love, lobster two for five dollars and my dad

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My dad was a compulsive gambler. It caused a lot of heartache and it is why my mom ultimately divorced him as soon as she climbed over my back as her household/childcare slave to get her college degree. Truth told, dad had stopped gambling by the time mom left him but it was less painful to buy the gambling excuse than to admit my mom was a grasping bitch. She just wanted to be married to a more prosperous man and she found one. She claimed three rich men proposed and she chose the one who remained calm when my sister, about age 2 at the time, had a tantrum in a restaurant. I still wish she had married the Cadillac dealer she claimed also proposed. I suspect Ron was the only deal cause other than his money, she stoooped down to marry him. Uneducted but rich and such a male chauvinist and fat - repulsively so. I used to wonder how she could stand sleeping with him on top of her.  I used to fantasize the Cadillac dealer would give all of us used cars. Not Cadillac! Ugh. I never wanted one of those. A modest used car would have been just fine.

All thru h.s. I never socialized (maybe that's why I have no memories of being ostradizd; I spent h.s. caring for my baby bro and sis. My sis born the week I graduated 8th grade and I spent more time with both those babies in the first years of their lives than mom cause mom worked half time to pay her tuition and went to college full time. Mom said 10,000 times "I am determined to finish college before you graduate h.s. and head off to college and then I'll be able to help you." I believed she meant it and I truly believed I was investing in my own future as well as hers. It wasn't until I was in my forties that I realized she was determined to graduate from college before I left home from college cause without her slave (me) she could not do college. She needed my childcare. In those days, day care centers rare. Mostly babysitters were neighbors who charged by hour and I was pressured to rush home, starting in sixth grade through 12th, to pick up the latest baby to save babysitting money. I couldn't play after school:  I had to rush to save babysit money, then tidy the house, usually do a grocery run with a stroller and one or two babies and fix dinner. I did that for six years. Then ONCE in coillege, with my dad left holding the bag for three kids in college at the same time and mom gone -- she disappeared for a couple years with my babies, which was close to what losing Katie felt like but I got them back eventually, I had loved them like my babies cause they were mine.  Once dad said at the beginning of a semester that he was having a hard time coming up with cash for books for all three of us in college so i said "I'll ask mom, she promised for years to help me." my mom had a good teacher job and a husband who paid all the household bills so her salary was pocket money and she had to pay for the kids needs but, still, all I all I asked for was $30 for books, explaining dad could give it to me, financial aid didn't cover the textbooks. and she wrote back and said, Gee, Ron and I just bought a Winnebago (a gigantic one that slept 8) so we can travel with his girls next summer and I agreed to make the payments from my salary so I can't give you any help." I wrote back -- too poor to phone -- and said "Please, mom, the semester has started, I don't have books, I have no way to buy them, it's only $30" $30 in 1974 more than now but geez, I literally put her through college. It broke my heart but my heart breaks easy I guess cause everyone I have ever loved has stomped all over it. Well, I have a few friends who love me who have not broken my heart -- but I have "friends" who have also broken my heart. Like Marc.  These friends take from me and give little. Take take take. And I am such a chump. I give generously whenever I can.

I hated that Winnebago. She used the payments to justify never helping me. A fucking luxury camper in her husband's name.

My dad borrowed the money from one of his gambling pals and I got my books and my dad said "I will never forgive you, Therese, if you ever ask that woman for another dime. Fuck her. She used you and then she stiffs you like that. Have some pride and don't you ever ask her again." And after that, dad made sure I had what I needed and it was hard with 3 kids in college at the same time.

Money had such different value. My college had trimesters, so ten-week semesters, not really like the quarter system. I would get $100 for spending money for those ten weeks and it seemed like a fortune. Plus I had a campus job. I didn't spend much.  I did not ask my mom for money again until Katie's father sued her for custody. And she came through for me, saving Katie. But that was her husband who shelled out, not her. He was a decent man. I kinda liked him but never spent any time with him so he was more like a cartoon than a person to me, unreal.

One year, tho, still seeking my mom's approval, I scrimped and saved to send her a dozen yellow roses for Mother's Day. Yellow roses were my mom's thing. I learned that if I ordered far enough in advance, it was a little cheaper because that company for sending flowers -- blanking the name, it was a national deal that contracted with local florists and charge high prices -- but ordering early meant no long distance call so it waved me a couple bucks. I remember the roses cost $30 -- interesting coincidence. I was so proud of what I had done. so on mother's day, I sorta thought mom would call me and thank me, even tho kids see it as their duty to call mom on mother's day. Finally, the day winding down, I called her. I chatted a bit, said happy mom day and waited for her to say thanks. But she didn't. puzzled, for there had been a card from me included, I was careful of that -- talked to the local florist to be sure about the card -- so I asked her if she got my yellow roses. She sighed a big dramatic sigh -- mom was a drama queen and said "Oh that, it was such a disappointment. When the florist pulled up, I thought Ron (husband #2) was sending me flowers to recognize my stepmother of his girls (who despised her, of course and she never did a damn thing for them -- they lived with their mom and were just kids) so when  I opened the card and saw it was from you and not Ron, I was disappointed."  I wish I were making this up.  I never sent her a mother's day gift again, altho I would call. I doubt if she ever realized why.

Another griper -- when mom had a hsyterectomy and was found to have cancer, she was in hospital long time. I sent her several care packages, obvious with my name on the return. again, she never thanked me. Again I asked her if she had enjoyed getting her favorite treats in a series of thought care packages -- I kept sending them when she went home, cause she was laid up for several weeks. Like Brussels Pepperidge Farm cookies -- her favorite, one week. Brie and good water crackers another. And novels and magazines. I kept it up every week for months and she never mentioned it. when I asked her, she said "I assumed they were from your sister, she is always so thoughtful."  My sister had not sent her a single card.  Even after she knew the weekly care packages were from me -- she knew all along, I had my return address on them -- she did not say thank you.

Story of my life.  Nobody notices me, the people I poured the most love into ignored me.

A happy story. The first christmas after mom told us where she was living -- she hid a couple years, having lied under oath when the divorce judge made her pledge under oath that she would not take the kids out of Ilinois. Two hours later a moving truck pulled up and took all our furniture -- taking her kids beds away without the kids! and then she hid cause she was afraid of having lied to the jduge. She moved to Ohio the day she looked a judge in the eye and swore she would keep the kids in Illinois. Why did she turn up? Because she pissed off the judge. My dad never hired a lawyer, just advocated for himself. He went down and asked the judge, pretending he didn't know he wasn't supposed to talk to the judge without a lawyer, if he had to pay child support when she wouldn't tell him where her kids were. The judge was furious that she had lied so blatantly under oath and suspended child support and said "She won't get a dime until she shows up back in my court and tells me where those kids live."

In those days, there was no interstate custody jurisdiction protection, no PKPA (the parental kidnaping prevention act -- which I literally wrote a book about long ago in another life, for a continuing legal edudation class. It became the handbook for the State of MN until the next continuing ed on interstate custody jurisdiction.  I had written it for my boss, who wanted to get elected as a judge and wanted to appear as a family law expert but I wrote it. He didn't really even underatnd the PKPA. AT the CLE conference, it was painful to listen to his presentation on the act. On the table was my book, two inches thick, full of rich analysis and useful insights for lawyers and he clearly did not understand it. But when it had come time to put an author's name on the book, he left my name off. When I objected, he said "we never had an express agreement I would credit you" and I said "We never had an express agreement I would do all this work for free AND for no credit. My name goes on the cover." Grudgingly -- I wrote the fucking book -- he listed himself as the author and credit me as a helper.  I took it cause fuck him, right? Man that guy was a pig. 

He did become a judge too and then he got pushed off the bench for, basically, being such a jerk. He would joke about wanting to smack his wife around during divorce trials involving spouse abuse. A feminist group monitoried divorce judges and worked to get rid of him. He took an early retirement, using his hearing loss as a disability. He had had the hearing loss all his life and when he took the bench. it was a bullshit and expensive-to-taxpayer way to get rid of an incompetent, abusive boob sitting on the bench.

She told us older kids she had hidden because she was afraid dad would kill her. Baloney. My dad was never violent -- ever, in any circumstance. He was cowardly, actually.

so then, for that first xmas -- all us big kids missed the little ones and missed our mom -- all my brothers rushed to Ohio to spend Xmas and see mom's new home and see the kids. So I stayed in chicago cause otherwise my dad would have been alone. I was about a college junior. Dad said "Go with them, I know you want to, I know you are just staying cause you pity me."  I said "Dad I am staying because I love you." On that Christmas Eve, my dad, who was severely allergic to shellfish, went out and bought two live lobsters just for me -- among a ton of other treats. He swore the lobsters had been on sale two for five dollars off a truck but i know he went to a fishmonger and paid going rates.  And he got his sister to have us over for dinner so we wouldn't roll around alone in the house without all our other kids. How I loved him for those lobster.  I didn't much care for lobsters, altho of course I can enjoy them once in awhile and of course I ate those, flamboyantly savoring them for dad's sake.

My dad was hard in many ways. His gambling hurt us. He incested me when I was about seven (and, I believe,  but do not know, all his kids). One thing most folks don't know -- and I know this from my dad and Katie's -- that even parents who do things like that love their kids and even after things like that, the kids go right on loving their dads. that's just how kids come, programmed to love and they don't stop loving just cause someone hurts you.  

After 'the incident'  used to beg her dad to come see Katie, even tho she had a guardian ad litem after her assault and the guardian ad litem insisted they see each other in court-supervised settings. Two hours in a boring center with a stranger sitting to supervise is a little visit for a drive from Omaha to Minneapolis and I knew Katie needed her dad so I said I would subvert the guardian ad litem and let him see her and just escort them, keeping my distance so she could see her dad. But he didn't want to see her. Once she was hospitalized -- on dec 22, 23, and 24. Of course I told her father how sick she was. Caller ID was new. I got an unfamliar call number but the message was Frank so I dialed -- he was at a motel near the Mall of America shopping with his girlfriend with his daughter in a hospital, hemmoraging huge gobs of blood the size of baseballs and bigger. She had to get transfusions and my severely OCD kid freaked out cause I had to sign acknowledging that the transfused blood might give her aids. back then they didn't know how to test to be sure there was no aids in the blood. And the pig didn't call her, much less go see her in the hospital. He was christmas shopping an ssee shows with his girlfriend.  I didn't tell her he was in town. I couldn't hurt her.

I didn't tell her that throughout her childhood I used to beg him to come see her and I used to write to her other relatives in his family and offer to pay to fly her for visits. I wrote 'she loves you and needs your love" and they ignored me. I didn't tell her that stuff either cause I didn't want her to be hurt if they turned me down, which they did.

then she gets into an IVY and the whole clan brags about having a relative in the Ivy League, taking credit for her and he told her "Honey, we all tried and tried to see you but your mom wouldn't let us, she cheated you out of having our whole family in our life."  He said "now we can finally have a relationship, she can't stop us."

The fucker. I had begged him for years to see her, call her on Christmas and her birthday.

Once, before the incident, she spent Xmas with him and I shipped all my present to her to Omaha. He told her they were from  him and mommy didn't give him anything.

I hate everybody. Esp. me.

I have scrimped and save to buy other gifts for other friends.  I'll tell those sob stories another day.

my night in a VW bus

In the fall of 1972, I spent the fall semester in Guanajuato, Mexico studying with my university. They sent down one Professor, a Spanish professor, who hired a couple local lecturers and a rug maker. Voila, a small satelite campus! The local lecturers were anthropologists and archaeologists.They told us amazing stories of ancient Mexico and right up to when the Spaniards quite viciously conquered the Mexican indios.

The rug maker was a sweet guy who taught each of us how to make one small two foot by three foot rug. I wish I still had that rug. The first half was perfect, each loop perfectly sized, so perfectly a machine could have done it. I used a pencil to make each loop perfect. but it took forever and I wanted to get class over with and get stoned. All I wanted to do was get stoned. So I rushed the rug. I loved the rug because half of it was obsessively perfect and the other half was wild, uneven loops, lazy, quick, rushed loops. I got the rug done in record time and my late afternoons were no longer wasted on rug looping. I was out getting stoned. And my only regret is I got rid of the rug, testament to my pot smoking, errant youth.

We made friends with other Americans who were just passing through, trying to travel all around Mexico in their year off. They saw us students as stodgey, although we had more dope than they did. Young Americans traveling in VW vans as a couple did not make all the Mexican male student friends we two blonde gringas made. My blonde travel pal and I had endless guys followinig us around, all of them hoping to get lucky. My roomie and I had great dope connections. Two blonde American college girls attracted endless packs of admiring Mexican boys who all fanasized that all American college girls had free love sex. In truth,my pal and I were virgins but none of the Mexicans believed us. And all of the Mexicans would score us dope, hoping with each buy that we might have some free love sex with them.  You didn't buy lids in Guanajuato. You bought bricks. The bricks were the size of the much larger house bricks used in adobe homebuilding, bound tightly with metal wire lie a bale of hay back on my uncle's farm in Indiana. Cut open the metal wire and the tightly bound brick burst into a bushel of dope. Our first bushel was the best. Acapulco Gold. It was golden toned and looked like a loose bushel of wide wavy waves of grain, like the golden tops of good wheat at its peak on an Iowa plain.

Acapulco Gold was as good as its reputation, much more powerful than the skunk week sold back home. Plus the altitude in Guanjuato was high. Two hits and we were flying. And we rolled 'em like cigars and smoked one cigar each. Why not? I think we paid $20 for that first kilo of Gold and it was always that cheap or cheaper.


We got to know other Americans, the travelers. These other Americans were a young married couple who ended up breaking up in Guanajuato when the gal slept with a sleazey Mexican womanizer who slept with all the sexually active gringas. So he didn't sleep with me. I was a virgin. He did con me out of my brohter's h.s. football jersey, which was an idem with considerable cachet in Mexico. It had his school'name on it and his number in bulky embroiderered letters. The guy said "You can always get another one" and he was cute so I gave it to him but I knew I could never get another one.  My brother dropped off the team and became the team manager. Managers did not get those cool jerseys. That jersey was super thick, long, warm,cosy and cool. It came below my ass, kept me toasty warm and in Mexico it was very, very cool to be seen in it.  And I just get it away to a guy ally catting with several girls i knew. I was a dope. He was very cute. but he never hit on me.  Maybe that's why I gave him the jersey altho I also remember being disgusted by him because he told each girl he slept with that she was his true love.  I still want that Jersey back.

Before the couple broke up, a few Americans decided we would celebrate American Thanksgving, our first away from home for all of us,, by driving to a nearby town with a steakhouse known for its Argentinian steaks. Huge fat steaks super cheap, by our standards. None of us drank -- we were all too stoned.

The steaks were awesome.

We had intended to drive home the same day but we fell asleep after the steaks and by the time we awoke it was too late to drive on the dark, bad roads.So we agreed to camp under the stars. No one had tents but all had sleeping bags.

I had a bad cold. I was coughing, hacking and wheezing.

The married couple with the van got to sleep in the van which was not exactly warm but at least they weren't on the ground. They whispered to one another and agreed that I was too stick to sleep outside on the gorund so they insisted I sleep in the van. I was shy about intruding into their sex life, which was a big deal to my virgin self.   I knew they had sex in that van most nights but I was very sick and I couldn't resist sleeping indoors. Believe me I wasn't such a virgin that I didnt know they fucked like bunnies in the van. But they insisted I sleep inside, expressing concern I migh develop pneumonia. I was pretty sick. And i didn't really sleep all night cause I hacked all night. So i doubt the couple slept all night either.

As soon as we all got settled in for the night I heard a zipper unzip. I never wanted to beam myself magically out of a space more. I heard that zipper. How could I not hear it. I lay on one side of the van, the woman in the middle, the young husband on the other side. He unzipped her zipper, testing the situation, I suspect, in hindsight. Man, that zipper sounded loud.  It had to have sounded just as loud to each of them as it did to me. And then he put his hand down her pants and fingered her and she moaned.

Oh my gosh, I wanted to escape but I was on the inside. I could not have left the van without making a scene. I steeled myself for a long stretch of sexual play. But they must have come to their senses. I think the gal pushed his hand away. We all knew I could hear it all.

We never said anything.

That zipper was so loud but so was the fingering and the mild moaning before she stopped it.

And I actually believed sleeping in the van seriously helped my health. Really.

I was so sick. It was sick cold out. Everyone not sick was jealous I was in the van but I would have given everything not to sleep in the van.  And sadly there had been room for everyone in the van. It is weird, in hindsight that since the couple lost their sex nest, they didn't let everyone in.

That zipper was so loud. Blue jeans. Levis. Loud zipper.

Great steaks. Happy first thanksgiving abroad.

Z-i-p!  That was in November 1972. I have never heard a louder zipper since then.