curiouser and curiouser

one of my mantras is 'how does it work?'; 'what's inside?'
i have had the need to see and know all things around me and beyond since i can recall taking breath.
i really needed to see those people in the radio. a soothing memory of my mom is her ironing, with the windows open, a fan oscillating and the radio tuned to"Stella Dallas" - a radio soap from the days when your imagination was allowed to make characters fit their voices and to 'see' with your ears and mind. i would be playing something quiet while she listened and she thought, i am sure, that i was oblivious to the story or actors. i held my curious head as long as i could - until the opportunity opened up for action. mom took some clothes into the other room and i hurried up onto the chair by the table that my 3 year old legs could not reach on their own.
i pulled the plastic and metal radio toward me and began to unscrew the little fasteners that held the back particle board onto it. i was just about to get the cover open when mom reappeared - and flipped out!
'stop' she shouted. 'you'll get shocked!' the thing was plugged in and of course she was right, now that i think on it.
but i was so disappointed. she had stopped me seeing those tiny, little faery-like people who lived inside that radio. why was she so nonchalant about listening in on them? did she not also want to see them?
i think that i grew curiouser and curiouser, a bit like Alice, as i got older.
i still keep the bits of my Cinderella watch that my granny bought me for my 6th birthday. it was so pretty and the second hand moved with such a precise rhythm bringing the other 2 hands along so very slowly. of course i needed to know what and how. it was easy to pry off the face. and the delicate, tiny parts that made up the time-ticking were just lovely. i really enjoyed exploring that watch. my main problem came though when i tried to put it back together. i couldn't. there were more pieces than when i began it seemed and the gear that should go here, would only fit next to the one over there...and you see the issues. i put it away with other things that somehow would not come back together, in the back of a sockdrawer somewhere.
in jr high we had to dissect a crayfish!
# 1 how gross is that?
#2 how gross is that for a vegetarian and animal lover?
Linn and i were lab partners. our victim had been kept in formaldehyde and tiny as it was, this creature had a really foul odor. so strong was the stench and the psychological effects of what we had to do, that Linn and i took turns with the whole activity. first she would do an organ removal, then go to the hallway to breathe while i went in to do the next cut.
the challenge [as if this wasn't enough] was to wrap up the parts, store them, and put them back in place the next day.
so we came in next afternoon and started our turn-taking routine and when we finished, there was an organ left over. see i told you there are more pieces when you start putting things back. well what could we do? we checked and re-checked, matched the parts in the book, held our breath and checked some more.
but nothing could be done for a dead, split crayfish with an extra organ. so we dropped the leftover piece into the ink-well in the old desk! next day the stench was still awful [DUH]. but we had turned in our 'project' and to our utter amazement we scored A's on it.
poor thing.
i still take things apart. jewelry that i remake into whatever shape interests me. movies that have no apparent end or that have intricate plots - got to fix those.
PEOPLE. i take people apart. mostly me. i take me apart. in dreams and stories. i over-think; analyzing everything i do and even what i think! :0(
over-think-analysis i believe it's called.
and the grief i have felt for so long now - i can not let go thinking it long enough to feel it or to integrate it. i keep taking it apart. maybe i should stick it in the back of the sock drawer too. or better yet, just drop it into the inkwell.
but even then i would still smell it.