51 pages • 1-hour read
Notes to John
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Index of Terms
Alcoholics Anonymous (AA)
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussions of substance use, addiction, and depression.
Alcoholics Anonymous, or AA, is a sobriety program started by Bill W. In Notes to John, Joan Didion repeatedly refers to AA because her daughter Quintana is a person with alcoholism. According to Bill W.’s Alcoholics Anonymous: The Story of How More than One Hundred Men Have Recovered from Alcoholism (familiarly known as the “Big Book”), a 12-step program can lead individuals with alcoholism towards a healthier life. At times, Didion is grateful that Quintana is attending AA meetings. She wants Quintana to get help and is hopeful that AA will offer her some guidance. At the same time, she tells Dr. MacKinnon that she is skeptical of the program and its central beliefs. In particular, Didion struggles with AA’s idea that people with alcoholism “have to be sick for the rest of [their lives]” (77). One of the groundbreaking aspects of the “Big Book” was how it represented alcoholism as a disease rather than as a moral failing or personality dysfunction. However, Didion feels frustrated that Quintana is limited by this message; she can’t see herself outside her relationship with alcohol.
Didion’s regard for AA changes over the course of Notes to John. At times she tries to engage more openly with the program. She reads the “Big Book” and even attends meetings with Quintana. These were some of Dr. MacKinnon’s suggestions for how she could better support her daughter. If Didion showed an interest in the program, Dr. MacKinnon thought Quintana might feel less apprehensive about it. This is true for a time, as Quintana’s regard for AA vacillates depending on how her depression is manifesting.
Rational Recovery
Rational Recovery (RR) is another program meant to guide people with alcoholism toward recovery. Didion repeatedly alludes to Rational Recovery in her sessions with Dr. MacKinnon. It was developed in the 1980s as a direct reaction to AA. While AA represents alcoholism as a disease, Rational Recovery is “basically the rejection of the medical model of alcoholism” (77). Didion explores Rational Recovery as an alternative to AA because she thinks it “resonate[s] in terms of Quintana’s situation and her reaction to AA” (77). She is hopeful that this alternative guide to addiction might be clarifying for her daughter.
When she references the program in Notes to John, Didion is conveying her desire to reach Quintana where she is. She is seeking out various forms of assistance on her daughter’s behalf, and trying to find an instructional program that might be more meaningful to her. Didion’s interest in Rational Recovery also supports her underlying belief that Quintana can take control of her situation if she chooses to. This viewpoint aligns with the central tenets of Rational Recovery. According to RR, people with addiction can decide to become sober and can pursue sobriety (or abstinence) via both will and guidance. The program doesn’t pose people with alcoholism or addiction as sick but as the proverbial masters of their own fates.
Quintana’s Photography
Quintana was a photographer and worked for various magazines throughout her career. In Notes to John, Didion repeatedly alludes to Quintana’s photography work. In one session with Dr. MacKinnon, she describes a time when she and Quintana discussed her photos openly and Quintana honestly expressed her fears of not being good enough. According to Didion, Quintana “said she couldn’t bear to go through her photographs, it was just too painful, because when she went through them she knew that they were really, really good” (89). The pain she associated with going through the photos, she went on to tell Didion, “came from fearing that you would never find the will or nerve to show the work, to let it be appreciated” (89). Didion is grateful that her daughter is discussing her work with her. However, this interaction frustrates her because she wants Quintana to use her career as a stabilizing mechanism—the way Didion does with writing. She often asks Quintana about her work or gives her new photography equipment to help her career. These are Didion’s ways of showing that she believes Quintana’s photography has vocational and personal merit. Despite Didion’s support, Quintana does not regard her photos as an avenue to achieving mental and emotional peace. Rather, her photography seems to produce more anxiety than fulfillment.
Where I Was From
Where I Was From is a work of nonfiction Didion published in 2005. She refers to the process of writing this book throughout Notes to John. This is the “California book” she and Dr. MacKinnon repeatedly discuss (157). When Didion first mentions the book, she alludes to an idea she had to write about California years prior. Her idea was to detail the history and culture of the state, but in doing so she discovered that she’d have to write about her own personal and familial history with the place, too. She abandoned the project because it felt too emotionally difficult to confront these aspects of her past.
Throughout Notes to John, Dr. MacKinnon encourages her to delve into this project despite her fears. He asserts that “this is a very good time for you to be doing this particular book” because it “bears directly on what we’re talking about [in therapy]” (157). The title indeed incorporates aspects of Didion’s personal experience and past life into her accounting of California’s state history. With Where I Was From, she essentially applied the lessons from therapy to her writing project. For the first time, she felt capable of exploring her origins and their relevance to her life in the present.
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