Two or Three Things I know for Sure

Two or Three Things I Know for Sure is a beautiful exploration of the human condition, told from a unique female perspective. Allison speaks frankly and intimately with her reader and allows them into the deepest facets of her being. It is because of this, and her extraordinary gift for weaving words together, that I found this work the most moving and relatable of the readings we have done in our class. Despite her incredible talent, Allison never comes off as pretentious or self-aggrandizing, but more like a woman who is telling her story in the most honest and forthright way she can.
Allison’s reflections on love and lust and the tragedies and joys that are born from them showcase her distinct ability to combine sensitivity with a kind of primal rage. This ability can be seen here:

Love was something I would not have to worry about….Women who pined, men who went mad, people who forgot who they were and shamed themselves with need…Love was a mystery. Love was a calamity….Sex was the country I had been dragged into as an unwilling girl—sex, and the madness of the body. (55)

The author employs strong, evocative language to relate her thoughts to us and one cannot help but be moved by the way in which she does it. For a long time sex and love exist as two mutually exclusive entities for Allison. They are “countries” that are completely independent of one another. As a result of things she has observed in the past and her sexual abuse as a child, this concept makes perfect sense and though I have heard of this emotional response before, Allison’s description makes the concept so utterly comprehensible. Allison seems to be stating that at this point in her life she found love something that can be prevented or kept in check by the force of ones will, while sex is a wild, uncontrollable force. In other words, our bodies will betray us but our hearts and minds don’t have to. This conviction does not last much longer.
Allison is equally vivid and bold when she describes the first time she experiences longing for another person in an emotional sense rather than a purely sexual one. The author says:

She had no way of knowing that without warning or preparation I had just become my mother’s daughter, my sister’s counterpart-tender and fragile and hungry for something more than dispassionate curiosity. (58)

Allison can finally relate to the vulnerability, which she had mistaken for weakness up until this point, of the women in her family. It is not until now that she can truly feel a total and complete kinship with her mother, sister, aunts, and cousins she had always watched with a sense of pity and confusion while growing up. Again Allison’s interesting juxtaposition of adjectives can be seen in this passage. She is “tender” and “fragile” yet “hungry” all at the same time.
Allison’s work is endlessly rewarding because of her honesty and courage. At the risk of sounding cliché, the author takes her reader on a journey of self discovery and explores how one can come to truly love and accept oneself.