The band, Macxermillio, Macfearson and Lebohang, has been my imaginary friends for so long and actually been with me through difficult times. They studied with me, went to the hospital with me, looked after me when I was sick, and also encouraged me when I felt like giving up. There is only so much they could because they are immaterial, they couldn’t stop me from doing other harmful things from myself or from my suicidal attempts.
Now I’m sure you have realized how essential and important is the Macxermillio character, by the way the Macxermillio and Macfearson in the book are the same as my imaginary friends except in this novel I have put them in a situation for a purpose. I don’t know if this matters, but they agreed to it, we sat together and decided on it and everything. Instead of having the second version of me remain Lebohang in the novel I named gave him the name which is really his, Sandy. It did not make sense to call him Lebohang when the wasn’t going to be me in the book. So there wasn’t going to be any confusion. Since all the imaginary friends subservient to Macxermillio are “Macxermillian” in a sense. That is why Sandy is: Sandy Macxermillian.
I hope all of this makes sense and reveals why Sandy, in the novel, is Sandy. Now a main character in a novel having the same name as the author might have other effects and spawn a whole number of interpretations and I think that is okay. I have some things in common with Sandy, a lot, but he just isn’t me. And since the book is written in first person this relationship between author and main character gives the illusion of the story being non-fiction, therefore amplifying the story’s importance and intended function.
The Three Faces of Sandy
Although the ending of the novel allows for many interpretations as to what is meant by “imaginary friends” there is one thing that is clear. Sandy, Macxermillio and Macfearson, work as a single unit. Just how this trinity functions is the interesting part and reveals a lot about the nature of the main character(s) and illuminates some of the things that occur in the story and lends a lot of meaning to how and why the story ended as it did.
The trinity is modeled, in part, over the Freudian concept of the id, ego and the superego. For more information on these go online, I’m going to touch a bit on these here.
Id – the id it is irrational and fantasy orientated. It is pure desire and instinct, all it wants is to fulfill these basic instincts and desire not matter the cost or the consequences. It is the most primitive part of our psyche and it is largely unconscious and impulsive.
Ego – it is orientated around problem-solving; realistic and rational it is. It negotiates ways, between us and our world, which can fulfill the desires or urges exerted by the id while avoiding the most pain it can to the self. However, it does not have a sense of right and wrong.
Superego – it is the voice of conscience and the source of guilt in most of us. It is aware of right and wrong, values and the society at large. If a person gives in to the desires of the id without listening to conscience, it can punish you by guilt and other uncomfortable emotions or thoughts; the reverse of that will be making us feel proud when we do something right.
Now the trinity itself is divided into these functions or a version of them. Instead of these functions being part of one psyche they are personalized and function as three distinct personalities who have their own psyches (or at least they are presented that way).
Macfearson is the id, he is the most primitive and instinct bound of the trinity. He has these erratic energies and passions inside him, obsessive, impatient and not easily influenced by reason. He is brute desire and feelings. The only thing keeping him on check is Macxermillio who Macfearson is subservient to him largely because of the reasons I have elaborated on previously.
Macxermillio is the voice of conscience, reason. He is the superpergo and also part ego. He is the intelligent, meticulous, even-tempered and strategic one of the trinity. Without him, they have no direction and they are bound to self-destruct, he brings order to chaos, calm to the storm and direction to aimlessness. However, sometimes, although rarely, he can get side-tracked because of his tremendous responsibilities that is why he sometimes needs Macfearson to remind him of what they are about (a bit of passion). Macfearson needs him the most though, without Macxermillio he is bound to wind up in trouble; he requires the moderation. Macfearson without Macxermillio is oblivious to the consequences of his actions, he is race car without breaks. Macxermillio without Macfearson is a machine without a soul.
One of the chapters that illustrate this dynamic is Chapter 3.2
Sandy is part ego and part id and he is also the axis at which these personalities meet. Since he is the one with a body, or the real one, the others depend on him to exist simply because they are ‘in his mind’. Contrary to intuition, that does not make him the strongest force in the trinity or the most significant. He might be the body that moves about in the world, but he is not in complete control. He, like Macfearson, is also subservient to Macxermillio. He is also drawn more to Macxermillio because, like Macxermillio, he is rational and pragmatic, at the same time Macfearson is a part of him and he sympathizes with bits of his personality because after all he is half-id.
This is why the death of Macxermillio by the calling is important, it signals the triumph of irrationality, instinct, confusion and brute forces because the force that keeps everyone together and sane is annihilated, namely Macxermillio (the superego and half-ego). Why does that happen? What is it that takes away this element of common sense and conscience? The only element capable of understanding reality or society? The trinity’s, or Sandy’s, only hope of dispelling its delusions? Well, the simple answer is depression. The complicated answer is the calling.
Since Macfearson, being the personification of brute desire and instinct, is the most homicidal and extremely suicidal force, that is also obsessed with the fields/the crop, he is left to reign over the weaker Sandy, who is half-ego and id and no superego therefore no match for Macfearson. This is why the self-destruction creeps in once Macxermillio is removed and the novel takes a somewhat exaggerated erratic turn. There is no moderation, a voice of conscience or a sense of direction remaining. That is why the book ends like it did.
It’s worth noting that although Macxermillio is the voice of conscience and direction, he is a different kind of conscience that holds unusual values, beliefs and moral standards. This is because he is a conscience in a mentally ill mind. A mind that is warped and twisted. Perhaps the most important thing about him is that he represents the capacity to heal. He is the hope because he can initiate change and see the world as it really is.
The trinity, in a sense, is a state of perpetual internal conflict since the others are “imaginary friends” except Sandy. However, in a way, the trinity is Sandy Macxermillian and Sandy Macxermillian is the trinity: this is why I titled essay this “Three Faces of Sandy”.
The Calling
What is it? What does it do or how does it affect the characters? Why did Macxermillio call it “father”? Well, this is a complicated answer. I sometimes get confused by it myself and I created it, this is because it has gotten so complex. To try and make this answer easy I will answer this question in the following sections:
A Metaphor
An Entity
Influences and Relations
A Worldview
A Metaphor
The calling is, as alluded to in Cheryl’s Notes, a metaphor of clinical depression and other mental illnesses that may come with it. Think of all the symptoms of depression, that is what the calling is. So every time in the book when the character’s say “the calling is getting stronger” or “can you feel the calling” what they are saying is that their mental condition is getting worse. Here is a list of the depressive symptoms prevalent in this book and are constantly referred to in different ways, sometimes indirectly by characters suddenly changing behavior:
Feelings of hopelessness and helplessness.
Loss of appetite
Sleep changes
r /> Loss of energy
Self-loathing
Concentration problems
Crying spells
Extreme sadness and pain
Emptiness
Feelings of worthlessness
Frequent or recurrent thoughts of death and suicidal/homicidal thoughts (should be noted that homicidal thoughts are very rare)
Neglecting hygiene
Self-harm
Delusional thinking
I feel there is much more than the list says, but I think you get the point. With self-harm, it is interesting to note that the characters use it so they may feel better for a while(to dispel the calling) but this act is nonetheless a symptom of mental illness. Self-harm can only get worse as it did with Calvin which the trinity refer to when advising Sandy about using self-harm to curb the “weight of the calling”(the psychological pain).
An Entity
The calling is also a personification of clinical depression and the mental illness that may come with it. In the novel Sandy speaks to the calling (Chapter 6.4), the calling is described as some enigmatic abyss-like creature when it kills Macxermillio(Chapter 11.5). They refer to the calling speaking to them and they do not know whether they should trust it or not. They wonder if it is their guide to the home or it is a product of the universe that is rejecting them since they consider themselves not belonging in this universe.
They did all the homicidal experiments as a way to test if the calling was to be trusted but that came to no avail that is why they tried therapy. More on this on the fourth section of this essay.
Influences and Relations
So Macxermillio calls the calling “father” when it reveals itself to him right before killing him. This exchange reveals that there wouldn’t be Macxermillio or Macfearson if it wasn’t for the calling. How so? Well, remember in Chapter 4 when Sandy meets Mafearson and Macxermillio for the first time? In Chapter 4.2 Macfearson tells him a story of “how it starts”. Read that and come back here if you can’t remember. What Macfearson is telling Sandy or what that reveals is how the depression started and the sense of alienation. The depression made him weird and, as a result, his peers, family and others rejected him or forgot him. Maybe because he was already in the process of alienating himself as people with depression often do.
As a result of Sandy’s loneliness and alienation (depression) he creates “imaginary friends” or the “imaginary friends” come to him. Therefore the calling (depression) twisted and warped his brain and life until Macxermillio and Macfearson came out of him. In a sense, this makes the calling the father to who Sandy, Macxermillio and Macfearson end up becoming because it shapes their feelings, bombards them with thoughts, distorts their perception and filters their experience. A child who grows up depressed or with depression is very much molded by the illness(the illness influences their identity and what it becomes) if it is left untreated and that is what is being insinuated in the book.
In Chapter 11.5 Macxermillio calls the calling “father” when this insight is revealed to him and the calling calls him “son”. Why did he apologize to the calling? Because he hasn’t been a very good son, he tried his best not to listen to what the calling/depression orders out of him. Since the calling is the stronger force in the book it eventually beats common sense and rationality, aka Macxermillio, and kills him. This alludes to ways in which delusional thinking and some of the ways depression can affect our thinking, often killing rationality, distorting perception and keeping us delusional. That is why Macxermillio goes in the end, because depression, left untreated or not treated quickly enough, only gets worse and more powerful.
A Worldview
The calling isn't a worldview, but it is responsible for a worldview the same way it is responsible for Macxermillio and Macfearson. Because of the alienation created by it and the suffering Sandy/the trio started to believe that he does not belong in this world, not even in heaven or hell. In fact, he/the trio strongly believed that they came to exist into this world by a mistake. They even had a name for who they were, deathlings. They even had a name for where they belonged, the crop or the fields. But what does all of this really mean? To answer this, I am going to reveal to you their entire worldview/theory.
It is important to understand realms of existence as Sandy/the trio understood them. When they refer to “this world”, “the universe” or “this existence” in the book what they are referring to is a realm of existence, they are not talking about earth, a country, a universe, a parallel universe or the town. What they are referring to is a concept that goes along the lines of a mode of existence.
What is a realm of existence?
The simplest way I can explain it is in this way. Think of all that exists or you know to exist as in our picture of cosmology today. Think of the universe, the parallel universes and multiverse. All of that, to Sandy/trio, belongs to this world. It is one mode of existence. What they have in mind is that our entire picture of cosmology is only one way that things could be or exist. Not only are there other universes spatiotemporally separated from ours but they are made with a different kind of stuff altogether (not matter as we understand it but something completely alien and incomprehensible to us).
There is a finite number of these realms of existence, Sandy/trio believed, and they are thinly next to each other like slices in a loaf of bread except that in between these slices there are membranes separated the modes of existence. These membranes are where all things are formed in their pre-existing state and according to the essence of the entities formed they send the entities to their appropriate realm of existence/homes. Occasionally, a mistake happens and entities formed in the membranes are transported to realms of existences which aren’t appropriate to them. And that is precisely, they theorized, what happened to them as deathlings. The simple meaning behind the term, as they used it in the beginning of the novel, was that they belonged in a different mode of existence altogether and the name of every intelligent being from that mode of existence is a deathling. They called that realm of existence the crop/the fields. They theorized that suicide done the right way might send them across into the membrane which might then direct them to their home where they belong instead of hell, heaven or the afterlife which still belongs in this realm of existence. That is what all the homicides(the sampling) were about in the novel, they were experimenting in hopes of finding the perfect suicide to transmit them to the crop/fields/home. Of course, they begin doubting and thinking their entire method is false, after killing Jay, and they regroup and try come up with an alternative while they figure things out, that is when the idea to see a therapist comes in.
They came to believe this because of the anguish that resulted from being depressed and mentally ill, and because of the delusions engendered by mental illness (the calling) they formed this worldview. In this worldview, their conception of death is transmittal unlike in the end of the novel when this view is shattered and death is an annihilator and they conclude that they are inanimate entities trying to pass on as living things, therefore, explaining their discomfort and anguish.
Thank you for reading books on BookFrom.Net Share this book with friends