i did become a sadistic little brat. i loved having physical control over other living things. that primarily included my brother and our dog. i think about the things i did to my brother and to the dog and i feel alot of shame, especially about the dog. it wasn't limited to my brother and my dog, of course, but they were the ones that were always there and could be easily overpowered.
i also did stuff to myself. i always thought those things were no big deal, and loved the shock factor involved when i did them in front of others. however, when i was in the mental hospital and the shrink asked me if i had ever been self-harming, i was like, "no, not in a really serious way." then he asked me to describe the things i did when i was a kid and what i do now, and as i spoke the acts out loud, they seemed much more fucked up.
if i saw my kids do to themselves what i did to me, it would break my heart.
moving right along - to sum up the childhood (ha ha, who am i kidding?), i would describe my child-self as angry, bossy, mean, loud, lonely, sad, and really sometimes very sweet, even to my siblings. it was also obvious from an early age that i was pretty inteligent. i believe my dad was hoping i was some sort of prodigy, and he taught me how to read when i was 3. i was not a prodigy, but ironically, reading was my primary form of escape from reality.
i LOVED books! i still do, but especially through elementary school, i did not really socialize with other kids. i would read whenever there was even a single second of down time. i could not bear to be unoccupied. i didn't attempt to do much socializing - i just assumed other kids thought i was a big weirdo and so wouldn't want anything to do with me. also, i was very sensitive to any sort of negativity. i mean, what kid isn't? but i would be devastated if someone said something unfavorable about me, and if i didn't pay attention to any of them, they would never have that opportunity, at least not one that i would be aware of.
i read when i woke up, i read in the bath, i read on the bus, i read during recess, i read when we had to do laps around the track, i read when i was supposed to be paying attention in class, i read in the car, i read in my room, i read outside in the yard - like i said, every waking moment i had a chance to read, that is was i was doing.
sometimes when my mom wanted me to do my chores or something, i would lock my self in the bathroom and sit on the toilet and keep reading. it really held her off for a long time - longer than anything else, long enough for my legs to get numb. it was kind of like when someone runs into a church and yells "sanctuary" - the bathroom was the sanctuary in our house.
the only exceptions to my incessant reading were family meals and church. my mom insisted i not have a book at the table when we were all eating together, and my dad felt it was one of his specific duties to make sure his children could sit still in church. he thought of it as one of the many valuable life-lessons he had to offer - the kind for which we'd thank him later. thank god we were presbyterian, because they really stick to the clock. one hour sermons, and if there was anything over that, people just got uncomfortable.
i hated going to church. i hated having to wear tights and pretend to be cute and pretty like the other girls. i resented their frills and bows and hats and ribbons and lacey ankle socks and cute hair. it was another environment in which i felt almost completely displaced.
i did really love the youth group, though. for those of you without a middle class protestant upbringing, a "youth group" at that time (late 80's, early 90's) was a chance for younger people to get together (at church, of course) and hang out and do fun stuff.
and it was fun. the youth pastor, jerry, was awesome. i loved him. he made me feel really good about myself. my first interaction with him was during a wednesday night supper (yes, in addition to every sunday, we went to church every wednesday, too). i had noticed him when he first came to our church - he is almost impossible not to notice - and was envious of anyone who seemed to be in his inner circle.
i was not quite old enough for the youth group yet, and was pretty excited about being a part of it the next year. when i saw jerry at the wednesday night supper (yes, you have to say the whole thing every time), i assumed he had no idea who i was. i mean, i wasn't someone people usually went out of their way to meet.
some people did go out of their way to meet me, though, and to be nice to me, and to just not treat me like a freak. jerry was one of those people. he was on one side of a table of food and i was on the other. i was looking down, of course, and i heard him say, "you're beck, right?"
i was delighted and, of course, said nothing. he smiled and said he was looking forward to me being in the youth group the following year, and he moved on. after that he would say "hey beck" whenever he saw me. my church friends were jealous, especially since i was typically on the fringe of everything new and exciting, and never in the middle of it.
and jerry was new and exciting. i had been going to that church for as long as i could remember, and there was a pretty consistent core group of other kids that had been there the whole time, too. there was rarely anyone new OR exciting there, and jerry had been recruited from out of state. he was fascinating.
anyway, we sang stupid songs and played stupid games every sunday night, and then jerry would do his little sermon for us. he could always relate the point of the stories in the bible so well to me. i actually liked hearing them. i had never had more fun anywhere or at anytime as i did in that youth group.
that went on for a couple of years. i was actually enjoying being around other people and feeling accepted for the first time in my life. i have had experiences in other church youth groups, and i cannot honestly say i enjoyed any of them at all. not for a single minute. they seemed very dorky and desperate. jerry was the magic and the glue of the group i was in, and no one could ever do any better.
as everyone knows, shit happens. the shit that happened with jerry was that my dad chased him out of the house with a baseball bat. my parents had been involved in some big mess that resulted in the church splitting. around that time jerry came to the house to talk to my dad - i don't know about what, but i do know jerry was pretty upset that my sister and i were not in his group anymore.
whatever it was that happened between jerry and my dad happened, and suddenly we were not a part of that life anymore.
to be continued...
