The street lights still glowing as the dawn had not yet risen.  A loud rap echoed from the back door. The door was on top of a large cement porch which was a flight above the ground. Our yard backed up to Uncle Pappy and Aunt Rosie’s house. Waking up startled I opened the back door, it was Skippy my mother’s boyfriend.  He quickly waved me away, as to shoo a fly, and told me to go back to bed, sternly with a slight tremble in his voice.  Something was wrong, the air stood still as my Nanny greeted him at the door. As I hesitantly shut the bedroom door and lay down on the floor, in my nightgown, with my ear to the opening underneath. I heard those words… the words that would change everything. The words that would echo through my mind and soul for years to come. The words that were changing fate.  My mother had been in a terrible car accident, she was in the hospital. Nanny should go, he would stay with us. Hearing my mom had been in an accident only meant one thing to my innocent five-year old mind.  It meant I would never see her again, she was gone, as far as I could understand, and I never did see her again, other than pictures and dreams.  She remained in the hospital for 2 long and harrowing weeks. Vague memories run through my little mind about a broken neck, a coma, a drunk man running a red light, her friend in the car walking away unscathed, that was not fair. It was dark, quiet and still in the hours, days and weeks that followed.  Not much talking only whispers could be heard. Whispers became the norm, each time I entered the room, the chattering voices abruptly ceased, whispers followed.  Did they think I couldn’t hear them, was I becoming invisible? What about the children? Joyce never came back home, she passed away as a result of the injuries sustained in that automobile accident.  Her body was so shattered she could no longer hang onto life.  The rest of us would try to live with the pieces of our shattered hearts that were left behind.  Did she have a nice funeral, who was there? Were there many beautiful flowers, did she look peaceful, was she crying; as she lay there at only 26 years old or was she all cut up and bloody.  A life cut short, so many other lives cut to pieces.  Like the snow pushed by the plow, it would never be the same.  The beauty of the fallen snow had suddenly turned to dirty slush. How on earth could it ever be good again? Would it be, could it be ? Life has a way of melding the pieces together, sometimes smoothing away the rough edges to which makes us who we are; always changing like the colors of leaves on a tree. No two leafs exactly the same.

Joyce would look in the bathroom mirror and pull the curlers from her sandy brown hair. She would spend what seemed like hours putting on layers and layers of make up.  I simply adored watching her paint her face like a great artist. Everything had to be just right. Last but not least was her final touch, when she put the VO5 all through the strands of her silky hair. It would stay in place as if some magical glue had just been added.  Sometimes to make me laugh she would stand her hair straight up, but that would only last for a minute or two.  This makeup and hair business was serious !  The VO5 came out of a tube as she squeezed it into the palm of her hand. She gently rubbed her hands together before spreading generously to cover her head.  It never occurred to me that Joyce was anything but beautiful, but somehow after this makeup/hair ritual was over, she thought of herself as more beautiful.  It became clear to me that being happy and beautiful had a lot to do with all those tubes and compacts and hair spray.  The lipstick was always the final touch and of course the puckering of her full lips.  Wah Laahhh ……….perfecto……. muahhh , as she pursed her rosy red lips together.

Before much time passed I stood in the doorway of that very room.  The same room my mother spent all of her time chatting on the phone to her friends. The room I had my ear to the floor that fateful morning.  The room that once held a light, airy feeling, full of laughter and giggles was now dark and dreary. Why even the paint on the walls appeared sad, listless, dark and empty.  A large empty cardboard box was  placed in front of the closet.  My job, as instructed by my Nanny was to fill the box with all of Mommy’s belongings. Clothing, purses, makeup, curlers, shoes with very high heels, her special pens that she doodled for hours with, even her precious silky  VO5.  Each and every one was going away as my insides screamed “No please don’t take this all away, I want to keep it”.  Each and every last piece had to go, not one thing would remain of all the beautiful dresses, skirts, tops, hats and shoes.  Even her sweet special smell would be gone, once the filled boxes were gone. Wishing I could keep some of her treasures but not able to say those words out loud, although inside they were screaming. Tears rolled down my cheeks as I helped to fill the box.  Nanny didn’t see my tears; I hid my face I didn’t want to make her cry too. She was so sad; misery and pain etching the lines in her face even deeper. Nothing was going to break her stoic affect. It was as if the pain was too deep to even speak of.  That just may be why nothing was spoken about the accident, the box or her belongings again, as if she was never there.  An entire person and lifetime vanished in one single instant.  Another deep crease and shift in my soul, never to be talked about again. The whispers soon began whenever I entered a room or a class is school; they were everywhere it seemed. There was no getting around it, this young little girl was now broken, different from everyone else.

She may not be around anymore and we may not talk about her but I remember her. I remember every single thing about her and I will not let that ever go away. Oh how I missed her.  I was so sad for my brother because I knew he didn’t understand like I did. She had gone to heaven because she was dead, he only knew she was not there.  One morning while getting ready for school, I went into the bathroom and stood up on the step stool.  There I was in the mirror, my mothers mirror.  I was going to be pretty just like her.  As I opened the squared container of petroleum jelly I was convinced it was just like VO5.  I would need the entire container to pull throug my long dirty blonde strands of hair.  It was a very satisfying feeling, I was getting so grown up, just like my mom, beautiful simply beautiful !!  Well that sentiment was not shared by my Nanny. As she entered the bathroom the squeal that came out of her was sort of like a small animal, I didn’t know what it meant but could tell it was not good. As my hair was all clumped together with petroleum jelly my Nanny shook her head and lowered her face into the palm of her hand, NOW WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO? .  She sent my brother off to the neighbor’s house and began the tedious process of cleaning my hair.  Apparently, we had to get this out of my hair before I could attend school again.  That would take exactly eight hair washings using very strong detergent, not the good shampoo I might add, and enduring the lecture of why I should never ever again do that.  So I learned VO5 was a “special” jelly for hair and I couldn’t have any.  It was not the same, but then nothing was.

Each night when we went to bed we had to say our prayers. “Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep.  If I should die before I wake I pray the Lord my Soul to take”, and if you don’t take my soul please bring my Mommy back home.  It wasn’t that I didn’t love Nanny, who now had taken over full legal custody of my brother and I.  I did love her, I absolutely adored her, but she was not Mommy, she wasn’t funny like my mommy.  She was sad and broken-hearted and tried so very hard to hide it and pretend everything was normal. Nothing was normal; nothing was ever going to be normal again.  At school, I became known as the girl whose mother died. The one with no mother.  Who would I make a card for on mother’s day or special macaroni box on father’s day? I didn’t want to go to school on those days, I often pretended to be sick.  I knew deep inside it was going to come up and the heat would rise up through my neck to my head with embarrassment.  Please don’t call attention to me, please pretend I am just like all the rest, that I am normal too.  What I didn’t know then, was there was no normal, that everyone was dealing with something that sometimes was not good.  Normal were the families on TV, on the radio, in the magazines. I thought the neighbors families were all normal but what is “normal”?

Skippy, who lived behind us with his parents was in his thirties. Did he have a job? Did he help take care of his parents? I never knew, I just thought they were normal. Next door the Sarinarios had five children and a mom and dad. Now THEY were normal.  Sometimes we played baseball in their side yard. Their five children almost made up a whole team, just them.  We would spend hours out there playing with the other children, or raking the leaves in our yard and jumping in them like the flying acrobats on TV.  In the evening the lightning bugs would come out.  Firefly’s caught in the jars we had with holes punched through the top. As the sun began to set, all the children knew they were to go home or endure a scolding or even worse, the paddle.  Until it was time to go inside, the giggles were plentiful as we each inspected the other’s treasures. There was always so much to do and so much fun to be had as children, that was our business.  We were in the business of having fun, but that all changed just a little bit after Mommy left. Then eventually nothing escaped the changes.

Sometime later that same year someone killed the President of the United State of America.  I was sitting on the floor in our living room watching the daily soap operas my Nanny loved.  I was getting good at sewing and was sewing the latest new badge onto my brownie sash. Suddenly, the whole world stopped.  Everything stopped, it was on every channel, it is all everyone talked about for a long time. It was truthfully so very sad, and everyone was sad.  Now, the whole world changed for everyone else too.  It was as if he was their relative or neighbor, why was it that it was more important to everyone that he was dead, my mommy was still dead, but it didn’t seem to matter anywhere.  How does a child process that?  Nobody could talk about mommy but everyone could talk about him, why?

Soon the Christmas holidays would roll around. We tried to put the train city up; little streetlights and benches and people all around the tree.  Careful to lay the “snow” sheet down as even as we could.  Somehow it just wasn’t as pretty or as special, but we pretended it was.  Each Christmas Eve the neighborhood people would all gather next door at the Sarinario’s house.  Most of the time Santa would show up and have a huge sack full of gifts for all the children.  You could feel the anticipation mounting as he dragged this big heavy bag into their living room.  All the children sitting on the floor; just waiting for their name to be called.  It was a tradition in our neighborhood that would not die with Mommy.  So off we went, Christmas Eve to wait for Santa’s sled to hit the roof.  Peeping out the windows until we were scolded and told he won’t come if you’re looking.  We all had to go in the back room and just wait, maybe play a game or watch TV, but just waiting was sheer torture.  I remember seeing out the window, Mr. Sarinario in a Santa suit carrying a big bag.  I was in shock, suddenly I knew it wasn’t real, but I could never tell the other children. Everyone was so excited, he had arrived.  He passed out all the gifts we just sat and watched. Each child’s name being called one by one.  Why couldn’t  I  just disappear, or become invisible just for tonight.  Magically, wish myself somewhere else; just like Bewitched on TV did.   I knew Nanny didn’t have any money, I knew we were poor. There may not be gifts for my brother and I.  I didn’t care so much but I was so afraid at how that would hurt Nanny and my brother.  How unfair it would be for my brother, he didn’t do anything bad and yet probably wasn’t getting anything.  I was strong and had learned to take the licks life was throwing at me.  I was a big girl.  Well, there were gifts at the bottom of the bag.  Mine was a small coin purse, the rubber kind you squeeze together to open; it was red.  I acted all surprised and delighted.  Happy as one could possibly be over receiving a coin purse.

I think they knew I was faking but no one ever said one word. My memory doesn’t recall what my brother received that night but I am certain I was just as disappointed at that.  We just packed up our meager gifts and went back next door to our own house.  Acting cheerful became a way of life.  I could never let people know how very sad I was inside, how could I ever be that ungrateful for my Nanny taking us.  Also, we can never make her sad, she has had such a hard life.  Just be good and do what I’m suppose to do and everything will be fine.  So I did, I worked very hard in school and normally got the honor roll and all types of ribbons each semester.  Meanwhile, my weight began to increase, little by little. The food came often as a way of showing love, showing appreciation or just plain old comfort.  No one ever mentioned how I was growing.  When I did good in school or was awarded some special honor Nanny would say we can go out to eat and I can have whatever I like.  Oh how I loved to go have Veal Parmesan at the local Italian restaurant. We had to take a taxi to get there and it was always a big event. It was located at a marina where we could look out the window and see all the boats and water.  Many awards and honors continued to come; but for some reason, it still never felt like I was good enough.  All the good grades, the honors, awards and food was not going to change a thing. We were still different from all the other kids, all the other families.

Occasionally when I rode my bicycle with my best friend Nora, we would ride all the way up to the busy streets where all the business was.  There was a very large church with a bell and steeple, they kept the doors open all the time.  Nora and I would go in and I would run straight to the side of the church where all the candles were. You could light candles in this church and no one was there to scold you !!  So I lit as many as I could, with the long matches provided near the candles.

Not knowing the formal prayers or even the sacred reason for the candles I just lit them.  Oh I would go up to the front and kneel down in front of the cross and bow my head.  It seemed only right and I knew enough to do that, but who was I praying to, who could hear me, was there really a God. Could my mommy hear or see me.  I hoped not because boy would she be mad !  I would have been in big trouble for lighting those candles, since they weren’t mine.  Sometimes we would get spooked by a sound or hear someone coming and we would run out, jump on our bikes and head home as fast as possible.  Looking behind the entire way to make sure no one from the church or business area was following us.  That was the only reason I ever went into that big beautiful church, to light candles.  It never occurred to me that people went there for more sacred, spiritual reasons.

Riding our bicycles in the late afternoon early evening was always so much fun.  Sometimes the ice cream truck would come by and if we were lucky sometimes we could get ice cream.  Oh how I loved that stainless steel ice cream truck, I could hear it coming from blocks away.   Other times though, we wouldn’t be so lucky it wouldn’t be the ice cream truck but we were just as excited to see the mosquito man.  That was a fogger truck that drove up our street leaving a huge cloud of some type of mosquito repellant or fumigation.  What did we know, who cares anyway, we rode our bikes right smack in the middle of the cloud, following the truck for blocks and blocks.  Imagining we were up in the clouds riding to heaven.  Inhaling that rancid smoke and hacking like we had been smoking Lucky Strikes our whole life.  Funny, no one ever told us not to do that, not to ride in the cloud of poison fog.  My brother and I developed bronchial asthma when we were kids, and kept it all through our lives.  When we got sick the doctor would come right to our house and tend to the patient right there in his or her bed.  That was completely normal, everyone knew everyone’s name and story. The whole town it seemed knew everything, nothing was sacred or so I thought.

A few years after my mom died I had the opportunity to take a summer vacation with my Aunt Dot, who was married to my Grandpa.  She was going to go to Florida and visit her mother and father and bring me along for the trip.

I was ecstatic to be flying in an airplane and going all the way to Florida.  That’s where movie stars went and some even lived.   We were going for two weeks and I couldn’t wait.  The excitement almost overtook me as I sit at the back of the landed plane on the runway in Florida, puking my guts up.  Sick as a dog, all the other passengers had deplaned, I was still on the plane sick.  Although, the plane had landed it still felt like we were moving.  That is when I learned about motion sickness, which then followed me for years to come.  Finally after getting our luggage and going over what seemed like the longest bridges ever, we arrived at Aunt Dot’s mother and fathers house.

It was a small little bungalow type of house on a typical small street with about a million parakeets at the end of the street up in the trees.  More news to me, parakeets flew freely in Florida. There were palm trees, oceans and now parakeets.  I was completely in awe until something brown crawled into the back door.  There was a room at the back of the house, they called it the “Florida room”, hmmmm, appropriate.  In through the back door, just under the jalousie windows crawled a tiny little dinosaur.  I had never seen anything like it or heard this type of creature even existed.   I jumped onto of the tables and chairs out there screaming bloody murder.  Calling to my would be step great grandma to come quickly.  I was being invaded by a dinosaur.  They all came in running, with broom in hand.  “What is it dear? …. oh my, it’s a lizard !!”.   Come to find out, they are everywhere in Florida.  They won’t bother you – ARE YOU KIDDING ME – but really to the untrained eye, they are disgusting !  “Just leave them alone dear, they will just run away!” Hummffff…. not if I have anything to do with it, they might run right on me, how gross !!  There were many more Florida creatures I would learn about as years went by, some more random than others.  In this new place no one knew my story, no one knew how different I was.  I could just be me and it was good enough.  Each morning I ran to the end of the street to look up atop the trees and see the flocks of birds or what I thought were green parakeets singing and squawking, loudly.  I would stand there for hours just watching in amazement, imagining what they might be saying to each other.  It was the most beautiful peace I had felt in a long time.  Just me, on the corner street, watching the birds, just simply watching. No agenda, no one to impress, nothing to win or achieve. Just me, the birds and that beautiful blue morning sky.

The trip was over once we landed back in New York.  Before I could get off the plane however, I had to dispose of my sick bag which the stewardess had kindly provided to me.  Back to regular irregular life, back to pretending.   I brought back many remnants of Florida to show my classmates.  It was all I could think about while I was gone.  Just how absolutely impressed they would all be and how special I would be for having been to Florida.

I was the only child in the class that had ever flown on an airplane or traveled to another place.  This was going to be good !!  My “Show and Tell” presentation was extensive and elaborate to say the least.  Spread across several tables, organized neatly with descriptions on index card, it included sand, maps, tourist pamphlets, sand dollars and shells.  As each child went through the line to look at my display I would explain in great detail about the sandy beaches and palm trees.  At the end of the line, each child in my class would receive their very own piece of Florida to treasure.  I brought back a bunch of palm tree pods that had fallen off a tree and handed them out to the class as if they were gold.  I expected everyone to cherish that little piece of paradise I had brought them.  To my dismay, it wasn’t as big a hit as I had hoped, in fact, some of the kids didn’t even look at it.  Oh how my heart sank with disappointment, again.  It seemed no matter what I did or how hard I tried, I was not going to “measure up” or be anything or mean anything to anyone, ever !!   

Most of the class was very impressed by my display and all my seeming geographical knowledge.  It was only a few that made fun of me or ignored it completely.  They were the ones that caught my attention, not the positive, only the negative.  In my mind, I had failed it wasn’t good enough to win the applause of everyone, so it wasn’t good enough, nor was I.  Disappointed I gathered up all my trinkets from the tables and put them back in the box to take home.  Somewhere along the line my personal existence had become dependent on what others thought of me.   The honors and awards were fleeting, nothing seemed to last.  Always back to square one, always back to the reality that I was different.  In my small young mind that could only mean one thing; different meant not good enough.

An autumn landscape of all the various leaf colors, sizes and shapes is made all the more beautiful by the differences.  A truth I had yet to learn, still under the false belief that perfect was real.  What exactly is perfect?  No flaws, just simply perfect. That now sounds boring and fictional to me, yet for so many years it was my view and I was never there.  How lonely that is to know the world is something very different than you are or will ever be. Exhausting to continue trying and always failing, to fill that pattern of perceived perfection…beauty; Happiness !   Just barely reaching it; catching a glimpse of it each and every day.  Only to realize I was further from it than ever before.  Trying to be an adult with the mind of a child, drawing conclusions to questions without ever asking or being told.  Day after day the puzzle got more complicated.

THE EARLY YEARS

As far back as I can remember, my grandma was always there.  We called her Nanny, she loved us so much.  This was the beginning, the first of many lives to come.  I was two years old when my brother was born.  I don’t remember much of that but from looking at pictures; I am guessing I found him to be a great toy.

Come in here now and drink your eggnog my mother shouted across the relatively small Long Island house.  In the shaker she put 2 raw eggs and milk. Now drink up, this will make you strong and healthy.  Oh my god how slimy and disgusting the taste was.  It made me gag as it slipped down my throat.  Does everyone really have to drink eggnog?  It must be some kind of torture or secret potion no one else knows about except my mother.

Many times during dinner she would have to get up to talk on the phone. The telephone was in her bedroom.  She would lie across the bed and talk for hours, all the while doodling on the telephone book. The book was completely covered with all sorts of geometrics, sketches, dots and stars.  So worn through with all her creativity the paper was wearing thin.  Very often the food was disgusting.  Some type of silver fish with big bulging eyes, which I had watched her cut the heads off, that part was great fun.  After the phone call she would be going out again that night.  She would get dressed and go pick up her friends.  A night of chatter and drinking would follow, with all her best friends.

One time one of those friends moved in with her little boy.  He shared the bed with my brother and the two of them often got into all kinds of trouble.  I took the heat for them more than once.  One morning I was awakened by the sounds of giggling and laughter.  As I approached the hallway I could see the two of them stirring a pot on the floor filled with powdered chocolate pudding and milk.  Slopping it all over the rugs and wooden floors, in horror I stood frozen.  The first sound of my mother coming sent me into action…get out of here you two let me clean it up so Mommy doesn’t get mad.  That was my mistake, while they slid into their bed like they had been sleeping all along my mother walked out to find me and this big pudding mess all over the floor.  Those wooden paddles with the little balls on them were fun to play with and Mommy used them to spank us, I was spanked often with those paddles.   I don’t know how long they stayed with us, but chances are it helped my Mom with the rent and food and I’m sure having her friend around was comforting to her.  Sometimes she seemed lost so friends probably helped with that.

Before that we lived with my brother’s father.  She married him and my brother Tom was born 2 years after me.  My stepfathers name was Joe and I do not have any memories of him other than when he threw me down a flight of stairs.  That night he and my mother were in the other room watching TV and he was drinking beer.  My baby brother Tommy was in his crib and in the same room I was laying still in a small twin bed or maybe a cot.  Joe yelled into the room for me to be quiet.  That puzzled me because I wasn’t making a sound, it was Tommy doing all the crying and whining.  Again, his loud angry voice shouted for me to stop crying and go to sleep.  As Tommy continued to cry I was whispering for him to be quiet. That is when Joe came into the room picked me up by my hair and threw me down the flight of stairs that lead to the front door, all the while yelling “I told you to BE QUIET” as I tumbled down the stairs; head over feet.  It was a fall night when I finally hit the bottom of the stairs on the landing; I just lay there crying.  He came running down the stairs, stepped over me and out he went. Through the front door with my mother right on his tail.  She told me to go back upstairs and ran after him.  He wasn’t around much longer after that.  They had changed my last name to match his but once he was gone they changed it back.  I was glad he was gone though I never knew what happen to him.  To this day my brother nor I have any idea what happen to him.  For my brother it’s sad because he has never had a relationship with him.  We have never really had any male figure in our lives.  My father left before my mother gave birth to me.  To my knowledge I have never met him.

She had a boyfriend now, Skippy who lived behind us.  Our backyard touched his and he lived with his parents. They were a happy Italian family, which we spent every Sunday with.  Our whole neighborhood was Italian with fancy Italian names like Sarinario , DiEsso and LasAtosta.  Our names were very different and everyone in our house had a different last name, not one of which sounded even close to anything Italian, it was evident even to such a young mind that we were different.  Sundays were very special in the neighborhood.  The neighbors all got together and cooked up a huge Italian feast.  Tomato sauce with pig’s feet and homemade ravioli stuffed with meat and cheese.  Oh there were meatballs to die for and sausage too, but the best part was the pig’s feet, a real delicacy.   Most often Aunt Rosie and Uncle Pappy (Skippy’s parents) would let me press out the ravioli with a glass against the pastry.  I was very proud to be included in the weekly traditional feast.  The cooking would go on all day and climax early in the evening with everyone having a bowl of ravioli and sauce.  All those delicious calories and carbohydrates always brought about a full, comfortable and tired feeling that all enjoyed.  The television would be put on and all would settle in.  Before we knew it bedtime had come in a sleepy haze.

Grandpa would come over and pick me up sometimes so I could visit with him and Aunt Dot.  She was his wife but not my grandmother so she didn’t want to be called grandma.  She said she was too young for that.  Mommy and Grandpa didn’t really like each other.  They fought all the time and mommy often hung up on grandpa when he would call on the phone.  I never knew why but it always made me feel bad.  Going over to grandpa’s house was usually a lot of fun.  They had a pool and I had gotten to know the kids down the street so I always had someone to play with.  Grandpa had a typewriter store in his basement where he repaired them.  I would sit for hours on end with him while he worked on the typewriters and adding machines I would sit at the desk right next to him and pretend I was a secretary and try to type and add.  To this day I remember “the quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog”, the sentence that included all the letters of the alphabet.  He would encourage me and tell me I was doing great, it always made me feel good.  They never ever talked to me about my mother.  It was as if she just didn’t exist when I was over at their house visiting.  They had two sons, Jimmy and Gregory. Both of whom I called “uncle”.  It never really occurred to me that they were Joyce’s brothers, but they were.  Perhaps they were raised to be ‘distant’ to her, they were always that.  Jimmy was the older of the two and I didn’t see much of him.  Ahhh, but Gregory, he was my hero.  He was in the marching band at school and played all types of instruments.  He taught me many of them, the trombone and drums to name a few.  We would sit up in his room for hours on end playing these instruments.  Those were times I truly enjoyed, until Aunt Dot would make me come down and help with dinner. As I look back now, I wonder if he cherished those moments as much as I did or perhaps I was a nuisance five year old.  Either way, it never occurred to me that I was anything but his favorite cousin or niece or whatever I was.  It was never really clear to me who I was related to or who I really was.  That would haunt me for years to come.

At Grandpa’s house I usually had the time of my life.  They had an above ground swimming pool and a huge back yard. Often we would swim or play ball in the yard.  There were times when grandpa and Gregory would be in the pool with me and somewhere along the line they got the idea that it was really funny to hold me underwater and maybe for good measure tickle me.  At first I would laugh until the air and breath was gone, as I struggle to get air I vividly remember them laughing and dunking me under again. The moments seemed like eternity before I was able to get a quick breath of fresh air and would be dunked under again.  It seemed to go on for hours, though I’m sure it was only moments, I remember being terrified and thinking this is not funny. Finally, when I could get away I would jump out of the pool and be finished with ‘swimming’, they called me a sissy.  I suppose to be brave I should have remained to my last breath.

Sometimes my mother would put me in a taxi cab and I would travel all the way over to the next town to spend the weekend with my great grandmother.  My mother loved her and the feeling was always mutual, which was very obvious to everyone that cared enough to pay attention.  Going to her house was always exciting because most often it involved taking a train into the city and somewhere along the line riding on a subway.  My great grandmother was affectionately named “Nanny” by my brother and I, and lived in a big 3 story house where she rented a room from a woman she worked with.  She worked in the cafeteria at school and was good friends with all the cafeteria ladies.  Occasionally, one of her coworkers would come over and visit our house which was always strange because they were a different color than us.  I didn’t mind at all but Nanny would say “it made people talk” and I really never understood what that meant. They were all very nice ladies and they thoroughly enjoyed each other’s company, which was obvious, they were like a family of their own.  Later on, she retired from that job and came to live with us.  I don’t really know if she had to retire or it was just time.  She was a hard worker all her life and had withstood many difficult situations in her life.

The newspaper story title read “Man murdered by drifter he helped”.   The article told a story of a ‘young couple’ that had helped a young man during times of need.  The husband aided in his obtaining employment and the couple agreed he could stay at their house while he got back on his feet.  As both men went to work daily, the wife stayed home and cleaned, laundered and prepared meals.  It’s unknown to me how long he stayed with them but that was her first husband, Charlie Brown.   She was so good and already had so much sorrow in her young life.  An acquaintance told me the story and eventually I found the old newspaper article, folded with deep creases etched into the aged paper.  Decades had passed and much more sadness was to fill her life.  More sadness and struggle than one person should ever have to withstand.  More than most could endure.

Maybe some people are born to endure.  Just simply to endure.  If the possibility of that exists, she would have been the one to have been blessed with that plight.  Seems that is a special category reserved for only the caring and loving souls that are full of unconditional love and relentless strength.   Perhaps there is some type of invisible target on those persons that only life can see.  Her second marriage brought her two wonderful children Clement and Dorothy.  Dorothy was the eldest and passed away, as did that husband.  That left her to raise her son on her own until her third marriage.  Three marriages may be commonplace in the twenty first century but they were surely not in those days.  She was not a martyr or one to whine.  She did what she had to do, to do what she needed to do.  She always managed to get the job done and have a little extra to give to someone less fortunate, and never without a smile and a kind word.

My mother was one of Nanny’s biggest fans and I think it was mutual.  That always made me happy since my mother and her dad never got along.  It always seemed as though Nanny was her only family, at least the only one she would claim beside my brother and I and whoever she was married to or dating at the time.  She had a lot of girlfriends.  They would call and talk on the phone for hours on end.  While talking on the phone my mother would be draped sideways across her bed, all the while doodling on the telephone books and chewing gum blowing huge bubble and popping them, it always made me laugh.  There was hardly an empty space on any of the books with all the doodling.  My mother must have loved to draw because sometimes while playing up in the attic I would rummage through her things.  There was a huge old cedar chest that was filled with my mother’s most secret possessions.  Hours were spent by me going through each and everything like it was a rare find of a gem.  Often I would stumble across pencil and charcoal drawings done by my mother.  More often than not they were drawing of semi-nude women, with some type of fabric draped across their body as they sat with legs bent and head back.  Great detail went into the fabric and every shadow on these women.  My mother must have been very artistic and talented, none of which was passed onto me.  The women in these drawings were all very beautiful yet dark and obviously so alone.  That was my mother I would someday realize.

She often went out at night with her girlfriends or her boyfriend and my Nanny would come over and stay with Tommy and I.  That was such a great treat and with all the love she gave us, it felt very natural.  When mother was home and not on the telephone she would be in the kitchen cooking or maybe doing some type of craft.  She would sit for hours on end and do crafts of all kinds.  Vividly I remember making Styrofoam Christmas Balls with gems of all colors. Glistening and shining when the Christmas lights would be strung around them.  There was an entire city built under the Christmas tree. The city was focused around a train station with a train that wrapped around the tree and made various stops along the way.  City folk were all entrenched in their own drama as they hustled about in an attempt to get home to their loved ones and catch up on last minute Christmas rituals.  Almost twelve train cars all attached made their way around out Christmas tree, passing the bus stations, the trees and benches.  The whistle would blow and it was an amazing sight to see, especially through the eyes of a five year old little girl.   With each passing of the train, I admired my mother more for her ingenious sensibility of setting up the whole city.  She enjoyed it as much as we did.  The tracks and trains were all made of steel and the little benches on the side along with the bushes and trees and various buildings were never to fall, they were all built of heavy steel and placed carefully along the train route.   My mother was still a little girl inside.  She watched over her little train city with vigilance.  It often crosses my mind whether or not she watched over my brother and I with the same care.  I really don’t know.

Most often, it really did not matter because I’ve hung onto the times that I remember her being very protective of me.  One time in kindergarten my hand was slammed in the car door of the neighbors that brought me to school.  My fingers were flattened like pancakes and several of my fingernails were black and bleeding.  The pain was excruciating and I remember crying in school, it was early in the morning.  Sometime after lunch my mother arrived and yelled at the teacher for not calling her sooner to come get me.  I remember feeling cared for and loved even though I was hurting really bad.  I do not remember what happen when I left school with my mom but that never really mattered either, I knew I was loved and that was all that mattered.  I could have lost my hand I didn’t care.  I think I sought that feeling of being protected and loved all my life, just desiring the knowing sense that someone cared.  Actions always spoke louder than words.  Many words have been spoken over the years but very few actions.  Those that did display actions were always held dear in my heart.  The rest of my life would be spent searching for those small displays of affection.  Often overlooking the glaring negative behaviors a person exhibited and clinging to those small tidbits or deeds that meant I was loved and important.  That search for adoration was the driving force for the rest of my life in so many ways.

What is it that causes an innocent little girl the burden of always searching for affection, attention and love?  How does it develop in such a young mind the belief that you don’t matter and you are not good enough?  Are we born like that, I don’t think so.  When each of my own children were born I remember looking at them and knowing I was in the presence of an angel.  There was a sense of knowing with every fiber of my being that they were perfect exhibits of God’s love and presence.  There was never a doubt in my mind or soul.  These children like all the rest, were born perfect, innocent and pure.  They were as pure and clean as the driven snow that had fallen freshly on the ground.  Like the snow it doesn’t remain in that perfect state for very long.  Nature along will change the design of the way it had originally fallen.  Small animal footprints begin to litter the snow and the wind blows it in so many different directions. Then eventually that same beautiful, pure and innocent snow is besieged with footprints and debris.  After awhile you have to look very hard and very specifically to see the beauty of that same fallen snow.  Look up at the tree branches and remember how calm and peaceful that snow was.  Its essence is still present but somehow has been marred by life. It was changed in a way that will never return to its original state.

So as with the rest of nature, we change with each footprint that is left upon us. We are never to return to our original state.  Perhaps some footprints are deeper than others, some are careful while others are reckless and destructive. Thus, are the footprints left on our soul, in our mind and heart… changing us and shaping our vision of the world and of ourselves.  Some changes to our soul are so subtle that they are barely noticed, while others are drastic, life shifting, changing our perspectives forever. As the snowplow comes to “move” the snow from the streets it is pushed and swept to the side, so changing its original nature forever.  The snowplow operator is simply doing his job, not necessarily there to cause any damage but rather to assure safety to the masses.  In that simple act, even without his knowing he has changed the landscape in a way that it will never return.  As people enter each life, so changes the landscape of our lives.  Sometimes they may not even know they have become a part of what will be imprinted on us forever, they may be simply doing their job or living their life.