T H E M A N , H R E C E N T P A S T , A N D H S 0 N S 円 C T IJ R E Box 6 」 Lewis Carr011's Boat beneath 0 Sunny Sky A Boat, beneath a sunny sky Lingering onward dreamily ln an evening ofJuly— Children three that nestle near, Eager eye and willing ear, PIeased a simple tale [ 0 hear— Long has p aled that sunny sky : Echoes fade and memories die: Autumn frosts have slain July. StiII she haunts me, phantomwise, Alice moving under skies Never seen by waking eyes ・ ChiIdren yet, the tale to hear, E ager eye and willing e ar, Lovingly shall nestle near. ln a Wonderland they lie, Dreaming as the days go by, Dreaming as the summers die: Ever driåing down the stream— Lingering in the golden gleam— Life, What iS it but a dream?

Lucy in the Mind Of Lennon ln humans, this basic motive emerges quite strongly around the time children start crawling and is evidenced by their tendencies tO protest when separated 伝 om their caregivers and tO cling tO them upon reunion. and Other behaviors serve at least t , 0 functions: [ 0 keep increasingly 1 れ Obile children near the caregiver at a time when they could endanger themselves by wandering 0 圧 and to help children receive the comfort and "emotional refuel- ing" they need throughoutthe day (and night). cross-cultural studies ShO 、 that 1 OS [ caregivers meet their children's attachment needs by sensitively responding tO their children in warm and consistent ways, thereby helping the chil- dren to develop what Bowlby called a "secure attachmentstyle. ln their interactions With caregivers, children With secure attachment styles come [ 0 learn that they are loveable and that other people are trustworthy; as such, these children develop a strong sense Of self-esteem that allows them [ 。 confidently function in the world. lhey also typically believe that others will be available to provide them with C01 れ for [ when it is needed. Not all children are so fortunate. Research shows that chil- dren With caregivers WhO are rather COld and undemonstrative develop what is called an 420 / イ〃ー attachment style, as they learn that their attempts [ 0 seek SOlace are likely tO be rebuffed or met with half-hearted compliance by the caregiver. For these reasons, avoidant children are often hyper-independent, eventually devel- oping the attitude that "l can take care of myself and don't need anyone else. " still other children are raised by caregivers who are highly inconsistent, sometimes showering the infant with but Other times being physically or emotionally unavailable to help soothe 70

10 Lucy in the Mind of Lennon that a consistent predictor Of suicidality and depression (among bOth poets and non-poets) is the frequent use Of first person sin- gular pronouns, especially in the context ofpainful feelings. This aspect Ofthe way a person speaks and writes seems [ 0 belie a ten- dency on the part ofdepressed (and suicidal) people to be overly aware of themselves and to strongly identify with their psychic pain; such tendencies probably both reflect and contribute to their depression. ln contrast, nondepressed individuals seem able tO distance themselves from such unpleasant feelings, and this psychologically adaptive tendency expresses itself in the way that such individuals write and speak. Here S another question. During the investigation intO the alleged kidnapping of two children, the distraught parents made the 応Ⅱ 0 、ⅵ ng statements [ 0 police. Which parent は s later con- victed ofmurdering the children? Was it Parent 1? My children wanted me. They needed me. And now I can't help them. '' Or Parent They're okay. %ey're going [ 0 be home soon. The clue that helped police investigators identify the murder- mg parent is another seemingly small point Of grammar, in this case, verb tense. Typically, when parents believe that their children are missing but alive, the children will be referred to in the present tense. This is how the children's father, David Smith, spoke of them in the second quote. But it seemed odd tO the investigators that the mother, Susan Smith, spoke Ofher children ⅲ the past tense when she claimed that they had been

THE MAN, HIS RECENT PAST, AND HIS SON'S 円 CTURE 71 the child. Research suggests thatsuch parenting often leads these children to develop an 4 〃 0 郷房ん加 attachment style (or what is also called a おなな〃 or ア 0 〃 2 イ attachment style). These children learn from their interactions [ their caregiv- ers that while other people can occasionally help or soothe them when they are feeling bad, they should not be [ 。。 confidentthat those people will consistently be available. These disruptions in the attachment relationship also leave such children relatively unable to soothe themselves when they are upset, for they have not had the kinds of caregiving experiences that facilitate the development ofthis capacity. AS a result, anxious-ambivalent chil- dren are understood to have a んツ 2 ど - c 万″ 4 たイ attachment system, because they have stronger-than-normal desires for relationships that might give them the soothing they cannot give themselves. These children Often come to feel rejected because oftheir parents inconsistencies, thereby raising questions in their minds abOL1t how loveable they are. Negative beliefs about themselves, in turn, can cause them even 1 れ ore distress, thus lOCking these children intO a distressing cycle, as they have diffculty both soothing themselves and finding people who are consistently available to help soothe them. Much about Lennon S experiences in the first five years Of his life would have predisposed him towards developing an anxious-ambivalent style ofattachment. From the point Ofview Of a young boy trying to understand his world, the experiences he had with caregivers must have seemed rather bewildering. HiS father was repeatedly present and then absent throughout the first couple of years of Lennon's li に His mother seemed to like to play with him, but, ifthe reports ofbiographers can be trusted, a1k00 often

Lucy in the Mind 0f Lennon 72 he awoke alone in a dark room and called for her in vain. He was taken fror れ his mother's home tO live with an aunt and uncle, and then, after a few months, yanked back to his mother's home, where he soon found her liVing With a new and sometimes ViOlent 1 れ an. soon aåer that, he was again separated 伝 0n1 his mother when his father took him to the beach resort. lhen, after being forced to make a ChOice between his parents (a ChOice that no five-year 01d has the cognitive or emotionalcapacity [ 0 make), he paid the price ofa seemingly permanen い eparation 丘 om his father, who le 丘 his life entirely for years. And on the heels of this abandonment, the mother he ん 4 イ chosen to stay with gave him up yet again, this time for years. Essentially, the near-constant refrain ofLennon's first five years was union fO Ⅱ 0 ℃ d by separation, a style Ofcare that is proto- typical Ofthe disruptions in parenting consistency that are kno 、 [ 0 create anxious-ambivalent attachment styles in children. Beliefs about others and themselves that children derive from their earliest experiences dO not disappear as they age, according to attachment theory, but become part and parcel of their devel- oping personalities, even intO adulthood. it is possible tO provide further evidence that Lennon may have developed an anxious-ambivalent style Of attachment by considering the extent [ 0 which he exhibited the various features that research has shown characterize such individuals. Generally speaking, the match is strong. For example, children with this attachment style are likely to be angrier and behave more aggressively than children with the Other tWO primary attachment styles. Lennon clearly acted out physically and verbally throughout his childhood and adolescence. Research has also shown that the problems with self-esteem and

69 THE MAN, HIS RECENT PAST, AND HIS SON'S 円 CTURE cut yesterday. '" lnstead ofexpressing his emotions or talking about his pain, by all accounts Lennon s primary means of coping with his mother's death became hiding the sadness and anger he felt, drinking copiously, and being verbally and physically aggressive to those around h ⅱれ . ノ〃 4 いなイカ翩加着 0 〃 4 / 〃ⅳ 0 リ : ノな 4 訪ど乃印リ Many different theoretical approaches could be used to understand how Lennon s personality developed out ofthese (and other) expe- riences 伝 om his childhood and adolescence. One approach that seems tO stand out as particularly relevant and useful in the case of Lennon is called な訪ど加坊卲リ . DeveIoped in the 1960S , attachment theory was created by John Bowlby in an attempt to integrate ( 1 ) the psychoanalytic approach in which he had been trained, ( 2 ) research literature on the relationships Of young ani- mals with their caregivers that had emerged ⅲ the 1950S , and ( 3 ) his own experiences working with British children who had been separated om their parents during World War Ⅱ . %e ideas that Bowlby came tO propose in his classic three-volume work on attachment and loss (titled respectively, ノな 4 訪な S 孕〃 ; カ ) have been remarkably influential across several subdisciplines ofpsychology, generating thousands ofresearch studies, and yield- ing one of the best-validated sets of ideas for understanding how children's development and personality are affected by their early experiences With caregivers. Bowlby began by drawing on the work of animal researchers such as Konrad Lorenz (with geese) and Harry HarIow (with monkeys), which suggested that many young animals come into the world with a predisposition tO attach themselves [ 0 a caregiver.

101 T H E N EXT S 0 N G S lndia. Lennon stayed two months, hiding om Cynthia the fact that he was receiving almost daily letters 丘 om ko. Lennon later said ofhis time in lndia: I couldn't sleep and I was hallucinating like crazy—having dreams where you could smell. The funny thing about the camp was that although it was very beautiful and I was medi- tating about eight hours a day, I was writing the most miser- able songs on earth. ln 召んお when I wrote "l'm so lonely I want to die," (sic) I wasn't kidding. That's how I felt … up there, trying to reach God and feeling suicidal. During the first part of 1968 , Lennon continued his attempts to weaken his ego (now through meditation rather than LSD) and experienced separations both 伝 om his father and from ko , the , 01 れ a With " h01 れ he increasingly Obsessed. these circumstances are the type that would heighten the accessibility of his thoughts and feelings about earlier separations in his 1 飛 , it makes sense that "mothers" in general and, for the first ⅱ 1 e , Lennons mother in particular, appeared in three ofthe songs that he began writing while in lndia. ln 乃ど朝加切〃切辞 0 ワイお〃〃んルお / ″ , Lennon satirized one ofthe meditators at the ashram who took a break 丘 om the peace- ん 1 vegetarian lifestyle atthe ashram [ 0 go hunttigers. As he had done in Cry ルり Cry, Lennon broughttogether children, moth- ers, and death in the last verse Ofthis song: The children asked him ifto kill was no い sin. "Not when helooked so fierce," his mommy butted ⅲ .

THE MAN, HIS RECENT PAST, AND HIS SON'S 円 CTURE 75 for BowIby's studies ofattachment was to understand how people, especially children, react tO separation and IOSS. Researchers have examined these connections, conducting dozens ofstudies h() 、 grief and attachment styles relate. psychologists R. Chris Fraley and PhiIIip R. Shaver summarized this literature: [%ere] is considerable empirical support for BowIby's idea that ChroniC mourning stems れ an anxious-ambivalent attachment organization. He believed that lack Of respon- siveness on the part ofattachment figures ()n both childhood and adulthood) heightens an individual's vigilance and sen- sitivity [ 0 cues regarding separation, rgection, and IOSS. AS a result, When irretrievable losses occur, anxious-ambivalent or preoccupied individuals have diffculty resolving these losses because their attachment systems are primed tO con- tinue yearning and searching for the missing attachment figures. problems associated with "irretrievable losses" for anxious-ambivalent individuals are even 1 れ ore acute When they attempt tO suppress their thoughts about separation, as Lennon seems tO have done. ln one research project, for example, study participants were asked tO imagine that an important relationship had ended, and some Of the participants were encouraged to try to suppress their resulting thoughts and feelings. All study par- ticipants then wrote in a stream-of-consciousness style, and the researchers lOOked for themes Of IOSS in the prose that subjects had generated. Suppression seemed to work for individuals with an avoidant attachment style, as their prose revealed 、 ver themes

E X P R E S 引 0 N n the 日 1 of 1970 , Lennon once again opened the door on the expression of his feelings about his mother and her death. lndeed, he knocked the door completely offits hinges. Earlier that spring, the BeatIes had offcially disbanded and Lennon was once again forced [ 0 confront the question OfhOW he would construct a new 1 飛 for himself. ko had also recently suf- fered t , 0 miscarriages, the second rather late int0 her pregnancy. And around this same time, Lennon seems tO have drastically reduced hiS heroin intake. COmbination ofanother Separation (from the Beatles), two more deaths (ofhis potential children), and the relative cessation Of his self-medication (with heroin) might explain Lennon S reaction that March when he received in the 1 れ ail an advance copy ofthe book 乃ゾツ & : / ツ乃ど , ど C 〃 - ルを〃 0 ム . Lennon immediately read the entire b00k, in which the American psychotherapist Arthur Janov presented his extension and elaboration of Freud's ideas that psychological suf- fering could be relieved through the strong emotional release (or catharsis) ofthe pain people carry around from their childhood. Upon finishing the book, Lennon contacted Janov, asking the therapist to come to England and begin treating him ・ Janov agreed, and the two worked together almost daily tha い pring and summer, first at Lennon's home in England and then at Janov's therapy 107

99 T H E N EXT S 0 N G S afterJulia died, Lennon broughttogether severalfriends to hold a seance and try tO reach her. lhe First Ha 圧 0 日 968 As noted in chapter 6 , fundamentalto BowIby's attachmenttheory iS the idea that emotional distress results when people are separated 仔 01 蝨 important individuals their lives. Research studies consis- tently show this [ 0 be the case for infants, children, adolescents, and adults, and further document that theloneliness, anxiety, and dep res- sion that occur after separations are particularly intense for individu- als who have anxious-ambivalent attachment styles. such painful feelings are thought [ 0 be particularly severe for these individuals because separations in adulthood reactivate their beliefs that they desperately need relationships [ 0 soothe themselves but that other people are unlikely to be consistently available for that purpose ・ Lennon experienced tWO note 、 vorthy separations during the first half of 1968. First, Lennon's father moved [ 0 Scotland with his young fiancée (who had served briefly as JuIian's nanny). Some stories suggest that this separation was precipitated by an argu- ment between Lennon and Freddie about Lennon's wife cynthia. ln any case, although Lennon continued [ 0 send Freddie money, they once again parted, this time for almost three years. second, certainly crucial, separation was 仔 01 れ YOkO Ono. Lennon first met thisJapanese avant-garde artist in early November of 1966 , previewing her show ata friend's art gallery and then seeing her again a couple ofweeks later at another show.. soon after, ko sent Lennon her book of aphoristic poems, G 第亜〃″ ,