Sometimes things are not as they seem from the outside looking in...
When I was a little girl I used to watch the neighbor family across the street with longing and hope. I lived in a middle class neighborhood; attended a middle class school with all the middle class kids, but in reality, my life was anything but average middle class story book material.
You see my family had secrets.
I longed for the life I saw my friends had; hoped that someday things behind our closed doors would change. When I was five years old we moved to a new place. The house was larger than the one we left behind. In the old house my brother, sister and I had shared one bedroom while my parents had the other. In this new place we each had our own room. Well kind of anyway. Actually, my mom and dad made a bedroom out of the dining room for my brother.
It was summer time. School had just let out a couple of days ago, and now we had a new place to explore. While the moving men unloaded our furniture I was allowed to play outside, as long as I stayed out of the way, so I set out walking on the curb to see who else I might find in this new playground.
My pigtails of sun-kissed brown ringlet curls blew in the breeze and bounced up and down with each step up on the curb and then down on the edge of the street. My eyes scanned the houses and yards as I walked searching for the occupants. It was early morning, around 8 on a Saturday, so most families weren’t up or out yet.
A noise across the street drew my attention. I stopped to watch as a garage door came up. A tall man dressed in a blue uniform of some kind raised the door; beside him stood a boy and girl. They were all smiling and talking. The man put a bag of some kind in his little funny looking car that didn’t have a top; that’s when he did something that told me things were different across the street in this new neighborhood. He squatted down in front of the two kids and pulled them closely, wrapping his arms around them and kissing the tops of their heads.
I couldn’t help but keep watching. I was still standing there with one foot on the curb and the other on the edge of the street frozen in time… watching… when the little girl spotted me. She waved and ran to the end of her driveway and smiled. “Hi,” she said brightly. “I’m Jenny.”
“Hi.” I responded softly.
“What’s your name?”
I found myself afraid to befriend this girl who had to be my same age, for fear that she might find out… like people in the old neighborhood, that we weren’t a normal family.
Oh no one ever said they knew in the old place, but I knew they knew. My friends couldn’t come over to play at my house anymore. My parents didn’t seem to have any friends to invite over except when my daddy had his friends over to play cards on his special card playing table. When that happened, us kids had to go to bed early and were forbidden from coming out of our room.
We could hear them laughing and smell the smoke from their cigarettes. They got to eat chips and snacks that we didn’t get to have. Daddy and his friends would be up late into the night, but we were forced to lay awake in our beds and listen to the racket until either sleep claimed us or the party ended. I didn’t want Jenny to find out about those things. Not now… we could be friends… for now.
“Can you play?” Jenny asked with hope in her eyes.
“I guess.”
“Okay. I’ll be back.” She turned and started to run up the front yard waving at her father as he backed his funny car into the street. She stopped and turned back to me. “What’s your name?”
“Katie.” I yelled back with a bit of hope.
Her dad stopped backing up and started forward. He glanced over at me and winked before he drove off.
I couldn’t help the trembling that started after that wink. I knew what a wink from a man meant. Maybe I didn’t want to be friends with Jenny after all. But something was different about her dad. I didn’t see anything bad in his eyes when he smiled at me before driving off. Maybe he wasn’t like Daddy’s other friends. I turned and skipped back to my new yard to ask my mother if I could cross the street and play with Jenny when she came back outside.
1/19/2014
When I was a little girl I used to watch the neighbor family across the street with longing and hope. I lived in a middle class neighborhood; attended a middle class school with all the middle class kids, but in reality, my life was anything but average middle class story book material.
You see my family had secrets.
I longed for the life I saw my friends had; hoped that someday things behind our closed doors would change. When I was five years old we moved to a new place. The house was larger than the one we left behind. In the old house my brother, sister and I had shared one bedroom while my parents had the other. In this new place we each had our own room. Well kind of anyway. Actually, my mom and dad made a bedroom out of the dining room for my brother.
It was summer time. School had just let out a couple of days ago, and now we had a new place to explore. While the moving men unloaded our furniture I was allowed to play outside, as long as I stayed out of the way, so I set out walking on the curb to see who else I might find in this new playground.
My pigtails of sun-kissed brown ringlet curls blew in the breeze and bounced up and down with each step up on the curb and then down on the edge of the street. My eyes scanned the houses and yards as I walked searching for the occupants. It was early morning, around 8 on a Saturday, so most families weren’t up or out yet.
A noise across the street drew my attention. I stopped to watch as a garage door came up. A tall man dressed in a blue uniform of some kind raised the door; beside him stood a boy and girl. They were all smiling and talking. The man put a bag of some kind in his little funny looking car that didn’t have a top; that’s when he did something that told me things were different across the street in this new neighborhood. He squatted down in front of the two kids and pulled them closely, wrapping his arms around them and kissing the tops of their heads.
I couldn’t help but keep watching. I was still standing there with one foot on the curb and the other on the edge of the street frozen in time… watching… when the little girl spotted me. She waved and ran to the end of her driveway and smiled. “Hi,” she said brightly. “I’m Jenny.”
“Hi.” I responded softly.
“What’s your name?”
I found myself afraid to befriend this girl who had to be my same age, for fear that she might find out… like people in the old neighborhood, that we weren’t a normal family.
Oh no one ever said they knew in the old place, but I knew they knew. My friends couldn’t come over to play at my house anymore. My parents didn’t seem to have any friends to invite over except when my daddy had his friends over to play cards on his special card playing table. When that happened, us kids had to go to bed early and were forbidden from coming out of our room.
We could hear them laughing and smell the smoke from their cigarettes. They got to eat chips and snacks that we didn’t get to have. Daddy and his friends would be up late into the night, but we were forced to lay awake in our beds and listen to the racket until either sleep claimed us or the party ended. I didn’t want Jenny to find out about those things. Not now… we could be friends… for now.
“Can you play?” Jenny asked with hope in her eyes.
“I guess.”
“Okay. I’ll be back.” She turned and started to run up the front yard waving at her father as he backed his funny car into the street. She stopped and turned back to me. “What’s your name?”
“Katie.” I yelled back with a bit of hope.
Her dad stopped backing up and started forward. He glanced over at me and winked before he drove off.
I couldn’t help the trembling that started after that wink. I knew what a wink from a man meant. Maybe I didn’t want to be friends with Jenny after all. But something was different about her dad. I didn’t see anything bad in his eyes when he smiled at me before driving off. Maybe he wasn’t like Daddy’s other friends. I turned and skipped back to my new yard to ask my mother if I could cross the street and play with Jenny when she came back outside.
1/19/2014
