Why am I so free"? The answer? Gerard Pommier

psychoanalyst, 1941-2023, a tribute

            In the early aughts, I decided that psychoanalysis was the ring of power and could not be wielded by the inhabitants of Middle Earth, or academia. I had started an analysis that made me view the rampant use of psychoanalytic terms with a mixture of fear, seduction and loathing. George Bush the younger was the President. It was a time of the War on Terror, dot com euphoria – the World Wide Web was going to disrupt the way we lived and I was obsessed with the Lord of the Rings. I had a toddler, lived in Minneapolis and was the primary breadwinner for my family. My department at work was torn apart by in-fighting among Leftists, Deleuzians vs. Cultural Studies Marxists, Deconstructionists and Frankfurt Schoolers found themselves in an uneasy alliance. Everything in the world seemed false.

I had a dream on the night of September 6, 2023 that I had returned to Paris and I saw Gerard Pommier, my analyst, looking younger and more vital than I could have imagined. It was simple wish fulfillment. I had ended my analysis with him fifteen years ago. I began my analysis on September 11, 2001. I had my first session with him on September 11, 2001 on the Rue du Val de Grace the day the planes flew into the Twin Towers. I had a sabbatical. Afterwards, from 2001 to about 2008, I sent him a dream a week and saw him once a every other year in person, for a month, four times a week. Pommier saved my life. It’s hard to be in such debt to a simple human being, but there it is.