Well, I lay in bed for about an hour and my brain didn't want to shut off. I went by classmates today for some weird reason, they sent me some junk mail from when I had registered long ago there, didn't even remember a password or anything. Found a connection where ppl actually go there to speak. (Waves to ppl coming by from that place. Oh, how I love my statcounter!) Long story. So I got to thinking bout what was supposed to be our 10 year reunion last year. I had wondered, but it seems that it never happened and some may attempt to try for this year. Half our graduating class lives here still. Who do I really know from back then? Not many, I knew who most everyone was, but you know how that is. So, in hopes of shutting my brain off we are taking a trip down Memory Lane.

Ever since I can remember we never had any kind of 'outside' communication devices. The radio only played tapes and I have a memory of being very little and watching my father throw the tv out the front door. From where we were living, I can conclude that most likely I wasn't even in school yet. Hence ya'll get some kind of idea why I so love my cartoons now. Can you imagine how hard it was to do current even type things in school? The librarian wouldn't let me cut the newspapers, oh well. I guess I forgot to mention we never had a tv since then either. I think it was summer before 3rd grade my mom left my father, then we lived in a motel I think, then lived in a not so nice place to be, then my mother gave us up because, and I quote directly, "God told me to". Let's see, that summer we went to NE for the annual family reunion and came back to the step-bitch living with us. Technically we were told she and her kids was watching our house for us. She never left. So, on one hand we have a biological mother who we only exist for if we are actually right in front of her, and stepbitch who is in love with only herself and somewhat her oldest daughter and her son. Note here, that she actually has 3 children. Poor Mouse, I don't know which of us had it worse, my mother ignored us but hers did it right in front of her. You can kinda see why in my story a while back, I never tolerated anyone giving her shit. Stepbitch was technically a housewife, and I do use the broadest sense of the term: she didn't have a job nor did she work. I can't remember how old I was, but it may have been 4th or 5th grade. Let's see, no tv, no radio, no way to get anywhere and 7 kids 2 adults, and I use adults in somewhat broader terms than most. My days in this household....get up at I think 5:30 am (nightowl can't sleep til after 11 or so). Get dressed, feed and water the animals. Animals you say? Morning was the rabbits, chickens(not my chore), the dog, the pigs and we had quail once too, oh and a goat. Just so you know, the pigs were at the top of the hill, there were 2 5gal buckets of water to be carried up there every day before school. And yes, this was my chore except for the chickens. Mouse had to help too. By 6:30 we usually managed to have it done. Then there was, if you were lucky, time to actually fix and eat breakfast. If you didn't have my father's breakfast done perfectly hot and on the table at 7am sharp, there were consequences that weren't pretty. In the middle of it all was trying to atleast somewhat clean the kitchen, there was hell to pay for that too. 7am run down to the bus stop. Damn bus driver was an asshole. That man learned to wait for our stop until 7:15am, I taught his ass that. Maybe he noticed I wasn't gonna take more of his shit. Then was the hellish bus ride. I never did understand why most guys went out of there way to make us feel like shit. But, they did learn, the hard way. Jess was the only one stupid enought to wait until he had quite a few bruises. If I ever see Luke again, I may just kick his ass for the fun of it. Then there was school. Oh, did I tell you what my wardrobe was like? Mostly it was stuff for working in, chores. So before every school year I got maybe 2 or 3 new shirts and if I was really lucky I got 2 pair of jeans. I was not allowed to wear any of my 'school' clothes just once before washing them, but we'll get to that part in a bit. I did get new shoes too, my feet were growing. Before school was spent avoiding mean ppl, so what that really meant to me was running with the so called 'bad' crowd. Didn't fight, didn't have to. No, didn't do drugs, smoke or drink, I wasn't like that just ran with 'em. Classes were boring. Too many teachers spent too much time teaching while I needed to use the time for homework, we'll get to why later. Then the hellish bus ride home. When we get home we have to feed and water the animals again and start dinner which gets us short on time, cuz we get home at 4pm and there's hell to pay if dinner isn't on the table by 5pm. No more than 30 minutes allowed at the dinner table. While we are doing dinner and feeding the animals there is expected to be 2 loads of laundry washed and hung to dry on the closeline. Did I mention it's after 4pm now? Then, if no one (me) is grounded there's dishes, cleaning the kitchen, bathroom, bedroom, vacuuming. Oh yeah, and making their bed too, cleaning THEIR room. Pretty much me and mouse doing that, and that's only if we haven't done something to piss stepbitch or Missy off. That's where most of our grounding came from. We really didn't have time to get in trouble. Oh, yeah after that we had time to do homework. After a year of that is when I decided that if it didn't get done in the classroom I wasn't doing it. Not to mention the REQUIREMENT of having a job at 14. Atleast a couple nights during the week and the whole weekend. It wasn't optional. Yes, chores were to be completed before work or you didn't go, where you would be fired and punished for not having the job. No, they didn't take our money damn good thing too. You starting to notice yet that stepbitch really didn't work? Yes, this went on til I left home, which I did before my senior year in HS. Lets see, what was expected from me in school was I was not allowed to bring home a grade lower than a C(M). I was damn lucky I'm smart. If I couldn't ace any test put in front of me, I'd have been screwed, I did no homework again no time.
Well, what did you do if you were grounded you ask? Well, I dug under the house with a hammer in the winter. I dug a pond up the hill during the summer. Cut the grass with a pair of scissors. I'd say weed the garden, but that was a requirement for weekends, if you were grounded you did it by yourself. I still won't clean my bathroom. I had that job for months on end, everytime I had it spotless, one of the kids would mess it up more often than not on purpose. Oh and food while grounded was scrumptious. I don't think I ever told ya'll this. Every meal while at home when grounded was green. That frozen in the box shit. Broccoli, brussel sprouts and okra. Little trick: after heating the okra rinse it off while they aren't looking it won't be slimy anymore. You had 20 minutes to eat it and get your happy ass back outside to work(read: dig), if you ate within the alloted time you could have what was on the table within your 20 minutes. To this day I eat a plate full of food in 10 minutes or less. That and I'll eat anything but cranberry jelly. That stepbitch was so disappointed I would eat anything she finally noticed I wouldn't eat that shit at holidays. Damn near puked and I do get dry heaves just smelling it. Can you imagine a can of that for a meal?
Of course there were other chores that came most days but weren't constant. 5 gallon bucket fulls of crappy mostly. I don't allow that shit in my house, hubby goes fishing he don't bring it home. Scale and fillet, usually 2 buckets. Atleast 3 times a week. Kill, skin, clean and cook rabbits atleast once a week. Skin, clean and cook squirrels all squirell season long. Skin, clean, butcher and cook the 2 or 3 deer a year. I can dress, skin and butcher a deer quicker than most men. Gotta do it fast enough and with very little error if you don't want a foot up your ass, steel-toed no less.
Summer chores were construction work with my father all day, plus the every day chores, plus your own job. Gardening, including tilling, manuring and other things included for a garden. Lawn care also. Can you say lawnmower has no engine and never did. I tell you it was very rare for my father to pay any money for a lawnmower that actually had an engine in it. Most of the time it was a weed wacker, no it didn't haven an engine either, think schythe but the blade at a different angle and a very old fashioned rolly blade looking thing that was a lawn mower in the old days. Of course there was the one time with the scissors.
Let's get to the part where you're told you are 'stupid, worthless and can't do anything worth a shit' over and over damn near anytime you get anywhere near your so-called parents. These are the people who are supposed do the unconditional love thing. Is it any wonder I am a very shy and withdrawn person. I don't trust people. I say it with my oldest a lot, it's a miracle we turned out sane. Notice I make no mention of my biological mother here. She wasn't there. EVER. We had a phone, an address, everything like that. She lived in town. We never moved, same place always. Can anyone say unwanted?
Then you have jr high and high school. Kids are mean. Not all were. I didn't associate with anyone who even looked like they might be thinking of saying what my parents did. However there are quite a few ppl I wouldn't mind seeing again.

After all that, I think I may tell you the story of my first 'love' and the losing of the virginity thing. I have some questions for ya'll bout that. Later! |