I Lines
by Bobby Crace

 

I Lines¹
Bobby Crace²

1. 1. I is a word that stands for a person. An I is affected by the words that surround it. Sometimes the words surrounding an I create an idea that is not true of the person the I stands for. Sometimes the words surrounding an I create a resounding truth that is hard for the person the I stands for to accept. The words surrounding Ies form sentences that can be referred to as I Lines. A person knows how to be an I before they know what an I is. Language can bifurcate a person into a Natural Self made up of body and instinct and a Self that is transposed into language. As the Language Self grows, it often becomes the main interface between the person and the world as well as the person and the Self. This gives the words that form around Ies, I Lines, tremendous power over one’s Self and others. The following is an essay of I Lines forming around persons at different points in their lives. 
   2. Bobby Crace is the author. He decides the words that attach to the persons in this essay. The persons in this essay have no say over the words that represent them in either the Lyric or Footnote sections of this essay. Bobby Crace will refer to himself in the third person so that each I correlates to the person being observed.

 

An I becomes an I around a hurt³

Ella’s trauma Ies:⁴

strong dad stands in camera lawn
strong dad stands with camera mom
strong dad stands as daughter girls’ jungle gym
strong dad throws happy bodies in the chlorine splash box
strong dad lies on Christmas lights bed that goes in Christmas lights car that goes to blank place⁵
strong mom waters the driveway strong mom drinks the pebbles strong mom turns into stone mom
strong dad turns into lawn
I am strong dad now

1. 3. A person’s first trauma can cause the relationship with that person’s Natural Self to be unbearable. Often a person needs the Language Self to form identity bridges of I Lines over gaps of pain. Those bridges can expand to roads of I Lines that the person, for better or worse, follows as Self. A younger person must grasp at words with an underdeveloped understanding of language patterns to accommodate an event that isn’t understandable. An immediate, improvised arrangement of words is needed to support necessary functioning. 
   4. Ella is the mother of Bobby Crace. This is how Bobby Crace sees the words collecting around his mother’s I when Ella is 8-14 years old. 
   5. Ella’s father has leukemia. He does not tell his young daughters about his illness. Ella does not tell Bobby Crace how her father hides the effects of his cancer treatments. Ella tells Bobby Crace that one day her father collapses, an ambulance takes him to the hospital, and he dies.

 

Avery’s trauma Ies:⁶

chalkboard eraser free throw line one two three jump turn land grab go
chalkboard eraser baseline faster for the timeclock grins⁷
report card letters for the parent place
one two three jump turn land grab go
chalkboard eraser isn’t for P.E.
chalkboard eraser plays History
I make erasers run fast I make History erasers P.E. I make a move idea I make a catch throw turn sprint idea
one two three jump turn land grab SNAP POP⁸
glass stab
dark

1. 6. Avery is the father of Bobby Crace. This is how Bobby Crace sees the words collecting around his father’s I when Avery is 12 years old.
   7. Avery is a gifted athlete. He is doing a timed shuttle run drill for his middle school P.E. class.
   8. Avery tears the posterior cruciate ligament in his left knee.

 

Ella’s hurt:⁹

mom phone doesn’t work
I call the sad places
mom parent doesn’t work
I yell at the sad sister
mom person doesn’t work
I fold the mall clothes
I get the mom checks
I lose the school letters¹⁰
I meet the schoolboy¹¹

1. 9. This is how Bobby Crace draws the words lining his mother’s I when Ella is 17 years old.
   10. Ella works at the mall. Her grades at school suffer. She is an adult for her sister and her mother. Ella’s mother spends the small amount of life insurance money she receives.
   11. Ella goes on a date with Avery, the town’s football hero.

 

Avery’s hurt:¹²

my knee is an old man
my arm is a champion
I throw harder
I throw 400 miles per hour
I throw my knee into a young
I throw my knee into a lie
I throw my knee into an I
I throw the colleges to my sidelines
I throw the words into my newspapers
I throw the footballs into my Roman Empire
I throw the world to me¹³
I throw an Ella to me
my knee is the tower of babel
I fall
with everything
‘my knee is an old man’ is the only I to throw¹⁴
Ella is the only person¹⁵
I know

1. 12. This is how Bobby Crace draws the words lining his father’s I when Avery is 15-18 years old.
   13. Avery is a standout quarterback being recruited by several top tier collegiate programs. He is known for having an extremely strong arm and an ability to read defenses quickly. He begins to date Ella. (Bobby Crace does not inherit his father’s arm. Derrick Crace, Bobby Crace’s brother, does not play sports. Bobby Crace remembers one impromptu game of catch where he asks Avery to throw the ball as hard as he can. Bobby Crace feels the comic book power when he catches the ball and falls backwards.)
   14. During his junior year, Avery tears the anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee. He recovers in time to play football during his senior year of high school. Just as college scouts are willing to give Avery another look, he blows out his left knee. 
   15. The townspeople and friends quickly forget about Avery, but his relationship with Ella strengthens. 

 

An I becomes an I around a hurt
An I becomes an I in the heal¹⁶

 

Ella’s heal:¹⁷

I follow Avery to a living place that is not my state. I follow Avery because he is an I that I grow around. He is the I that I want to grow Ies with. I am sick of making my mom an I. I am sick of keeping my sister from becoming the I she’s turning into. I am sick of the I that I can only be in the place that I am from. Avery is sick of being in a place that only sees him as one I. We go to a different place because of an Avery college that his parents made. I fold mall clothes in the new state like I folded mall clothes in the old state. The new living place doesn’t care about our Ies. I liked that at first, but now I can’t make any of the here people believe that I’m an I.¹⁸ 

1. 16. After a person learns to define their I around a trauma, they often look to more fertile pastures to plant new I Lines. Rather than stagnate in the soil of Hurt, Survive, and Shock, persons often look for change by placing their Natural Selves in new places. They also place their Language Selves around new words. During this time there is usually a better understanding of societal norms and expectations. A person’s inventive grouping of words that make sense only to the maker can now be shaped around a common sense, a standard of language. 
   17. This is how Bobby Crace moves the words with his mother’s I when Ella is 18-19 years old.
   18. Ella moves from Ocala, FL to Nashville, TN with Avery. She works at a mall while Avery goes to college.

 

Avery’s heal:¹⁹

Hospitals are blank places. I live in a cotton swab every six months so my knee can stand me. I sit in a hospital bed because my dad knows how to make me insured. The cheer people show me disappointment faces. I am a pity mask the town wears on Halloween. Ella gives me the I face. The I-want face. She makes it a you-want face which makes me an I again. I want out with Ella. I ask my dad to make me a new bed. I become his I when he gives me things.²⁰ I will be his I as long as I can take Ella with me.

1. 19. This is how Bobby Crace moves the words with his father’s I when Avery is 18-19 years old.
   20. Avery spends two years in and out of hospitals for surgery and physical therapy. Avery’s father, Dan, moves his business to Nashville, TN. Avery moves to Nashville and works in the accounting department of Dan’s business. Avery applies to schools in Nashville. He attends Vanderbilt University.

 

Ella’s language Ies:²¹

I want to enjoy being newlyweds for a couple of years, but he’s begging to have children right away.²² He’s desperate to become something else now that he can see a something else. I’m happy for him. I know he’s excited and repurposed. It’s what I want for him. But I just got back to school. It’s my turn to college.²³ I made a whole big deal about it and now I can’t read the fucking words. I build cement blocks around hours. It’s not the amount of time. Avery doesn’t come within fifty feet of me when I’m studying. It’s not the distraction. I would be an assassin in business. I coordinated my father’s entire funeral while everybody shaked and cried. I want to make my own money so goddamn bad. I want to prove my entire genealogy wrong, but whenever I look at a set of words, they turn into complete tie dye. And I just can’t understand.²⁴ So I fall into myself completely unready to tell anybody that I can’t school.

1. 21. This is how Bobby Crace makes the words catch up to his mother’s I when Ella is 20 years old.
   22. Ella and Avery get married.
   23. Ella begins to take business classes at a local community college.
   24. Ella’s undiagnosed dyslexia keeps her from continuing her studies. 

 

Avery’s language Ies:²⁵

I’m finally starting to college the way I want to. I’ve been throwing grades at the resume, but the resume ideas can’t hold an Ella and kids. When I’m moving boxes into a new basement, my old body thinks we’re footballing again. My old body becomes hero mover until my kneecap dislocates. I drop a moving box. I throw up kneecap pain. The box throws up my old hospital journals. I put my knee back together; throw up more kneecap pain; read my yesterday words; and begin a career in sports psychology.²⁶

1. 25. This is how Bobby Crace makes the words catch up to his father’s I when Avery is 22 years old.
   26. Avery applies to graduate schools to become a psychologist. 

 

An I becomes an I around a hurt
An I becomes an I for the heal
An I becomes an I in a purpose²⁷

 

Ella’s purpose:²⁸

I have never paid so much to see a movie. Is the last Star Wars movie really worth a six-dollar ticket? I’m not leaving the theatre even if the contractions have started. I’m not leaving the theatre even if strangers are pleading and timing. I leave at the credits and prove myself. I don’t remember any Wookiees. We make it to the hospital. The boy is born. Avery takes him out of the room to show his parents before I get a chance to hold him. When he does this, I realize that Avery and I are very young. The boy finally comes back to me and I can only think of how much I’ve hated until now. I decide that I’ve hated since dad died. The boy makes me forget hate. I name him after dad with Avery’s last name. Dad would’ve hated to hear his name without an Italian ending. It’s the best I can do, pops.²⁹ 

1. 27. A sense of purpose can take command of one’s Language Self and Natural Self. When purpose arrives in one’s life, one’s I can become infatuated with that purpose, bending all its I Lines toward purpose like a plant bending around a shadow. When the Language Self is in the background, standardized language patterns can become the dominant organizational framework of one’s word selection. 
   28. This is how Bobby Crace picks up the words stumbling over his mother’s I when Ella is 21 years old.
   29. Ella gives birth to Robert Louis Crace, the author of this essay, the morning after she sees Stars Wars: Return of the Jedi.

 

Avery’s purpose:³⁰

I am officially me: Father, Husband, Almost-Shrink. I will throw all the world out of the way for little Bobby. I will throw all the world out of the way for Ella. I will study all the hours of all the days. I will work all the nights to afford the things. I will only sleep accidently. I oversleep. I run to the lab. When I get there, I remember that it’s Ella’s birthday. She is angry and hurt. I will throw myself into an I that will never hurt her again. I will throw Ella and Bobby into a best life. I will throw harder.³¹

1. 30. This is how Bobby Crace picks up the words stumbling over his father’s I when Avery is 24-28 years old.
   31. Avery attends graduate school while working for the accounting department of his father’s business.

 

Ella’s bending Ies:³² 

I give birth to my second son, Derrick James Crace. I fail my first son. My husband receives a job at the University of North Carolina.³³ I try to settle into the role of mother. I am a mother. And I am not a mother. Avery’s paychecks start to become enough money. I join a gym with a daycare. I start to like that gym. I start to like the break from mother so I can simply move and sweat. The daycare employee is caught by the police.³⁴ My son is ruined. I am a broken boy’s mother. 

1. 32. This is how Bobby Crace smells the words rotting his mother’s I when Ella is 26-30 years old.
   33. Ella, Avery, and Bobby Crace move to Durham, NC. Ella gives birth to Derrick James Crace.
   34. The MetroSport Fitness Center in Durham, NC is raided by police when reports that one of the daycare’s staff members has been sexually assaulting the kids. (Bobby Crace is having trouble writing his Third Person Name into this footnote.)

 

Avery’s bending Ies:³⁵

I get the plane up in the air. I level it out at altitude. Then an engine blows up. Ella knows how to fly on one engine. I am worthless.³⁶ We take Bobby to a child psychologist every week. He doesn’t seem any different which scares me even more. He is an athlete like me. How will this trauma grow up in his muscles? Derrick is sickly. My dad was sickly. Derrick is like him. I am responsible. I work. I work a lot. I am best for Ella, Bobby, and Derrick when I (a) acquire income (b) show affection (c) keep my shit together. I work more because I know how to help clients. How do I Dad and keep my shit together?

1. 35. This is how Bobby Crace smells the words rotting his father’s I when Avery is 30-34 years old.
   36. Avery finishes his doctorate and becomes a licensed psychologist. He worries about making mistakes as a father. 

 

An I becomes an I around a hurt
An I becomes an I for the heal
An I becomes an I in a purpose
An I becomes an I with the scramble³⁷

 

Ella’s scramble:³⁸

I try to show Bobby how to balance a checkbook. He is like my sister. I try to tell him that if he doesn’t change, he won’t become. I try to tell him that he won’t make any money.³⁹ I lock his bedroom door on the outside because he’s too old to be sleep walking. Is he being ruined again? I worry about him when he’s out there on his own, but if I don’t push him to be normal, he will fail.⁴⁰ My other son is a bubbling easy. I have not broken Derrick. I am responsible for Bobby. I don’t get my I back until Bobby says, ‘I am ok.’

1. 37. Often the purpose that once dominated one’s Selves and Ies begins to lose its pull. As the luster of purpose fades, so too can the conventions and expectations in one’s life. One may experience another trauma which forces a person to redefine their Selves and Ies in the context of this new trauma. An insistence on standard language patterns can fade along with convention and purpose prompting the return of words to a person’s invention. A person’s I at this stage in life is often informed by the weight of experience.
   38. This is how Bobby Crace tastes the expired words souring his mother’s I when Ella is 36-40 years old.
   39. Ella regularly imparts to Bobby Crace the importance of money and decision-making. She expresses concern for the choices a teenage Bobby Crace is making. Bobby Crace is choosing to follow a developing passion for the arts. 
   40. Ella suspects that Bobby Crace is experiencing more sexual harm. Ella does not confirm these suspicions until years later when the former boss of Bobby Crace’s teenage job is caught harming someone else. 

 

Avery’s scramble:⁴¹

I ask Derrick correct questions like, “How does that align with your values?” and “How does that make you feel?” He never answers. I’m bad at driving sons in cars. When I drove Bobby around, a trauma song would come on the radio. I wouldn’t even notice the music until I’d look over and see Bobby hypnotized in some deep terror.⁴² I will not let Derrick feel hurt.⁴³ “So describe your typical day when you get to school. What is most meaningful?” Derrick says that he doesn’t know. He says to stop asking Dad questions. Derrick will not open the door to me. I will work harder.

1. 41. This is how Bobby Crace tastes the expired words souring his father’s I when Avery is 37-42 years old.
   42. Avery is driving a pre-teen Bobby Crace to soccer practice. Bobby Crace states that the song on the radio is making him feel afraid. Bobby Crace states that the song is sending awake nightmares into his brain. Avery strategically asks about those scenes and the details match the police reports from MetroSport Fitness Center. Avery explains to Bobby Crace what had happened to Bobby Crace. Over the next several years, songs and smells continue to open new nightmares in Bobby Crace’s mind. Avery notices these developments.
   43. Avery overcompensates his perceived failures with Bobby Crace by over-attending to a young Derrick Crace. Bobby Crace’s younger brother is a private, interior person who is good at listening to his Natural, Body Self. Derrick is careful to select Ies and I Lines that accurately represent his Self. 

 

Ella’s weighted Ies:⁴⁴

I give words to my kids and they get mad. Avery gets mad. I get mad. They don’t know that they are doing the wrong things. I am a villain for warning them?⁴⁵ Avery says to let them live their truth. Let me live mine. Bobby says he’s going to marry the poor person. I ask if he knows that he has to take on a spouse’s debt. That’s not only my truth that’s beyond truth. That’s rules. I am a villain?⁴⁶ Bobby always shared his toys. I love his share eyes, but that’s why he is ruining. I give him money to help with their wedding show. I am a villain? I am a truth. I’ve only ever moved in truth. So I will yoga in this teacher’s training course where I will show strangers to move in truth. Strangers who know what my family doesn’t. I am not a villain.⁴⁷

1. 44. This is how Bobby Crace hears the words marching behind his mother’s I when Ella is 50 years old.
   45. Ella worries about Bobby Crace and Derrick Crace’s career paths. Bobby Crace is in New York bartending and writing. Derrick Crace is in Nashville designing and painting. Both of her children do not make much money.
   46. Ella is concerned that Bobby Crace’s girlfriend might have a lot of debt. Ella thinks Bobby Crace is going to bury himself financially if he marries his girlfriend. 
   47. After an elbow injury, Ella discovers yoga. She is drawn to the spiritual and physical power of yoga practice. As her children become more distant, Ella’s interest in yoga turns into dedication which leads her to become a yoga teacher and eventually a licensed yoga therapist.

 

Avery’s weighted Ies:⁴⁸

I parent hurt. I career success. A blank hospital has my name on it. I heal. I name therapy place.⁴⁹ I heal. I hurt my boys trying so hard not to hurt my boys. Derrick puts his words in a phone and they say that he’s dating someone. The words say the someone is a man.⁵⁰ I can only think of all the car questions I asked him. All the proficient questions I bombarded him with while he shook in his closet. I hurt. I heal. I hurt. I will be best adult parent to my best adult boys. I hurt. I heal. I heal. I hurt. 

1. 48. This is how Bobby Crace hears the words marching behind his father’s I when Avery is 51 years old.
   49. Avery opens a multi-million-dollar health and wellness center. As he collects career accolades, Avery wonders how much of his psychologist mind contributed to the hurt each member of his family may be struggling with. 
   50. Derrick Crace tells Avery and Ella that he is gay. Avery regrets the invasive questions he regularly asked when Derrick was growing up. Avery worries that he made Derrick feel more isolated because Derrick doesn’t feel comfortable coming out to Avery and Ella until he is in his late twenties. 

 

An I becomes an I around a hurt
An I becomes an I for the heal
An I becomes an I in a purpose
An I becomes an I with the scramble
An I becomes an I for the was⁵¹

 

Ella’s carrying Ies:⁵²

mom I doesn’t work.⁵³
I teach the sad bodies
mom I doesn’t work.
I let go of the children math
mom I doesn’t work.
I go through the hard shit. Like the you should.
I fold into generations of cancer bumps and escape in chemo cars⁵⁴
I litter the secrets
I meet the me place

1. 51. Retrospection can reform the memory of a person’s past Self. I Lines can manipulate the past into shapes one is willing to carry around in the present. Age can validate a person’s prerogative to assemble their I Lines however they see fit. Often this autonomous assembly can cause past patterns of life and language to bubble to the surface.
   52. This is how Bobby Crace feels the words attacking his mother’s I when Ella is 53-57 years old.
   53. Ella stops trying to make others think ideas they don’t want to think. She lets go of work that she doesn’t want to do as her own mother did when Ella was young and working. 
   54. Ella is having periodic battles with breast and oral cancer. She finds remission. She exudes confidence and strength with her Body and Mind.

 

Avery’s carrying Ies:⁵⁵

my I is an old man
my family is a champion
I throw slower
I throw my children into the other states
I throw cancer into my skin
I throw cancer into my I
I throw surgeries at the months
I throw months on the life⁵⁶
I throw phone calls at family ears
They throw words I want to hear
I throw ideas at Christmas plans
I throw my world into a freezer
and listen to the language breathe
I-am-sorry and I-love-you are the only Ies to throw
Family are the only persons
I know

1. 55. This is how Bobby Crace feels the words attacking his father’s I when Avery is 55-57 years old.
   56. Avery is having an escalating battle with skin cancer. Every couple of months he receives increasingly larger surgeries to have melanocytes removed.

 

Ella’s was:⁵⁷

I strong dad at a history party with the birth people playing songs everybody wants to hear
ears learn backwards and they can’t read my music forward
I stop dotting the score
And my persons hear the chords under all their melodies⁵⁸

1. 57. This is how Bobby Crace sees the words floating by his mother’s I when Ella is 59 years old.
   58. Ella knows her triumph.

 

Avery’s was:⁵⁹

I build skinny truths for ticklish spots and cry hugs
my I lives to die for the you place
the you champion that throws footballs at the laughing poodle to fetch and drop all slobbery at my feet hurting to heal⁶⁰

1. 59. This is how Bobby Crace sees the words floating by his father’s I when Avery is 60 years old.
   60. Avery knows his triumph.

 

An I becomes an I around a hurt
An I becomes an I for the heal
An I becomes an I in a purpose
An I becomes an I with the scramble
An I becomes an I for the was
An I becomes an I around a line⁶¹

1. 61. Ies and I Lines may be a mirage of meaning until they affect a Self.

 

 

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BOBBY CRACE is a writer, editor, teacher in New York City. He has been published by various literary, service industry, and sports publications. Bobby has an MFA from Stony Brook University and a BA from Berklee College of Music.