To Escape into Dreams

By Hélène Andorre Hinson Staley

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To Escape Into Dreams by Hlne Hinson Staley is a three-volume
collection

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To
Escape Into Dreams by Hlne Hinson Staley is a three-volume
collection. style="mso-spacerun: yes">

style="mso-spacerun: yes">To Escape Into Dreams echoes my
voice and those of ancestors, the author says on the back cover of volume I.

style="mso-spacerun: yes"> IT IS ABOUT dreams and family histories.
It is about those significant to me. To Escape Into Dreams is
filled with photo-heirlooms, commentaries, documentations, stories,
observations and speculations. It models and preserves family history and
reflects struggles immigrants to America persevered and endured. It reflects
the struggles of early American-born generations. This book is a
summation-combination heirloom-scrapbook, genealogical-compilation-history
book. If you are interested in genealogy or currently tr

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jul 30, 2003
• ISBN: 9781465329295

Hélène Andorre Hinson Staley

About the Author Hélène Andorre Hinson Staley STALEY IS A 1987 graduate of the School of Journalism – currently known as the School of Journalism and Mass Communication, at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She is married with three children and has two cats, two dogs and two fish. Books written by Staley: Shielding Our Innocents To Escape Into Dreams, revised edition, vol. 1. Appendices of: To Escape Into Dreams, vols. 2-3. Dishonest Housekeepers

Book preview

Copyright © 2003 by Hélène Andorre Hinson Staley.

This book is copyrighted with the United States Office of Copyright, Washington, D.C. by Metallo House Publishers [MHP]. To Escape Into Dreams was printed and bound in the United States. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form [including electronically or mechanically] without written and expressed permission of MHP and / or the author. Brief passages may be quoted in published reviews.

The author and publisher have made every reasonable effort to ensure accuracy and completeness of information contained herein. We assume no responsibilities for inaccuracies, omissions or any inconsistency. Any slights of people, organizations or places are unintentional. This book is intended to inspire readers to conduct their own family research and to inform readers of genealogy materials, thus far, gathered by the author via contacts and documents. This book is in part the creative expression of the author’s memories and those of interviewees.

Front cover photos: Top photo: Zachary and Nicholas, Moore County, N.C. in year 2000. Bottom photo: Clarence H. and Mary Ruth McTall [Mattalle, Metallo] Leighton, Oakland, Md. early 1970s.

© Copyright, 2002, 2003. All Rights Reserved. Metallo House Publishers, [MHP] Moncure, N.C. 27559 & Hélène Andorre Hinson Staley. United States Office of Copyright, Washington, D.C.

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

Xlibris Corporation

1-888-795-4274

www.Xlibris.com

[e-mail]

17798

Contents

Preface

Foreword

About the author . . .

Something more than a hoot & a holler

Introduction

Acknowledgements

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Journal notes autumn, 2001

Suggested Reading & Sources

To my parents: James & Patricia;

maternal grandparents: Ruth & Clarence

great Aunt Bert & my children: Zachary & Nicholas

Image11133.TIF

Photograph of my parents: James Noah Hinson, M.D. [left] & Patricia Ann Leighton Hinson, B.S.N., R.N., M.Ed., C.I.C. [right] Nov. 18th, 2000.

Contact the author: Readers may send comments, opinions or additional information to Metallo House Publishers [MHP] via fax: 1-[919]-774-5611 or e-mail: [e-mail].

Order additional copies: Place book orders via the Internet at Xlibris by visiting www.2.xlibris.com/bookstore/index.asp or contacting: Xlibris #436 Walnut St., 11th Floor, Philadelphia, Pa. 19106-3703 U.S.A. Ask for this book in fine bookstores. Copies of this book may also be ordered from Metallo House Publishers.

Note: Genealogical information was gathered via personal interviews, photos and public documents: citizenship papers, land deeds, tombstones, records of birth, baptism, marriage, census, shipping, military, will, demise, etc. The gathering of names, photographs, documents, etc. has required several years of research. The omission of some family members is unintentional. If you are connected via blood or marriage to families herein, send genealogical information: full name, spouse’s name [or spouses’ names], names of parents, siblings and children, birthdays, birth places, etc. along with your complete address. Information will be included in future compilations or family histories. Family stories and photographs are welcome.

A giant hug of appreciation is extended to those who helped with this genealogy quest.

Chapter One: Italian Immigrants &

Italian-Americans.

Barbara Willis Sorvari Blesener

Bertha Bert Leona McTall Buckle

Mary Altobelli Checco

Elvera Helen Checco Johnson

Louis Leonard Checco

Mario Domenico Dominic Cione

Salvatore Sal Sam Cione

Marceleigh Pratt [Prato] Craner

Eleanor Elly Cione DeNicola

Irene Cione Ernst

James Noah Hinson, M.D.

Patricia Peachy Ann Leighton Hinson, B.S.N., R.N., M.Ed., C.I.C.

Bernadette Bernie Wolf Janz

Mary Ruth Dot McTall [Metallo] Leighton

Helen Emberton McTall

Margaret Pratt [Prato] Quartucci

Margaret Frances Wolf Stark

Joan Jenny Pratt [Prato] Wilson

Ann Gambini Zbacnik

Chapter Two: Biller Ancestors from Germany

Charles Chuck Biller

Bertha Bert Leona McTall Buckle

Patricia Peachy Ann Leighton Hinson, B.S.N., R.N., M.Ed., C.I.C.

Mary Ruth Dot McTall Leighton

Stephen Earl Pence

Chapter Three: British Immigrants to New York

in 1851: Isaac Leighton (1828-1911)

& Elizabeth Vernon Leighton (1832-1911)

Mary Linda Carmichael Crawford

Robert Bob Buntin

Robert Bob DeVries

Carolyn Ann Leighton Flude

Doreen Hopwood

Patricia Peachy Ann Leighton Hinson, B.S.N., R.N., M.Ed., C.I.C.

Mary Ruth Dot McTall Leighton

Jean Leighton Robinett

Margaret Joann Leighton Storey Schrock

Bridgitte Winsor

Chapter Four: British Ancestor born Abt. 1796:

Joseph Vernon & other Vernon Ancestors

Carolyn Ann Leighton Flude

Patricia Peachy Ann Leighton Hinson, B.S.N., R.N., M.Ed., C.I.C.

Doreen Hopwood

Jean Leighton Robinett

Bridgitte Winsor

Chapter Five: Johannes Wilhelm Seyn:

German Immigrant via Rotterdam,

The Netherlands & his wife, Anna Maria

Carolyn Ann Leighton Flude

Bryant Galusha, M.D.

Crystal Friend Sines

Edgar Clinton Sines

Gary Silas Sines

Lawrence Sines

Shirley Engstrom Sines

Mary Ruth Dot McTall Leighton

The Garrett County Historical Society

Chapter Six: Marcus Egle (1690-Abt. 1767) Immigrated from the Canton of Zürich, Switzerland

Betty Lou Hinson Heath

James Jim Noah Hinson, M.D.

Lloyd Thomas Eagle

Chapter Seven: Cherokee Ancestry Ties & Links: The People of Kituhwa

James Jim Noah Hinson, M.D.

William Ashley Billy Hinson

Chapter Eight: Timothy Lucas (1831-1910);

Ann Fitzpatrick Lucas (1832-1897) Irish who Immigrated Abt. 1857 from Manchester, England

Milton Milt C. Staley

Chapter Nine: The Watkins Connection

Milton Milt C. Staley

Chapter Ten: Boniface Euker & Anna Scholter—German Immigrants to America in the late 1800s

Marie Cecelia Mae Euker Staley

Milton Milt C. Staley

Rita Marie O’Donnell McCann

Chapter Eleven: Daniel Hagan & Bridget Heffron Hagan in Philadelphia, Pa.

Marie Cecelia Mae Euker Staley

Milton Milt C. Staley

Chapter Twelve: The Staley Family as traced to

Carl A. Staley

Diane Marilyn Staley Strathern MacFeeters

Rita Marie O’Donnell McCann

Marie Cecelia Mae Euker Staley

Milton Milt C. Staley

Preface

By Hélène Hinson Staley

Use what talents you possess; the woods would be very silent if no birds sang there except those that sang best.—Henry Van Dyke

[Note: Henry Van Dyke {1852-1933} was pastor of Brick Presbyterian Church, New York City, N.Y. {1893-1899}, professor of English literature, Princeton University {1899-1923} & U.S. minister to The Netherlands {1913-16}.]

Sunshine dances. Light-glitter spills into rolling

ripples. My face fills with happiness. Tall green pines sway as I reach into blue space warmed by the yellow-white sun. I close my eyes. Into the wind I fly above trees like silver seagulls dipping and gliding on breaths of angels above cool, splashing waters of Jordan Lake. A breeze lifts my hair and flutters my clothes. Feet are positioned firmly; steadily on the ground. Vapored-heat waves rise from dark-gray asphalt.

It is here I stand to rest. I look toward fishermen who are like dots in the rocks on both sides of the dam. I release a lungful. A little paradise—this town: Moncure. It is safe from congested streets. I live nearby with my children and their father. Peace of the area stirs within solitude and reflection. I am not running up and down stairs—doing laundry, scrubbing, cleaning after everyone else. I am not the paramount of homemakers—though cleaning my home is a daily regime. Messes wave in the predictable and unpredictable.

Jesus, I say in my mind as I walk.

"Thank you . . . this is my prayer . . . this wonderful breeze off of Jordan Dam."

Thoughts return to household duties and those of mother. Mothers understand without reservation. There is no evading except moments I find when God and His angels speak through nature or in tiny heart-felt voices.

You are going to be okay. Stay calm. We are watching over you and your children, they say.

When awakened in darkness in the earliest of morning hours by stomach pain, I call to God Our Father inside the brain and heart of my essence. I pull the Bible next to the bed closer.

Stand watch over me, I say to God as I exit.

Nerves and stomach acid, I explain to myself on the way to the refrigerator for a glass of soy. I keep a mental list of things and people to worry about. Then, I repent myself to sleep.

"I need to write . . . I want to write . . . What can I write? . . . What should I write?" echoes me to sleep and awake when I rise in sunshine or rain or in the obscurity of whippoorwills.

On days I am inspired to poetry, I thank God for that . . . if only that. Laundry, dishes, beds and floors begin to look at me with secret voices only mothers, maids and the slaves of our ancestors can translate. Mops and brooms, toilet brushes and buckets take on faces and personalities. If I sit to write, the vacuum roars. Spray cans of polish and ammonia hiss for a kiss at perfection. If I clean, the house will exhaust me. With an audience of furnishings, photographs and the darting about of maturing rug-rats, energy from a force of angels lifts my legs to climb stairs to my office. I sit in front of the computer keyboard. I think about the line Gabriel Byrne says as the character Friedrich Fritz Bhaer in the film Little Women [directed by Gillian Armstrong] to the character Jo March [played by Winona Ryder]:

"You should be writing from life . . . from the depths of your soul . . . There is more to you than this; if you have the courage to write it."

When inspiration deserts creativity, I work on genealogy. I note memories. The words flow enough to blot out the wavings and carrying-ons of household assistants. A broom resembles a man with a blond crew cut. The mop is his wife of many hairdos. Their son is by far the bravest. He is the web mop used to reach laborious spiders; their mummies and trapezes. There are moments when I am Cinderella; never a Charlotte or Wilbur. Within depths of my soul, the spirit chases them to the laundry room and allows me to sit at my desk to write.

There is little dodging chores. To hire a maid as I do when one can be found means more time to search for one, more time cleaning to get ready for one and more time cleaning with her to make sure each job is done. At very least, we have an occasional helper for yard duties and outdoor projects.

He’s a middle-aged African-American—a man from the other side of the tracks—a man I waver back and forth deducing whether or not should be trusted when I am out of eye-range. He says the law is forever after him—always, I am told: Petty offenses. I keep my eyes on him as I travel outdoors up and down stairs of the carport, where my office is located. He continues to work here because according to Howard, no one within 25 miles of our house will show up for work at the spur of a moment.

When the helper, I will refer to as C, is here I prepare lunches and snacks in apprehension his diabetic-state might provoke a preventable episode. The last thing I want to do is perform mouth-to-mouth on his toothless, whiskered, tobacco-permeated grin. There is goodness in this man . . . somewhere God and his mother know.

My youngest seven-year-old son Nicholas—a replica of an angel with his pinked-porcelain complexion and blond hair, asks:

Why do I have to serve his lunch? Why can’t he make his own?

"Never mind . . . Just take him this lunch . . . so he doesn’t faint," I say.

Extra help and moments with God are appreciated. Escaping hassle does not come during vacations or outings. They bring more. I seize concise moments under water; surfacing for air like a whale blowing a geyser until pink recedes my cheeks.

In December 1998, it snowed within weeks of moving into a new house. On a first night, power lines failed. Snow and ice caused lines approaching the neighborhood and inside the parameters of it, to collapse from the weight of fallen branches. Warmth gradually left.

Wearing winter pajamas, my children snuggled into their blankets like cocoons waiting for spring. Busy tones were the hourly reception of calls made to the power company. Snow and ice fell knee-deep. Wind engineered drifts nearly five feet. Evening was spent in front of the fireplace. I frequently checked my sleeping children. We would survive. All my life things like this have occurred at one time or another.

My experiences growing up visiting my father’s parents, whose lifestyles strongly resembled those of America’s early colonial period, supplied mental and physical preparation. This preparation was doubly armed by childhood experiences living in an historical house, where renovations waxed and waned. The power was restored over 24-hours later. Now, we could take warm baths and showers. I, for one, breathed a thank-you-God-for-relief as I rubbed my frozen toes and fingers against the other and took my face out of my shirt.

Moncure is a tiny town with a quaint post office, a bank, a beauty salon, a country store called Ray’s Supermarket and a convenience store: Jordan Dam Mini Mart, where locals and visitors buy gasoline, picnic items and fish bait. Within months of moving here, I selected solar blinds and wallpaper. I got accustomed to new surroundings by making trips with my children to B. Everett Jordan Dam for picnics and my version of safety fishing.

We took two fishing rods—not the real ones we keep in the tool room. The lines of those were knotted together. Apprehension I had of hooks possibly sticking my children, gave ample excuse for choosing instead a Fisher-Price ™ fishing rod and a Looney Tunes ™ fishing rod with a red, plastic fish attached to it. At the dam, we stood within ten feet or so from two real fishermen. They were filling their buckets and coolers with fish. I sat next to my sons, then ages four and six with pretend fishing rods. Our pretend fishing rods were better than regular pretend—they were props for our imaginations.

The Looney Tunes ™ fishing rod’s line was plastic. It stretched nearly to the water. We stood and sat on a cement walkway below the rocks, which are perpendicular to the dam and parallel to the river bank. The Fisher-Price ™ fishing rod’s cloth line was no longer than 15 inches. As we sat, my youngest son, Nicholas, requested he use the longest fishing rod. He began to note fishermen close by. He saw they gathered real fish from their lines. Their hooks were baited with red wigglers and minnows. Stray cats darted about rocks—carefully approaching to snatch discarded minnows. Nicholas ignored the cats as he stood up. He focused his eyes astutely on the fishermen. He walked over to them; watching as they retrieved real fish. He looked at me and wailed:

I don’t want to play fish anymore. I want worms. I want WORMS!

I attempted to quiet Nicholas for trepidation of others misunderstanding what he was shouting—especially what he meant.

Earliest days as Moncure residents were spent like this. We played kickball around grassy picnic areas of Jordan Dam. Sunny skies and clouds drifted across blue-pink whispers of Heaven.

Sometimes, we find ourselves outdoors working belligerent gray-red soil—clay and rocks. We attempt to inspire anything more pleasing than poison ivy, sumac or weeds. I planted a green eucalyptus tree of not more than 20 inches tall within the first year here. The tree currently soars 30 plus feet. Howard planted rose bushes around it during the summer of 2001. The ground was softened with topsoil for a flowerbed. Up until then, I planted this bed with different flowers each year.

One day I was planting flowers. Nicholas ran to me with a dead fish in his hands. He claimed he retrieved it from the fountain, which at the time, contained goldfish. We had a fish funeral. We buried the fish in a flowerbed. We made a cross. We used a little rock for a marker. Nicholas picked flowers to place over the site. Nicholas’ imagination grew to collecting a pile of acorns, blades of grass, brown leaves, etc.—adding these to the fish grave. Finally, I said:

"Nicholas. The fish is in the flowerbed. It doesn’t need all those blades of grass and leaves. I try to keep the grass out . . ."

After Nicholas asked God to accept the fish into fish heaven, I prompted Nicholas to come into the house for dinner.

We are having fish sticks, I told him.

O boy! I love fish sticks, Mommy!

He ran into the kitchen.

Not long after we moved, change beckoned. We were Episcopal—except for Howard, who was raised Roman Catholic—no red meat on Fridays, regular screen-to-ear Confessions for menacing deeds, etc. As years pass, he professes to belong to no church; unless I join the Roman Catholic Church. He claims I am Roman Catholic at heart. I was raised for five years of my childhood in Roman Catholic school.

We first visited St. Bartholomew’s Episcopal Church in the adjoining town of Pittsboro. Later, I visited Pittsboro Presbyterian Church. There I volunteered to re-start the church newsletter: The Link. Since March 2000, I have been its editor.

My home office is peaceful. It is a place I use Internet sources to make genealogical contacts and weave lives into stories of my American and European heritages. I study ancestors of my children—what it means to be American—what it means to be a hodge-podge of bloodlines. I am surprised we don’t resemble calico cats. To be in the present looking into the past is To Escape Into Dreams. For an immigrant to America during the 1600s, 1700s or 1800s, looking into the future was to do so as well.

Foreword

Young Influences

The breakfast room table was where my father

began his genealogy teachings.

He asks:

Do you know who Solomon Eagle, Senior was?

It made no difference whether I affirmed or shook my head, No. His ten-second question was an introduction to lectures on who begot whom, when and where they were born, lived and died and to what degree any particular cousin was who came into the spotlight of his mind. My brother and sister braved themselves to disappear after my mother took the lead. He might ask me to repeat names. The last thing I wanted was for my father to believe me truly dumb. I affirmed recognition of ancestors he made commentary on. His teachings—I cannot call them conversations, were difficult to retain.

There were no photos with his lessons. He drew boxes, circles and lines to illustrate how names were linked. Thoughts of escaping this boredom were beyond question. It might be mistaken as disrespect. I waited, listened and tried to remember in case he should test me.

The phone often rang. A sure way of ending genealogical chats was remedied by emergencies. If a patient needed him, this meant freedom to disappear. Freedom was guaranteed to the following Sunday.

Many of my father’s patients were elderly. My father is a medical doctor who specializes in internal medicine, the lung and heart. I believe him to be the best doctor in the world. He has saved and lengthened many lives.

In the 1990s, I began researching first my mother’s mother’s father’s lineage. I was fascinated with Italians in general and wanted to understand my Italian beginnings. Italians represented romance, everything beautiful. Movies, architecture and art defined this. My maternal grandmother Mary Ruth McTall [Metallo] Leighton confirmed in my heart by telling me more than once:

It only takes a little Italian blood to make you beautiful.

My father’s genealogy has been a focus for my father most all my life. Not much mention, until now, has been given to my maternal roots. I found myself in a genealogy snare. I jumped between British lines to Swiss and German lineages—this time, not dreaming of potential distractions. Genealogy research is a major distraction. It has kept me up through many nights, the ends of which are viewed as seconds-of-time. It became me reciting genealogy. When I forget a name—out of the thousands I have compiled, I refer to my index. Still, I receive questions:

How can you hold all that in your head?

The genealogy experience takes on a life of its own like the pines in the wind around Jordan Dam. Talking with my eldest son, I discover he is like his grandfather. Had it been Zachary sitting at the breakfast room table 20 years ago, I believe to say the least, he would relish genealogy as peppermint.

Genealogy is boring if one does not have a sense of connection. Americans—no doubt, are genealogically connected to the entire world. Zachary occasionally read portions of this book in manuscript form. One day he said:

This is an interesting book, Mommy, but the only people who are going to buy it will be people who are interested in genealogy.

About the author . . .

A Little About My Growing Years . . .

[or things that helped shape me]

"He wiped your face off and said, ‘It’s a girl,’ my

father recollected.

"I asked, ‘How can you tell it’s a girl when all you see is the head so far?’

Then the doctor said, ‘There is no boy with a face as pretty as this.’

You did not cry, my mother recounted once.

The doctor knew you were alive because you urinated on him the day you were born.

That day was Feb. 4th, 1963. Smiling faces looked at a new one. I arrived before, but ready for Mardi Gras with a temporary strawberry hemangioma near one eye. In time, it faded.

We lived in New Orleans, La. until 1967. Our apartment at the end of General Pershing Street marked our second move. My first pet was a German shepherd: Ladybird named after President Lyndon B. Johnson’s wife: Lady Bird Johnson [a.k.a.: Claudia Alta Taylor].

Ladybird was my best friend and playmate [ . . . until Häns]. It guarded me as if I were a puppy sometimes daring my father not to pick me up. My mother says I dragged Ladybird around our apartment with Ladybird’s teeth attached to a cotton diaper, while I knocked her into doorway sides and corners.

My mother says Ladybird saved my fingers from flickering-blue flames of a gas stove. Ladybird began barking to get my parents’ attention. When they did not respond quickly enough, Ladybird knocked me to the floor. I have scant memories of Ladybird—touching fur on her back—knowing this dog loved me. One of two nurseries I attended was located at the hospital, where my mother worked and studied: Southern Baptist.

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I am three years old. My brother is 16 months younger.

We walk down gray stairs leading from our second-story apartment to a chain-linked, fenced-in backyard. There is a swing set that belongs to other children who are part of a family that lives in an apartment below us.

My mother explains the swing set does not belong to us, but we can use it. I never see these phantom children.

We swing on a two-seater. Wind currents whisk about—slamming the door. I run to the door. I pound the door. My father’s face appears as he opens the door that leads upstairs to the kitchen. We are okay. He disappears upstairs. We decide to take turns holding the door while the other uses the swing. We reason the mop will hold the door open. The doorknob is too difficult to turn. My father walks downstairs and finds the mop. He understands why we put the mop there. I insist he not move it.

This is my earliest memory of a mop.

After my father completes his residency at the V.A. Hospital under the Auspices of Tulane University and my mother finishes her studies at Louisiana State University and work at Southern Baptist Hospital, we move to Salisbury, N.C.

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I attend Jack & Jill Nursery until first grade at which time I attend Overton Elementary School. I attend school there until the school system instructs families in our area to attend a different school. The other school requires crossing a railroad track to drive us to and from school. My mother resolves we attend Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Elementary School. We are not Roman Catholic. We are Episcopal. Our father is a Baptist who occasionally attends St. Luke’s Episcopal Church. [I was baptized Aug. 25th, 1963 at St. Mark’s Lutheran Church in Oakland, Md.]

Sacred Heart is a blessing. The YMCA was located across the street from this school. We enroll in YMCA after-school and summer activities—swim team practice, Camp Eagle Feather, gymnastics, etc.

One of my favorite television shows is The Flying Nun with Sally Fields. To begin the first day at Sacred Heart in second grade, I ask the principal nun:

Can you fly?

My mother stands next to us. The nun has a sense of humor. She smiles.

I love this school. I wear a plaid uniform. I attend Catholic Mass twice a week during the time religion class is normally held. I adapt readily to prayers. There are prayers before school following the Pledge of Allegiance—prayers before the first class of the day [in the classroom]—prayers before lunch—prayers before the end of the school day. I say Hail Mary’s—read prayers during Advent—go to confession. I am denied receiving Holy Communion during Mass. I am Protestant. I am the English Catholic sort, which I consider may make me more acceptable. [I know this to be untrue now. Roman Catholics embrace everyone.]

My mother gives me a navy-colored knit poncho. I flip it over my head and proudly wear it like a nun’s habit, crossing myself and genuflecting about our house. I profess to Sister Mary Jean one day during recess I am going to be a nun when I grow up. Her response is to smile:

I will see you in the Convent. [That is the day I learn what a convent actually is; a new word.]

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Roman Catholic schools and churches fall victim to scrutiny when worldly troubles set up housekeeping within its gates. By contrast, my happiest years of schooling under age 12 were spent in Catholic school. Sacred Heart continued through sixth grade. Afterwards, grade students had public schools as choices. Mine were narrow. I attended Knox Junior High School, where the first time in my life, I was wisely fearful of other students.

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Student restrooms are smoking sprawls for bullies I sporadically encounter.

Eating in the cafeteria means finding a seat to eat a bagged lunch. I purchase milk at the end of the food line. To do these things without being snubbed or snagged by a bully is a good day.

I am very tall—five feet six inches beginning seventh grade and five feet seven inches at the year’s end. Knox Junior High contains strange characters—some of which inspire serious avoidance.

An African-American girl begins to demand milk money. [I will refer to her as J. She was in my grade at the time, and she was one or two years older.] Her hair and body reek of stale cigarette smoke and tobacco. Her breathe is about my face during attempted extortions. Sometimes, she carries a pick-comb in her hair or back pocket. A front tooth is absent from an angry mouth. Her physique is muscular in ragged, smoke-permeated clothes.

Gimme yol’ money, she demands routinely—every time she sees me.

I cannot not blink or wish her away. I ignore her with my eyes wide open. I avoid looking at her, if at all possible. I never give her one-cent.

Another girl—Caucasian, I will refer to as R also bullies by taking pencils and pens. She gives me nubs in return, and when it suits her, she twists my arm. [Nubs are one or two-inch pencils with worn-out erasers.] I learn to walk around buildings and walkways to keep both at bay. One day R walks into the restroom. I am washing my hands in the midst of being bullied by J.

J instantaneously sees R as an opportunity for extortion. I watch through the mirror. J intimidates R quickly into handing over pocket change. I never give J anything she demands. It is interesting R—a bully, readily complies with her wishes. I slip out the restroom to avoid a double confrontation.

As fate has it, R looks for opportunities to bully. During music on another day, she—along with her followers, pulls a chair out. I hit the floor. It is concrete covered with indoor-outdoor carpeting. J is next to me. She looks at R and her clique. I jump up. I get a sense I should not give them attention over this. Picking is their favorite past time. They pick if you wear the wrong clothes or shoes. They pick if you use vocabulary they judge to be too grown up. They pick if you answer a question incorrectly. They pick if they judge you to be too tall or too skinny or too fat, too pretty or too ugly. Their picking is like a bared rooster’s reddened rump—bared raw from the plucking of its barnyard peers. [I wish to God Sacred Heart had extended its classes to include seventh through 12th grades.]

J is not included in cliques [but neither am I.] She is understandably a different personae to fear. She comes from the festered side of the tracks. This is obvious by her hygiene, language, habits and the I-want-to-beat-someone-up expression she wears daily. She sees R’s group laughing. Her expression is that of Medusa. Their faces turn to stone. She says loud enough to be heard by them:

They aren’t like you. I saw what they did. If I were you, I would kick their asses. Kick R’s ass! If you don’t do it, I will.

I politely and cautiously, decline. From then on, I never experience another wisecrack or practicable joke from R or any more money demands from J. J is understandably someone to be feared. This time, she stands up for me; not that I want her too. I am grateful nevertheless.

I am assured by expressions of those who fear her retaliation they will not be hatching more schemes. For J, I believe, her revelation is to realize not all white girls are ruthless. I recognize, though I am too young to verbalize it, J constructed definite lines between herself and everyone around her until that day.

Attending public school supplies more than traditional public education and fear for my physical safety. It contains benefactors for compassion lessons I stored from Catholic school.

I walk through the cafeteria—avoiding legs of chairs. I avoid standing in the long food procession. I walk to its other end and wait for a polite opportunity to purchase milk. I pass tables and chairs. I carry a bagged lunch. I search for a place to sit. Walking through a cafeteria, jammed with noisy students, I notice the crippled girl I refer to as L.

She slides her shoes against pavement and heaves great breaths. Her shoes connect to braces. Her arms are positioned low in crutches. Fingers on her hands are bent in peculiar directions and work against efforts to steady. Her brown eyes are magnified in thick frames. She is dragging her legs on the edges of her shoes. Her long strands and bangs whip about her face. Her legs and crutches are like a crab without joints—always within a hair of falling.

The peak of cruelties in this middle school comes from students—cliques who deem themselves better than the poor or awkward or shy. I am among wolves, opossums and rattlesnakes.

Busy conversation and noisy trays bang about the air—the air I wish to whiz through peacefully. A new friend of mine then, whose name I will keep out for the mere hope she has changed through decades, rushes over and says within a half inch of my ear in a loud, vapored whisper:

Watch L. Say nothing.

She proceeds to tell me students I will not name here—but should, put a slit mustard pack in her chair.

I turn toward L. She is falling into her seat and moving her crutches next to the table. A roar of laughter races through the air like a speeding truck on a red, dirt road. There is jeering and laughter of red faces crackling at another’s misfortune of getting caught in their fangs. The laughter originates from a section of the cafeteria, where the self-deemed popular students sit rattling about like the snakes I perceive them to be. I realize L has no idea of the what, why, when or how. I doubt her paralyzed legs feel the cold mustard venom. I drink my milk hastily as I walk towards the doors and forget my sandwich. I did not have the heart to tell this lamb her existence was used as a source of perverted entertainment. I hate those who destroy innocence and make me feel I could be next.

When I was growing up during middle and high school years, I avoided mentioning my father’s farms. I feared students finding a reason to poke fun at me. Among my extended public school peers, I heard certain students make fun of others who attended county schools outside of Salisbury.

These students poked fun at students if they demonstrated any trace of "country-bumpkin." I would have been better off attending a county school. Although unspoken, I was proud of my father’s farms and all the wonderful stories and memories I have as treasures today. After a while, I realized bullies who make fun of others are cowards and are threatened by misconceptions. They briefly scared me into being untrue to myself—to things I loved by causing me to fear speaking of them. It was easier to pretend one was invisible—to walk decisively in the midst of possible rattlers whose venom was stronger than mustard. I avoided speaking to them whenever possible. I can compare this to when as a child I ate cooked spinach or prunes in the cafeteria at Sacred Heart. A younger student held his nose and said for the entire table to ponder and scrutinize:

"Oewwww!"

This did not bother me, but had it happened in the public schools, I might have felt like a leper in Biblical times. At Sacred Heart, teachers protected students. We were to regard fellow students and teachers with respect and love—as we would our brothers and sisters. In most cases, we innately knew we were expected to treat our school peers better than our siblings.

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After three years of attending Knox Junior High, I attended Salisbury High School, formerly known as Boyden. I graduated in 1981 an average student with well-above-average term papers. I was distracted by snootery. I dreamed of the day I would go to college to escape a world that was torturing me on a school-day basis and deepening a sense of loneliness.

The summers I spent during growing years were done so in a hodge-podge of places, including long stretches of time at my paternal grandmother’s home and farm. I chased chickens and guinea birds, ate pies Virgie baked in a wood stove and listened to stories she told and illustrated on paper. She made up for any love I missed from my parents. It was in junior high school I first recalled Virgie speaking of her school experiences—telling me when I was still in grammar school.

Grandma, did anyone make fun of you when you were in school, I ask as she combs my hair. I am sitting next to her.

"Yes . . . Some boys used to pull my braids to the point I cried," she answers.

What did you do about it? I ask.

"I told my mother. She began fixing my braids up with ribbons . . . so they had nothing to pull," she responds as she fixes my hair in a Victorian-style.

Did anyone ever make fun of your clothes? I ask.

My mother used to sew my clothes, she replies.

"I liked everything she made. She made a wool apron to wear over my dresses to help keep me warm in winter. I think some of the children thought this apron was funny looking . . . I did not worry about what they thought. I liked it because my mother made it."

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It is the on and off times of my childhood.

I greet Virgie with a kiss and hug. I kiss and hug her when I pass through one room to the next or to go outside to play. When we gather eggs or pick flowers, fruits or vegetables, I am an extra walking stick. Virgie