{"id":96949,"date":"2016-04-13T17:18:17","date_gmt":"2016-04-13T21:18:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=96949"},"modified":"2016-04-13T17:23:37","modified_gmt":"2016-04-13T21:23:37","slug":"little-match-girl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2016\/04\/13\/little-match-girl\/","title":{"rendered":"Little Match Girl"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

A nineteenth-century illustration for The Little Match Girl<\/i>.<\/p><\/div>\n

The first time I remember lying about why I was crying was in second grade. I\u2019d burst out sobbing in the middle of social studies and, rather than admit I\u2019d been thinking about the plot of \u201cThe Little Match Girl,\u201d I claimed vaguely that there was some problem at home, prompting a humiliating private lunch with my teacher and a parent-teacher conference. You\u2019d think that would have cured me.<\/p>\n

But being upset about\u00a0nothing<\/em>\u00a0is galling. It\u2019s hard to explain to a stranger on the subway that no, tears are actually rolling down your cheeks because of an episode of\u00a0The People v. O. J. Simpson<\/em>,\u00a0<\/em>or a piece of music you\u2019re\u00a0not even listening<\/em> to.\u00a0<\/p>\n

This time it was a message on Facebook that did it\u2014from some three weeks ago. It said something like, Why does Sadie Stein only write about such pedestrian things?, with my name tagged. I can\u2019t tell you what the exact wording was because I suspended my Facebook account right then and there and haven\u2019t looked at it since.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Now, by any standard\u2014by real-world standards, not just Internet ones\u2014this was a mild message. I\u2019ve received plenty of abuse in my time: anti-Semitic rants, threats of sexual violence, ad hominem attacks well larded with profanity. Those hurt, like punches that knock the wind out of you\u2014and enough punches can of course do internal harm. But in a way, you can dismiss them. You can tell yourself the person on the other end is unwell or angry and understand that it comes with the territory of airing your thoughts and feelings in a public forum.<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t even mention this one to anyone. Not to my husband, not to my family or friends. I knew it was too inconsequential; they\u2019d all tell me not to listen or something, and I\u2019d know they were right and feel even more a fool for letting something like this get under my skin.\u00a0<\/p>\n

And yet it\u2019s eaten at me every day since, and it\u2019s his voice I hear when I sit down to write\u2014dismissive and genuinely curious and not completely wrong. I have conversations with him in my head. I want to say, I like to talk about small things as a way into bigger ones. I want to say, I\u2019d like people to feel that they have a friend. But even in my imagination, that doesn\u2019t sound very convincing.\u00a0<\/p>\n

And here is the thing: I don\u2019t want my loved ones to make that voice go away. Because a part of me likes not getting away with it. It makes me feel less alone in the world. To me, that stranger is the most powerful person in the world; I wouldn\u2019t recognize a world where he was stripped of that power. Because aren\u2019t we all full of such endless potential? That\u2019s worth crying about, I think.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sadie Stein is contributing editor of <\/em>The Paris Review, and the <\/em>Daily\u2019s correspondent.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The first time I remember lying about why I was crying was in second grade. I\u2019d burst out sobbing in the middle of social studies and, rather than admit I\u2019d been thinking about the plot of \u201cThe Little Match Girl,\u201d I claimed vaguely that there was some problem at home, prompting a humiliating private lunch […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":178,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13115],"tags":[478,15273,16743,513,951,12796,21947,17024,12735],"class_list":["post-96949","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-our-daily-correspondent","tag-criticism","tag-critiques","tag-crying","tag-depression","tag-facebook","tag-insults","tag-little-match-girl","tag-sadness","tag-the-internet"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nLittle Match Girl: Taking Abuse on the Internet<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"April 13, 2016 \u2013 The first time I remember lying about why I was crying was in second grade. 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