Original post Feb 5, 2010
Rotten II
My brother, sister and myself did get ourselves up and go to school most of the time. The main reason I went was because I could get something to eat. I thought the cafeteria lady was an excellent cook. I would have gone even more often if they had served breakfast back then.
I know there were times when I didn’t have a bath for weeks and didn’t have any clean clothes to wear. I don’t remember owning a tooth brush. I was a very dirty little girl, I had poor manners and would fight anyone that said anything that made me mad.
I remember getting into a fight in the girls bathroom with a girl named Tina. She was making fun of me. The walls in the girls bathroom had tile most of the way up and I remember knocking her head against them. She never liked me but she also never made fun of me to my face again. I didn’t get in to much trouble because the teacher knew how hateful Tina could be. I did miss playground time for awhile.
One of our favorite pranks was to get on the roof of our house and throw things at cars that drove by. We did it often enough that we had hit the same car several times and the owner was not in the least bit happy with us. He tried knocking on our door and talking to our mom about it.
Remember what I have said about my mom?
For some reason he did not want to stay and talk to her for very long.
Of course we thought that made the whole thing even funnier!
I did say I was a brat.
We tried to hit his car again after that. When we succeeded he stopped in the middle of the road, jumped out of his car, and screamed a few new curse words that I hadn’t heard before. He was just a little bit mad.
The cops showed up.
My mom was always on her best behavior when the cops were around. We quit throwing things for awhile, and left the old, cursing man alone after that. I think it made an impression on me that my mom could magically act normal when the cops showed up. (At least most of the time she could)
I remember being afraid to go to bed because I didn’t want the roaches crawling on me in my sleep. That was also a big fear of mine while taking a bath. The roaches were so bad that they crawled all over the ceiling and often fell down on me while in the bath. I had to be pretty stinky to risk taking a bath! It is hard to run or jump away from them if you are all wet in the tub, ya know?
I loved to sing as a kid. If I wasn’t in school I was probably out walking around singing. I also liked to whistle. I was often teased that I could never sneak up on anyone because of all the racket I made. I wasn’t any good at either of these things but I sure tried.
I did get to sing in the school talent show. It was around the holidays and the music teacher put a mike in my hand and had me sing "I’m gettin nothin for Christmas". If they had asked me to memorize lines or do something in a play I would have been scared to death! But singing I had no problem with. Only Bruce, my girls, and sometimes(if I forget myself at work) Truman have to listen to me sing now. I am still not any good at it, but I still enjoy it. It is just one of those simple pleasures that I really like. Shame God didn’t give me any talent to go with this weird desire to sing!
Summer time was always so much fun! We didn’t have to go anywhere or do anything. Even as a child I knew this was a wonderful freedom. There was no adult supervision.
We just ran the neighborhood.
My brother’s best friend was a real tough guy. But his mom was a wonderful lady! Her name was Ms. Ula. She was a single mom and had 4 kids that she was raising all by herself. Most of our food came from her. She made the best "stick to your ribs" kind of food.
Funny thing is I am just now realizing that most of my cheap recipes were inspired by the meals she served us.
We played hide and seek a lot. We used a whole block for our play area and would pick someone’s front porch as base. No one’s yard was off limits. It never crossed my mind to bother someone else’s stuff. I just wanted a good hiding place. We never had a grumpy old neighbor come out and tell us to get out of their yard. I may have been a brat but I was not a thief or vandal.
Ummmm, unless you want to count the roof thing as vandalizing?
I look back now and realize that mom had a cool car back then. She drove a turquoise Ford Mustang. I really liked that car. I loved to lay on the hood after the sun went down. It was so warm from the sunshine and I would just kick back, soak up that warmth, and look at the stars.
Usually didn’t have problems finding mom. She was always in the same spot. Laying in bed, light off, door shut, all by herself. She also used to laugh a lot when she was in that room all by herself. That was creepy to me. I used to ask her what she was laughing about. She always said the same thing, "just something I was remembering". It was really bad that last year we lived with her. I remember my brother was brought home by the police a few times that last few months. I know, if we had stayed there much longer, it would be me that the police were bringing home next.
The last week before she was locked up for the 2nd time is a little bit fuzzy for me. I know she had some delusion about our house so she made us all leave. We showed up at my Aunt’s house and mom refused to leave after my aunt let us in. My aunt was another person that mom often thought was trying to kill us, so..... my aunt didn’t stay. She left her own house. A few days later, with grams and gramps help, they were able to get mom picked up. She had been off her meds for too long and was completely off her rocker. The cops showed up to take her to the mental hospital and she didn’t go willingly.
I should have been in school.
I played hooky that day so I got a front row seat.
It was a huge fight with lots of things broken. I hid behind the bedroom door and stayed there for a long time after they left. Grams came in looking for me and found me there. Always was grams that ended up picking up my mom’s messes.
So my mom had another complete break down and was locked up for the 2nd time. We stayed with grams and gramps for a little bit. We were so used to running wild, I know we had to be a hand full for grams. My mother, while being locked up in a mental hospital, was causing such a huge stink. She didn’t give grams or gramps any peace. I am sure part of the reason that nobody in the family wanted us was the fact that my mother would bug the SHIT out of them.
Grams told me later about going over to the rent house to clean it up. She said it was awful! It was winter time and the gas had been turned off so it was very cold in the house. She said that there were dead roaches everywhere. Our clothes were too filthy to try to clean so she just threw everything away! Everything! Grams said that when she opened my mother’s bottom dresser drawer she found a huge pile of food stamps and tons of my mom’s meds. All that time being hungry and she just hid the food stamps. If I had known they were there I would have given them to Ms. Ula and asked her to cook more food.
We never lived with my mom again after that. I am not sure how long we stayed with grams and gramps before we were taken to the Children’s home. I know I was still in the 5th grade and it was starting to get warm. The year was 1976. I remember that because they had the bi-centennial train come to the new elementary school. I don’t remember anyone telling us anything about moving there. I don’t think grams knew how to tell us.
I will try to find the story that I wrote awhile back about the beginning time at the home. It is pretty short for covering 7 yrs. This part wasn’t too bad for covering about 5 yrs. Eeh?
Now keep in mind that during this time frame I was between 5-10 yrs old. Playing on top of a house! What was I thinking?
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