Off the Cuff / My Other Journal

Jane Eyre is a pushover!

Finally it happened. I dreamt of my muse…compliments of Jane Eyre.

Since most everything written nowadays is occult, gore, cheap sex, mayhem, and murder, for my bedtime reading, I decided to go back to my teenage favorite, Jane Eyre.

Last night, the second night I was reading, I dreamt of my muse, a tall thin wiry guy whose energy far surpasses anyone else's that I know of. The muse wanted to tell me something, but I shooed him off. That is, I caught him in a net and physically threw him out the door. Who needs a buttinsky, right?

Well, this buttinsky managed to bust through the window, all tied up in rope--my earlier doing--and breaking the glass and some part of the window frame. He, then, claimed his territory by bugging me.

“Leave Rochester alone! He’s no woman’s hero,” he proclaimed as I went at him, beating him with my slipper.

“Don’t put a Rochester in your books. He ain’t real.”

I stopped suddenly. Rochester, not real?

“Rochester fooled Jane. He hid a mad wife in the darkest section of his castle. He’s the most selfish, most twisted character. And you think him a lover? Phooey!”

Well, I woke up…factually speaking.

Yes, the muse had a point, but we, the lovers of the world, love our faulty love objects, don’t we! Masochists us! Wasn’t it the same with The Beauty and The Beast? At least, Beast was a rung higher than Rochester; he didn’t have a hidden mad wife.

For argument’s sake, I thought, what if the tides were turned and I hid a mad spouse in my castle? Of course, in my case, the castle would be a split level and I’d have to hide my mad spouse in the wood shed, but knowing me, I most certainly wouldn’t be able to get away with it.

Even Rochester wasn’t all that successful, but the end proved his means, and Jane took him back…willingly! Of course, Rochester had to suffer for what he did by becoming blind and having a face with burn marks.

Yet, can you imagine Jane’s life after marriage? I can just hear her screaming. “Rochester, don’t walk up the stairs alone!” “Rochester, that is the closet not the bathroom.” “Rochester, let me cut your meat. You’re making a mess.” etc. etc…

Who was the author punishing?

Poor Jane! Poor lovers of the world!

My muse was right.

Tonight, I’ll go back to reading occult, gore, sappiness, cheap sex, mayhem, and murder...willingly.