What Agatha Christie taught me about myself

There are a few things about which I am, to put it succinctly, a drama queen. I am overly exuberant, animated, and ridiculous. Things like that include Harry Potter, Halloween, lightsabers... basically anything in which I can express my true 5 year old self.

But in everything else, I find myself to be a remarkably subtle person. If I were an evil super-villain, I'd be a lot more like Saruman (Though, hopefully I wouldn't suddenly be faced with a wizard that took over my power and kicked me out of my strongholds) than, say, the Joker. I wouldn't go out and just start shooting people and robbing banks. I'd get in with both sides, set up my pieces, and you'd never know it was me until it was too late. At which point I would deploy my super-planet-busting-weapon. I can't deny the taste for dramatic flair. But I'd have set everything up so that by the time I needed to use my weapon, there'd be no way I could lose. I even play backgammon this way.

When I am sad, I don't just say "I feel crappy today." I make a sad face and go on with whatever I was doing. Sure, I often hope that someone will notice and say "aw, are you okay?" It would make me feel better. But I find that this is nearly always far too low-key for those of normal observation power to detect.

I don't know why, but I just can't bring myself to say "I'm sad. Make me feel better." There's some sort of psychological block. As though, if I point out a misfortune or an event I'm super excited about, I am being remarkably self centered. I can't really explain it.

The same is true for saying "I love you." For any that I have offended because of not saying those three words, I am honestly sorry. I don't do it to withhold love, or because I secretly hate you. I just have this subtlety thing going on. I can't just say it. I'm more of a giving-you-presents, remembering-your-birthday, talking-to-you-when-you-need-it type. You know, things that actually take effort.

Anybody can say "I love you." You can say it and be lying. You can say it as a placatory filler. You can say it without actually thinking of what it stands for. People do it all the time, and it's really lost its meaning for me. To me, showing that you care about someone is about doing something that takes a little forethought. Proving that you're thinking about them more often than just while they're present in the room.

But again, I find that this sort of thing is too subtle for most people. They don't even notice, half the time.

This is one of the original strand magazine illustrations of Holmes and Watson. Just like the creators of the recent movie, I feel like we lost that essence of who they were under a stereotype of a fat old man and a boringly serious middle aged guy. This picture shows that it wasn't always like that. It's much more accurate to my idea of how they ought to be. However, unlike the movie makers, I did not feel like Robert Downey Jr.'s version was really accurate either. Sure he was interesting, and not horrible by any means, but, to me at least, far too convivial and goofy. Holmes was too intellectual to ever be goofy. But I like that he was much more active. At least in terms of running around in disguises. =>

It's sort of sad, sometimes. I occasionally wish that people understood me better. That I wasn't so overlooked. But not enough to try to draw attention to myself. Like I said, I'm rather a subtle type.

By this point you're certainly wondering what Agatha Christie has to do with any of this. Well, I'll tell you.

I was reading "And Then There Were None". It's pretty awesome. She does a spectacular job of telling you exactly the right things about each person to make all of them look completely innocent, and totally guilty at the same time. So far, I don't know anyone who figured out whodunit the first time through.

I was almost there. Right after person 5 died, there was a part in the chapter with a quote from everyone left. It didn't tell you who said what. You only knew that 4 were innocent and 1 was the culprit. I'd been trying to narrow it from the beginning. That's the whole point of a mystery for me. To see if you can piece the clues together before the reveal. From this section, I was able to narrow my list down to two. I was absolutely certain that it was one or the other.

I ended up decided that it was the one guy, and the other would be the next victim. Well, I was almost right. So so sooo close. The one guy was the next victim. But he was also the culprit. A very, very clever culprit. So the whole rest of the book I'm thinking that I totally called it and got the right guy, and I was gonna be all big and bad about it on my facebook status.

But I was wrong. At least I got it down to two, right? That's farther than a lot of people get. I knew it was one or the other, and just picked wrong. But still... I didn't quite make it. And that was very disappointing.

After all this, I happened to remember an old discussion with a friend in which she explained to me how she never, ever sees things coming. Big plot twists are invariably a surprise to her. But she kind of likes it that way. She likes to just wait and be surprised. I don't. I mean, I love it when I am surprised, but only when it's a surprise that's been so cleverly disguised that I don't see it coming even after having been working methodically through all the clues. Needless to say, that doesn't happen nearly as often to me as to my friend.

And I love being right. I love figuring out the pieces and discovering what's about to happen, and then finding out that I'm totally on the ball. Especially in Sherlock Holmes, where you don't always get all the clues. Watson is kind of an idiot sometimes. In the Scarlet Pimpernel I felt smart for weeks afterward because I figured out which person was the Pimpernel in disguise at the end. My mom didn't even do that. She knew he was Percy Blakney, and that he was around somewhere, but not which guy he was. I totally called it. It was a great moment in my life.

Anyway, the point of all that was to say that I've finally recognized this love for subtlety. It's the reason I like watching Bones. Because I want to figure out who did it. It's the reason I love Sherlock Holmes, and have an overwhelming desire to create an unsolvable mystery just like Agatha Christie did.

Ps. Jude Law makes a fantastic Watson. Exactly how I imagine he should be. Proper doctor but military, carries a gun, and doesn't look creepy in the mustache.=>

I like putting together the clues that surprise most other people. It makes me feel very smart, and feeling that smart is like a sugar high. But it annoys me greatly when the clues are slapping you in the face, and the characters STILL can't figure it out.

Case in point, "Vampirates". It's a book series about pirate vampires. I only read the first one. And this is mostly why. There's a girl who gets lost at sea, and finds herself on a ship. These are the facts:

-Her father used to sing an old sea shanty about vampire pirates

-The sailors only come out at night

-She's locked in her room for her protection

-Once a week they have a "special feast"

-Some of the sailors have special mind powers

-All of the mirrors on board are smashed

-She glimpses one sailor with blood all over his face

-Her host accidentally stays too long once, and can't leave until dark because the sun seers his skin

-She accidentally stabs her finger with a pen point, and the host immediately notices the blood splatter when he enters the room.

And, after all of this, it took her 100 PAGES to figure out that she was on a vampirate ship. 100 Pages!! I almost put it down right then, because she was being so very obtuse. I was literally dying inside.

But that was an unnecessary tangent. The point was basically that, after reading Agatha Christie, and remembering that conversation with my friend, I realized just how much I rely on subtlety in my life. How fun it is to figure it out, and how I really don't like drawing blatant attention to myself. Subtle is how I like it.