부산대학교 도서관

The author discusses her childhood facination with saints, particularly St. Thér&eagrave;se. As a child the author hoped for pain and trials to become a saint. The author and her sister used one of mother's steel steak knives, carefully dissecting the microscopic sliver of St. Thér&eagrave;se's shin bone into two pieces which they each swallowed in hopes of some sort of supernatural reprecussions. Born in France to a wealthy family, the youngest of nine children, St. Thér&eagrave;se had rejected worldly pleasures and entered the contemplative order of Carmelite nuns at age 15, then died of tuberculosis at 24. As an adult, suffering from severe back pain, she looks back at her innocent masochism as a child. The author discusses the difficulty in measuring and treating pain.