Never Bored

The Narcissus Complex is an old school, Freudian diagnosis that would probably be hard to come by nowadays. It is defined as a variety of neurotic self-love spurred on by a lack of reciprocation of one’s love for others, particularly one’s parents. My father was very pleased by it. He loved having a name to attach to the way he had felt his entire life. It made him feel grand. But he was also the worst with names, and he always forgot what it was called. Hey Dais, he’d say, you know that story of the Greek guy who was staring at himself in the water and then he fell in? I’d say, Yeah, Narcissus. he would declare happily, Right! My analyst says I have one of those. This was always followed by laments about how little attention he’d been paid by his parents – his father because he was a workaholic, and his mother due to her mental health problems – and what a great burden it was to be the artist son of a famous artist father.