The Comfort of Monsters
Beowulf casts me through the past, not to mythical Scandinavia but to my childhood with a different book in hand. Sitting on the beige carpet floor with my legs crossed, a book of monsters splayed across my lap. Each page and chapter was dedicated to a different monster that lived in the world. I got it for my tenth birthday. Since then, the large pages were slightly bent from the number of times I flipped back and forth between them.
On each left-handed page, the names were in big letters: Chupacabra, Jersey Devil, Yeti, and of course, the European Dragon. A four-legged monster with scales, wings, large enough to tear a tower from a castle; the same kind Beowulf would die fighting. On the other page, a disgustingly detailed rendering of its anatomy, muscles, veins under the skin. Skeletons gave way to organs with labels for the stranger pieces. An annotation pointed to its underbelly and advised its readers the soft spot to strike. I studied feverishly the shapes and names so that I would be able to spot any monster in the book. More importantly, I learned how to kill it. I never found any, but maybe that was for the best.
Beowulf is the hero, the king, strung enough to rip limb from body and hardy enough to hold his breath to the bottom of a lake. I could barely run a mile before needing to lie down for the rest of the day. More than that, I would never find a monster-shaped-monster. One night, I laid on the carpet instead of my bed in total darkness. I held a wooden sword and waited, like a great warrior waiting for the fated day to awaken. Each bump and movement in the house was analyzed to see if it was approaching and my time was here.
No little creatures nor massive beasts entered my view. I only heard of monsters during my classes. Each time, my head lifted and looked and listened, eager to kill a monster like a great hero. Each time, the monster turned out to be an ordinary person and I wondered where were the wings and horns and fire? There didn't turn out to be shapeshifters nor mind controlling fey nor trance inducing vampires, just people. Those people always had some history attached to them and my mind wandered from the speaking teacher. I doodled monsters in my notebooks with me standing over them and X's on their eyes.
Sometimes, I envy the simplicity of Beowulf's world where the monsters looked like monsters. Here somebody, maybe even anybody, could come with a fell swoop and cleave the problem away. Gone the curses, the fires, the tragedies, because all that was needed was a sharp blade.
Then, I look at my skin, the shape of my body. The scales of dried skin along my neck, the sharp shoulder blades protruding out, how easily it could be dissected and analyzed and broken into different charts and diagrams. I poke at my soft belly. A sword through there would mean death for me too.
Some point after reaching double digits in age, I started to be aware of my body and how different it was compared to others. No claws nor fur nor snout but smaller things like how not white my skin was, how much thinner my limbs were, how differently my teeth were shaped. I was told quickly which category these differences belonged to, which place among the dividing balance between normal and different were, which spot I stood in between a normal animal and a monster. Because I looked this way, therefore that meant I usually acted this or that way. That these behaviors are good and those ones are unexpected.
I walked to my next class and somebody asked me, squinting their eyes with their hands in fake karate open palms waving around, "Hey, can you show us your ching-chong kung fu?"
And I wanted to show it by punching them in the face. Beowulf would have. He wouldn't have questioned himself in his violence, in his unbridled enforcement of pride and wrath, in his rampage to force the world into what befit his strengths. It wouldn't be a dragon but was close. Maybe, humans were so monstrous they made others extinct, obsolete. I could be a hero and find my monster to slay and emerge triumphant. I didn't. Instead, I looked away and made an awkward laugh and withdrew from it all.
I wonder if the dragon from Beowulf felt the same. It was too large to live anywhere, too different to be welcomed wholly, its beautiful glittering scales of gold accursed to anybody that couldn't see the luster, not even given a name but simply the category "dragon." When humans came professing themselves ownership and true heirs of the world, it emerged to be a hero of its own story. Maybe they grew their features, their fire and scales and wings to protect themselves from children like me all to ready and wanting to rip it apart, like an evolutionary response to other monsters.
It's a cold morning and I let out a warm breath, frosty air billowing from my mouth. Maybe, I could learn to do the same.
On each left-handed page, the names were in big letters: Chupacabra, Jersey Devil, Yeti, and of course, the European Dragon. A four-legged monster with scales, wings, large enough to tear a tower from a castle; the same kind Beowulf would die fighting. On the other page, a disgustingly detailed rendering of its anatomy, muscles, veins under the skin. Skeletons gave way to organs with labels for the stranger pieces. An annotation pointed to its underbelly and advised its readers the soft spot to strike. I studied feverishly the shapes and names so that I would be able to spot any monster in the book. More importantly, I learned how to kill it. I never found any, but maybe that was for the best.
Beowulf is the hero, the king, strung enough to rip limb from body and hardy enough to hold his breath to the bottom of a lake. I could barely run a mile before needing to lie down for the rest of the day. More than that, I would never find a monster-shaped-monster. One night, I laid on the carpet instead of my bed in total darkness. I held a wooden sword and waited, like a great warrior waiting for the fated day to awaken. Each bump and movement in the house was analyzed to see if it was approaching and my time was here.
No little creatures nor massive beasts entered my view. I only heard of monsters during my classes. Each time, my head lifted and looked and listened, eager to kill a monster like a great hero. Each time, the monster turned out to be an ordinary person and I wondered where were the wings and horns and fire? There didn't turn out to be shapeshifters nor mind controlling fey nor trance inducing vampires, just people. Those people always had some history attached to them and my mind wandered from the speaking teacher. I doodled monsters in my notebooks with me standing over them and X's on their eyes.
Sometimes, I envy the simplicity of Beowulf's world where the monsters looked like monsters. Here somebody, maybe even anybody, could come with a fell swoop and cleave the problem away. Gone the curses, the fires, the tragedies, because all that was needed was a sharp blade.
Then, I look at my skin, the shape of my body. The scales of dried skin along my neck, the sharp shoulder blades protruding out, how easily it could be dissected and analyzed and broken into different charts and diagrams. I poke at my soft belly. A sword through there would mean death for me too.
Some point after reaching double digits in age, I started to be aware of my body and how different it was compared to others. No claws nor fur nor snout but smaller things like how not white my skin was, how much thinner my limbs were, how differently my teeth were shaped. I was told quickly which category these differences belonged to, which place among the dividing balance between normal and different were, which spot I stood in between a normal animal and a monster. Because I looked this way, therefore that meant I usually acted this or that way. That these behaviors are good and those ones are unexpected.
I walked to my next class and somebody asked me, squinting their eyes with their hands in fake karate open palms waving around, "Hey, can you show us your ching-chong kung fu?"
And I wanted to show it by punching them in the face. Beowulf would have. He wouldn't have questioned himself in his violence, in his unbridled enforcement of pride and wrath, in his rampage to force the world into what befit his strengths. It wouldn't be a dragon but was close. Maybe, humans were so monstrous they made others extinct, obsolete. I could be a hero and find my monster to slay and emerge triumphant. I didn't. Instead, I looked away and made an awkward laugh and withdrew from it all.
I wonder if the dragon from Beowulf felt the same. It was too large to live anywhere, too different to be welcomed wholly, its beautiful glittering scales of gold accursed to anybody that couldn't see the luster, not even given a name but simply the category "dragon." When humans came professing themselves ownership and true heirs of the world, it emerged to be a hero of its own story. Maybe they grew their features, their fire and scales and wings to protect themselves from children like me all to ready and wanting to rip it apart, like an evolutionary response to other monsters.
It's a cold morning and I let out a warm breath, frosty air billowing from my mouth. Maybe, I could learn to do the same.
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