Finding Answers in Broken Mirrors

The subconscious mind works in mysterious ways

Yesterday, as I was walking to the nearest grocery shop to buy some strawberries and apricots, I passed by a mirror. It had probably been the door of an old-style wardrobe. Somebody had wanted to get rid of it and had discarded it next to a bin.

It was all broken and it looked as if a spider had cut webs into it. Shards of glass were hanging loose on the margins reflecting passersby from numerous unnatural angles.

I’ve always been fascinated by mirrors and I stopped, got closer, and took a quick look. It seemed old and somehow uncanny. It made me imagine for a second that I was maybe in a reality show like Truman and there were a thousand tiny cameras behind each piece of broken glass and that my life just like anybody else’s, was actually a dream or a movie that somebody else directs.

The mirror had me wondering why it was lying there.

Had somebody died and the new owner had decided to replace the furniture? Did it break because someone’s grandson had been naughty and thrown a toy at it with more force than usual? Or maybe, did the owners have a fight and a cup aimed at someone’s head took an unexpected trajectory and graciously (or not!?) landed on the mirror?

Well, I guess I’ll never know, I thought to myself, putting a stop to my flights of fancy. I then walked away and forgot about the mirror and my musings altogether.

Today, in the morning, the image of the mirror popped into my head again and again. Why my subconscious found it necessary to bring this to the forefront of my mind... is anyone’s guess.

The last phrase I read before going to bed last night was something about the biggest advantage of being a writer: one gets spiritual freedom. It went like this:

Everything is grist to his mill, from the glimpse of a face in the street to a war that convulses the civilized world, from the scent of a rose to the death of a friend. Nothing befalls him that he cannot transmute into a stanza, a song, or a story, and having done this be rid of it. The artist is the only free man. (W. Somerset Maugham — “The Summing Up”)

I shall write about the mirror then, I thought, and by doing this, I’ll put it out of my mind for good. I don’t know what I’ll say, but the pen will take the lead. Not that I consider myself an artist or anything. I quite enjoy flirting with writing though.

So here it goes. Starting my own private investigation. I will try to free associate.

Last month I broke a mirror. It landed on the floor and it shattered into a thousand million pieces. Well, not as many as that exactly, but you get the gist.

Seven years of bad luck because of a damned small round mirror, and a single moment of distraction from the task at hand? Dear God! That must be a joke.

While I don’t believe in superstitions and I laughed it off at the time, this might have had a bit of an impact on me. It might have lingered in my mind having me worried that the issues I’ve been dealing with at work lately might be looming large in my team as a consequence.

With a cigar in his right hand and famous round glasses on his nose, an imaginary Freud has got me on the proverbial couch. I can see his incredulous look disdainfully disregarding the explanation above.

This definitely can’t be it.

A few days ago I went to my favourite bookshop in town which is located in a quaint building with creaking floors. It has many rooms and there’s always soft piano music playing in the background. There’s even a smell of incense floating everywhere and pleasantly tickling everyone’s nostrils every now and then.

One of the rooms has an enormous mirror on a wall. (So yet another mirror.) Its frame is white with intricate decorations, but its waters seem to hide some murky depths as the mirror has a few black spots. They don’t ruin it in the least, but give it a rather charming mysterious look.

One really has the feeling that it’s not a simple mirror, but some kind of portal to another world that hides … well, who knows what? The marches where the key to unlocking one of the crannies of my mind has been lost? I highly doubt that.

No, this could not be why my psyche superimposed the image of the broken mirror on everything else I thought in the morning. The imaginary Freud is now visibly frowning, impatiently waiting for me to go on and dig into another memory.

Another mirror that I can think of is the one (not quite the right term) I saw last year when I attended ART Safari, an art event that takes place in the city I live in. I’m not sure that this was part of the actual exhibitions, but there was a whole room whose walls were covered with the differently-shaped broken pieces of more than one mirror.

I remember I was fascinated with it at the time and took some selfies (something that I very rarely do as I don’t like selfies).

I really liked the metaphors that all those shards of glass seemed to express. Our memory is made of pieces that are put together to create a sense of self. Or, we’re all actually made of many selves. Or, our recollections are like flashes that run through our heads, exactly like the fleeting images one could see in those mirrors when moving around. One could really take their pick.

I sent one of those selfies to a friend and we had a whole philosophical debate about what that piece of art could mean. It just so happens that I haven’t been talking to this friend of mine for almost a month now because something he did bothered (bothers?!) me.

He hasn’t said what’s on his mind about this fact. I haven’t either. There was no fight, no words thrown in haste, but a bit of a cold war is definitely going on. We’ve both been politely silent for quite a while now.

“There you have it, Ms!” Mr. Freud is smiling and nodding while (finally!!) fading away into the recesses of my mind.

The mirror resurfaced in my head as a reminder. That must be it. The flashes must have pointed out the obvious: I miss the friend.

Our subconscious mind doesn’t use language per se but is one hell of a master of metaphors and hidden meanings.

The broken mirror thrown on the street could have made for a great discussion with this friend of mine only. It is high time we had a talk. Peace negotiations are in order for the apparently non-existing war.

No mirrors will be shattered in the process, rest assured.

Oh, and the quote about the writer actually starts like this:

To him life is a tragedy and by his gift of creation he enjoys the catharsis, the purging of pity and terror, which Aristotle tells us is the object of art. For his sins and his follies, the unhappiness that befalls him, his unrequited love, his physical defects, illness, privation, his hopes abandoned, his griefs, humiliations, everything is transformed by his power into material and by writing it he can overcome it. (W. Somerset Maugham — “The Summing Up”)

So overcoming it I am by having written this. Setting myself free as Maugham aptly puts it. I’ll be enjoying the catharsis.