My IF: Recalling My Own Imaginary Friend

I was going to put this personal anecdote in my review of the new movie IF starring Ryan Reynolds and John Krasinski but, some people seem to think that personal anecdotes in movie reviews are 'everything that is wrong with film criticism.' I'm being facetious, that's a terrible take, and I put many personal anecdotes in movie reviews and there is nothing wrong with doing that whatsoever.

The actual reason I dropped this anecdote from my review is because I want to expand on this idea and the review was already getting long considering that the movie isn't great. IF isn't a good movie, it's just a bit wonky and off. Read my full length review for more of my thoughts on the movie IF. With that out of the way, the movie did inspire me to consider my own childhood and my own imaginary friend.

I have this memory of snow. It's a giant pile of snow, the result of a plow clearing streets. I repeatedly climbed to the top of this 5 or 6 foot tall pile of snow in a race with my friend, John. John was my imaginary friend and yes, John is, perhaps, the least imaginative name for an imaginary friend. I chose John because it rhymes with my name, Sean. I've always enjoyed simplicity and a touch of laziness.

So, who was John? He was me, but cooler. John was everything I wanted to be. He was great looking, he was smart. He was funny. Anytime I wanted to do something, I would always ask John what he would do in that situation. He'd invariably give me great advice that I would completely ignore. I was desperately shy. I wanted so much for people to like me that I defaulted to rarely saying anything.

Instead, in my head, I was having a conversation with John. He lived in my brain, you see. He had a cool pad. It had all the cool kids stuff I wished I had in my bedroom. Imagine Tom Hanks' apartment in Big. And it all existed inside my brain. John was so cool and had everything and he chose to live in my mind.

John had cool friends who I would also meet and talk with. All the while, to the rest of the world, I was this silent kid, constantly staring into the middle distance. My teachers eventually decided that I had a developmental disability. Perhaps I did or do, but the reality for me was that I felt safer in my mind with John than I did dealing with the unpredictable world outside my own mind.

It's easy for me to reflect on John now and recognize that he was a represented my fears, insecurities and anxieties. Talking to him, having conversations with him was my way of coping with my fears. It was not healthy. I should have spoken to actual human beings about my fears and anxieties and insecurities. Instead, I stayed in my own mind. I camped out and hid away from the world.

When I was 10 years old I made my first best friend. We're still friends almost 40 years later. He brought me out of my head. He was and is the kind of person who make other people feel safe. He has a care and compassion that comes forward effortlessly, he has no idea he's doing it. It's like he shares his confident charisma with his friends because he has confidence and charisma he can spare.

Because of him, I began to let John go. My imaginary friend faded into memory as such things of childhood do. I will never forget John as I have never forgotten the fears, insecurities and anxieties for which he was both a an avatar and a refuge. I created John to protect me from the world and while many will be loathe to admit it, that's likely the origin story for most imaginary friends.

I regret locking myself away from the rest of the world as a kid. I regret the friendships I never cultivated while I crawled inside my own mind. But I don't regret John. My imaginary friend led to my meeting real friends, people who drew me out of myself and into the world. That shy kid struggling with his fears, anxieties, and insecurities, grew up to become a writer, a professional, and most importantly, a person with real friends, kind, compassionate, cool people who make me forget my fears, anxieties, and insecurities.

John needed to exist until he didn't. I imagine that is true of all Imaginary Friends. They get invented as a way for a child to cope with the world around them and they fade away as they are no longer needed. Imaginary friends serve a purpose, they are an expression of a child's mind and soul. They are a fount of creative thinking and, in my case, it was cry for help. Getting lost in my own mind was a way of telling the world how afraid I was. People eventually recognized it and some people helped me deal with it and recover.