Part X

Now that school was out, Rosanne and I had more time for our "chalk houses" and riding bikes. I had been working hard on riding my bike without the training wheels, and finally mastered it. A very proud moment. We spent what seemed like every waking moment outside riding, drawing and exploring new things.

Our yard was pretty and green now, and we had lots of space to play in the yard, so our outdoor playground was twice its old size.

I didn't know what Grandma had done or said, but Daddy was home a lot more now, and Mama wasn't crying much at all. Actually, Daddy decided that he would get a contractor to build us a real playhouse with windows, doors and even a lock on our door in the backyard. We were so excited about that because we could pretend we had our own house with REAL furniture and curtains.

Daddy had also put up a basketball hoop in the front yard at one end of the turnaround, but I didn't care much about that. It was so tall, I never could get that big orange ball in it. I tried my little super ball, but it went down the hill never to be seen again. Daddy also bought a camper and named it "Jesse." It sat in the turnaround next to his black Cadillac. Jesse was black with white stripes down the side, and he was fixing the inside up with blankets, pillows and other things for us to go camping. He even had "Jesse" painted on both sides of his new camper.

Mama was getting ready to have a baby any day, so she hardly came outside that summer. She said when women are going to have babies, they get hot enough without going outside and it was too hot for her. She was walking funny, too. Daddy said she looked like she swallowed a watermelon seed and it was "one big watermelon" growing in there. I reminded him that she didn't eat a watermelon seed, it was a BABY.

Soon after we had moved into our new house, a man built a raised flower bed about waist high. Mama planted it with every kind of cactus you could ever imagine. I loved it. It was on the opposite side of the house from Eula's side, so I visited it often. I didn't even have to bend down to get a close up look at every detail on all these beautiful and strange looking plants. I had two favorites. Mama called one of them the "old man," and the other had needles growing out of it but also big, beautiful red flowers. The old man looked just like an old man, but with no face. It was a tall, narrow, and round plant completely covered in what looked like long flowing white "hair." It fascinated me. I wanted to touch it every time I studied it, but Mama told us never to touch any of the cacti.

I don't remember Mama going to the hospital or even when she went, but I do remember Eula sleeping in the house with us when Daddy and Mama went to get the baby. The baby was born on August 24, 1961 and we were all so happy. We would get to play with her because school wouldn't start for another few weeks. I recall Daddy taking us one day to the hospital to see our new baby. He said we couldn't go in, but we could stand outside with him and look at Mama through her window. We waved at her and she weakly waved back, but she looked sick. It seemed like she could barely lift her head up and tried to smile. We didn't get to see the baby, but Daddy said it was a baby sister and her name was Tara. He said she was really pretty and that Mama was a little sick, but would be just fine.

I remember asking Daddy if Mama was going to die and he said, "Of course not! She had a baby. That's how women look when they have babies."

I was still worried, but Mama and our new sister came home a few days later and I was relieved. I remember Mama stayed in bed a lot and acted like she was sick, but Grandma and Eula said that was normal. (I found out years later that Tara was not an easy birth. She was born breach, and Mom had a doctor that didn't help much with some complications she had. She almost had to have a blood transfusion.) Tara was beautiful and very quiet. I thought babies would cry a lot, but she didn't.

Daddy seemed a lot happier. He was home more often, tinkering inside Jesse, talking to Jethro, and tossing us in bed again like he used to. He had even added a couple of new songs for our bedtime ritual. "Bonanza" and "Johnny Yuma" were two of his new favorites. My personal favorite was still "Pick a Bale of Cotton" because I loved to act out the "jump down, turn around, pick a bale of cotton" part, while he sang it with us. We always ended up laughing and falling into our beds. He laughed a lot too, and I loved his laugh.

We had more friends now too. They came to the house to see the baby, and I loved having company. Carl and Pearl Butler were coming often because they sang, too, and traveled to California a lot. They didn't have any children for us to play with, but they played with us, and they played cards with Daddy and Mama. I liked to watch, so I took great pride in being the "waitress." I brought them snacks and cokes and loved to sit close by and listen to the grown ups talk and laugh. Grandma and Grandpa came to visit too and I loved to watch Grandpa talk to Jethro. Grandma always brought something good to eat and took good care of Mama and helped with Tara. I remember asking Grandma if she still loved me now that we had a new baby and she assured me that there was "Plenty of love to go around", she loved us all very much.

Cindy was three now so playing with her was more fun. For a while. If Rosanne and I were riding bikes, she seemed to always be in the way. That was annoying, but inside the house we had fun. I let her play with some of my toys, and I liked some of her toys, but wouldn't let anyone see me play with them because they were too babyish.

Tara slept in a tiny baby bed next to Mama and Daddy's bed until she was a few months old. One day I decided that I wanted my own room and so did Rosanne. I took the quiet "nursery" and Rosanne took the guest room across the hall from me. Cindy and Tara moved into our pretty big room with the dressing room and bathroom. I'm sure Rosanne was happier than ever because I was still having night terrors. They were scary and exhausting, but somehow I had learned to manage getting sleep through it and it wasn't a huge ordeal as it had been.

I don't remember much about my room except that I had a bigger bed, which was nice, and I had framed photos of my Aunt Sylvia and Uncle Ray on the shelf above my headboard. They're Mom's only siblings and my Godparents. They both still lived in Texas so we didn't see them very often, but Mama talked to them on the telephone quite a bit. My Mama's parents also lived in San Antonio, so I didn't know them very well, but I remember getting cards and letters from them. My closet was directly across from my bed. It had wooden sliding doors, and I always made sure they were closed before I fell asleep.

Mama was back to normal now and looked exactly like she did before she gave birth. She was tiny again, and her hair was past her waist by now. She was gorgeous.

Rosanne and I had been back in school a while now, and first grade was much different from Kindergarten. I was learning things about the alphabet and spelling some words now. My teacher was a thin young nun, covered from head to toe in a black dress with strange black boots. Her head was also covered in a black veil with a white band around her face. I remember sitting in my desk wondering what color her hair was, or if she even had any hair.

At the beginning of school I thought she'd be nice because she was kind of pretty. She wasn't. She was meaner to the boys than the girls, but she didn't seem to like any of us. When a boy would do or say something she didn't like, she'd make him come up to her huge ugly desk and put his fingers in her top drawer. Then she'd slam the drawer! I couldn't believe it. The girls got off a little easier. We got our knuckles smacked with a wooden ruler. Of course we had to come up to her desk in front of everyone for her to smack them. I was shy then so I made sure that I stayed as quiet as a mouse. I never got the ruler, and didn't intend to. I did throw up once though. Throwing up in her class was just as humiliating as her other tactics.

When someone threw up, all of the boys had to go outside in single file, cup their hands and fill them with dirt. Then they had to walk back inside, single file, and put the dirt on the vomit. When the teacher thought it was "safe," she'd get her special broom and dust pan and sweep it all in the trash. Then she'd pick one victim, a boy, of course, to take the trash out. It was a bizarre ritual, and completely insane to me.

I looked forward to weekends all through first grade, because not only did we have a crazy nun for a teacher, we also had to ride the bus and it had become very unfriendly. Rosanne and I got called "Cash trash" and everything else you could imagine children can rhmye with CASH. Our friends were the only ones that didn't join in the chorus. They tried to stick up for us, but all that did was make them come up with new names for them.

I was really glad things were better at home. At least for now. First grade was not fun, and I couldn't wait until it was over.

Be Sociable, Share!

• 

• Tweet