comfort 
in the fact that the exhibits remain 
constant with each visit, even as 
he changes. He acknowledges that 
these changes in himself may not 

always be robust — in fact they may 
seem insignificant at times. Even 
still, these changes and morsels 
of character growth exist and are 
fulfilling for Holden to reflect on 
against the stable scenery. 

As chaotic of a character as he 

seems, Holden just wants a sem-
blance of stability while he grows. 
It’s not the growing up itself Hold-
en wishes to avoid but the lasting 
changes to his surroundings that 
come with it. More concisely, he 
doesn’t want to lose the people and 
situations external to him in order 
to grow internally. We all wish we 
could have the merits of growing 
up without the ongoing hardships 
from which the lessons stem. Rath-
er than getting bogged down hating 
Holden Caulfield and his numerous 
arbitrary internal tirades, we need 
to remember where his shortcom-
ings came from and will ourselves 
to move on where he could not.

Seventeen is the idolized 

coming-of-age age. It’s not rep-
resentative of a number neces-
sarily but of a concept. The idea 
of 17 has been explored and 
exploited in Hollywood since 
1965 — “You are sixteen going 
on seventeen / baby it’s time to 
think / Better beware, be canny 
and careful / Baby, you’re on 
the brink.” Seventeen is notable 
because it’s between two sym-
bolic ages in American culture. 
At 16, you’re given a taste of the 
future that awaits you; getting 
your driver’s license is less of 
an obligation and more like a 
rite of passage. A license means 
freedom, it means power, it 
means control over your life. 
It’s the peak of the romanticiza-
tion of adulthood. It’s an intoxi-
cating age, and it all leads up 
to 18, when these dreams and 
manifestations can be realized 
because you are now, legally if 
not mentally, an adult. 

Seventeen seems far from 

both of these vital ages. I felt a 
bigger distance between 16 and 
17 than I had with other ages. I 
felt old — too old for high school 
yet too young for any substan-
tial life changes. I certainly 

didn’t want to be 16 anymore, 
but I was equally certain that I 
didn’t want to be 18, either. I was 
trying hard to avoid change, but 
it was occurring incessantly: 
There was no escaping the col-
lege search or impending SATs. 
I could feel the future breathing 
down my neck, and I shuddered 
at its uncomfortable warmth. I 
didn’t find any solace in looking 
back at the past either, most-
ly because there was nothing 
there for me anymore. Seven-
teen erases nostalgia but fails 
to replace it with anything else. 

This depressing understand-

ing of 17 is only one side of the 
coin; the other is much more 
enticing. The fresh start hang-
ing in front of your face is tan-
talizing. 
Though 
uncertain, 

17 offers the chance to chase 
something new, to ride the high 
of the break in expectations, to 
explore a new side of yourself, 
all of which was not lost on me. 
Avril Lavigne’s “17” captures 
this essence of the age per-
fectly. She sings: “We were on 
top of the world / Back when I 
was your girl / We were living 
so wild and free / Acting stupid 
for fun / All we needed was love 
/ That’s the way it’s supposed to 
be / 17.” This 17 is unrestrained, 
unlimited and compelling. The 
world is right in front of you, 

you can go anywhere you want 
to go, and you can be anything 
you want to be. It’s not yet time 
for the hard decisions; real-
ity can be suspended for a little 
while longer. 

As an anxious person, the 

unrestrained possibility of 17 
was not particularly enticing 
to me — it was nauseating. The 
suspension of reality made me 
feel lost. Instead of enjoying 
the delight of avoiding big deci-
sions, I was stuck in a constant 
loop of said decisions: Where 
would I go to college? Did I 
want to be close to or far from 
my family? What do I want to 
do with my life? Should I even 
go to college with no plan in 
sight? Why does this make me 
upset? 

“Heathers: 
The 
Musical” 

explores the ambiguity of 17. 
Neither of the protagonists 
are enjoying their age; instead, 
they’re 
singing 
about 
how 

they’re desperate to be “nor-
mal” teenagers that “sneak a 
beer and watch TV.” Although 
the circumstance they’re in 
deserves acknowledgment of 
its absurdity, the sentiment 
remains: “Can’t we be seven-
teen? Is that so hard to do?” It is 
hard to be 17, and not only when 
you’re in a relationship with a 
serial killer.

Though the thought of inch-

ing closer to adulthood was 
scary for me, I decided I would 
embrace the glamour of 17 and 
use it as a time to explore who 
I was and the things I wanted. 
For two months, I embodied 
this side of 17 to a T. I made 
lists of potential colleges, I 
researched the best college 
towns, I enjoyed commitment-
free relationships and I spent 
too much time having late-night 
life conversations with friends.

I was preparing to travel out 

of the country over the summer 
when I finally admitted to my 
mom that I was having trouble 
eating. Anything I ate or drank 
caused me physical pain. I had 
been ignoring it for some time 
for the sake of being 17 the way 
I wanted to. I wasn’t ready for 
life to get serious yet. Cancer 
was simply not part of the plan.

I spent a few weeks abiding 

by a strict doctor-ordered diet, 
and after seeing no changes, 
I had the MRI that showed 
the first tumor. It was hard to 
admit I was sick after having 
spent months forcing myself to 
embrace the invincibility of 17. 
It’s the perfect balance between 
youth and adulthood: At 17, you 
are free to make mistakes with-
out large repercussions. You 
can afford to be careless and 

impulsive because you have the 
redeeming qualities of youth 
on your side. At the same time, 
it’s when you first have the 
chance to take control of your 
life. Though most major deci-
sions can be delayed until 18, 
you start to weigh them at 17. 
What colleges sound exciting? 
What new place would you 
like to explore? How will you 
decorate your new space? To a 
certain extent, these questions 
are largely in your hands. So I 
didn’t want to be sick. I didn’t 
want to miss out on this part of 
being 17 — on the making mis-
takes, on the manifesting of my 
future path. 

Cancer magnified this para-

dox. I spent the rest of my 
summer in Ann Arbor, moving 
constantly in between the Rogel 
Cancer Center and the C.S. 
Mott Children’s and Von Voigt-
lander Women’s Hospital. For 
my specific type of cancer, usu-
ally seen in patients 60 years or 
older, the more qualified doc-
tors resided at Rogel and the 
main University Hospital. But, 
since I was only 17, I had all of 
my MRI, CAT and PET scans 
at the Children’s Hospital. At 
17, I was handed a pink Dora 
pillow as they prepared me for 
my scans. I took a picture with 
a Big Bird statue and started to 

collect hospital stickers. The 
enormity of the world I origi-
nally feared became painfully 
small. 

It was difficult to figure out 

how to feel about it all — not 
just the diagnosis, but being rel-
atively young for the diagnosis 
and all the while being on the 
brink of adulthood. At Rogel, I 
was constantly placed next to 
white-haired, wrinkly patients 
in the lobbies, and every time I 
met a new doctor or nurse, they 
would greet me with “I’ve never 
had such a young patient here 
before.” Meanwhile, I stuck out 
like a sore thumb at the Chil-
dren’s Hospital, standing next 
to toddlers as we rode the eleva-
tor up to pediatric radiology. 

The original beauty of the 

paradox of 17 quickly turned 
ugly. I was treated neither like 
an adult nor like a child. I had 
to be accompanied by an adult 
to all of my appointments and 
scans, but I was the one fill-
ing out the paperwork. I was 
old enough to articulate my 
pain and understand my diag-
nosis, but I needed my parent’s 
consent to receive any medical 
treatment. I was contemplating 
my odds of living before I could 
even buy a lottery ticket. 

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