Why & Why Not

By Marie K. Hemrik

Karen writes, "What would sanity be like? I cannot substitute someone else's thinking for my own. When I am paranoid I can guess what my sister will say: that people can't be bothered to care so much about my personal life. My fears are absurd. But I am unable to feel reassured. Trust isn't something people arrive at, logically. It's a type of faith. I am a chronic disbeliever. No one seems to be telling the truth. I only pretend I am not being persecuted. I only pretend to believe what others say. I play along, as if I believe what others call sane. But I do not really believe the persecution is imaginary. I doubt I am safe with the raw woundedness of someone recently betrayed. I have my own ideas about how my life makes sense."
In this fictionalized memoir Karen struggles to reclaim her own authenticity from a swamp of denial and mental illness. Why & Why Not explores the questions of what is true, what has value, and how one arrives at forgiveness.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Marie K. Hemrik
• Release date: Aug 5, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301709892

Marie K. Hemrik

I have a MS and a BA in Psychology. I have a diagnosis of Paranoid Schizophrenia. I hope you will find my work honest, though what I cannot prove is submitted to you in fictionalized form.

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Why & Why Not

Published by Marie K. Hemrik at Smashwords

Copyright 2113 Marie K. Hemrik

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Preface:

I can tell you about psychosis. Imagine driving for hours, across country from the mid-west to Los Angeles. I have done this and somewhere in western Nebraska, believing that the radio wasn’t coming in very well, I reached to adjust the station and discovered that the radio was off. Crazy thinking can be like that: straining to extract meaning where most would say none exists. I wasn’t used to the desert climate in California. I picked compulsively at my dry scalp and at the ultra-thin sheets of skin on my chapped lips. Crazy thinking can be like that: pick, pick, pick. I can’t leave myself alone and I am determined with every action, every word, and every breath, to define myself in order that they not dictate who I am. (I imagine I know who they are and why they would make me their puppet.) I woke one morning and did not know who I was. I was conscious, but I wasn’t conscious of anything. I felt nothing. I didn’t know where I was. My eyes must have still been closed. It didn’t occur to me to open them. I didn’t know I had eyes. I had no memory at all. I was nameless. I was nothing. I felt something at the edge of my empty awareness scrambling, panicked, for ties to save me from the void. Yet I was only an observer, perceiving my own distress with a flat indifference. Crazy thinking can be like that: dissociated. These things, I think, may be outside common experience, different from the definite reality of the mentally healthy.

What would sanity be like? I cannot substitute someone else’s thinking for my own. When I am paranoid I can guess what my sister will say: that people can’t be bothered to care so much about my personal life. My fears are absurd. But I am unable to feel reassured. Trust isn’t something people arrive at, logically. It’s a type of faith. I am a chronic disbeliever. No one seems to be telling the truth. I only pretend I am not being persecuted. I only pretend to believe what others say. I play along, as if I believe what others call sane. But, I do not really believe the persecution is imaginary. I doubt I am safe with the raw woundedness of someone recently betrayed. I have my own ideas about how my life makes sense.

This is my story. A lot of it is what I truly believe. But I am mentally ill and I know have been mistaken about some things I’ve believed. You probably shouldn’t believe everything I say. We will call this a work of fiction. I have changed the names and details by which private individuals could be identified. I have provided a complete list for all of the cultural references I’ve included.

I was born in July of 1961. My earliest memories are of being sexually abused. I was my parents’ first child. I don’t know if I was my uncle, Alan’s, first victim. He was my first abuser. I could remember four different occasions, all of them before I turned six. In 1964, when I was with my parents at the New York World’s Fair, the model T-Rex in Sinclair’s Dino-land reminded me of Alan. It moved; opening and closing a mouth full of big teeth. I begged my father to take a photograph. I wanted to remember the danger. When we visited Niagara Falls on the same trip the roaring water made me cry. I was afraid my father would drop me over the edge.

Most of the time survival required that I focus on the positive things that made life worth living. My childhood wasn’t all bad. One of the best weeks of my childhood I spent with my maternal grandparents. It was the June before I turned five. Then, I’d swung on the porch swing with my cousins till my grandma had yelled. I’d eaten green apples one of the neighbor boys had stolen from another neighbor’s tree. I’d played Tarzan, swinging from the branches of the weeping willow tree. Grandpa took me fishing and grandma fixed the fish I caught for my lunch. I was given a pony ride at the farm my grandparents owned, outside of town. I had a sleep over with my cousin. That evening there was a big truck with a load of sweet peas parked in the driveway. We could have as many as we wanted. I loved raw peas. A couple of the farm cats had had kittens. My cousin caught them and she let me hold them. My grandpa even bought me a root-beer float at the A&W drive-in. I had lots of fun, but I loved my parents and I wasn’t so miserable at home that I didn’t want to return to them.

It was easier to remember good things. The last episode of child sexual abuse was the worst and it was also the most difficult to remember. Something bad had happened to me on a family vacation to Montreal in 1967, the summer I turned six. I blamed myself, for not being able to remember, feeling crazy. The memories and psychosis seemed inseparable.

The overt sexual abuse stopped when I was still quite young. Then both of my parents insisted upon denial. I wasn’t allowed to talk about my experience. They avoided social situations where I might interact with adults who had known me before the trip we took to Montreal. They never took me to my former pediatrician again. They changed churches. We didn’t get together with some of their friends anymore. At six, I wanted to be like an elephant and never forget, but I felt it was already too late. I was amnesic for much of my earlier childhood.

Chapter 1: Independence

May 1977: I might never have rebelled, to the basic foundation of my essential self, if I hadn’t had to defend myself. I got in a fight with my dad. I was fifteen. My family had had a supper of breaded, fried sunfish, buttered macaroni and broccoli. The small kitchen was crowded with the family of five, sitting around the table. In my mind, I can still see my mother standing at the stove. She was frying a mixture of leftover egg and cracker crumbs to give to the dog. Her body was cumbersome with nearly eight months of pregnancy. She wore a green apron over her work clothes. Her short, permed hair was a soft brown. It framed features, distorted in an irritated grimace. That evening I was the object of her dissatisfaction. I work all day, teaching. She complained. Then I come home and have to be the cook and bottle washer; nobody helps. Are you finished eating, Karen?

I don’t want any more. I’m done.

My mother turned to my father. Brad, they sit around and expect to be waited on.

What needs to be done? My father asked.

The place is a pig sty. Look at that living room! Nothing’s been done. My mother’s voice was a whine on the edge of hysteria.

Doesn’t the living room need vacuuming? My father’s intense gray-blue eyes glared at me from behind the strong lenses of his gold wire framed glasses. His jaw jutted forward, threatening fury.

I was going to do my chores after supper. I replied. I did not remind them that I always cleaned the basement and I hadn’t been asked to do the living room till then. I excused myself, slipping sideways off my chair into the narrow space between the table and the wall, squeezing past my father. The vacuum was sitting out in the middle of the living room. I pulled a length of cord from the vacuum canister and plugged it into the wall outlet.

She condescends. My mother remained un-mollified. I got no help with supper. They all seem to think I’m a servant around here.

I always do my chores. I ventured. I did. I earned mostly A’s in school. I didn’t smoke or drink or party. I didn’t date. I was obedient. I just spent a lot of time avoiding my parents. I liked to read and usually shut myself in my room.

You always argue about everything! My mother’s voice became plaintive as distress brought her near to tears. Brad, they have no respect!

Are you talking back to your mother? My father stood up, scraping his chair across the floor. He glared into the living room.

No. I replied.

My father lunged forward as I tried to walk away. Don’t you use that tone of voice with me, he spat. Animal! he accused. He planted a kick on my backside.

I saw myself kicked, in the living room mirror. I had a shit-eating smile stretched over my teeth. I hated myself in that moment. I didn’t know how to hate him. Instead, I accused the ugly girl in the mirror. Unaccountably, the word in my mind was Whore. But, if I was disgusting, my next thought was that my father was to blame. I turned to face him, grabbing him at both his elbows and uttering a curse, Damn you! I raked my fingernails down his lower arms, leaving two sets of bloody furrows.

Wild-eyed and red-faced furious, he struck my face and shoulders repeatedly with his fists, forcing me to the floor as I tried to curl myself up, away from the blows. Six feet tall and nearly two hundred pounds, he climbed on top of me to keep me down. I cursed him again. He held a hand over my mouth, saying, I’ll teach her to cuss at me! Who does she think she is, cussing at me? I bit him. He grabbed the sides of my head and started slamming it against the floor.

My mother began to protest on my behalf. Don’t, Brad. She got down on the floor and tried to hold my head away from the floor. Stop, she said. You’ll really hurt her.

My mother preferred a more saccharine version of life, one glazed over sweetly with denial. She was not taking responsibility for having provoked my father. What did she understand about my humiliation? She knew nothing. I wished to be smashed unconscious.

My sister, Anna, yelled from the basement, Mom, dad, I broke something! There’s glass! My father got up, walked away; went downstairs to see about the manufactured emergency. I picked myself up, disoriented. So, that’s it, I thought. Or is he coming back? I walked to the door.

Where are you going? My mother wanted to know.

I don’t know. I replied. The dark had smelled of rain and lilacs. Where was I going? My friend, Sandy, lived across the street. It was the only possibility I could imagine. My friend’s father answered the door. Is Sandy there? I asked.

She’s downstairs. I’ll get her, Mr. Anderson answered, and left me standing on the steps. Suddenly, across the street didn’t seem like nearly far enough away from home.

When Mr. Anderson returned he told me, She’ll be up in a couple of minutes and he began to walk away.

My ability to pretend normalcy had begun to crumble. Look, please, could I come in and wait inside?

Sure, sure, of course… It’s raining. He seemed surprised that he hadn’t thought of it himself, and then, surprised at me, as he saw my face in the light.

I had remembered that my father would be angry that I’d gone to a friend and that he would come after me. The entry was not safe and I couldn’t afford to be polite. Please, could I wait in Sandy’s room? Could you tell her that I’m waiting in her room? By then, Mr. Anderson was sure there was something wrong, but that couldn’t be helped.

I walked into the familiar bedroom with the pink walls and the rock and roll posters. I sat on the edge of the bed. I tried to wait, but I couldn’t. The room was too big and I was too visible. I was alone and there was no one’s permission to ask, so I retreated like a two-year-old, to the darkest corner under the bed.

Sandy Anderson’s voice asked, Karie? Karie, where are you? What’s the matter? Sandy Anderson and I had known each other all our lives, but there were many times when we were small that she had told me to get out of here instead of inviting me to join the play. We were friends, but she still made fun of me often enough. It’s not like I could trust her to be on my side.

He’s going to kill me, I wailed from under the bed, feeling panic.

Sandy called, Mom!

What’s the matter? Mrs. Anderson questioned, arriving at the door to Sandy’s room. Mrs. Anderson was thin, her face drawn.

She’s under the bed. Sandy explained.

Karen, why are you under the bed? Mrs. Anderson’s voice was sternly disapproving.

He’s going to kill me. He’s going to come after me and kill me.

Who is going to kill you? Sandy was incredulous.

My dad, I replied. I was bereft, they did not understand.

Karen, you cannot stay here. Mrs. Anderson’s voice was firm. You need to collect yourself and you need to go home. Your dad is not going to kill you. The Andersons were friends of my parents. It wasn't that Mrs. Anderson lacks compassion, she simply did not believe in my distress.

In the following moment of silence I could hear Mr. Anderson at the door, arguing with my father. You can’t come in. This is my house. He said. And, he had continued, You don’t hit girls. We’ll send her home in a few minutes. Mr. Anderson didn’t want to be involved.

He’s not coming in here and you can’t stay under the bed. Mrs. Anderson was determined. You need to wash your face, compose yourself and go home.

Not looking at either Mrs. Anderson or Sandy, I extricated myself, muttering, If he kills me, it’s your fault.

In the few minutes before I left, my father had gone home. A numb detachment came over me as I crossed the street. My father met me at the door. He was still angry, but he had himself under control. He asked, again, and again, Who do you think you are?

Fearful that any answer would have further infuriated him, I was silent.

You sit there. He commanded, pointing at a kitchen chair.

I sat, resigned.

Mrs. Anderson is dying of cancer and you go running over there. Do you ever think of anyone but yourself?

I rather hoped that I’d mostly been a diversion and done no harm, but I decided it was another rhetorical question and remained silent.

I never struck my father. He continued. He used to beat me and never once did I defy him. I had respect for my parents. I was so afraid my parents would divorce, I never complained. You use that disrespectful tone of voice with your mother! You cuss at me! What’s the matter with you? You have no respect! My father talked for nearly an hour and I listened, silently and steadily more depressed.

I did decide that I had had the right to defend myself. If it was wrong for me to attack someone (and it was), then it was wrong for someone else to attack me. The rules I had learned for being a good person had to apply to others as well as to me. I’d reached the developmental level where abstract reasoning was important.

But I was unable to reason away the consequent depression. The next morning I turned off the radio, loathing the music I had loved only the previous day. I felt as if everything were bad. At breakfast, I had no appetite. I ate a slice of bread without bothering to toast it or to spread any topping on it. I hurried to finish before my father sat down at the table. I loathed him. At school, I was unable to concentrate. In English class I was unable to organize my thoughts into sentences and paragraphs to write a paper. In math class, I couldn’t even stay awake. I thought that, if I had realized how profoundly the fight would affect me, I might have swallowed my pride and taken my father’s kick without any resistance. I’d underestimated my vulnerability. I’d walked off an emotional cliff. I felt scattered and undone. I’d forgotten that my father was dangerous. I told myself that it would have been even worse if I hadn’t fought back, that my rebellion was essential to my survival as an independent adult. But I didn’t know if that was true.

July 1978: I had just turned seventeen. I had repressed all memory of the early sexual abuse I experienced. My Uncle Alan and Aunt Beth had asked me to accompany them on a trip to Wyoming. I didn’t remember any reason not to trust Alan. We visited the same house where I first was raped. I stood in that same bedroom as a teenager and remembered the whole incident, except I failed to identify it as a memory. I was shocked that I would have such perverse thoughts about a baby. I shrugged it off and I didn’t recall the incident again for ten years. Alan didn’t lay a hand on me as a teen. I had a great time talking with another girl my age. We spent time at Yellowstone National Park and went horseback riding in the mountains.

When I returned to Illinois, I went to live with my maternal grandparents for the rest of the summer. I had a job in the little mid-western town where they lived. I had also worked there the previous summer.

The factory, in town, was owned by Green Giant and processed fresh vegetables for supermarkets. Corn arrived by the truckload. It was husked, sorted and either cut, cooked and canned, or frozen on the cob. The humid factory air always smelled of corn. I did sorting on the jigs sometimes. But usually I was assigned to boxing frozen corn on the cob. Several workers would stand along one side of a steel table. I was one of them, a girl, who liked to watch the sparrows, high above me, as they flew through the rafters. Eight hours is a long time to spend standing in one place. My cheap tennis shoes inevitably hurt my feet. The song Strawberry Fields Forever seemed to play over and over in the drone of the machinery around me. From a nearby bank of freezers, men brought wide steel trays, which they flipped, slammed down on the table with a crash and then removed, leaving bags of frozen corn on the cob scattered in front of the line workers. I gripped two bags at a time and slid them across the tabletop and into a corrugated cardboard box. The process was to be repeated 24 bags to a box, box after box. I would shift my weight from foot to foot. I would pause to secure the plastic combs that held most of my short hair out of my eyes. By the time the shift was half over, I always had a standing in one place too long backache and frozen-wet hands. And thinking about all of the workers moving the sweet corn from the fields to the trucks, through processing and the grocery stores to dinner tables everywhere, only made me feel insignificant. I imagined that my co-workers were also uncomfortable, but sympathy didn’t make the job any more pleasant.

Believing in the work ethic didn’t help either. I didn’t feel good about myself. I felt like a slave. For only a little more than minimum wage I sold each hour of my freedom. The exchange felt dishonorable, left me trying to reason away negative emotions. I told myself that a high school student couldn’t expect much better. I knew I needed the money. I reminded myself that I had only just returned from a vacation in Wyoming and I ought to be grateful for the privileges I had. I thought about how glad I was to be living in the small farming town rather than with my parents. I had decided to run away from home in the fall. I needed the money I was earning to support my move. Adults work. I believed that self-reliance was the only way I would ever be free to learn what I needed to know in order to live successfully. But I couldn’t make myself feel happy. I could only sigh and push another corn-filled box down the line.

Failing to find any enthusiasm for my present circumstances, I would think about telling the foreman that I was quitting or lying that I felt sick and had to leave. I also would imagine just walking off without any explanation at all. I had to decide repeatedly to be responsible.

I spent most of every eight hour shift lost in fantasy. In my imagination, I was Karie, not Karen. Karie had been my nickname as a child. My younger sister, Anna, always called me Karie. So did Sandy. Karie was better than Karen. As a teen I had the sense that the two names named different things. In truth, Karen was icky, I was icky. Karie named my innocence lost. I was slender and of medium height. I had an oval face with a receding chin. My nose was slightly crooked and one eyebrow arched higher than the other. I imagined Karie with prettier, more regular features. I didn’t know why, but I felt monstrous, still guilty for the awful things I knew I was capable of thinking: like the pervasively sexual dream about the sitting naked, chained in sewage. I knew I was warped. I knew I was vulnerable. But, in my imagination, Karie was free of self-loathing. Throughout my childhood I had lived in an extended daydream about all of the things Karie would do. At night, in my dreams, I was sometimes Karie. I often embellished those dreams that I remembered, with my fantasies. The factory work required only my mechanical presence and I was able to spend my evenings in semi-conscious reverie.

On the Wyoming vacation a guy who was only a year older than I was had had his own Chevy conversion van. I had thought it would be fun to travel around the country by myself, camping out with my own van. I imagined one that was baby blue, with a western scene airbrushed on each side in mauve, magenta and burgundy. It would have a TV and a stereo cassette tape deck. It would be well stocked with snack foods like those we had eaten sitting outside the RVs in the Wyoming evenings: nachos, smoked oysters and sardines, blue diamond almonds, snack crackers. The upholstery and carpeting would be burgundy. I would travel and see everything from one side of the country to the other. I’d live on permanent vacation. It was pleasant to imagine.

The foreman shouted, Break!

I walked to the picnic tables in the roped off area near the vending machines. I brought along a paperback library book. I was reading Tolkien’s Ring Trilogy that summer and a history of philosophy. I usually bought a wild cherry soft drink from one of the vending machines.

On one particular night, I had only just sat down, when a boy I’d known the previous summer, came up and sat opposite me.

He was short and stocky with curly dark hair. Sweat stained the old red t-shirt he was wearing. Hi, how’s your summer going? He greeted me.

Fine, John was it?

And you’re Cherie.

Karie, I corrected him, shrugging apologetically.

Right. He was snapping and unsnapping the band on the John Deere cap he had taken off. His hands were dirty and calloused.

How’s your summer? I looked down at my own hands noticing that her fingernails were gray and broken from the work.

All right.

I haven’t seen Tracy or Lynn at all this year. I thought they’d work here this year, again. What are they doing, do you know?

Lynn’s dead.

I tripped on a time warp. When I felt surprised mortification the sinking feeling always reminded me of walking off a cliff. What?

Lynn died.

No. The boy’s expression was incongruent with the news he was imparting. He seemed to find something amusing. I shook my head, my eyes on his face. You’re not serious. You’re just making that up.

I’m not making anything up. She’s dead. He insisted.

I don’t believe you, How?"

Car accident; they were at a kegger. Tracy was driving drunk and ran off the road into a billboard sign. Tracy got hurt and Lynn died.

I felt numb. How badly was Tracy hurt?

Her back is all fucked up so she can’t walk, but they say she will, later.

When did it happen?

This last spring- I’m going over to Tracy’s next week on Friday. Do you want to come with?

I don’t know what I’d say. I had finished my soda and was tearing the empty cup into strips.

You don’t have to say too much. We won’t stay all that long.

Sure. I guess I could. My tone was doubtful.

You’re staying at your grandma Jordan’s.

Yes, I allowed.

I’ll pick you up about 1 o’clock and you’ll still have plenty of time to get ready for work. The young man put the John Deere cap back on his head.

As he walked away, it occurred to me that his name was James, not John.

I gave up trying to concentrate on the book, and instead, watched some men work. I remembered the shame I had felt when a group of kids I didn’t even know had started throwing bits of paper at me during study hall. The emptiness of my social life at the suburban high school I attended threatened to swallow up any effort I made to redefine myself. In my school I was never invited to parties. I didn’t have a boyfriend. The few friendships I did have didn’t seem like much of a social accomplishment. Sandy teased me. Kim had better friends. Mary barely knew me. When I worked at the factory the previous summer, I pretended to Tracy and Lynn that everything was cool at home, all the while feeling that if they really knew me I would be rejected. I’d felt phony. I was just a nerdy, brown nosed loner.

I bit at the inside of my cheek and twisted together the shredded strips of my paper cup. I thought maybe bad vibes attracted bullies like blood attracts sharks. I had been the object of cruelty often enough. I doubted it was my appearance. I was neither exceptionally ugly, nor especially beautiful. The man driving the front loader was moving a palette of boxes. I remembered his name. It didn’t matter. He kissed me once a year ago, but he’d stopped bothering to say hello. I decided not to consider James’s invitation a date. I was sure that wasn’t his intention.

My memory of the rest of that night is lost in the generalized routine of two summers. My shift ended at last. I left the monotony of industrial noise and the smell of steamed corn for the fresh night air of the small mid-western farming community. It was after midnight. The streets were deserted: many stars visible in the dark sky. I had two blocks to walk from the factory to my grandparent’s house. They left the porch light on for me. I took the key from the nail where it hung in the garage and let myself in.

I loved the big old house. Two stories with porches on three sides, my great grandfather had built it himself. Both my maternal grandmother and my mother were born in that house. It had eighteen rooms, all with tall ceilings and most with big windows. The white vinyl siding and sea foam green carpeting were new. The furniture was solid antique wood, including a grand piano in the parlor. For my grandparent’s fiftieth wedding anniversary there had been over a hundred guests and yet I had found an unused bedroom upstairs in which to hide myself away with a book. I was still in grade school that summer. The place held year after year of memories.

The house only had two bathrooms. I would clean up downstairs after work at the factory, settling into hot bath water and scrubbing away the dirt until my skin glowed a healthy pink. I’d dry myself with one of the worn terry towels and dress in a short white cotton nightgown. In the kitchen I scrounged a variety of foods: a piece of pecan pie, some leftover tuna hot dish, a turkey sandwich. I would fill a plate and carry it up the back stairs to that same bedroom where I had read years before. The solid oak bedroom set had belonged to my great grandfather. A fern and several of my grandmother’s African Violets occupied the table near the tall corner windows. I would tune the radio to a rock station and sit in bed, propped against pillows, again to read. After a while I’d turn off the radio and set the book aside. Before I went to sleep I would listen to people talk in my head. What they were saying didn’t usually make sense. I dismissed it as a side effect of the factory noise to which I’d been exposed.

On Friday, I watched a few raindrops slide down the porch window at my grandparent’s house, and although I didn’t feel I had a good reason for being sad, I thought of tears. My grandparents had been to the Laundromat and had returned long before I had gotten up at noon. My grandma was ironing clothes, the board set up on the porch. Grandma was a small town matriarch. Her bearing was unassumingly dignified. She was ample without obesity. She always wore dresses and black, horn-rimmed tri-focal glasses. Weekly beauty shop appointments kept her hair permed and bluish gray. Her skin was soft with extra folds, powdered and smelled of perfume gardenias. She belonged to card and garden clubs, groups of elderly ladies that met monthly at each other’s houses. Her interest lay in her church and in the doings of friends, neighbors and family. She was always working on some craft project. I was sharing the porch couch with a canvas bag that I knew contained the pieces of a blue afghan that my grandmother was crocheting.

Being her granddaughter was only awkward when I tried to talk to her. There was a fight. My dad beat me up. I offered.

My grandmother barely responded, Hmmm, really? Her attitude seemed to add the words, And you don’t know the half of it. She continued ironing.

Although it was gratifying that my grandmother didn’t seem to doubt my word or approve of my father, I found my grandmother’s air of superior knowledge mystifying. I wished I could talk to someone. But I didn’t feel comfortable confiding. I sighed. With an index finger, I traced the path of a raindrop down the porch window and thought again of tears. The last fall, I had even begged to be allowed to see a psychologist. My parents had denied me that option, recommending that I talk to the parish priest, instead. Throughout my childhood, my parents had used religion as a means of enforcing repression. Guilt motivated denial. Being good had meant winning my parents’ and teachers’ approval. But lies are evil. Lies confuse. Without a healthy grounding in reality, more religion could only have done me more harm.

I made some macaroni salad to bring over to the lady across the street. Your grandpa and I had some of the extra for lunch. My grandmother was saying. You can have some.

Sure. I threaded my fingers backwards: like the tines on my mother’s old nut grinder, like the gesture to accompany the children’s rhyme. See all the people. The lady across the street had MS. My grandmother did for others when it was seemly. Life went on, but that summer I didn’t feel like I wanted to live any more. I thought the world would be a better place if I didn’t exist. I felt as if tolerating my life were ignoble. My father liked to say, with contempt that a person could get used to anything. Suicide seemed like the only adequate rebellion. But I didn’t want to give up hope. I thought I just needed to fix myself, somehow.

We could play some double solitaire, later, my grandmother offered.

Sure, I answered. I can’t today, though. James will be here soon. I’m going to go visit Tracy today.

Is that the Salem girl?

No. That was Lynn. Tracy lives on a farm near Olney.

Those were the two in that accident, then. The Salem girl died.

Yes.

How is the Olney girl doing?

I guess she’ll be all right, eventually.

The girls were drinking. My grandmother’s voice was disapproving.

Yes. I felt relieved to hear a pick-up’s horn blare from the front driveway. I let myself out through the garage and walked over to the unfamiliar truck. I opened the passenger door and climbed in. James was smoking. He gestured with the cigarette, Do you mind?

No, fine, I answered, though in fact I did mind. Do you know what I should say? I wondered aloud.

James laughed. Say whatever you want.

So, did you graduate this spring? I tried another question.

No, I graduate next year. Did you?

No. I was a junior too. I thought about the upcoming senior year, which I didn’t plan to complete. James said nothing and the radio filled the silence with Jackson Browne singing Running on Empty. The lyrics seemed like they were for me. I thought I ought to want the things my parents wanted for me: honor student behavior, good grades, and college. But although I knew my parent’s opinions, I didn’t know my own. I had sat alone in the living room of my parent’s house the last Christmas Eve, after everyone else had gone to bed. I had felt my unhappiness all the more for having pretended the day’s celebration and I had decided that I had to leave.

Do you like going to a big school? James tossed his cigarette butt out the window.

It’s all right. Everybody’s got his or her own clique. It’s not so easy to make friends. You end up belonging in one group or another.

Wherever you go to school, people have their own group of friends.

Sure, but I didn’t. Sandy knew about my father’s beating me and she wasn’t on my side. She had laughed when I told her I was going to run away. There hadn’t been anyone else to tell.

The truck turned into a gravel driveway and we drove up to a white two-story farmhouse. James parked on what might have been an attempt at a front lawn. Tracy was sitting in a lawn chair.

It had stopped raining. James and I got out of his truck and approached Tracy. How are you? I asked. I’m sorry about the accident, Lynn and all.

I’m fine. Tracy answered. She was a chunky blond, wearing an oversized plaid flannel shirt and shorts. One of her legs was in a brace and propped up on a footstool. Her half smile was distant and abstracted.

James and I sat nearby, on the grass. It was then that a thought occurred to me and the accompanying feeling of dread and anxiety hit me hard. My stomach sank like free fall. I remembered a T-shirt design that I had made: a flowered key chain and a car key hanging from the word ace. The previous summer, Tracy had said she liked the Beach Boys’ song about the girl ace with the T-bird. I couldn’t remember whether I had sent the t-shirt design to Tracy- or not- or why. I knew that I would never drink and drive. Lynn was dead. I blamed Tracy. But my judgmental unforgiving-ness embarrassed me. I didn’t like to see myself as sarcastic and cruel. Had I, in fact, heard about the accident? Had I known about the accident and then thought it was all right to send Tracy that drawing? Had I sent it? Had I? I didn’t know. Again I felt mortified, wondering how many gears my mind had slipped.

Tracy’s expression seemed knowing to me, as if she were guessing the subject of my thoughts. It occurred to me that I didn’t know Tracy. So, you’re going to be fine, eventually, right? I asked. However uncomfortable I felt, I was determined to pretend away my consternation.

Mostly- I’ll need at least six more months of physical therapy, Tracy answered.

After a silence of several minutes, I tried another question, So, do you feel all right?

Mostly, Tracy answered again. James was smoking another cigarette. I was imagining how awful I’d feel if I were responsible for a friend’s death. It’s the families that are hurting the most, now. Tracy added at last. Lynn’s mom died of cancer last fall. So, it’s just Lynn’s dad and her sister, but her sister got pregnant. She’s due next month. Lynn’s dad is real hurt. And my parents, of course, aren’t too happy with me. Tracy fell silent again. She seemed resigned to a hurt beyond words.

There were another few minutes of strained silence, and then James spoke to Tracy. Mike Halvorsen bought a new pick-up.

The one Roger’s dad was trying to sell him? Tracy asked.

No, he bought one from a dealership in Springfield.

I stopped listening to the conversation. I thought about Anna’s telling me that she didn’t want me to leave, that she would miss me. I doubted my company was good for my little sister. What Anna needed was to have friends her own age. It was important that Anna not grow up completely in the shadow of my misery. It was another reason to leave. Anna would be better off without me.

What? I heard my name and brought my attention back to James and Tracy’s conversation.

I was saying maybe we should be leaving, to have enough time to get to work. James explained.

I’m ready. I responded. I hope you recover quickly, Tracy. I’m real sorry about Lynn and all.

Thanks, you have a good year. Tracy’s tone was polite.

September 1978: I walked from the bank to the parking lot where my father was waiting for me. I opened the door of the silver impala and leaned inside. I didn’t deposit my checks, I said. The bank account isn’t really mine.

What do you mean, it’s not yours? Of course it is. My father replied.

I can make a deposit, but I can’t withdraw any money without your signature.

I’ll go in there with you, then. My father offered, opening his car door.

You know, I continued with a plaintive note in my voice as I walked beside my father. It’s my money. I should be able to withdraw it when I want to.

Nobody said it’s not your money. My father replied. He hadn’t hit me since the big fight nearly a year and a half ago.

I rarely asked for anything, but this time I had to persist. They’re giving away free blankets. I want to open a new account that’s just mine. Then I can have a blanket.

We could do that. My father agreed. He could rarely resist getting something for nothing.

I snuck a glance at my father as we stood in line. His small blue-gray eyes were fixed on the teller. He had a deep summer tan. I hated having been manipulative and deceitful. I felt guilty. But I left the bank with a new passbook, hugging my free blanket and clenching my teeth. When I ran away, I would need the money in that account.

Changing that account was unnecessary. My father observed as he started the car.

I evaded actually lying. I didn’t need contact lenses. I could have just kept wearing glasses. But I wanted contacts. Every once in a while, why shouldn’t I have something just because I want it?

No harm in that. My father seemed surprised at the idea.

I watched the suburban scene roll past outside my window. The neighborhood was mostly white middle class. The lawns and the foliage of the many oak trees were a deep late summer green. I envied all of the snug homes with well-kept yards. In the spring, my family had moved a little way across town from the rambler in which I had spent all of my early childhood. Our new house was a brown split-entry. It looked unremarkable.

I started school. I acted as if nothing were wrong. That first week my guidance counselor called me to her office. She gave me a letter of commendation from the National Merit Scholarship people. My test scores for math had been average but my verbal score had been in the ninety-ninth percentile. I thanked her. After I left her office, I walked to the girl’s bathroom, shut myself in a stall and cried. I wanted to go to college. But I needed to save myself. I feared the will that kept me going would be choked off completely if I stayed. It was a rebellion that was a long time coming. I had planned to run away, someday, when I was only six. I thought about things that helped to strengthen my resolve. I remembered sitting in the basement on a Sunday afternoon, working on a paper Mache` piñata for my Spanish class. I’d been watching a Star Trek episode on television. I had been alone, but my family returned and my father came downstairs and changed the channel on the T.V. without acknowledging my presence. I had protested. Dad, there’s only fifteen minutes of my show left. He had refused to allow me to watch the end of the show. A threat had been in the air. I had retreated to my room in silence. The piñata was a blue donkey. I gave it to my father for Christmas.

I wasn’t allowed to express anger or disagreement directly, so I learned to imply, to use symbols, to layer meanings. My favorite necklace was a bird shape covered in rainbow enamel that hung on a black silk cord. I traced its outline in black on a piece of white paper. In the space outside the silhouette I wrote the lyrics to songs about freedom. I borrowed conviction on the authority of pop culture. I knew the words by heart. It was about four in the morning when I packed as many belongings as I could into my suitcase and a plastic garbage bag. I dressed myself in one of the two new outfits my parents had bought me for school: rust colored cords and a matching plaid flannel blouse. I felt as though I were diving into life head first with no knowledge of either the current or the depth. I left the paper with the copied lyrics on the kitchen counter. The writing was tiny. I knew my parents would never read it. I gave my sister, Anna, the bird necklace.

That morning, there were arcs and streamers in the dark of the pre-dawn sky, feathered curving bands of white light. I had seen the northern lights only once before. I wished they could be taken as a sign of good luck. The houses lining the suburban street were still and dark. I carried my suitcase and Anna carried the plastic garbage bag as we walked to the bus stop. Be good. I admonished. Don’t get in any trouble. Don’t rebel just for rebellion’s sake, not just out of defiance. Make it count. Save rebellion for when you are right and it matters that you are right.

I will, Anna answered solemnly.

You don’t have to do everything your friends want you to do, either.

No. Anna was quietly withdrawn. I felt guilty that the pavement was cold. She hadn’t been ready and I’d rushed her out the door. She was barefoot. I was abandoning her.

I wished Anna were older. I would have welcomed advice or even joking around. I guessed from Anna’s wide, sad eyes and slight frown that she was feeling abandoned. I told myself again that she would be better off without me. You’re pretty and people like you. You’ll be just fine. I tell her, keeping my voice confident.

I’m ok. Anna agreed, willingly. She was struggling with the cumbersome garbage bag but she walked beside me on the September cold pavement, uncomplaining.

Minutes after we reached the bus stop, the city bus pulled up to where we stood waiting. I put my suitcase on the front seat, and then turned to take the plastic garbage bag. Take good care of yourself. I said. See you later.

As I added my coins to the bus’s fare box I imagined the other passengers were watching me. I wondered if anyone was guessing that I was running away. The city bus would take me to the greyhound station downtown. I planned on going to Des Moines. My family had driven past that city on our way west. I had liked the view from the freeway. It was big enough, I thought, to find work and yet small enough to avoid getting into any trouble. Besides, the bus tickets weren’t so expensive. It wasn’t that far away.

I sat on the edge of my seat and worried that any minute something could happen to spoil my plans. What if my parents noticed too soon that I was gone? Most of the people on the bus were going to work. What if someone reported me to the police? I felt alien to the normal lives going on around me. My first experience of independence had the quality of hyper-vigilant caution. I knew that I hadn’t achieved self-control. My thinking still reflected the life I had known with my parents. I wanted to remake myself according to my own values. In my mind, I was talking to myself, playing the role of a supportive adult to the frightened child. Don’t worry too much, I told myself; this is an adventure.

The bus pulled up to the stop nearest the greyhound station in downtown Chicago. I disembarked. Carrying both the suitcase and the plastic garbage bag, I could only struggle a few feet before stopping to rest. As I made excruciatingly slow progress over the block and a half distance, I tried not to draw attention to myself. After arriving at the bus station, buying a ticket and checking my bags, there was nothing to do but wait. The bus going to Des Moines would leave at about the time my parents would be getting up. I watched for the police.

The stress was doing things to my thinking. I felt as though I were watching another girl run away. You weren’t allowed to make hardly any decisions, I told my alternate self. You just lack experience. My nearly adult reasoning had little effect on my childlike fear and, in truth, I welcomed my own distress. It reminded me of how it had been to be Karie. I boarded the bus exulting; at least they didn’t catch me before I left. I felt cool. Rebellion had dignity. I chose a window seat near the front of the bus. I knew my parents would be upset about how my running off would look to their friends. It wasn’t the reason I was leaving, but I didn’t mind getting a little revenge. I didn’t think they would actually miss me. I wanted to exorcise them completely, to have integrity, to make sense in terms of an internal center rather than as adjunct to their authority. My father had liked to say that as long as I ate at his table, I would do as he said. I’d merely chosen not to eat at his table anymore. Now, I could do as I pleased. He couldn’t blame me for that. I watched as the mid-western farmland passed by outside the window. It was mostly yellow oblivion, field after field of spent corn and soybeans.

The bus arrived in Des Moines in the late afternoon. I picked up my baggage and caught a cab to the Holiday Inn. I bought a newspaper and checked the want ads for apartments. I circled the cheapest one. Everything seemed to require great effort. The Guess Who song, Undun, replayed itself over and over in my mind. I wondered if I were going crazy. The motel room felt empty and impersonal. I fought down desolation and made a phone call, arranging to see an apartment. I had dinner alone, at the motel restaurant. Finally, I lay down on the double bed.

Every night, for as long as I could remember, I had engaged in a ritual. I would lie on my stomach, propping myself on my elbows, my arms on either side of the pillow I was facing. I would throw my upper body forward, hitting the pillow with my head, then immediately lift myself onto my elbows again. I would repeat these motions for about fifteen minutes. I didn’t think of sex, although most adults would. At last, I would lie on my side and toss back and forth till I was tired enough to sleep. I had always felt ashamed of the rocking and bouncing. It was a mark against me, a sign of defect. That night in Des Moines was different. I decided to quit. By force of will, I lay still, like a normal person, until I went to sleep.

In the morning I took a cab to the apartment I had circled in the newspaper. The cab took me sixteen blocks north of downtown, to one of Des Moines’ poorest neighborhoods. It was a one bedroom on the third floor of an old brick building. It rented for ninety dollars a month. As the manager and I walked across the street to see it, I overheard a woman say that someone had died there- or was that only my imagination? A twin bed was the only furniture provided. The apartment had high ceilings and lots of windows. The floors were hardwood. It might be all right, I thought, if it were fixed up. I ignored nagging thoughts that I should look at other places. Without work, I couldn’t waste time or money on indecision and cab fares. I signed the month-to-month lease and returned to the comparatively luxurious motel room for one last night.

The next day I returned to the apartment with all of my belongings. I set the suitcase and the plastic garbage bag on the floor in the middle of the living room and walked to the grocery store. On the way, I was harassed by groups of black men hanging out in front of the apartment buildings that lined the street. Hey, you got a boyfriend? One of them asked. I shook my head but kept walking fast. I was afraid. I wondered if my reaction was racist. I decided I would get over it with more experience. At the store I bought a broom, a scrub bucket, pine cleaner and bug spray.

The apartment needed plants, furniture and an exterminator. I had no money for any of that. I swept up the bodies of dead cockroaches, forming a pile an inch deep and a couple of feet across. The dry, dead bodies rustled like fallen autumn leaves. Live roaches were also everywhere, even inside the refrigerator. After emptying two cans of bug spray I gave up. I cleaned the bedroom meticulously, put down roach tape at the doorway and resolved to worry about the rest of the apartment later. The smell of insecticide permeated my clothes and hair. I wondered if it was bad enough that other people would notice. I opened some of the windows to clear the air. I didn’t unpack much. There wasn’t any place to put anything. Instead I spread my newly acquired bank blanket over the bare mattress, lay down on the bed and stared at the unfamiliar ceiling. So, I thought, with gallows humor, this is freedom.

Actually, freedom had been an important subject of my thinking. I didn’t think of freedom as the right to do anything in particular. I thought freedom happened whenever other people didn’t have the right to interfere with my life… like the right not to be hit, or the right not to have someone steal from me. If it was wrong for me to use force on others, it was also wrong for others to use force on me. I was proud of having reached this understanding, independently. I was free as long as no others had any right to control me.

The knock on my door came on late Saturday afternoon. I had been lying on my bed reading a library book. I walked across my empty living room to stand behind the door. Who is it? I asked.

It’s me, Anna, my sister’s voice answered.

I opened my door a crack, leaving the chain on. How did you find me? I asked.

We checked the want ads for apartment listings at the library.

...we? Who is with you?

Dad, Anna replied. The rainbow enamel bird hung on its black silk cord around Anna’s neck. He isn’t going to make you come home. I made him promise he wouldn’t before I’d tell him what city you’d gone to.

I took the chain off the door and opened it half way. Anna was wearing a red and white top she had often worn roller-skating. Anna’s expression was serious and worried. I gave her a hug, but she was out of reach.

Dad wants to talk with you. Anna continued. He didn’t want to come in. He’s waiting in the car.

Fine, I agreed. I let myself out of my apartment, thinking it didn’t hurt; it was something to do. Why did you tell where I was? I asked Anna.

I had to. She replied. Everybody told me I had to, Sandy, mom and dad. They made me feel so guilty, like something bad might happen to you if I didn’t.

The blue Skylark was parked across the street. I was surprised to see that my father’s manner was more resigned than angry. On the other hand, he did seem to be shaking with the strain. I wondered if he was going to maintain his composure. You found an apartment. He observed. But there are some rooms available in a much better neighborhood across town. I want to take you to see them and get you on the waiting list for one of those. They’re only slightly more expensive than what you’re paying here.

I already have a place. I answered.

These other places are clean and in a safe neighborhood, my father insisted.

I’m making my own decisions, now, I thought, silently.

Just look at the other places. My father started the car. I thought we’d get something to eat and see a movie. You stay with us tonight and go to church with us tomorrow morning.

You’ll bring me back here tomorrow?

Yes, he agreed.

I got into the back seat of the car. Anna got in front with our father.

Everybody was really worried about you, Anna observed. It’s a good thing we found you.

I’m fine and I don’t think so. I mean it’s nice to see you, Anna, but I didn’t want to be found.

Well, I’m not going to make you come home. Our father put in. So, why don’t we all make the best of it?

Sure. Anna and I fell silent. Our father was driving west on the main thoroughfare through the city. I wished he would relax and quit shaking. Perspiration was showing through the upper back of his white golf shirt. It made me feel sorry for him and anxious about what he might do next. West of downtown, the car turned into a parking lot. The building had once been a budget motel, but had been renovated as dormitory style accommodations mostly for college students. The management showed us a room. It rented for 120 dollars per month and there was no sign of cockroaches anywhere. They didn’t have one currently available. I agreed to be put on the waiting list.

That’s a better place. Anna tried to encourage me.

If I find work I might be able to afford it, I allowed.

You didn’t find a job yet? Anna sounded worried again.

No. I applied at a factory near where I live. They screen applicants for manual dexterity and I’m not especially good at that sort of thing. I won’t get that job. But I have an appointment on Monday with an employment agency.

I noticed a McDonald’s we drove past, would that do for supper? Our father asked.

Sure. Anna answered.

We sat in the McDonald’s with our hamburgers and soft drinks. I wished again that our father would relax and quit shaking. He was sitting stiffly on the edge of his chair, his hands unsteady, as he reached for fries or picked up his coke. Everyone ate in an uncomfortable silence. So, how are your students this year? I tried to start a conversation.

The kids are a real bunch of losers... not many good ones. There never are.

Oh. I cringed, thinking he probably had a similarly low opinion of me. "Did I tell you, I have an appointment with an employment agency?

Yeah, Anna answered. You already said that.

Our father had opened a copy of the newspaper to the movie ads. The new comedy with Chevy Chase, here, he pointed. ’Foul Play’ is on at the shopping center on this side of town. Is that one that you both want to see?

Sure, I replied. But I don’t go to church anymore. I don’t want to go with you tomorrow morning.

My father’s agitation increased. I don’t care what you do later. He replied. I had failed to live up to his expectations. He would not give me a second chance and I would still obey him. You’re with me right now and tomorrow you’re going.

That movie sounds fine, Anna put in. She was watching my face sympathetically.

If God even exists, he hates me, I thought bitterly. I became aware that my jaw was painfully clenched. I feared a confrontation. My father and sister would be gone by tomorrow afternoon and it wasn’t worth a fight. I felt myself sink into resignation but I do not reply. I thought philosophy was a better place to start thinking for myself. I wanted to