Never Been to Paradise

Author's note: This story is heavily based on the 1977 Charlene song "I've Never Been to Me". I do not own the rights to this song or its lyrics.

TW: Mentions of abuse, marital sexual violence

**

October 7, 1978

Buckle Rod, Alabama

Dear Charlene (or, whatever your name is),

Firstly, yes, I can finally admit it: meeting you two years ago was indeed, as you put it, fate. I must admit that I was, at first, visibly annoyed when you, looking every inch like a Golden Age film star in your Hermès scarf, approached me at the park, only for you to preach --- well, more like sing--- at me. I remember repeatedly barking at you to leave me alone. However, now that I’ve thought about it, there really was something about your Guérlain-perfumed silk dress that smelled of Madagascar vanilla and your fire engine red Christian Dior lipstick that also compelled me to talk to you, just as you told me you wanted to speak to me. I was about to tell you all this, you know.

Then, those screaming banshees that came from my womb violently slammed those thoughts away. You know very well that in our world, a woman is measured by the number of pieces of herself she has given away, how many holes there are in the jigsaw puzzle of herself. I felt like I had no choice but to put away the first thought I had for myself in a long while to once again, drown myself in the routine of wiping snotty noses and giving stern looks, a woman’s pre-assigned lot, I supposed. Just like the last time. And the last time. And the time after that.

“That’s the real truth,” you told me then as my eyes started to break out in tears. ”It’s the love you have for your babies.” 

My eyebrows flew to the top of my forehead, and I tried to escape your little sermon. I subtly backed out and tried to find the nearest exit. You cornered me and continued to badger me, though, and so, I had no choice but to sit down. You recounted your life of tasting the smorgasbord the entire world had to offer, a life of frequent flyer miles, Veuve Clicquot champagne, and meeting crowned heads, a life beyond these town limits --- a life I’ve dreamt about since I was a little girl. You then told me that you’d have given it all up for my cotton dress covered in baby vomit and the man that warms the other side of my bed, for a life of “domestic bliss” rather than the jet-set life. 

I replied that I thought that was poppycock, but you insisted that in your running away from the life pre-assigned to us women, you also ran away from yourself. Worse still, you kept pressing me, telling me that if I escaped from the lot I had, I’d also be escaping what you thought of as real. Enraged, I quickly gathered all my things, bolted out of the park, and let the children follow me home. I admit that that scene of me running away from you might have looked strange, but hey, what was I to do?

I guess my abrupt exit from the congregation of one in front of your pulpit was quite a shock for you because the next thing I knew, you’d written a song about me, a ditty that has been on the airwaves every now and then. In interviews, you mentioned that there was a possibility the song would offend me (It did.) but that you still wanted to teach me “to see the value in the routine I lived”. Well, despite my indignation at first, I’ll have you know that I did learn something from the conversation we had at the park, something that, if you don’t mind, I’ll share with you now.

To make it a lot more interesting and because you sang about my life, I thought I’d dispense that lesson I learnt in the form of lyrics to the tune of your hit song. Please forgive me if I’m rusty; after all, it’s been a while since I wrote anything other than a grocery list. Yes, it’s been a while since the days I secretly perused my father’s copies of Newsweek and dreamt to be featured there one day. It’s been a while since my English teacher, Mrs. Freedman, told me I’d written the best poem in class she’d ever graded in her long career. Yes, it’s been a while since I became Editor-in-Chief of our school paper under a male pseudonym. It’s been a while since Mrs. Freedman and I held secret after-school sessions to hone my writing skills so I could surely get into journalism school, only for my very conservative, almost cultish father to find out and burn down my portfolio of work. Hopefully, though, I’ve still got it.

**

Hey, Lady, you, Lady

Leering at my life

Yes, I was cursed to be a mother

It's the worst to be a wife

Some so-called bliss, all of this

Thrust on my fragile self

Don’t you realize

That I’m feeling like

Just a rag doll on a shelf

I wish I’d been to Georgia

And California

And my place out in the sun

No need to fall in

When I am soarin’

I won’t walk, I would run

I want to see those places

With friendly faces

Where I would be wild and free

I crave for paradise

Out where I could be just me

Please, Lady. Stop, Lady

With this, a soul can tire

I feel that domestication

Has just put out my heart’s fire

That I'll relight so very bright

It’s time to claim what’s mine

Yes, it’s time to start

‘Cos my weary heart

It yearns for the stars that shine

I long to sail the Nile

Sit on a Greek isle

Roam ‘round Tokyo, I won’t mind

To put on the Ritz

Out in Saint Moritz

Where I could find my kind

I want to learn some things

And to spread my wings

And to live and to laugh and to be

I crave for paradise

Out where I could be just me

Hey, you know what paradise is?

It’s freedom

Beyond just a fantasy of places and spaces

It’s you choosing your path

But you know what truth is?

It’s knowing who you are

And living as the true you

The same one with dreams wider than galaxies

That’s truth, it’s self-love

Sometimes, I’ve been to crying

For dreams that’re dying

That would have made me complete

So no, don’t you blame me

Or try to tame me

Time to march to my beat

Time to go to the unknown

Even if I’m ‘lone

Yes, it’s so worth it to be free

Hey Lady, I’ll be in paradise

And scream that I've been to me

I’ll be in paradise

Now, I've been to me

**

By the time you get this letter, I’d have already run away across the Atlantic to Paris, jetting off with no one to catch me just three days after receiving my airline ticket. I’d be admiring the stunning view of the Arc de Triomphe from my bedroom window. At seventy square meters, my new apartment is certainly smaller than the large country home I’m leaving behind tomorrow (as of time writing), but to me, the liberty that comes with the tiny city apartment is so much more expansive than that. I hope you understand. You should understand because once upon a time, you also chose this for yourself.

I also would have started on my first day at my new job as the host of a bilingual travel show geared towards women for the TV station Antenne 2. Yes, I will be hosting it in French, one of the languages I secretly learnt under the covers by flashlight as a child. (You probably should have seen more than my womb that day in the park and looked at what else I was capable of, by the way.) You see, after I heard your song on the radio, I felt the flame inside my heart reignite and started rewriting some of the favorite articles I’d penned from memory, then stuffed newsroom and television station mailboxes with parcels of them. On a whim, I sent some of them to France, and now, here I am. I’m ready to fly from my Paris-dise to other slices of bliss across the globe. I will make sure to visit every single locale you mentioned in your song, as well as the ones in the lyrics I’ve written, and soak in these places, enjoy the fact that I’m out of the cage I’m leaving tomorrow.

Of course, by the time you read this, the divorce that my soon-to-be ex-husband Stanley and I had signed would have already been filed. I’m both relieved and shocked that Stanley had accepted the terms I set, including that I would never be forced to come back to the boonies and that he have full custody of the children. 

Just to clarify, yes, Stanley is the same man who, after I had repeatedly rejected his advances, tattled to my father about my journalism school plans. It’s the same man, who I married, immediately after the discovery that ruined my future, with a shotgun to my head because his family had paid my father, as if I were a prized cow. It’s the same man I never made love to, only had undesired, forceful sex with because it was my duty as a wife, I thought. It’s the same man who, knowing I never wanted kids, tampered with my birth control pills before violating me, resulting in twins. No, contrary to the song you put out, we hadn’t just fought the morning you and I had our chance encounter; I’ve fought him and everything he represents to me for my entire life. This time, I won.

(Then again, perhaps, Stanley’s quick acceptance was most probably influenced by the fact that the producer of the show had told him that she was more than willing to use her media connections to make him a national laughing stock in France if he ever so much as suggests I come back from Paris-dise. After all, even if he and the rest of the Robb family have no connections to my new home country, their pride would not allow for one smidgen of taint.)

Speaking of my new boss, I had only spoken to her on the phone, but it seems to me that Madame Moineau --- or perhaps, I should say Marianne, as she insists I call her --- will be a fantastic mentor to me. Before she booked that airline ticket to France for me, she spoke about being excited to work with someone who reminds her of herself, another country girl who had narrowly escaped the prison of giving up chunks of yourself to the altar of domesticity. Marianne and I had discussed on the phone about how we hope the show we’re working on would help women find their paradise, wherever it may be. Hey, perhaps, in the future, womankind wouldn’t even need a travel show to tell them to go to where they can be free. One thing’s for sure, though: If Marianne had approached me on a park bench, I’d never be annoyed. Oh no, I’d actually more than welcome it.

So, no, it may not be the lesson you wanted to impart to me, but thank you for teaching me that it was time to choose paradise, to choose me. Will I regret it, just like you did? I don’t really know. However, if I would, I think it would sting less than if I chose to stay in some small town with small-minded people instead of flying to find my paradise. If you don’t mind me saying it, though, I hope you too had learnt a lesson throughout all this: Never give unsolicited advice to people who clearly don’t want it.

Finally heading to me,

Celeste Robb Highmore