Without difficulty, I can point to specific events in my past and tell you how they contribute to my beliefs today. I have sad stories, frustrating stories, and stories that prove I have always been bossy, opinionated, and ever-so-selfish. But I love telling all of them just the same.
So, since I'm forever telling you WHAT I believe, I'd like the chance to give you the whys...
Let me tell you a story.
I was born in Kentucky.
My memories of my life then look like a half dozen still-shots, much more brief and random than the "video" memories I devoloped later. I see the pictures very clearly in my head, even though I was younger than three when I snapped them.
It puzzles me to explain what caused these few, unimportant seconds to stay in my mind. I can't figure out why I still remember the guilt from accidentally shattering a jar of my brother's baby food, or the day I discovered a strawberry Mento under my parents' waterbed—how I popped it into my mouth without blowing the germs off. From these and other "photos," I remember Grayson, Kentucky.
My parents were a couple of kids pursuing bachelor's degrees when they decided to add marriage and two babies to their four-year plan. I was born first, when Mom and Dad were 21, and they sold the title to their only car to my grandfather for money to pay the hospital and bring me home. Without question, we were poor, and it would have forced Mom and Dad to drop out if mysterious bags of food had not showed up once in a while, a little money at other times. Their bare needs were met this way, as well as through my mom's thriftiness. We lived on bare necessities--nothing extra. And that's why entertainment was my responsibility.
I began my role as a living toy shortly after word got out that Dad had one of the first private computers on campus. He was a computer junkie before it was cool, and our living room quickly filled with needy college students carrying their as-yet-untyped papers. And the college atmosphere was just what I needed to play my part as a two-foot doll, spouting facts and songs for anyone who pulled the right string...that is to say, provided any sort of acknowledgment whatsoever.
My language was far advanced--Mom says I spoke well before I was a year--and I became accustomed to praises for it. The students who came to type their papers were wonderful fans. I could count on them to request my best songs and gush over me at the appropriate times. It was the beginning of a life-long love of theater and language arts.
But it was just a short period before self-awareness spoiled a few things. I performed and was loved in Kentucky until I started wondering what others thought of me (and frequently concluded they thought negatively). This was before the Difficult Child was born and before I became a "homeschooled freak." I wasn't nervous about what I had to offer back then, before I learned to blow the germs off Mentos. As a two-year-old, I shared my talents and bared my soul without weighing consequences or questioning my significance. I can only guess what started my shift toward self-consciousness....
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"The Difficult Child" was a title Tim shouldered before he could walk. He cried—screamed, as if in pain—for days at a time, wearing away at the sanity of our parents until their exhausted minds suggested violence. The little temptations frightened them, but no one could blame their mental instability. The crying only stopped when a sympathetic friend took Tim out of the house for a couple hours, allowing Mom and Dad to sleep themselves back into control.
By the time he reached grade school, most of our family was convinced he had anger management issues. Doctors found no abnormalities, but Tim turned hateful at the flip of a switch. At these times, he loathed affection as if our parents' love suffocated him. In their frustration, teachers often reinforced Tim's behavior with labels like “thick-headed” and "impossible." And, yes, he was....difficult. But, as adults heaped big helpings of “stubborn” and “impossible” on his plate, he only proved you are what you eat by fulfilling their negative expectations of him. Later judges and police officers called him “impossible,” too. It was bound to happen.
Yet, Tim's delinquency was the best thing a child like me could hope for.
People constantly compared my brother and I, calling me the well-behaved academic and Tim the unruly athlete. But, when a little girl well knows she is the Good One, there are plenty of opportunities for her to exploit that position...
TO BE CONTINUED...
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