A Home for Life
We had two parents, just not at the same time.
When Mom and Dad divorced I was two years old, and my sister was only a baby, so neither of us remembers the two of them as a pair. We have lots of memories of them as separates, though.
Like the time Dad shaved off his beard, and we couldn’t recognize him anymore. We stormed into Grandma’s kitchen and demanded, “Where’s my dad?” and the stranger sitting atop the woodstove wearing Dad’s black cowboy boots laughed and laughed.
Or the time Mom told us we were going to visit Santa Clause. We went on an airplane trip and I remember looking down on the puffy clouds below and asking her if we could ski on that snow. The foil package of peanuts was so salty that it burned my mouth. When we landed we were in Colorado, not the North Pole, and I was bitterly disappointed.
Mom tells me that some of our visits with both parents during those early divorce years would have been defined by certain authorities as child snatching.
When we were with mom we were WITH MOM. We didn’t phone our dad- we didn’t even know his phone number. (Did he have a phone?) We liked visiting/living with Mom because she let us choose our own breakfast cereal, and she said silly things.
In answer to the question, “Where are we going?” she often replied,
“To the moon!”
When we were with Dad, we didn’t know if Mom lived on the next block or on Mars. Sometimes she would materialize at our front door bearing gifts. Once she brought an EZ Bake Oven, and a battery operated sewing machine. We sewed ugly Barbie clothes out of old socks and dirty T shirts until the batteries wore out, and we fed Dad chocolate cake after chocolate cake until all the tiny cake mixes were used up. Then they both became gigantic appliances for Barbie.
When we had a place of our own with Dad there were always cows and chickens around, and when we were really settled we had pigs. Dad used to pretend to sit on the pigs, and we girls squealed with laughter when the pigs scooted out from under him and he pretended to fall on his bum.
Sometimes, though, we weren’t with either of our parents. Those were the times when we relied on our aunts and uncles.
Aunt Barbara tells me stories about how us kids (she had three of her own) used to help her weed the garden when we lived with her. I don’t remember that, but I love that she still sends me teddy bears when I’m lonely, Hershey Kisses when I’m sad, and Cinnamon Bears when I’m afraid.
Then ones I remember best are Uncle David and Aunt Eunice. Donna and I moved in with them the summer before I started the sixth grade, and it was a tough change. It was scary enough moving into their 100 year old farm house with its peeling, water stained wallpaper and its eerily tall doors; it was terrifying to have to learn how to have manners like they did.
“Patti, don’t use your finger to push your peas onto your fork.”
I couldn’t figure out how to eat peas for months.
Aunt Eunice taught us about doing our laundry, taking showers every single day, and combing our hair properly. She bought me my very first bra. Sometimes, she did unexpected things. Like the day I told her that I’d learned how to make mini pizzas in Home Economics class.
“Would you like to make mini pizzas for dinner tonight?”
Aunt Eunice dutifully recorded the necessary ingredients and went off to the store. I will never forget the queasy mix of emotions churning in my stomach as I carried that plate of mini pepperonis to the table that night:
Ashamed Who would want to eat these stupid pizzas, when we could have had Aunt Eunice’s cooking?
Sheepish I wasn’t accustomed to being treated like an adult.
Shy David and Eunice’s real daughters were right there, but everyone was paying attention to me.
Mixed in with all of those greenish feelings, was a little bit of pride, and a lot of disbelief.
After that school year ended Donna and I went to live with Mom for real, and we didn’t have to go and stay with any more aunts or uncles. I was relieved to be back with my ‘real’ family because- no matter how well I was welcomed- I always felt like a burden and a misfit when I lived with my aunts and uncles. But I missed the farm. My year there had made it’s mark on me; I continued baking apple pies the way Aunt Eunice had taught me, and I never pushed my peas onto my fork with my fingers again.
When I brought Kris home to meet my family he met both Mom and Dad, and he met my outspoken little grandmother as well. But I also made sure that he got to spend a lot of time on Aunt Eunice’s farm. After all the moves and adventures of my life, I knew there was one place we could go where he’d see one piece of my life story that is still there, right where I left it. It didn’t hurt that he got to eat plenty of home made ice cream while he was there.
Over the years, Aunt Eunice has given me so much more than a place to crash during that one rough patch. Aunt Eunice has given me a home for life.
Eryn said,
July 29, 2005 @ 3:31 am
Hi there. I hope it’s alright that I linked your blog on mine; I really enjoy reading it and try to share things I like with others. After I wrote in the html for the link I thought, “Well, what if she really intends for her blog to be mostly private and I’m screwing it up by exposing it to my audience of 12 readers?”
And then I thought, “Well, she probably won’t care. It’s on the internet. How private can it be?”
But then I thought, “What if she really DOES care and I look like a dummy for figuring she wouldn’t care?”
And now I’m thinking I’m over-analyzing this.
Patti said,
July 29, 2005 @ 11:08 am
Eryn,
I am gleeful when people link to my work.
After all, what is a writer without readers?
I can see why you might be concerned, since I sometimes share terribly personal things on my blog, but that’s part of my thing. I think writing is a way of connecting with people, and it should get at the things that are hard and scary if it’s going to be any use.
So link away, and thank you!
Eryn said,
July 29, 2005 @ 1:56 pm
Well, thank you for easing my mind on this matter, and let me comment that I really connect with this essay.
My parents, like yours, divorced when I was two and my younger sister was just a baby, and I also have no recollection of them as a Mother&Father. Just Mom. And Dad. And the titles “Mom” and “Dad” really hold little meaning, as most of the time they seem less like family and more like people who, by some cruel twist of fate, were given no option but to be linked to my siblings and I eternally as “caregivers”.
I think it must have been tough to be shuffled from place to place, but it is uplifting to hear that you found a friend, and a home, in Aunt Eunice.
I also admire your ability to segue and conclude! My writing skills have seriously declined in the last few years, and I can no longer seem to make cohesive grammar work.
Maria Angwin said,
July 29, 2005 @ 7:58 pm
Patti,
What a beautiful tribute to “Aunt Eunice”!
I remember well when you and Donna came to live with us. To this day, mom thinks of you both as “her” kids. Your recent trip to the farm was a wonderful time for the whole family to reconnect and make new connections. Meeting your husband and feeding him (you know how important food is to the whole experience) made my mother so happy.
She called to tell me that you had written this. She was crying she was so touched. Yes, you are right you have a “home” for life.
Your cousin, Maria
mom said,
July 30, 2005 @ 10:20 am
A new entry in granny I love you
Carlene Aro said,
August 2, 2005 @ 2:04 pm
Patti,
I have been thinking about your essay, “A home for life” for the last week. My first reaction was immediate memories of how you changed my life.
When you asked me, “But when you wash silverware and rinse it, don’t you place the forks and spoons tines and bowl down in the drainer? So we don’t touch the part that goes into our mouths? That’s what Grandma always has us do.” My verbal response, “yes, do it that way,” my internal response, “Of course, that makes sense. Why didn’t I always do that?”
My second reation was an acknowledgement that this essay is not about me, but about your memories. The way Aunt Eunice and Uncle David touched your life and gave you a safe place for a short period of time.
As I read the other responses, I have also recognized the tapestry of memories your essay evokes in each of us. We have touched others we shared our past with and left a lasting impression.
Please write more. Good writing always makes me think. The issues that I have examined because of your essay have included our national child welfare system, family relationships, and the joy that comes for being together both in the past and in the present. I know that that joy will continue into the future.
Your cousin,
Carlene
Patti said,
August 2, 2005 @ 3:47 pm
Carlene,
I don’ t think I could possibly have written a better synopsis of the effects of reading and writing, and of my reasons for writing.
I dream of writing a piece that is like a fishnet, which pulls at some memories in each of us, and reminds us that we are all family. We are all so much more similar than we are different.
Thank you for your thoughtful commentary. I never realized I was such an expert dishwasher!
But it doesn’t surprise me that I learned something like that from Grams. I also learned to be a very thorough duster, and how to properly set a table from her.
Love, your cousin,
Patti