LIttle Me (Part Two)

I remember one day...when I was really little...perhaps in kindergarten...when my Mom told me it was a new year. I remember running to the couch and looking outside...I fully expected to see something brand new and fantastic. This is the first time I remember being disappointed. I can remember the sun hitting the snow so very brightly. And it all looked the same. Absolutely the same as the day before. I still get so sad when I think about that day. I don't know what it is about that day and that experience that makes me want to cry every time I think about it. And now I'm here...in a school that I love. I take Spanish classes. I just finished a week creating my own life size puppet named Flora Florida, and we put on a show for the entire school. I'm in a special violin class, and we call our teachers by their first names. I love school. I wish I could stay in school all day and all night. I wish I could sleep at school. I wish I never had to go home again. Why did Keith have to leave? I hated Kansas City, but I loved Keith. We had just started calling him Dad. Me and Jason. He was a good Dad. He didn't yell or spank us unless we did something wrong. He took us fishing and to the movies. He showed us how his car worked and let us play in Foxy Lady...his special car...every now and then. Even though we fought sometimes with the kids in our neighborhood...they were our friends. I was happy there. Mom and Keith almost never fought. They never woke me up yelling. My Mom was happy there. I was happy there. I remember one time...when we were visiting Daddy in Minnesota. He hurt me really badly and scared me by throwing me in the deep end of the swimming pool so that I would learn how to swim. When I cried he told me that I couldn't swim anymore for the rest of the summer. I called my Mom the night before to tell her how he hit me with the belt and it made my arm bleed, and how he spanked me because he called me outside and I didn't hear him. And when I got out of the pool that day. I saw her car. She and Keith drove all the way from Kansas City to get us. I was so happy. We got to go home early. And on the way home. They told us that they got married. I was so happy. Keith was the best. He never made my Mom cry.

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I'm supposed to try and figure out what it is that my "inner child" is asking for every day this week (good lord I hate the whole cliche about the inner child...but hell...what do I know). And today...he's scared...and he wants to be loved...held...and hugged...a lot. I don't think there was much hugging and holding taking place at that time in my life. Man...it's a mind blower to think of how something that happened so long ago can continue to impact your life. Particularly a time period in your life that you have done your damndest to forget. I always wondered why I never blocked the memories out. You always see the adults on Montell crying because all of a sudden all these blocked memories pop up out of nowhere...but for the previous 20 years they'd lived in ignorant bliss...my brain just refused to cooperate on that score.

Comments

[-Jeremy Tequila]

Baby--
i'm proud of you for doing this work and for putting yourself out there like this.