Trapped In Between. Marilyn Elaine Lundberg Lundberg

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СКАЧАТЬ to her. I could not measure up to her standards, and that drove me crazy. I was frustrated, but never told her how I felt.

      I believe it was at that time in my life that I began to strive to be a perfectionist. I felt that if I could just do things with excellence, and at times even better than that, I would be appreciated and finally loved.

      I began to notice that Mom was always cleaning and recleaning the house. Over and over she would wash the walls, ceiling and floors with her favorite cleaning product Tide and water. She would scrub and scrub until she became exhausted. As she was cleaning, her eyes had a faraway look, and I would just watch her. I wanted to help her and just be with her, but it was difficult. She would go into her own world that excluded me, her little girl.

      I longed to have Mom stop doing her housework and pay attention to me and only me. I wanted her to hold me and cuddle me. I needed her to sit down in the rocking chair and read a book or play a game with me. I wanted her to talk to me as much as she talked to her imaginary friends. I hated those imaginary friends; they took my mom away from me every day. I was very lonely and I needed her in my life.

      I remember the exact moment sitting on the living room carpet, and promising myself that when I had children, I was going to play with them. I was going to hold them, love them and cuddle them. I was going to talk with them and not constantly redo the work that they had done. Also, there was absolutely going to be two kids, no lonely only children for me.

      If I had a choice to spend time with my mom or my dad, I always picked my dad, he was my buddy. I was sort of a girly tomboy, so hanging out with him in the garage or the greenhouse was fun, and also my way to escape my mom on those really bad days. We never really talked about Mom behind her back, but we both knew that something was definitely wrong with her. I think that Dad was often hiding from her too in the garage and greenhouse.

      One of my favorite things to do with my dad was to play catch with a softball or league ball. He would throw me fast grounders, high fly balls and all sorts of difficult balls to catch, and I loved it. When I practiced with him it improved my catching and throwing skills. I was quicker and better at playing softball in gym class when I practiced with Dad.

      One day, after a rousing game of catch, I said to him, “Do you wish that you would have had a boy instead of me?” I thought he would say, of course not, but what he said was surprising and very distressing for me. He said, “Yes, I wished that you would have been a boy to carry on the family name.” That was what he said. He could have added, but I love you just the same, or anything to make me feel better, but he didn’t add anything else, and that broke my heart.

      I also recall during this same time period, maybe it happened in the past, but I don’t remember, that my dad would leave the bathroom door open when he was using the toilet. He would call to me so our eyes met as I sat in the tan rocker, and he would do something to his private parts all the while staring at me and giggling. I was uncomfortable, and would look away, or stand up and shut his bathroom door, because it should not have been open. He also made a daily habit to walk from his bedroom to the bathroom naked. I had a robe and always wondered why he didn’t use his. My mom was never in sight when he acted this way. It was disturbing to me and made me uncomfortable.

      Dad and Mom never argued with each other in our home, except for one week a year. The loud discussion would begin when we were making plans to go visit my dads’ side of the family in Story City, Iowa. We would visit Grandma Ana, Grandpa Ed, Auntie Lou and Uncle Robert for a weekend. I would hear my mom cry and say things about Grandma Ana not liking her. It did seem like Grandma would say unkind things to her and my dad never stepped in to defend her, and Mom felt picked on.

      I personally loved going down there, I was the center of attention. Auntie Lou would always have fun little projects for the two of us to do, and I really liked Uncle Robert, he was my favorite.

      Grandpa Ed never said much to me. He just sat in his rocker in the dining room and rocked. When I would walk by, he would reach out and try to grab me. That always scared me; he was my least favorite person in the house.

      Uncle Robert was my dads’ baby brother. He and his sister Lou never moved away from home and he was now working a full-time job. I paid a lot of attention to Uncle Robert because I felt sorry for him. Robert was a grown man that barely spoke; he was so shy and inward. He was probably in his thirties but he looked eighty. He walked with his head bent down and kind of stooped over so that he didn’t have to make any eye contact. His bedroom was upstairs, and when we visited, we too slept upstairs in a bedroom down the hall from his room.

      At night I would hear very loud screams coming from his room; I believe that he was having nightmares, just like me. I would try to cover my ears to block out the screams, but to no avail. We visited Uncle Robert two times a year every year, and I never remember a night that he didn’t scream from his bedroom.

      Uncle Robert worked five days a week, but he told my dad that he didn’t want to work anymore; he just wanted to stay at home and take photographs. I could identify with Robert so much. I felt his pain and knew that something had happened to him. I would cry for him when I heard him screaming. When I looked at Robert, I saw myself. Nobody in the family every talked about Uncle Roberts’ problems. There was never any mention of the loud screams in the middle of the night, even though I knew he woke everyone up. Why weren’t the adults gathering around him to make a plan to remedy the problem? Why did the family just look the other way? I wanted someone to help Robert and to also help me.

      I overheard my dad say that my grandpa Ed, his dad, had spent some time in a mental institution. That was all I heard. There were lots of secrets in our family, and many subjects we were just not supposed to talk about. I just observed what was going on around me, but didn’t say anything to anyone.

      In the sixth grade I was very fortunate to have a super sweet teacher that was kindhearted to all of us. My situation was the same, but it was nice to have a loving and compassionate person for a teacher. We read numerous books in her class too, and we were told to sign-up for oral book reports. I never signed up and she noticed that. One day she called on me and asked me if I had read a certain book, I lied and said, “No.” She questioned me a little more on another book, but again I deceived her and said that I hadn’t read it. She knew what was going on, but she never pushed it and I never spoke in front of the class that year. I was very grateful that she didn’t force me.

      I really liked Mrs. Peterson; she had a beautiful smile, tiny waist and wore stunning pastel dresses. I kind of wished that she had been my mom at times. She loved us kids, you could easily feel that, and she loved to teach.

      One really hot day she threw open all the windows in our classroom so the winds could drift in and make us more comfortable. We had no air conditioners back in those days. The female principal poked her head in the door and called Mrs. Peterson out into the hall. My teacher came back in and shut all the windows, I could tell that she had been crying and I felt bad for her. She had just been trying to make the temperature bearable for us kids. We were all soaked with sweat.

      One day as I was getting up to sharpen my pencil, I looked out the school window and saw the side door open on our garage. I asked her if I could quickly run home and close it because my kitty was in the garage, and I didn’t want her to run away. She said lunchtime was just around the corner and I could leave then. In my mind I said, “Please, please, please let kitty be okay.”

      I arrived at home a short time later to find kitty safe in the garage all snuggled up in her bed. I gave her a few loving kisses, secured the door, ate lunch and headed back to school. I wished that my dad would be more careful when he left for work, and would lock up the garage. After all, he had lots of tools and other things in there too.

      There was only one occasion that made me sad concerning Mrs. Peterson, СКАЧАТЬ