Post 9: "Here Comes the Night"
“I want you to be concerned about your next door neighbor. Do you know your next door neighbor?” Mother Teresa
I sat on the front steps after the ambulance left, crying. Bernice, our neighbor down the way, fat as a couch and a gossip hound on the hunt, came over. "I'm sorry about your brother, what happened?" she cooed with the most sugar-coated concern, the glint of a fishing expedition in her eye.
Bernice’s niece, Arla, was one of my best friends. Arla lived with her grandmother; allegedly her uncle had been “inappropriate” with her. Arla and I played Barbie’s in her aunt’s basement. She had every twist-n-turn Barbie conceivable, with every hairdo and accessory available. No expense was spared.
I had to make do with a few standard Barbies that always had to fill in as dog toys. Standard Barbie was stiff and rigid, an appropriate doll for a good, Irish Catholic girl. However, not only did Arla have twist-n-turn Barbie, she had the entire clan, Midge, Skipper and she had Ken. Several, I believe. We played “honeymoon night, Barbie” and set up boudoirs in everyplace imaginable. As we managed this bordello I can only guess we shared our own personal experiences. I don’t remember Arla talking about her uncle, or telling my mother about her situation. That kind of information quickly got quashed by the Politburo before it would ever leave my mouth.
However, more than ten years later, I would finally remember and tell my mother what Sean did to me. In a moment of agitation she crossed the street and spoke to a trusted neighbor, Mrs. Johnson. What did Mrs. Johnson say to her? “Oh, I know what happened to Moira. Bernice told me about this a long time ago.”
So Mrs. Johnson knew.
For ten years she knew.
And Bernice knew.
And the only way Bernice knew was because my friend Arla must have told her from our playing “honeymoon Barbie.” So once Bernice found out, she couldn’t wait to tell the gossip chain of W. 85th Street that Sean Smith was diddling his kid sister. But no one thought it might be important to bring this information to Mrs. Smith’s attention.
When I realized this, I couldn’t breathe.
I felt re-violated. All those years I hung out on their porches, they had smiled at me, offered me Mountain Dew and chips, sharing the latest jokes from Hee Haw and Laugh In.
I gasped for breath.
So when I did get my memory back, after so many years, I begged, please forgive me, God.
I am so angry.
I imagined myself with a baseball bat smashing out all their windows.
But really I just wanted to curl up in a wormhole and disappear to some distant universe and cry. Why couldn’t one person, one decent person, have had the guts to knock on my mother’s door and say,
“Mrs. Smith, I have something I need to tell you?”
Notes:
http://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/838305.Mother_Teresa?page=4
Give the gift of music to the next generation through donations to:
The Manilow Music Project
8295 South La Cienega Boulevard
Inglewood, CA 90301
info@manilowmusicproject.org
Click here to go to the next post or click here to return to the previous post.
I sat on the front steps after the ambulance left, crying. Bernice, our neighbor down the way, fat as a couch and a gossip hound on the hunt, came over. "I'm sorry about your brother, what happened?" she cooed with the most sugar-coated concern, the glint of a fishing expedition in her eye.
Bernice’s niece, Arla, was one of my best friends. Arla lived with her grandmother; allegedly her uncle had been “inappropriate” with her. Arla and I played Barbie’s in her aunt’s basement. She had every twist-n-turn Barbie conceivable, with every hairdo and accessory available. No expense was spared.
I had to make do with a few standard Barbies that always had to fill in as dog toys. Standard Barbie was stiff and rigid, an appropriate doll for a good, Irish Catholic girl. However, not only did Arla have twist-n-turn Barbie, she had the entire clan, Midge, Skipper and she had Ken. Several, I believe. We played “honeymoon night, Barbie” and set up boudoirs in everyplace imaginable. As we managed this bordello I can only guess we shared our own personal experiences. I don’t remember Arla talking about her uncle, or telling my mother about her situation. That kind of information quickly got quashed by the Politburo before it would ever leave my mouth.
However, more than ten years later, I would finally remember and tell my mother what Sean did to me. In a moment of agitation she crossed the street and spoke to a trusted neighbor, Mrs. Johnson. What did Mrs. Johnson say to her? “Oh, I know what happened to Moira. Bernice told me about this a long time ago.”
So Mrs. Johnson knew.
For ten years she knew.
And Bernice knew.
And the only way Bernice knew was because my friend Arla must have told her from our playing “honeymoon Barbie.” So once Bernice found out, she couldn’t wait to tell the gossip chain of W. 85th Street that Sean Smith was diddling his kid sister. But no one thought it might be important to bring this information to Mrs. Smith’s attention.
When I realized this, I couldn’t breathe.
I felt re-violated. All those years I hung out on their porches, they had smiled at me, offered me Mountain Dew and chips, sharing the latest jokes from Hee Haw and Laugh In.
I gasped for breath.
So when I did get my memory back, after so many years, I begged, please forgive me, God.
I am so angry.
I imagined myself with a baseball bat smashing out all their windows.
But really I just wanted to curl up in a wormhole and disappear to some distant universe and cry. Why couldn’t one person, one decent person, have had the guts to knock on my mother’s door and say,
“Mrs. Smith, I have something I need to tell you?”
Notes:
http://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/838305.Mother_Teresa?page=4
Give the gift of music to the next generation through donations to:
The Manilow Music Project
8295 South La Cienega Boulevard
Inglewood, CA 90301
info@manilowmusicproject.org
Click here to go to the next post or click here to return to the previous post.