NONFICTION SCORE SHEET FOR 2013 WLT MANUSCRIPT CONTEST
Category: NONFICTION ______
Title ____Homeless Daughter_____Manuscript # _______NF26____
Judges: For ALL entries, please fill in blanks above and evaluate each item on the scale below, 1 to 10. (Zero or n/a are not acceptable scores.) For all entries EXCEPT those marked “straight entry” please also include 2-3 sentences of constructive comments in each of the 10 categories.
Points: Total minimum points = 10. Total maximum points = 100.
2 = Major problems. 4 = Needs work. 6 = Shows promise. 8 = Very strong potential. 10 = Excellent.
1. ____6____ Synopsis: Does the synopsis give a short summary of the narrative including subject matter, main characters, and conflict? Is the story line clear? Might the writer be able to produce a narrative based on this idea? Is the synopsis concise, compelling and complete?
Comments:
First sentence is hard to follow. Instead of relating the blow-by-blow personally here, I think it would be more powerful to write a synopsis with more control that explains the reasons for writing a memoir such as this. The good information you need is hidden in here, but it written almost as if it is part of the book, until the end where the author explains “I want people to fall in love with my mom.” That is the sort of analysis I think would be more helpful in a synopsis.
2. ____9_____ Hook: Does the story, subject matter, and/or main character grab the reader’s attention? Does the hook entice the reader to read further? Would the opening make the reader want to finish the book?
Comments:
Very clear and compelling. I think this is a worthy notion, to better understand homelessness; and the personal narrative—this is the author’s mother--gives it immediacy.
3. ____8____ Structure: Does the author adequately introduce the reader to the central subject of the book? Does narrative move at an effective pace? Does it flow smoothly?
Comments:
I would prefer less jumping around at the start—because, actually, that makes it seem like the author is unsure where the story begins. The hook is captivating. Then I might prefer we go back to the beginning for a smoother narrative arc. You might be able to work into the hook some of the material you are wanting to share by jumping into the future after the initial scene, if that was your thinking.
4. ____9____ Characters: Does the author clearly and vividly describe the characters or central figures in the book? Does the author provide convincing motives for the characters' actions/beliefs, whether fiction or nonfiction?
Comments:
The author has already begun to carve out realistic, rounded characters, through glimpses from different times and settings.
5. ____10____ Conflict: Does the author provide an original and credible conflict for the story? Is this conflict strong enough to move the story forward without distracting from it? Is it free from predictability?
Comments:
Very clear conflict, and well illustrated in the tension within the scenes.
6. ____10______ Dialogue (if applicaple) or Voice: Does the author present dialogue in a smooth, natural manner? Does it help move the action forward? If dialogue is used, it is credible, accurate, and documented? If the author uses no dialogue, does the voice make the thoughts and actions of the characters or narrator clear?
Comments:
The narrator’s voice is authentic and easy for readers to relate to (pardon the dangling prep). The actual dialogue is also believable and perfectly tempers the narrative—I like just little snippets of conversation that distill the moments recalled.
7. ____10_____ Setting: Does the author clearly and vividly describe where and when the story takes place? Does the setting enhance the story rather than intrude?
Comments:
The scenes in the hospital and in the social worker’s office are well described, helping put the reader in the narrator’s shoes. I also like the backstory scenes of stealing cigs from Granny’s purse, and the confession of the narrator to her mother, which begin to help us understand the backdrop of the narrative, and the tragedy behind her descent into homelessness and (I am assuming, perhaps) mental illness and addiction.
8. _____8_____ Narrative Arc: Does the author present a unique and intriguing narrative arc? Is the story line clear and concise, even in the case of nonfiction?
Comments:
I am hopeful the author will help guide readers a little more firmly with the structure, which bears on the narrative arc. For me, after the initial hook, it would feel more logical to go back in time to the start, rather than jump ahead. I recognize, the author may have her reasons. But from a reader’s perspective, chronology is easier to follow, and there are many unanswered questions until we are moored by the basic facts.
9. ____9______ Technique/Style: Does the author make skillful use of language and sentence structure? Are the descriptions vivid and believable? Is the author’s vocabulary appropriate for the book? Is the point of view clear? Does the author’s style enhance or interfere with the telling of the story?
Comments:
The writing flows and is engaging. Some of the mechanics work again the flow, though those are fairly easy fixes. The vocabulary and tone are perfect for telling this story—reasoned and poignant. The point of view is crystal clear.
10. ____8______ Mechanics/Grammar: Is manuscript neat? Is it free of grammar, spelling, capitalization and punctuation errors? (Authors may use such devices as contractions, intentional fragments, and sentences starting with conjunctions, if these devices are not overdone in context with the overall presentation.)
Comments:
All the doublespacing between grafs makes the writing feel more disconnected than it is. Use standard paragraph formatting instead to improve the flow. Extra space indicates to me a shift in time or frame of reference.
Make clear if the different scenes (ie “How could you? Age 42, Mom gone about 9 years”) are new chapters? With same typeface, only bold, and same doublespacing, it is hard for reader to understand the divisions.
Total Score _______
Additional comments on the manuscript as a whole:
This is an important project, and I hope it makes its way out into the world! The author has a unique bead on homelessness and it is a worthwhile project to educate others about the personal stories of those who become homeless, so they are not just a face on the street. I think this writing has lots of potential. The tone is warm and relatable and reasonable. Tighten up structure and mechanics, but this is a great start.
Monday, January 20, 2014
First 2500 words 1_20_2014
Chapter 1 Fallen Woman
If you had not fallen
Then I would not have found you
Angel flying too close to the ground
- Willie Nelson, "Angel Flying Too Close To The Ground"
Age 30, Mom age 50
I braced myself before answering. Calls coming from Mom’s section of Texas usually meant heartache. Still I answered because weeks had gone by since I’d heard from her, and because she had no phone to call her back. I was grateful for the merciful new caller ID showing me the unknown Houston number, so I wasn’t completely ambushed. “Hello?’ I flinched in that suspended moment before the speaker’s response sprayed shrapnel through my thoughts.
He was calling collect from a pay phone to say he had found her unconscious at an abandoned gas station. “She was bleeding,” he said, “from her mouth and – and – you know, her bottom.” I squeezed my eyes shut but the truth remained. The pain hit. My temples beat objection, hardly containing reality. I thought I might fall. Yet I stood, held the phone to my ear, immobile, noiseless.
I could picture her there, lying on her side in the gravel. It was summer. She probably wore shorts, wasn’t covered as well as she would want to be, and was in the most vulnerable state. Maybe she wore an old t-shirt, her hair wild, dusty against the slab. Maybe the blood trickled and dried. Was it enough to pool? Had someone kicked her? Had she passed out before falling? Was she there for an hour before he found her? A day?
The Voice broke in again about calling an ambulance that took her to Hermann Hospital, and then remained anonymous despite my asking. I realized he would hang up without revealing himself. “Please!” How did he know who she was? The last time we talked she told me didn’t have any I.D. Having no permanent home, she didn’t have a place to store such things. How did he know my number? How did he know he should call me? Click.
The blessing? At least he called and she was alive. For now. As I prepared to leave Austin to get to her, I was still distraught. Knowing a few facts didn’t help with the kinds of questions I had now. How had my own mother come to this? Should I have done more to help her?
After the phone call that day, I must have packed for the trip and driven from Austin to Houston’s Hermann Hospital. I don’t remember doing that.
I do remember being with my mom. Getting to her was both a relief and a nightmare.
Please don’t let her go without me seeing her, I prayed, and please don’t let her be horribly sick and suffering. One of those requests was answered affirmatively.
By the time I got to the door of her hospital room, it was dark inside and out. The yellow, pie-shaped slice of light from the hallway spilled onto the floor. Mom used to make pie, sometimes cream with yellow filling, or banana pudding with vanilla wafers, and she’d ask me if I wanted to lick the mixing bowl. But I would not find her making anything fun tonight. What I found, partially illuminated, was a barely recognizable shadow of Mom.
I walked gingerly across the room and dragged the cumbersome, institutional chair to her side, only the rails of her bed between us. I wanted to crumple when I saw her more closely.
Once, I tanned a monkey hide as part of a science class. During the tanning process, the skin – the leather – sort of turns a yellowish color and wrinkles, but it’s still somewhat supple at that point. That night in her hospital room, this was what my mom’s hands reminded me of, except her yellow skin was also brown from overexposure to the sun and elements.
That night she reached and clawed with those hands. Were those the same hands that had brushed my hair, sewn my Halloween costumes, put cold rags on my forehead, taught me simple piano songs? Once, she used to push my cuticles back neatly and trim them, filing the nails in a pretty half moon shape. Her own nails were now thick, yellow, splitting, dirty.
She struggled, fought against the railing, fought with her sheets, tried to sit, tried to get out of the bed, called out for help, called for drinks. In my own head, a hundred voices also gave me various orders in reaction. Run! Calm her down! Call the nurse! Let her be! She’s not hurting anyone.
But my loudest thought was “tie her down with the straps. Please. She is weak. She shouldn’t move.” She was detoxing so violently that she was out of touch with reality. Hallucinating. Just strong enough to move and fall out of the bed in her flailing attempts to get me to “bring [her] a brewsky!” Eventually the nurse did tie her to the railings.
The worst mixture of love, sympathy, empathy, disgust, sorrow, nausea. That’s what I felt. It actually swallowed me. I was bound by it as sure as the canvas straps of the hospital bed bound my mother.
Nothing soothed her. Not the Ativan, nor the pain killers. She was wild and virtually psychotic. I was completely helpless; I could not help her. To watch her was torture. So, I did the only thing that I could imagine. I began to sing a prayer that she used to sing to me. Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound. She looked up at me, mouth agape. Her eyes attempted to focus. I kept singing: that saved a wretch like me. She began to sing with me, “I once was lost…” I smiled at her, and she at me, “but now am found, was blind but now I see.”
Finally, she slept.
She was dying, the doctor told me out in the yellow hallway. Her stomach was actually eating itself. She not only was jaundiced and had cirrhosis, she needed a new liver. When I asked if she were a candidate to get one, the doctor looked at me like I was a candidate for the psych ward. You see, he explained, she caused her liver failure. Plus she doesn’t want to stop drinking. So many of her other organs are failing. It would be a lost cause. I don’t know how she’s alive right now. I give her, maximum, a week.
The thud of that truth was authentic, familiar. As we waited for the inevitable, the doctor tried to tell her about her severe condition.
“Ma’am, you have acute cirrhosis of the liver, your stomach is basically eating itself, and you have jaundice.”
“I wonder how I got that.”
The doctor explained that almost always it is caused by alcohol abuse, and that very rarely it can be caused by coming in contact with a chemical like a cleaner to which one may be allergic.
I was thinking, this is it. This is the moment of truth. Someone else besides me, someone with a degree in this is officially putting it out there. She will get it.
She piped up, “Well, I wonder what on earth I was cleaning with.”
Mind you, she had no home to clean. The level of denial that an alcoholic can achieve is sometimes astonishing and tragi-comical. It may give a hint as to how much pain someone must be suffering in order to hang onto the bottle at that point.
And so it was the moment of truth. Not for Mom, but for me. I got it, finally. I got it that she would not. I would have to love her just like that, just as she was, or wish something in vain for the rest of what little time we had left.
I started thinking about what our lives had been like, what happened, and what they were like later on.
Chapter 2
Where there's smoke...
Age 8, Mom 28
So Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego came out of the fire, 27 … They saw that the fire had not harmed their bodies, nor was a hair of their heads singed; their robes were not scorched, and there was no smell of fire on them. - Daniel 3:26-27
Most years after school let out, I spent several weeks with family in East Texas. The summer I was eight at Granny and Papa’s house, my cousins, a friend, and I devised a plan. We lay in wait for Granny to neglect her square, vanilla, leather box of a purse then lifted three Marlboro Red cigarettes from her matching cigarette case – one for each of us.
In the heat of the summer, we crouched like barn cats in the scorched grass behind the old, wooden shed. We had stolen some matches, too. My friend had stringy, blonde hair, a tiny, sturdy body and a hard, worn face even though she was only seven. Her lime green shorts were dirty, too short and too worn in the seat, her faded yellow and white striped cotton top fit just barely, but it wasn’t cute. It wasn’t fresh or something a mom who wanted her daughter to have darling clothes would let her daughter wear. She showed us how the tar from the cigarette stained a white Kleenex when she blew a smoky breath into it. It made a nasty orangey brownish spot right in the center as the three of us choked and laughed.
We smoked the cigarettes, and that was exciting. But, as B.B. King said, soon enough “the thrill [was] gone.” Bigger and better became the goal but stealing more cigarettes was out of the question since surely too great a number would be missed.
Now Granny and Papa smoked so much that the whole “living room” was hazy. Papa had a silver Zippo lighter that always smelled like the kerosene he poured into it, and he showed us how he could blow smoke rings. I had such good memories of those times that for many years whenever I smelled smoke I felt sentimental about it. But that wasn’t the end of the tobacco love. Granny also chewed it. Beechnut, to be exact.
We got a good idea. We would steal some of Granny’s chewing tobacco, dry it out for about 24 hours, and then smoke it. We snaked some of the tobacco and some paper towels, found a proper spot in the back bedroom, and spread it out the way some little girls dry out flowers to save. We checked on it every few hours to see that it was drying well and whether we were close to being able to smoke it.
About four the next afternoon it was ready. But wait. What would we roll it in to smoke? We needed some kind of paper. Granny wasn’t too concerned about having a lot of art supplies on hand for us kids, but we had a lot of chicken liver dressing and shelled a bunch of purple hulled peas on the back porch. In any case, there was no paper in the entire house except for Granny’s Redbook magazine. It would have to do.
I was a long way from being the coolest one in the bunch so they had to show me how to roll. And by God, we smoked that dried chewing tobacco in chemical- and ink-treated magazine paper. My friend could really blow some dark tar stains without a filter. Something in me shifted. This time, it felt dirtier. Planned out. More dangerous.
After I had stayed with Granny for about a week, I returned home to Houston and to Mom. I was sure she would figure me out. I was wracked with guilt and could not believe we had gotten away with it for that long, but I tried to tell myself to keep it together because I was sure my cousins wouldn’t tell and didn’t want me to rat them out.
One day passed. It was Sunday, so we went to the Baptist church we had attended for years. I held my secret in, but I was sure that my guilt could actually be seen among the truly holy. It was somehow seeping out like black sludge from under my feet. That night I managed to fall asleep.
In the morning, miraculously, another day began. My smiling mom glided into my room, beautiful brown hair, cute shorts outfit, and asked me with her sweet face if I had fun at Granny’s, and I could not keep holding the guilt in. It was too much against her glory. I let the words sink into my mire. I hoped she wouldn’t hate me or punish me forever but I was ready regardless.
What she did was sit with me, listen to me, take me seriously, look at me full in the face and say, “You did the right thing by telling the truth. And since you did, I will not punish you for this. Last, you must not do this again.”
I didn’t.
I found myself thereafter telling my story, telling the truth – regardless of the consequences – and hoping for the best because sometimes, if you tell the right person, the best happens. They hear you, see what you’re doing right, forgive you for what you did wrong, and hold you accountable for future actions which especially include telling the truth even if you're the only one who can or will.
Chapter 3 Lullaby and Goodnight
Age 9, Mom age 29
From the time I was six until I was eighteen, we lived in Southwest Houston close to the Astrodome. The neighborhood was humble and filled with good folks, nice families. Our home was tiny and had few frills. In that house, my prized possession was my bedroom set. I later learned that my folks had purchased it second hand from the family down the street, arranged for me to spend the night with a friend on Christmas Eve, then moved it, painted it, and set it up for me to have on Christmas morning.
One night when Mom said it was time to go to sleep, I was lying in bed with my spring green and white checked bedspread and matching canopy swathing me. Even with this sweet present from my parents surrounding me, that night I felt scared for some reason. Then Mom came in. She walked into my room gracefully, sat down beside me, and reached her slender hand out to place on mine. She effortlessly sang to me, her voice sweet and rich like brown sugar – once again – “Lullaby, and good night…” I wasn’t scared anymore.
After the song she stood, smiled, told me she loved me, walked to the door to turn the light out and said, “Good night, Irene!” Other nights she sang Amazing Grace. Sometimes she said, “Don’t let the bed bugs bite!” But every night she was there.
Thursday, January 2, 2014
Chapter 1 revision 1-2-14
Chapter 1 Fallen Woman
If you had not fallen
Then I would not have found you
Angel flying too close to the ground
- Willie Nelson, "Angel Flying Too Close To The Ground"
Age 30, Mom age 50
I braced myself before answering. Since I had learned that calls coming from Mom’s section of Texas usually meant heartache, I was grateful that the merciful new caller ID had shown me the unknown Houston number so I wasn’t completely ambushed. “Hello?’ I flinched in that suspended moment before the speaker’s response sprayed shrapnel through my thoughts.
He was calling collect from a pay phone to say he had found her unconscious at an abandoned gas station. “She was bleeding,” he said, “from her mouth and – and – you know, her bottom.” I squeezed my eyes shut but the truth remained. The pain hit. My temples beat objection, hardly containing reality. I thought I might fall. Yet I stood, held the phone to my ear, immobile, noiseless.
I could picture her there, lying on her side in the gravel. It was summer. She probably wore shorts, wasn’t covered as well as she would want to be, and was in the most vulnerable state. Maybe she wore an old t-shirt, her hair wild, dusty against the slab. Maybe the blood trickled and dried. Was it enough to pool? Had someone kicked her? Had she passed out before falling? Was she there for an hour before he found her? A day?
The Voice broke in again about calling an ambulance that took her to Hermann Hospital, and then remained anonymous despite my asking. I realized he would hang up without revealing himself. “Please!” How did he know who she was? The last time we talked, she told me didn’t have any I.D. Having no permanent home, she didn’t have a place to store such things. How did he know my number? How did he know he should call me? Click.
The blessing? At least he called and she was alive. For now. As I prepared to leave Austin and get to her, I was still distraught and full of questions. Knowing the facts didn’t help. How had my own mother come to this? Should I have done more to help her?
If you had not fallen
Then I would not have found you
Angel flying too close to the ground
- Willie Nelson, "Angel Flying Too Close To The Ground"
Age 30, Mom age 50
I braced myself before answering. Since I had learned that calls coming from Mom’s section of Texas usually meant heartache, I was grateful that the merciful new caller ID had shown me the unknown Houston number so I wasn’t completely ambushed. “Hello?’ I flinched in that suspended moment before the speaker’s response sprayed shrapnel through my thoughts.
He was calling collect from a pay phone to say he had found her unconscious at an abandoned gas station. “She was bleeding,” he said, “from her mouth and – and – you know, her bottom.” I squeezed my eyes shut but the truth remained. The pain hit. My temples beat objection, hardly containing reality. I thought I might fall. Yet I stood, held the phone to my ear, immobile, noiseless.
I could picture her there, lying on her side in the gravel. It was summer. She probably wore shorts, wasn’t covered as well as she would want to be, and was in the most vulnerable state. Maybe she wore an old t-shirt, her hair wild, dusty against the slab. Maybe the blood trickled and dried. Was it enough to pool? Had someone kicked her? Had she passed out before falling? Was she there for an hour before he found her? A day?
The Voice broke in again about calling an ambulance that took her to Hermann Hospital, and then remained anonymous despite my asking. I realized he would hang up without revealing himself. “Please!” How did he know who she was? The last time we talked, she told me didn’t have any I.D. Having no permanent home, she didn’t have a place to store such things. How did he know my number? How did he know he should call me? Click.
The blessing? At least he called and she was alive. For now. As I prepared to leave Austin and get to her, I was still distraught and full of questions. Knowing the facts didn’t help. How had my own mother come to this? Should I have done more to help her?
Monday, December 30, 2013
Ch. 1 Fallen Woman revised 12-30-13
Chapter 1 Fallen Woman
If you had not fallen
Then I would not have found you
Angel flying too close to the ground
- Willie Nelson, "Angel Flying Too Close To The Ground"
Age 30, Mom age 50
I braced myself before I answered. Since the merciful new technology of the caller ID had shown me the unknown Houston number, I wasn’t completely ambushed. “Hello?’ I flinched in that suspended second before the speaker’s response sprayed shrapnel through the silence.
He had found her unconscious at an abandoned gas station. “She was bleeding,” he said, “from her mouth and – and – you know, her bottom.” I squeezed my eyes shut but the truth remained. The pain hit. My temples beat objection, hardly containing reality. I thought I might fall. Yet I stood, held the phone to my ear, frozen, noiseless. I could picture her there, lying on her side in the gravel.
It was summer. She probably wore shorts, and wasn’t covered as well as she would want to be, in the most vulnerable state. Maybe she wore an old t-shirt, her hair wild, dusty against the slab. Maybe the blood trickled, and dried. Was it enough to pool? Had someone kicked her? Had she passed out before falling? Hit her head? Was she there for an hour? A day?
The Voice broke in again about calling an ambulance, calling me, and then remained anonymous despite my asking. I realized he would hang up without revealing himself. “Please!” How did he know who she was? She didn’t have any I.D. How did he know my number? How did he know he should call me? Click.
The blessing? At least he called and she was alive. For now. Of course I was still distraught, and even though I had lived it, been with her, been her daughter, one question in particular consumed me. How had my own mother come to this?
If you had not fallen
Then I would not have found you
Angel flying too close to the ground
- Willie Nelson, "Angel Flying Too Close To The Ground"
Age 30, Mom age 50
I braced myself before I answered. Since the merciful new technology of the caller ID had shown me the unknown Houston number, I wasn’t completely ambushed. “Hello?’ I flinched in that suspended second before the speaker’s response sprayed shrapnel through the silence.
He had found her unconscious at an abandoned gas station. “She was bleeding,” he said, “from her mouth and – and – you know, her bottom.” I squeezed my eyes shut but the truth remained. The pain hit. My temples beat objection, hardly containing reality. I thought I might fall. Yet I stood, held the phone to my ear, frozen, noiseless. I could picture her there, lying on her side in the gravel.
It was summer. She probably wore shorts, and wasn’t covered as well as she would want to be, in the most vulnerable state. Maybe she wore an old t-shirt, her hair wild, dusty against the slab. Maybe the blood trickled, and dried. Was it enough to pool? Had someone kicked her? Had she passed out before falling? Hit her head? Was she there for an hour? A day?
The Voice broke in again about calling an ambulance, calling me, and then remained anonymous despite my asking. I realized he would hang up without revealing himself. “Please!” How did he know who she was? She didn’t have any I.D. How did he know my number? How did he know he should call me? Click.
The blessing? At least he called and she was alive. For now. Of course I was still distraught, and even though I had lived it, been with her, been her daughter, one question in particular consumed me. How had my own mother come to this?
Tuesday, November 26, 2013
No Woman is an Island: the effects of alcoholism on mom and daughter: Two Days After Amazing Grace part 1
No Woman is an Island: the effects of alcoholism on mom and daughter: Two Days After Amazing Grace part 1: Chapter 1 Two Days After Amazing Grace Age 30, Mom age 50 In that suspended second before the response, I flinched, attempting not to fe...
Two Days After Amazing Grace part 1
Chapter 1 Two Days After Amazing Grace
Age 30, Mom age 50
In that suspended second before the response, I flinched. The merciful new technology of the caller ID showed me the unknown number from the Houston area, so I braced myself. “Hello?” His voice sent shrapnel into the silence.
He found her unconscious at an abandoned gas station. “She was bleeding,” he said, “from her mouth and – and – you know, her bottom.” I squeezed my eyes shut but the truth didn’t go away. The pain hit. My temples beat objection, hardly containing reality. I wanted to fall. Yet I stood, held the phone to my ear, frozen, noiseless. I could see her there, lying on her side in the gravel. It was summer. She probably wore shorts, probably she wasn’t covered as well as she would want to be, in the most vulnerable state. Maybe she wore an old t-shirt, her hair wild, dusty against the slab. Maybe the blood trickled, and dried. Was it enough to pool? Was she there for an hour? A day? Had someone kicked her? Had she passed out before falling? Hit her head?
How is this what had come to my own mother?
The Voice broke in again about calling an ambulance, calling me, then remained anonymous despite my asking. I realized he would hang up without revealing himself. “Please!” How did he know who she was? She didn’t have any I.D. How did he know my number? How did he know he should call me? Click.
The blessing? At least he called and she was alive. For now.
Age 30, Mom age 50
In that suspended second before the response, I flinched. The merciful new technology of the caller ID showed me the unknown number from the Houston area, so I braced myself. “Hello?” His voice sent shrapnel into the silence.
He found her unconscious at an abandoned gas station. “She was bleeding,” he said, “from her mouth and – and – you know, her bottom.” I squeezed my eyes shut but the truth didn’t go away. The pain hit. My temples beat objection, hardly containing reality. I wanted to fall. Yet I stood, held the phone to my ear, frozen, noiseless. I could see her there, lying on her side in the gravel. It was summer. She probably wore shorts, probably she wasn’t covered as well as she would want to be, in the most vulnerable state. Maybe she wore an old t-shirt, her hair wild, dusty against the slab. Maybe the blood trickled, and dried. Was it enough to pool? Was she there for an hour? A day? Had someone kicked her? Had she passed out before falling? Hit her head?
How is this what had come to my own mother?
The Voice broke in again about calling an ambulance, calling me, then remained anonymous despite my asking. I realized he would hang up without revealing himself. “Please!” How did he know who she was? She didn’t have any I.D. How did he know my number? How did he know he should call me? Click.
The blessing? At least he called and she was alive. For now.
Sunday, July 28, 2013
Gospel Music, Mom, and Me
Gospel Music
Mom had a beautiful soprano voice. She sang “I’ll Fly Away” and other gospel hymns often.
When Whitney Houston got popular as a pop icon in the eighties, Mom identified and referred to her as “Cissy Houston’s girl” because Cissy Houston had been a gospel singer whose music my mom knew well.
We watched Dionne Warwick on her show every Sunday evening as long as she had it. One of her regular guests was Gladys Knight, sometimes with the Pips, and Mom taught me the song “Midnight Train to Georgia,” which she sang with true passion.
We watched Barbara Mandrell and her sisters, who also had roots in gospel music.
Mom got to see Elvis when she was ten, I remember her telling me. She only understood later in her life what a momentous occasion that was. At the time, she had fun but did not fall in love or think Elvis was anything to lose sleep or scream over.
Crystal Gayle was another favorite Mom would easily belt out, especially her version of Blue Bayou and Don’t it Make My Brown Eyes Blue, as her eyes were brown.
I’ve spent a lot of years trying to get away from my gospel and country roots. I thought it was the part of our family that was backward, unhealthy. Now as I sit on my Texas porch this evening, listening to the crickets and cicadas, feeling the warm summer breeze, I feel it is the part of us that was sweet, and simple in a good, easy and humble way. I thought in order to be worldly and sophisticated – which I also thought was where it was at – I needed to denounce this past, to literally move away from it, and to show much disdain for it. Certainly that would mean I had arrived and understood the ways of the real world.
I still love and appreciate – and remain indebted to - the creative, employment, spiritual, and educational, as well as medical and technological opportunities a city brings. I also love the great number of people one can meet from all walks of life.
But I no longer believe it is better, and I miss and even love my country roots.
I had attached too much of the hurt, given the country in us too much responsibility for what had gone wrong. I had felt so isolated there, so like no one would hear me, and there was much truth to that. Getting to places that were more populated was a relief beyond measure at that time because I found so many resources for help and healing. I found people who would listen. I also found plenty of people in the country who would not listen and who wanted to perpetuate the family problems.
To be fair, I have also found those who would help in the country, and those who would harm in the city. I guess it was pretty simplistic of me to think I wouldn’t, to think it was that pat.
For a bunch of years, I had it good and really the best of both worlds living in Austin. But now the city is booming and seems to be set on proving itself as world class. Since living in a “world class” city about a year ago, I have lost all taste for that.
I have been two stepping a bunch lately, and eating farm fresh watermelon and peaches, drinking iced tea, going fishing, and wearing my cowgirl boots. I am moving to a smaller town just outside Austin.
I have also been reading intellectually challenging books, participating in political protests, going to the symphony, and meeting folks from all walks of life.
I feel magnificently about the whole kit and caboodle that makes up Texas and me, y’all.
Mom had a beautiful soprano voice. She sang “I’ll Fly Away” and other gospel hymns often.
When Whitney Houston got popular as a pop icon in the eighties, Mom identified and referred to her as “Cissy Houston’s girl” because Cissy Houston had been a gospel singer whose music my mom knew well.
We watched Dionne Warwick on her show every Sunday evening as long as she had it. One of her regular guests was Gladys Knight, sometimes with the Pips, and Mom taught me the song “Midnight Train to Georgia,” which she sang with true passion.
We watched Barbara Mandrell and her sisters, who also had roots in gospel music.
Mom got to see Elvis when she was ten, I remember her telling me. She only understood later in her life what a momentous occasion that was. At the time, she had fun but did not fall in love or think Elvis was anything to lose sleep or scream over.
Crystal Gayle was another favorite Mom would easily belt out, especially her version of Blue Bayou and Don’t it Make My Brown Eyes Blue, as her eyes were brown.
I’ve spent a lot of years trying to get away from my gospel and country roots. I thought it was the part of our family that was backward, unhealthy. Now as I sit on my Texas porch this evening, listening to the crickets and cicadas, feeling the warm summer breeze, I feel it is the part of us that was sweet, and simple in a good, easy and humble way. I thought in order to be worldly and sophisticated – which I also thought was where it was at – I needed to denounce this past, to literally move away from it, and to show much disdain for it. Certainly that would mean I had arrived and understood the ways of the real world.
I still love and appreciate – and remain indebted to - the creative, employment, spiritual, and educational, as well as medical and technological opportunities a city brings. I also love the great number of people one can meet from all walks of life.
But I no longer believe it is better, and I miss and even love my country roots.
I had attached too much of the hurt, given the country in us too much responsibility for what had gone wrong. I had felt so isolated there, so like no one would hear me, and there was much truth to that. Getting to places that were more populated was a relief beyond measure at that time because I found so many resources for help and healing. I found people who would listen. I also found plenty of people in the country who would not listen and who wanted to perpetuate the family problems.
To be fair, I have also found those who would help in the country, and those who would harm in the city. I guess it was pretty simplistic of me to think I wouldn’t, to think it was that pat.
For a bunch of years, I had it good and really the best of both worlds living in Austin. But now the city is booming and seems to be set on proving itself as world class. Since living in a “world class” city about a year ago, I have lost all taste for that.
I have been two stepping a bunch lately, and eating farm fresh watermelon and peaches, drinking iced tea, going fishing, and wearing my cowgirl boots. I am moving to a smaller town just outside Austin.
I have also been reading intellectually challenging books, participating in political protests, going to the symphony, and meeting folks from all walks of life.
I feel magnificently about the whole kit and caboodle that makes up Texas and me, y’all.
Sunday, April 14, 2013
Where There's Smoke revised 4_14
Where there’s smoke…
Age 8, Mom 28
While the kids across the pond in London were winding down their last few shows seeing the Sex Pistols, my Baptist family shielded me from the evils of punk rock in the year 1978. In America, Thin Lizzy may have been a household name for some, but for ours Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton reigned. Sadly for my mother, Eddie Van Halen – who was just debuting – would enter my repertoire a few years later.
We were, however, keenly aware of the Dallas Cowboys making it to the Superbowl as were most of the rest of Houston, Dallas, Cut n’ Shoot, Paris, and all other Texas towns in between – not to mention the nation.
The tragic story of Jonestown made its way to the headlines, but my traditional family and church were nothing like them, so not to worry.
For the time being, the center of my world was my church and family. For a portion of each summer, I would spend a few weeks with my East Texas loved ones.
During this summer, Papa bought Granny a great, big ole Pontiac with power windows. When I told her it was nice, she told me she had wanted a Trans Am. My cousins and I sat on the back porch with her and shelled purple hulled peas straight from the garden daily for dinner.
Although my cousins and a few neighborhood friends had a few things to do, I guess we got bored soon enough. One afternoon, we hatched a plan.
We lay in wait for Granny to neglect her square, vanilla, leather box of a purse then lifted three Marlboro Red cigarettes from her matching cigarette case – one for each of us.
In the heat of the East Texas summer, in the scorched grass we crouched like barn cats behind the old, wooden shed. We had stolen some matches, too. We choked and laughed. My friend with her stringy, blonde hair, tiny, sturdy body and hard, worn face that already looked middle aged even though she was only seven, showed us how the tar from the cigarette stained a white Kleenex when she blew a smoky breath into it. It made a nasty orangey brownish spot right in the center. Her lime green shorts were dirty, too short and too worn in the seat, her sleeveless yellow and white striped cotton top fit just barely, but it wasn’t cute. It wasn’t fresh or something a mom who wanted her daughter to have darling clothes would buy.
So we smoked the cigarettes, and that was exciting. But, as B.B. King said, soon enough “the thrill [was] gone.”
Now Granny and Papa smoked so much that the whole “living room” smelled like smoke, and I such good memories combined with the smell of all that smoke that for many years whenever I smelled smoke I felt sentimental about it. Not only that, but Granny chewed tobacco. Beechnut, to be exact.
We got a good idea. We would steal some of Granny’s chewing tobacco, dry it out for about 24 hours, and then smoke it. We snaked some of the tobacco and some paper towels, found a proper spot in the back bedroom, and spread it out the way little girls dry out flowers to save. We checked on it every few hours to see that it was drying properly and how close we were to being able to smoke it.
About four in the next afternoon it was ready and so were we! But wait! What would we roll it in to smoke? We needed some kind of paper. Granny wasn’t too concerned about having a lot of art supplies on hand for us kids, but we had a lot of chicken liver dressing and shelled a bunch of purple hulled peas on the back porch. Well, anyway for heaven’s sake, there was no paper in the entire dang house except for Granny’s Redbook magazine. It would have to do.
I was a long way from being the coolest one in the bunch so they had to show me how to roll. And by God, we smoked that dried chewing tobacco in chemically- and ink-treated magazine paper. My friend could really blow some dark tar stains without a filter. Something in me shifted. This time, it felt dirtier. Planned out. More dangerous.
I returned home to Momma. I was sure she would figure me out. I was wracked with guilt and could not believe we had gotten away with it that long, but I tried to tell myself to keep it together.
One day passed. I held it in, but I was sure that my guilt could actually be seen. It was somehow seeping out like black sludge from under my feet. I managed to fall asleep. Another day began.
My smiling mom glided into my room, beautiful brown hair, cute shorts outfit, and asked me with her sweet face if I had fun at Granny’s, and I could not keep holding the guilt in. It was too much against her glory. I let the words sink into my mire.
I hoped she wouldn’t hate me or punish me but I was ready regardless.
What she did was sit with me, listened fully, took me seriously, looked at me full in the face and said, “You did the right thing by telling the truth. And since you did, I will not punish you for this. Last, you must not do this again.”
Indelible. From that moment on I knew I would tell my story, tell the truth – regardless of the consequences – and hope for the best.
Age 8, Mom 28
While the kids across the pond in London were winding down their last few shows seeing the Sex Pistols, my Baptist family shielded me from the evils of punk rock in the year 1978. In America, Thin Lizzy may have been a household name for some, but for ours Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton reigned. Sadly for my mother, Eddie Van Halen – who was just debuting – would enter my repertoire a few years later.
We were, however, keenly aware of the Dallas Cowboys making it to the Superbowl as were most of the rest of Houston, Dallas, Cut n’ Shoot, Paris, and all other Texas towns in between – not to mention the nation.
The tragic story of Jonestown made its way to the headlines, but my traditional family and church were nothing like them, so not to worry.
For the time being, the center of my world was my church and family. For a portion of each summer, I would spend a few weeks with my East Texas loved ones.
During this summer, Papa bought Granny a great, big ole Pontiac with power windows. When I told her it was nice, she told me she had wanted a Trans Am. My cousins and I sat on the back porch with her and shelled purple hulled peas straight from the garden daily for dinner.
Although my cousins and a few neighborhood friends had a few things to do, I guess we got bored soon enough. One afternoon, we hatched a plan.
We lay in wait for Granny to neglect her square, vanilla, leather box of a purse then lifted three Marlboro Red cigarettes from her matching cigarette case – one for each of us.
In the heat of the East Texas summer, in the scorched grass we crouched like barn cats behind the old, wooden shed. We had stolen some matches, too. We choked and laughed. My friend with her stringy, blonde hair, tiny, sturdy body and hard, worn face that already looked middle aged even though she was only seven, showed us how the tar from the cigarette stained a white Kleenex when she blew a smoky breath into it. It made a nasty orangey brownish spot right in the center. Her lime green shorts were dirty, too short and too worn in the seat, her sleeveless yellow and white striped cotton top fit just barely, but it wasn’t cute. It wasn’t fresh or something a mom who wanted her daughter to have darling clothes would buy.
So we smoked the cigarettes, and that was exciting. But, as B.B. King said, soon enough “the thrill [was] gone.”
Now Granny and Papa smoked so much that the whole “living room” smelled like smoke, and I such good memories combined with the smell of all that smoke that for many years whenever I smelled smoke I felt sentimental about it. Not only that, but Granny chewed tobacco. Beechnut, to be exact.
We got a good idea. We would steal some of Granny’s chewing tobacco, dry it out for about 24 hours, and then smoke it. We snaked some of the tobacco and some paper towels, found a proper spot in the back bedroom, and spread it out the way little girls dry out flowers to save. We checked on it every few hours to see that it was drying properly and how close we were to being able to smoke it.
About four in the next afternoon it was ready and so were we! But wait! What would we roll it in to smoke? We needed some kind of paper. Granny wasn’t too concerned about having a lot of art supplies on hand for us kids, but we had a lot of chicken liver dressing and shelled a bunch of purple hulled peas on the back porch. Well, anyway for heaven’s sake, there was no paper in the entire dang house except for Granny’s Redbook magazine. It would have to do.
I was a long way from being the coolest one in the bunch so they had to show me how to roll. And by God, we smoked that dried chewing tobacco in chemically- and ink-treated magazine paper. My friend could really blow some dark tar stains without a filter. Something in me shifted. This time, it felt dirtier. Planned out. More dangerous.
I returned home to Momma. I was sure she would figure me out. I was wracked with guilt and could not believe we had gotten away with it that long, but I tried to tell myself to keep it together.
One day passed. I held it in, but I was sure that my guilt could actually be seen. It was somehow seeping out like black sludge from under my feet. I managed to fall asleep. Another day began.
My smiling mom glided into my room, beautiful brown hair, cute shorts outfit, and asked me with her sweet face if I had fun at Granny’s, and I could not keep holding the guilt in. It was too much against her glory. I let the words sink into my mire.
I hoped she wouldn’t hate me or punish me but I was ready regardless.
What she did was sit with me, listened fully, took me seriously, looked at me full in the face and said, “You did the right thing by telling the truth. And since you did, I will not punish you for this. Last, you must not do this again.”
Indelible. From that moment on I knew I would tell my story, tell the truth – regardless of the consequences – and hope for the best.
Friday, March 15, 2013
Disability and Powerlessness revised
Disability and Powerlessness
Age 30, Mom age 52
They wanted to release her. Release her? Where? This trip to the hospital – this time because she had been assaulted – had also resulted in the only home she had - her car - being impounded for having no registration.
She was just a little bit better off than dead. Release her?
Two nights before in her hospital room my only thought had been “tie her down with the straps. Please. She is weak. She shouldn’t move.” She was detoxing so violently that she was out of touch with reality. Hallucinating. Just strong enough to move and fall out of the bed in her flailing attempts to get me to “bring [her] a brewsky!”
She reached and clawed. The worst mixture of love, sympathy, empathy, disgust, sorrow, nausea.
That’s what I felt. It actually swallowed me. I was bound by it as sure as the canvas straps of her hospital bed bound my mother.
Her skin looked like some kind of leather dyed yellow; she was dying of alcohol-related cirrhosis. Her stomach was actually eating itself and she was found unconscious, hemorrhaging from mouth and anus in an abandoned gas station parking lot. The male voice that called the ambulance called to let me know, and remained anonymous.
Nothing soothed her. Not the Ativan, nor the pain killers. She was wild and virtually psychotic. I was completely helpless; I could not help her. To watch her was torture. So, I did the only thing that I could imagine. I began to sing a prayer that she used to sing to me. Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound. Immediately she looked up at me, mouth agape. Her eyes attempted to focus. I kept singing: that saved a wretch like me. She began to sing with me, “I once was lost…” I smiled at her, and she at me, “but now am found, was blind but now I see.”
I tried to picture this woman who the doctor said should have been dead by now being discharged onto the Houston streets, right outside the Ben Taub County Hospital.
I demanded that they keep her. They told me I could take it up with the social workers on staff.
What would have happened to her if I hadn’t been there? Would she have been put out already?
I made my way to the social workers’ office where I found the concrete bricks for walls were painted a dingy yellow, and the offices behind the door window dark. Clearly, hardly anyone was there. Someone tentatively stepped out, “Can I help you?”
“Yes, I need to speak to a social worker. The hospital wants to release my mother but she has nowhere to go. She’s homeless and extremely ill, on the verge of death. She’s also an addict and in a state of detox, and not safe to keep with me.”
She was not just homeless; she was not just an alcoholic. She was violently, incurably ill. She needed round the clock medical care. But to society, and to this hospital, she was a throw away.
Certainly she had a part in that. Some part of her had the guts and the defiance to turn her back on regular rules and tell it all to fuck off. Her choice. I never expected any other individual or society or even myself to make her better or to save her from her own consequences when she ostensibly could have made another choice. This was different. She was now physically, medically, mentally in every way unable to care for herself.
When this happens to your mother or grandmother, you call in a nurse, or put her in a nursing home, or assisted living. Well, when your parents are divorced, your mom never could get sober, her family is all dead or worse off than she is, and you are a single parent and teacher, calling in a nurse is not an option. Extended care at a hospital or other facility is not, either.
“Well, the social workers aren’t here, but you can fill out this paperwork to try to get her some disability insurance from Social Security. That usually takes a long time, though, and lots of folks die before the paperwork ever goes through.”
She delivered this mean fact like I had on a suit of armor that the terrible news could not penetrate. I got educated the way getting struck by lightning educates someone to come in out of the rain. Or the way getting bitten by a shark educates someone not to swim by the Farrallon Islands. I was mortally wounded and at the same time trying to navigate a solution, completely unprepared and unequipped to handle my mother’s disease or her imminent death emotionally. This was the sea and I was drowning in it. I was also unprepared practically and financially, as was she, even though I was a hardworking, tax paying citizen. But the state would put her out on the streets. The lack of care and the dangers on the street were sharks in the sea where I was drowning.
I sat and did the only things I could. I held the old, brown clipboard on my lap and filled out the paperwork that had the ever-so-slight chance of getting Mom a place to stay once she was discharged from the hospital. In that state, it was hard to think of my name and address. It was hard to think of Mom’s. Well, the address was easy. But what should I write? How would I ever find her social security number? She didn’t even know where head was. Besides, there was no home in which to search through file cabinets with any files at all! It was impossible. It couldn’t be done. I thought I should just give up.
I argued with myself. I fought my own will and got through that God forsaken document one damned blank at a time. Mother's Maiden Name: done. Mother's Father: deceased. Check.
I handed it to the un-social worker, knowing that the chances that my mom would get to see any benefits from it before she died were slim to nil.
Then I prayed. This is the definition of powerlessness.
Age 30, Mom age 52
They wanted to release her. Release her? Where? This trip to the hospital – this time because she had been assaulted – had also resulted in the only home she had - her car - being impounded for having no registration.
She was just a little bit better off than dead. Release her?
Two nights before in her hospital room my only thought had been “tie her down with the straps. Please. She is weak. She shouldn’t move.” She was detoxing so violently that she was out of touch with reality. Hallucinating. Just strong enough to move and fall out of the bed in her flailing attempts to get me to “bring [her] a brewsky!”
She reached and clawed. The worst mixture of love, sympathy, empathy, disgust, sorrow, nausea.
That’s what I felt. It actually swallowed me. I was bound by it as sure as the canvas straps of her hospital bed bound my mother.
Her skin looked like some kind of leather dyed yellow; she was dying of alcohol-related cirrhosis. Her stomach was actually eating itself and she was found unconscious, hemorrhaging from mouth and anus in an abandoned gas station parking lot. The male voice that called the ambulance called to let me know, and remained anonymous.
Nothing soothed her. Not the Ativan, nor the pain killers. She was wild and virtually psychotic. I was completely helpless; I could not help her. To watch her was torture. So, I did the only thing that I could imagine. I began to sing a prayer that she used to sing to me. Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound. Immediately she looked up at me, mouth agape. Her eyes attempted to focus. I kept singing: that saved a wretch like me. She began to sing with me, “I once was lost…” I smiled at her, and she at me, “but now am found, was blind but now I see.”
I tried to picture this woman who the doctor said should have been dead by now being discharged onto the Houston streets, right outside the Ben Taub County Hospital.
I demanded that they keep her. They told me I could take it up with the social workers on staff.
What would have happened to her if I hadn’t been there? Would she have been put out already?
I made my way to the social workers’ office where I found the concrete bricks for walls were painted a dingy yellow, and the offices behind the door window dark. Clearly, hardly anyone was there. Someone tentatively stepped out, “Can I help you?”
“Yes, I need to speak to a social worker. The hospital wants to release my mother but she has nowhere to go. She’s homeless and extremely ill, on the verge of death. She’s also an addict and in a state of detox, and not safe to keep with me.”
She was not just homeless; she was not just an alcoholic. She was violently, incurably ill. She needed round the clock medical care. But to society, and to this hospital, she was a throw away.
Certainly she had a part in that. Some part of her had the guts and the defiance to turn her back on regular rules and tell it all to fuck off. Her choice. I never expected any other individual or society or even myself to make her better or to save her from her own consequences when she ostensibly could have made another choice. This was different. She was now physically, medically, mentally in every way unable to care for herself.
When this happens to your mother or grandmother, you call in a nurse, or put her in a nursing home, or assisted living. Well, when your parents are divorced, your mom never could get sober, her family is all dead or worse off than she is, and you are a single parent and teacher, calling in a nurse is not an option. Extended care at a hospital or other facility is not, either.
“Well, the social workers aren’t here, but you can fill out this paperwork to try to get her some disability insurance from Social Security. That usually takes a long time, though, and lots of folks die before the paperwork ever goes through.”
She delivered this mean fact like I had on a suit of armor that the terrible news could not penetrate. I got educated the way getting struck by lightning educates someone to come in out of the rain. Or the way getting bitten by a shark educates someone not to swim by the Farrallon Islands. I was mortally wounded and at the same time trying to navigate a solution, completely unprepared and unequipped to handle my mother’s disease or her imminent death emotionally. This was the sea and I was drowning in it. I was also unprepared practically and financially, as was she, even though I was a hardworking, tax paying citizen. But the state would put her out on the streets. The lack of care and the dangers on the street were sharks in the sea where I was drowning.
I sat and did the only things I could. I held the old, brown clipboard on my lap and filled out the paperwork that had the ever-so-slight chance of getting Mom a place to stay once she was discharged from the hospital. In that state, it was hard to think of my name and address. It was hard to think of Mom’s. Well, the address was easy. But what should I write? How would I ever find her social security number? She didn’t even know where head was. Besides, there was no home in which to search through file cabinets with any files at all! It was impossible. It couldn’t be done. I thought I should just give up.
I argued with myself. I fought my own will and got through that God forsaken document one damned blank at a time. Mother's Maiden Name: done. Mother's Father: deceased. Check.
I handed it to the un-social worker, knowing that the chances that my mom would get to see any benefits from it before she died were slim to nil.
Then I prayed. This is the definition of powerlessness.
Tuesday, February 12, 2013
Refugee
"Somewhere, somehow somebody
Must have kicked you around some
Tell me why you want to lay there
And revel in your abandon
Listen it don't make no difference to me baby
Everybody's had to fight to be free
You see you don't have to live like a refugee
Now baby you don't have to live like a refugee." - Tom Petty, Refugee
It was Mama who dragged it out of me. I lay on my pastel green checked cotton and polyester bedspread, under my canopy of the same fabric. My feet were hanging over the side of the bed, almost touching the floor. Wranglers, bare feet, bony ankles, green carpet.
Mama was standing at the end of my knees, waving her arms, close to gnashing her teeth and wailing.
She had known something was wrong. She knew it was more than that stupid boy I had a stupid crush on. I hadn't said a word except asking Momma to come get me early from my aunt's house that summer. I hadn't realized it, but according to Mom I had been "moping around" since then for the past few days.
"Did George hurt you?" she finally let her fear punch the words out. I sat and waited, unsure of the answer but knowing the truth. That's when I flopped back onto my bed, put my hand to my frowning forehead and nodded. That moment forever changed the course of my life.
"I knew it! I knew it!" She was in obvious pain. Grimacing, starting to cry, taking a step, then taking it back.
"How did you know, Mama?"
"Because he used to hurt me."
"What?!?"
As my story unfolded, so did hers. And what my mother had convinced herself of, in order to cope and to limp somehow along in this life, was that George - her sister's husband - and she, Mama - a three year old girl (age when the abuse started that she could remember) had "had an affair." She convinced herself that it was just between them.
But the pain I was in broke through her denial. She was my champion, my hero, my savior.
My Granny had raised five kids on her own. She lost one of them in a drunk driving accident when he was 14. She lost her husband when she was in her thirties. So when George wanted to marry my aunt who was only thirteen, she agreed.
On one hand I guess their family situation could look kind of normal. George and my aunt had a regular house on a good bit of land. His daughter and her family lived in a trailer on one portion of the land, his son and family lived in another trailer on another portion of that land. There was a garden. My aunt had a small beauty shop just outside the back door which made it convenient for her to work there. It looked good.
Another way it could be seen, once some of the gritty truth started to emerge, is more like a compound. During those summer visits when I played with other kids in the area - which I wasn't allowed to do much - they would tell me that everyone knew George beat my aunt. There was always a lot of drinking. Two cases a night for George was not out of the norm. Add the sons in to that and any of George's "friends." The dark and off limits bedroom where George would "get you" if you entered. A dozen cars torn apart and rusting around the property. Then to find out that my aunt was not actually "allowed" to go to work outside the home, that even a niece who came to visit occasionally didn't escape the abuse, and you can see how the fact that my mom ever escaped is nothing short of a miracle.
That she ever spent time behaving like anything other than a refugee is miraculous, as well. There is no doubt in my mind that that's exactly what she was.
Must have kicked you around some
Tell me why you want to lay there
And revel in your abandon
Listen it don't make no difference to me baby
Everybody's had to fight to be free
You see you don't have to live like a refugee
Now baby you don't have to live like a refugee." - Tom Petty, Refugee
It was Mama who dragged it out of me. I lay on my pastel green checked cotton and polyester bedspread, under my canopy of the same fabric. My feet were hanging over the side of the bed, almost touching the floor. Wranglers, bare feet, bony ankles, green carpet.
Mama was standing at the end of my knees, waving her arms, close to gnashing her teeth and wailing.
She had known something was wrong. She knew it was more than that stupid boy I had a stupid crush on. I hadn't said a word except asking Momma to come get me early from my aunt's house that summer. I hadn't realized it, but according to Mom I had been "moping around" since then for the past few days.
"Did George hurt you?" she finally let her fear punch the words out. I sat and waited, unsure of the answer but knowing the truth. That's when I flopped back onto my bed, put my hand to my frowning forehead and nodded. That moment forever changed the course of my life.
"I knew it! I knew it!" She was in obvious pain. Grimacing, starting to cry, taking a step, then taking it back.
"How did you know, Mama?"
"Because he used to hurt me."
"What?!?"
As my story unfolded, so did hers. And what my mother had convinced herself of, in order to cope and to limp somehow along in this life, was that George - her sister's husband - and she, Mama - a three year old girl (age when the abuse started that she could remember) had "had an affair." She convinced herself that it was just between them.
But the pain I was in broke through her denial. She was my champion, my hero, my savior.
My Granny had raised five kids on her own. She lost one of them in a drunk driving accident when he was 14. She lost her husband when she was in her thirties. So when George wanted to marry my aunt who was only thirteen, she agreed.
On one hand I guess their family situation could look kind of normal. George and my aunt had a regular house on a good bit of land. His daughter and her family lived in a trailer on one portion of the land, his son and family lived in another trailer on another portion of that land. There was a garden. My aunt had a small beauty shop just outside the back door which made it convenient for her to work there. It looked good.
Another way it could be seen, once some of the gritty truth started to emerge, is more like a compound. During those summer visits when I played with other kids in the area - which I wasn't allowed to do much - they would tell me that everyone knew George beat my aunt. There was always a lot of drinking. Two cases a night for George was not out of the norm. Add the sons in to that and any of George's "friends." The dark and off limits bedroom where George would "get you" if you entered. A dozen cars torn apart and rusting around the property. Then to find out that my aunt was not actually "allowed" to go to work outside the home, that even a niece who came to visit occasionally didn't escape the abuse, and you can see how the fact that my mom ever escaped is nothing short of a miracle.
That she ever spent time behaving like anything other than a refugee is miraculous, as well. There is no doubt in my mind that that's exactly what she was.
Thursday, February 7, 2013
Our Own Private Ceremony
Every time I look at the ocean I am reminded of Mom. Standing on some of the most beautiful beaches in the world, the ocean is divine in its beauty. It is the very essence of life for many creatures. The waves lapping the shore and even crashing into it can lull one into a serene sleep from far enough away.
But to be in the water is another story entirely. It can be refreshing - warm and soothing or cool and thrilling. But there is no mistaking the power of the currents, the tides, of rogue waves...to say nothing of her in a storm or a hurricane. And chances are pretty good I'd catch her in all her glory, secure in all her vitality. Still, somewhere way back behind my laughter as I turned my back on the glistening water, I would remember the last storm and how she looked then. Terrible.
And no one would know that my laughter was cut just a little bit short, and that I pursed my lips together just a little bit more than needed while I folded the towel, and that the frown I wore wasn't just to protect my eyes from the sun, for just a moment.
Still, I am drawn to her. I get peace like little else from sitting on her shores, meditating on her waves. How I do love her.
I'm like the tide, myself. I retreat, recede. Then move closer, come in. I can't stay out or away for long. Part of me is always washing up and in just as some of me mixes with the sand and whirls it around, back out and on.
So, it seemed fitting to release the three pearls into the bay.
The sun was setting. We were at the State Park in Galveston where we had spent many days as a family. Pink and orange lit up the horizon between Texas and Mexico. My dad had gotten that pearl necklace, matching earrings, and cocktail ring for mom, had brought it all the way from Vietnam when he was so distraught and when there was no money. They were 20 and 23. They had already lived through a tour of duty, the birth of their first child, and uprooting their small town Texas lives to live worlds apart in Alaska and Vietnam.
For some reason, pearls are always depicted as feminine. I guess it's because they use their own bodies to create and protect that beautiful little gem. So, I took three pearls from the ones Dad had given Mom. One for her first child, one for her second, and one for her grandchild. I simply walked up to the gentle and warm receding tide, and returned what the ocean had freely given to us.
But to be in the water is another story entirely. It can be refreshing - warm and soothing or cool and thrilling. But there is no mistaking the power of the currents, the tides, of rogue waves...to say nothing of her in a storm or a hurricane. And chances are pretty good I'd catch her in all her glory, secure in all her vitality. Still, somewhere way back behind my laughter as I turned my back on the glistening water, I would remember the last storm and how she looked then. Terrible.
And no one would know that my laughter was cut just a little bit short, and that I pursed my lips together just a little bit more than needed while I folded the towel, and that the frown I wore wasn't just to protect my eyes from the sun, for just a moment.
Still, I am drawn to her. I get peace like little else from sitting on her shores, meditating on her waves. How I do love her.
I'm like the tide, myself. I retreat, recede. Then move closer, come in. I can't stay out or away for long. Part of me is always washing up and in just as some of me mixes with the sand and whirls it around, back out and on.
So, it seemed fitting to release the three pearls into the bay.
The sun was setting. We were at the State Park in Galveston where we had spent many days as a family. Pink and orange lit up the horizon between Texas and Mexico. My dad had gotten that pearl necklace, matching earrings, and cocktail ring for mom, had brought it all the way from Vietnam when he was so distraught and when there was no money. They were 20 and 23. They had already lived through a tour of duty, the birth of their first child, and uprooting their small town Texas lives to live worlds apart in Alaska and Vietnam.
For some reason, pearls are always depicted as feminine. I guess it's because they use their own bodies to create and protect that beautiful little gem. So, I took three pearls from the ones Dad had given Mom. One for her first child, one for her second, and one for her grandchild. I simply walked up to the gentle and warm receding tide, and returned what the ocean had freely given to us.
Friday, February 1, 2013
Oil Revenues
The sun blazed in the searing sky over the mid Texas town of Mineral Wells. Dead brown grass crackled under our feet as we walked the perimeter of the small piece of land.
Annoyed as I was in my teenage ire, I rebelled by not paying attention. As much as I loved my mom and wanted to care, the most important thing in the world seemed to be my comfort - or lack thereof. Little matter that she was enduring what I was as well to impart whatever it was she was trying to get across by being out there on that God awfully hot day, I would rather not hear it.
So, I have only a vague recollection of her explaining that she owned some mineral rights to this land, and that someday I would, too. I think Granny bought them.
About twenty five years later, the checks started coming. Nothing hefty or life changing in the sense that I could now retire or anything remotely close, but, enough that it did make a small dent in my tiny budget. Some months it made the difference between a bounced check fee or not, or another trip to the grocery store.
I think when I got my first check Mom had been gone about four years. I am once again humbled by her competence and nurturing. As much as I felt she didn't take care of me in so many ways, she is still taking care of me from beyond.
Annoyed as I was in my teenage ire, I rebelled by not paying attention. As much as I loved my mom and wanted to care, the most important thing in the world seemed to be my comfort - or lack thereof. Little matter that she was enduring what I was as well to impart whatever it was she was trying to get across by being out there on that God awfully hot day, I would rather not hear it.
So, I have only a vague recollection of her explaining that she owned some mineral rights to this land, and that someday I would, too. I think Granny bought them.
About twenty five years later, the checks started coming. Nothing hefty or life changing in the sense that I could now retire or anything remotely close, but, enough that it did make a small dent in my tiny budget. Some months it made the difference between a bounced check fee or not, or another trip to the grocery store.
I think when I got my first check Mom had been gone about four years. I am once again humbled by her competence and nurturing. As much as I felt she didn't take care of me in so many ways, she is still taking care of me from beyond.
Saturday, January 26, 2013
You just don't want me to have fun
Mom had always believed me, always had my back. Mom could and would trust me - rightfully so - and back me up when others couldn't or wouldn't. She believed me when my life was on the line, when my honor was on the line, and when my emotional well-being needed protecting. She had my back when she confronted her own sister when I told that my uncle - her sister's husband - had abused me.
So that Sunday when I told her what she had done the night before - and this time I had a witness there, too: my date to the high school Christmas dance the night before - I just knew she would listen to me and understand.
It was a gray, dismal day. This kind Houston was infamous for. Muggy and warm, even though it was December. She was in her robe in the kitchen, shocked and remorseful that she had said such horrible things and didn't even remember it. She was ready to go to AA. She got out the phone book.
I left, went with my date to return his tux, came back home, and found her drunk.
"Mom, I thought you were going to try A.A.!"
"You just don't want me to have fun!" she hollered back at me. "That's why you want me not to drink!"
It was crushing and sent my mind reeling. Not only had I wanted to trust Mom, have her get better, and have my mom back, but I had also been trusted by Mom. And here she was treating me like some conspiratorial suspect.
So, I was enormously hurt by her accusation. I knew it meant something was heinously wrong.
Also, it was absolutely terrifying, the lengths that she would go to to hang on to her drink. I never forgot it.
I believe it is much of the reason that a couple years later when I had a drink in my hand, and friends who were trying to take it because they thought I'd had enough, that I hollered and screamed and one of them said, "just give it to her" with a defeated tone, it wore on me. One year later I was looking for the number in the phone book for myself to get help.
So that Sunday when I told her what she had done the night before - and this time I had a witness there, too: my date to the high school Christmas dance the night before - I just knew she would listen to me and understand.
It was a gray, dismal day. This kind Houston was infamous for. Muggy and warm, even though it was December. She was in her robe in the kitchen, shocked and remorseful that she had said such horrible things and didn't even remember it. She was ready to go to AA. She got out the phone book.
I left, went with my date to return his tux, came back home, and found her drunk.
"Mom, I thought you were going to try A.A.!"
"You just don't want me to have fun!" she hollered back at me. "That's why you want me not to drink!"
It was crushing and sent my mind reeling. Not only had I wanted to trust Mom, have her get better, and have my mom back, but I had also been trusted by Mom. And here she was treating me like some conspiratorial suspect.
So, I was enormously hurt by her accusation. I knew it meant something was heinously wrong.
Also, it was absolutely terrifying, the lengths that she would go to to hang on to her drink. I never forgot it.
I believe it is much of the reason that a couple years later when I had a drink in my hand, and friends who were trying to take it because they thought I'd had enough, that I hollered and screamed and one of them said, "just give it to her" with a defeated tone, it wore on me. One year later I was looking for the number in the phone book for myself to get help.
Monday, December 3, 2012
She's Had a Hard Week
Tequila. Surely someone spiked it. I knew I felt woozy as I was trying to be sexy sitting on the console of my boyfriend's Ford Bronco, all of 17. I announce that I would say the multiplication tables starting from 9 and go backwards to stay focused. I was told I was somewhere in the middle of the 8's when I passed out, slumped forward and slid between the gas pedal and the console.
And, yes, we were moving. My boyfriend was flying down an unfamiliar highway in the backwoods of central Texas at 80, drinking himself.
Somewhere in the process of driving from Bastrop to his parents' home in San Antonio, I lost control of my bodily fluids and pissed myself as well as puked on myself and the car. I was completely gone, so I didn't even know he had changed my clothes for me at some point.
We arrived at his parents' home and I experienced one of the most demoralizing moments of my life. I could not move. I could, however, hear and see a little. The boyfriend drug me into his house with one arm over his shoulders. I could not move my legs to walk, or anything. Couldn't really pick up my head. But I heard his father say, 'Jeee SUS Christ, son, what! IS! THAT?!?!"
I wished I were dead. Or at least buried. So ashamed.
His wonderful family took care of me, cleaned me up, and put me to bed.
The following morning they called my mom and were very honest that they were going to let my mom know the severity of the situation.
I was scared of what mom would say, especially that maybe I wouldn't be able to see the boyfriend.
But, you know what Mom said? She said that I had had a very difficult week. Lots of stress. That I probably just blew off some steam. And that was that.
That's when I knew. Even though the last thing I wanted was punishment, I knew I should have it and that something was very wrong.
And, yes, we were moving. My boyfriend was flying down an unfamiliar highway in the backwoods of central Texas at 80, drinking himself.
Somewhere in the process of driving from Bastrop to his parents' home in San Antonio, I lost control of my bodily fluids and pissed myself as well as puked on myself and the car. I was completely gone, so I didn't even know he had changed my clothes for me at some point.
We arrived at his parents' home and I experienced one of the most demoralizing moments of my life. I could not move. I could, however, hear and see a little. The boyfriend drug me into his house with one arm over his shoulders. I could not move my legs to walk, or anything. Couldn't really pick up my head. But I heard his father say, 'Jeee SUS Christ, son, what! IS! THAT?!?!"
I wished I were dead. Or at least buried. So ashamed.
His wonderful family took care of me, cleaned me up, and put me to bed.
The following morning they called my mom and were very honest that they were going to let my mom know the severity of the situation.
I was scared of what mom would say, especially that maybe I wouldn't be able to see the boyfriend.
But, you know what Mom said? She said that I had had a very difficult week. Lots of stress. That I probably just blew off some steam. And that was that.
That's when I knew. Even though the last thing I wanted was punishment, I knew I should have it and that something was very wrong.
Sunday, December 2, 2012
The diamond ring
She wore a purple dress, too warm for the season. I knew it was too warm for the season because my mom taught me these things. And now, she was living in a mission, and even this was a step up from the God awful streets. As much as I prayed to accept the things I couldn't change, the truth of this crushed against my soul.
I had asked her if there was anything she would like to have, now that she had a home, an actual place to live. Yes. She wanted a diamond ring.
In the past my mom had worn beautiful jewelry. I remember one amethyst butterfly and diamond silver ring and matching pendant, in particular. She was not from this kind of place, but she had come to know it fairly comfortably. And now it was all gone. All of it.
Whether these items were hocked, stolen, sold, or bartered, I don't know. I don't know where the upright piano that was my great aunt's went. Nor do I know where the pictures from my childhood are. My trophies and medals from gymnastcis, U.I.L. for orchestra, all gone. These are some of the casualties of homelessness.
The repercussions of what I grieve over since it was my mom who had all these keepsakes and it was my mom who lost them, seem to be relentless and unending. It comes up over something as simple as a fun project at work when people want a photo of you when you were little, or your mom to compare it to. Thank God some of these things have resurfaced and also that other family members have at least some of these items.
So, I choose a diamond ring from the few that I have. This one was given to me at my son's birth. It's not much, but it is something.
I understand why she wants a diamond ring. It respresents some of the dignity, elegance, and beauty that we used to know.
I had asked her if there was anything she would like to have, now that she had a home, an actual place to live. Yes. She wanted a diamond ring.
In the past my mom had worn beautiful jewelry. I remember one amethyst butterfly and diamond silver ring and matching pendant, in particular. She was not from this kind of place, but she had come to know it fairly comfortably. And now it was all gone. All of it.
Whether these items were hocked, stolen, sold, or bartered, I don't know. I don't know where the upright piano that was my great aunt's went. Nor do I know where the pictures from my childhood are. My trophies and medals from gymnastcis, U.I.L. for orchestra, all gone. These are some of the casualties of homelessness.
The repercussions of what I grieve over since it was my mom who had all these keepsakes and it was my mom who lost them, seem to be relentless and unending. It comes up over something as simple as a fun project at work when people want a photo of you when you were little, or your mom to compare it to. Thank God some of these things have resurfaced and also that other family members have at least some of these items.
So, I choose a diamond ring from the few that I have. This one was given to me at my son's birth. It's not much, but it is something.
I understand why she wants a diamond ring. It respresents some of the dignity, elegance, and beauty that we used to know.
Thursday, November 1, 2012
Twirling
"Well, I fought with a stranger and I met myself
I opened my mouth and I heard myself
It can get pretty lonely when you show yourself
Guess I could have made it easier on myself
But I, I could never follow
No I, I could never follow"
- Dixie Chicks, Long Way Around
Here's the thing. Some folks in my family think I'm crazy. Or at least seriously consider it.
I have done some crazy shit. I have made many mistakes and hurt some folks along the way. I have, at times, been desperate and panicked. I do not live traditionally, nor do I wish to do so. I take a lot of risks and I don't worry about how things look very much. I open my mouth and stand up for myself sometimes. This, I know, baffles some folks, especially when my ideas directly oppose some of theirs - or the other way around. But, on a very basic level, I am not even one iota of crazy.
Trust me, I would be. I even should be and have been, briefly. But not today. Not today. And not for most of the days of my life.
I told the therapist i was tired of living, told him I had thought about ending it. I was seventeen. I had been abused, my parents were divorcing, and my mom was a raging drunk. I was in all advanced courses, working twenty five hours a week, was president of the orchestra and twirler in the band. I don't know, call me crazy. Oh, wait. I actually think I was just tired and depressed. Oh, and drinking alcoholically. Minor detail.
They hospitalized me for "major depression." It was actually voluntary. I signed myself in. Imagine that. I thought i could use some help and rest. Sounds nuts, I know.
I forgot to mention it was Christmas time. I am pretty sure all these things can depress you. In any case, there i was.
The morning after I arrived at the sanitarium, Mom came to visit.
What an entrance. She wore her blue, silk dress and fox fur coat, hair all done, stumbling in her heels, smelling like liquor, and loud for the very quiet "unit" I was on.
Oh, the irony. She left. I stayed.
Relatively speaking, nothing much happened. I hung out for a few weeks, had some therapy, and left.
But first, Mom had to ask a question. The day before I was discharged the doctor told me he was testing me for bipolar disorder. I asked why, whether this was standard operating procedure. He said that it was not. So, then I deduced that he must suspect me of being bipolar and suggested such, to which he replied that no, indeed he did not suspect me of being bipolar. When I looked at him quizzically he grew agitated and finally burst out with his explanation.
Sighing heavily, he quipped, "Kollette, your mother has requested this."
"Oh! Is she worried about me?"
"In my opinion, Kollette, she knows you are being released and yet you still do not see things her way. Therefore, even though we are telling her otherwise, she thinks something must still be wrong with you."
This simple statement set my world on edge. It both terrified and freed me. It has served me multiple times, since Mom is not the only person who has gone to such lengths to perpetuate some needed fantasy.
And the strength, the power, the cunning and baffling force of the disease of alcoholism once again attempted to engulf us both.
Tuesday, October 30, 2012
Comatose
Home for Freshman summer of college.
You have to do it! You just have to!
But I didn't have the strength. I simply did not have it.
I had walked in the door around midnight and she sat in the lounge chair near the front door of the little rental town home. All of the lights were off. She had her eyes closed. No movement. I was annoyed by her being so drunk that she just fell asleep right there like that.
But when I tried to rouse her, I got nothing from her.
I shook her a bit. Nothing. Harder. Nothing.
She was bluish. A little chilly to the touch.
Oh, God! Could she be...?
I cannot do this by myself. I cannot do this by myself.
I called for help.
That's when he demanded that I take her pulse while he got on his way to come over and help me.
My chest was made completely of molten lead. My brain was ice. I again attempted to summon up the needed courage and force myself to do it.
Nothing happened. It would not come.
You have to do it! You just have to!
But I didn't have the strength. I simply did not have it.
I had walked in the door around midnight and she sat in the lounge chair near the front door of the little rental town home. All of the lights were off. She had her eyes closed. No movement. I was annoyed by her being so drunk that she just fell asleep right there like that.
But when I tried to rouse her, I got nothing from her.
I shook her a bit. Nothing. Harder. Nothing.
She was bluish. A little chilly to the touch.
Oh, God! Could she be...?
I cannot do this by myself. I cannot do this by myself.
I called for help.
That's when he demanded that I take her pulse while he got on his way to come over and help me.
My chest was made completely of molten lead. My brain was ice. I again attempted to summon up the needed courage and force myself to do it.
Nothing happened. It would not come.
Sunday, October 21, 2012
The Hospice Lady and Peace
Evenings when the weather was rainy, or cold, or boiling hot, I would look out my window and hope and pray that she decided to stay in the mission, or at a shelter, or that a good person had an extra bed for her, or that she had maybe gotten money for a motel.
She would call but I often couldn't answer. I could not take the chance that she would be raging and drunk, or full of the latest drama she had largely brought on herself. Or maybe it was also that it was just so damned painful to hear from her. I knew that I was no match for the pain she was in nor for her desire to escape it. Nothing would stop her, not even her love for me. And that hurt more than I can put into words, even though it shouldn't. That should bring me relief, somehow, that it wasn't personal. It's just that it felt so personal.
Maybe I will always wrestle with that, as well as whether there was more that I could have done. Feeling so powerless, actually being so damned powerless, was also very painful.
My faith was also hugely affected. Terribly affected. For years I struggled with this question: how could You? God, how could you let her never, ever get out of pain? I prayed, I got and stayed sober, I begged, I helped, I stopped enabling...so why? I would hear someone say that they prayed and their brother got sober, so prayer really works. I would seeth with grief and rage, quietly daring God to explain that, to ask Him whether He wanted me to understand that prayer for others works but not for me and my mom. Why was her whole life so damned tragic?
I still don't fully have the answers to that. But I do trust God. He Has just been way too good to way too many people, myself included, for me not to. So, He definitely must've had His reasons. I think now that maybe it was actually more merciful to mom and that she was of better use to God just as she was, to leave when she did, the way that she did. The Hospice Counselor explained that when Mom actually died, she had a very peaceful expression. The counselor said that she had seen countless people die, and that no amount of drugs or medicines could keep a horrible look off of their faces if they were not at peace, so she knew that Mom was.
I know that her story has definitely inspired me to do all that I can to stay sober, and that many of my fellow alcoholics have not been able to do so. I also have realized, being forty two now myself, that although she was fairly young when she died - fifty three - that forty two and fifty three is a long time. I have already had a good life. She lived a very long time, had a long marriage, two kids, jobs, friends, and interests like singing for a whole lifetime before things got really, really bad.
There are those who believe that my mom was mentally ill, perhaps bipolar or some such other problem. But I don't think that's the case. I think she quite simply had alcoholism, and also PTSD from past abuse. Then I think person after person let her down, and she also did not turn to some places that she could have. I see Mom as a champion for women's rights in that she did whatever it took to stand up for herself. She was willing to lose support from people she cared about. Perhaps she was somewhat misguided, because certainly there is no bigger way to say "fuck you" to society than to quit living by its rules, but the ones she broke may have hurt her more than anyone. Still, she did it, which was enormously brave and I am so very proud of her for not going back on her truth about the abuse. I can only assume that at some point the lack of support was too much and so she got together with hurtful people and also back with her sister. Certainly much of her rebellion was aimed at continuing to blot out her pain with alcohol. Certainly that part hurt others, and ultimately I will call it wrong. Yet I have enormous sympathy for it. I know what that terror feels like, when someone has hurt you and you want the people you love to believe you, to protect you, to support you, and they don't. So you find something to help with that feeling. You deny it's a problem so that you can keep your defense. I understand that. I understand so much about her still today. She continues to inspire me still today. My whole life is one of bravery largely due to her.
I wouldn't even have said anything about my own abuse if it hadn't been for Mom. She taught me to speak out, to speak up. She believed me, and she thought I should be heard. She was my advocate.
She would call but I often couldn't answer. I could not take the chance that she would be raging and drunk, or full of the latest drama she had largely brought on herself. Or maybe it was also that it was just so damned painful to hear from her. I knew that I was no match for the pain she was in nor for her desire to escape it. Nothing would stop her, not even her love for me. And that hurt more than I can put into words, even though it shouldn't. That should bring me relief, somehow, that it wasn't personal. It's just that it felt so personal.
Maybe I will always wrestle with that, as well as whether there was more that I could have done. Feeling so powerless, actually being so damned powerless, was also very painful.
My faith was also hugely affected. Terribly affected. For years I struggled with this question: how could You? God, how could you let her never, ever get out of pain? I prayed, I got and stayed sober, I begged, I helped, I stopped enabling...so why? I would hear someone say that they prayed and their brother got sober, so prayer really works. I would seeth with grief and rage, quietly daring God to explain that, to ask Him whether He wanted me to understand that prayer for others works but not for me and my mom. Why was her whole life so damned tragic?
I still don't fully have the answers to that. But I do trust God. He Has just been way too good to way too many people, myself included, for me not to. So, He definitely must've had His reasons. I think now that maybe it was actually more merciful to mom and that she was of better use to God just as she was, to leave when she did, the way that she did. The Hospice Counselor explained that when Mom actually died, she had a very peaceful expression. The counselor said that she had seen countless people die, and that no amount of drugs or medicines could keep a horrible look off of their faces if they were not at peace, so she knew that Mom was.
I know that her story has definitely inspired me to do all that I can to stay sober, and that many of my fellow alcoholics have not been able to do so. I also have realized, being forty two now myself, that although she was fairly young when she died - fifty three - that forty two and fifty three is a long time. I have already had a good life. She lived a very long time, had a long marriage, two kids, jobs, friends, and interests like singing for a whole lifetime before things got really, really bad.
There are those who believe that my mom was mentally ill, perhaps bipolar or some such other problem. But I don't think that's the case. I think she quite simply had alcoholism, and also PTSD from past abuse. Then I think person after person let her down, and she also did not turn to some places that she could have. I see Mom as a champion for women's rights in that she did whatever it took to stand up for herself. She was willing to lose support from people she cared about. Perhaps she was somewhat misguided, because certainly there is no bigger way to say "fuck you" to society than to quit living by its rules, but the ones she broke may have hurt her more than anyone. Still, she did it, which was enormously brave and I am so very proud of her for not going back on her truth about the abuse. I can only assume that at some point the lack of support was too much and so she got together with hurtful people and also back with her sister. Certainly much of her rebellion was aimed at continuing to blot out her pain with alcohol. Certainly that part hurt others, and ultimately I will call it wrong. Yet I have enormous sympathy for it. I know what that terror feels like, when someone has hurt you and you want the people you love to believe you, to protect you, to support you, and they don't. So you find something to help with that feeling. You deny it's a problem so that you can keep your defense. I understand that. I understand so much about her still today. She continues to inspire me still today. My whole life is one of bravery largely due to her.
I wouldn't even have said anything about my own abuse if it hadn't been for Mom. She taught me to speak out, to speak up. She believed me, and she thought I should be heard. She was my advocate.
Saturday, October 20, 2012
Jesus, Joseph, Mary, and...
Paul. Damn him! Wait. I don't need to do that. Pretty sure he's already damned.
But what a conniving, awful, lech of a person. I know we are all children of God, but even as such we can do some low down things. Does it get much worse than strangling someone, hanging out in their hospital room when they almost died because you don't have a home, drinking with them when they are dying from drinking and so are you, not telling their daughter that they are in hospice dying, and then giving hospice the daughter's number when the bill needs to be paid but it's too late for the daughter to see her mom before she dies?
Even when I got Mom on disability and they placed her in that mission, that effing Paul managed to get placed there, too, somehow! But at least at that point I knew that she was in a facility with rules and was being watched over.
They had moved out and gotten their own place again after their time was up there, shortly. Then they lost that, I'm sure. I stopped keeping track of Mom's exact whereabouts when she started communicating again with her sister, Mary.
Mary was one of the family members who absolutely didn't stand by me or Mom when we made our claim that we had been abused by a family member. That member was someone Mary wanted to protect, so she betrayed us, as I saw it. For years, Mom didn't have anything to do with her because of that. I'm not sure exactly at what point she changed her mind.
At the time, I was really hurt by her getting back in touch with Mary and that part of the family. I told Mom I felt betrayed by that.
"Well, honey, I need help. I need support."
"Ask me, Mom!"
"But, baby, that's not your job. I should get help from other people in my life."
She was right. And what had I wanted her to do? I had wanted her not only to stand up to her family, also regarding her marriage for herself, etc. And she lost all of that support. Then when she became so hurtful, she lost a lot of mine, too.
Yes, possibly she could've sought help from other places. She had sought solace in the church, for sure. Even they betrayed her. A counselor at our longtime church that even counseled our family turned out to be a pedaphile. I know she did not feel that she got the reaction she wanted from the church. Although she never lost her faith in Jesus, She definitely stopped believing in the church. So did I for a very long time. In fact, the family person that hurt both of us had actually been a Sunday school teacher many years ago, so people didn't want to believe that he could possibly be a sex offender.
The one place she refused to turn that I so wish she had been able to in order to find some peace, love, and support was a twelve step program.
I guess that damned Paul had his reasons. He knew I wouldn't let him be there with Mom if I was there. Hell, one person in my family was pissed at me that I didn't call Mary when Mom died. I refused. She had not spoken to me since I made my claim that her precious someone had hurt me and then Mom told her he had hurt her, too. Mary was spitting mad at me, and I had been a child at the time. I owed her nothing. I felt she had given Mom up when she chose to protect That person. Mom belonged to me, I felt. I also felt that getting in touch with Mary could reignite a potentially dangerous situation for me.
Thank God that at that time, when I was getting raked over the coals for being "bad"for not calling Mary, Joe was there to help keep me balanced and keep me focused on Jesus, too.
If I have done something wrong, I can make amends. As it is, I have not found it necessary in this case.
But what a conniving, awful, lech of a person. I know we are all children of God, but even as such we can do some low down things. Does it get much worse than strangling someone, hanging out in their hospital room when they almost died because you don't have a home, drinking with them when they are dying from drinking and so are you, not telling their daughter that they are in hospice dying, and then giving hospice the daughter's number when the bill needs to be paid but it's too late for the daughter to see her mom before she dies?
Even when I got Mom on disability and they placed her in that mission, that effing Paul managed to get placed there, too, somehow! But at least at that point I knew that she was in a facility with rules and was being watched over.
They had moved out and gotten their own place again after their time was up there, shortly. Then they lost that, I'm sure. I stopped keeping track of Mom's exact whereabouts when she started communicating again with her sister, Mary.
Mary was one of the family members who absolutely didn't stand by me or Mom when we made our claim that we had been abused by a family member. That member was someone Mary wanted to protect, so she betrayed us, as I saw it. For years, Mom didn't have anything to do with her because of that. I'm not sure exactly at what point she changed her mind.
At the time, I was really hurt by her getting back in touch with Mary and that part of the family. I told Mom I felt betrayed by that.
"Well, honey, I need help. I need support."
"Ask me, Mom!"
"But, baby, that's not your job. I should get help from other people in my life."
She was right. And what had I wanted her to do? I had wanted her not only to stand up to her family, also regarding her marriage for herself, etc. And she lost all of that support. Then when she became so hurtful, she lost a lot of mine, too.
Yes, possibly she could've sought help from other places. She had sought solace in the church, for sure. Even they betrayed her. A counselor at our longtime church that even counseled our family turned out to be a pedaphile. I know she did not feel that she got the reaction she wanted from the church. Although she never lost her faith in Jesus, She definitely stopped believing in the church. So did I for a very long time. In fact, the family person that hurt both of us had actually been a Sunday school teacher many years ago, so people didn't want to believe that he could possibly be a sex offender.
The one place she refused to turn that I so wish she had been able to in order to find some peace, love, and support was a twelve step program.
I guess that damned Paul had his reasons. He knew I wouldn't let him be there with Mom if I was there. Hell, one person in my family was pissed at me that I didn't call Mary when Mom died. I refused. She had not spoken to me since I made my claim that her precious someone had hurt me and then Mom told her he had hurt her, too. Mary was spitting mad at me, and I had been a child at the time. I owed her nothing. I felt she had given Mom up when she chose to protect That person. Mom belonged to me, I felt. I also felt that getting in touch with Mary could reignite a potentially dangerous situation for me.
Thank God that at that time, when I was getting raked over the coals for being "bad"for not calling Mary, Joe was there to help keep me balanced and keep me focused on Jesus, too.
If I have done something wrong, I can make amends. As it is, I have not found it necessary in this case.
Thursday, October 4, 2012
Need to Write
I'm afraid. I'm afraid to even keep writing. There's some sort of powerful force in this vast expanse of grief that warns me not to go there. Do not say or write or communicate or express the things on your heart mind soul.
All was not roses and sun with Dad and me. To write about the real family dynamics when I have now lost both of my parents is more than daunting. It's terrifying.
The best I can do is to write about writing right now.
Make no mistake: I did love my father. I do love my dad. The same goes for my mom. It doesn't mean that hurtful things didn't happen. My son loves me, too. Doesn't mean I haven't hurt him. Maybe one day he'll write a blog or a book about the truth of what happened in his childhood. What I hope I have instilled in my son is a voice of his own, the ability to discern the truth in a reasonably sane manner, and to know that to speak the truth is not disrepectful or unloving. I hope if he has things he needs to say about me I can support his healing.
Part of my need - it seems like a need - to put my truth in words and to have others read it and know it and believe me is because the exact opposite happened in my childhood. I told the truth and I wasn't believed. It was an important truth. It was a truth that I needed help with, and it was brave for me to speak. I wasn't believed - not because there was any factual or logical reason to believe that i had lied - in fact I had a reputation for honesty and I still do. I wasn't believed because the truth that I told was too difficult for people to deal with, to handle, to believe themselves. So, as a child, i bore the burden alone. I was an outcast in many ways in my own family, including some members saying that I was a liar and having no more contact with them.
That's why I write my truth. Some of it may not be completely accurate or sane since it's just my point of view and I am a flawed human being just like everyone else. However, I feel confident that the great majority of my self will be revealed through my writing as truthful, trustworthy, and sane.
All was not roses and sun with Dad and me. To write about the real family dynamics when I have now lost both of my parents is more than daunting. It's terrifying.
The best I can do is to write about writing right now.
Make no mistake: I did love my father. I do love my dad. The same goes for my mom. It doesn't mean that hurtful things didn't happen. My son loves me, too. Doesn't mean I haven't hurt him. Maybe one day he'll write a blog or a book about the truth of what happened in his childhood. What I hope I have instilled in my son is a voice of his own, the ability to discern the truth in a reasonably sane manner, and to know that to speak the truth is not disrepectful or unloving. I hope if he has things he needs to say about me I can support his healing.
Part of my need - it seems like a need - to put my truth in words and to have others read it and know it and believe me is because the exact opposite happened in my childhood. I told the truth and I wasn't believed. It was an important truth. It was a truth that I needed help with, and it was brave for me to speak. I wasn't believed - not because there was any factual or logical reason to believe that i had lied - in fact I had a reputation for honesty and I still do. I wasn't believed because the truth that I told was too difficult for people to deal with, to handle, to believe themselves. So, as a child, i bore the burden alone. I was an outcast in many ways in my own family, including some members saying that I was a liar and having no more contact with them.
That's why I write my truth. Some of it may not be completely accurate or sane since it's just my point of view and I am a flawed human being just like everyone else. However, I feel confident that the great majority of my self will be revealed through my writing as truthful, trustworthy, and sane.
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