Come to Life posted 5/6/2008 5:04:26 PM | 20 kudos what's this?     report abuse tagged: love, passion, obsession

LaughTillYaPuke

My daddy always wondered why I felt the need to stomp my feet up the stairs, slam doors and scream into pillows. I've said it before and I'll say it again....it's a bitch being the youngest of 6 kids. You would think they would have spoiled me rotten (and I was in some ways) cherished as the last fruit of my mothers womb (I was not) or they would have at least made an effort not to break me before the age of 10. (I looked like the bride of Frankenstein by the time they got done with me.) And for you old timers who have been reading my blogs for a while, you might remember that as soon as my creation was announced, daddy trotted off and got clipped.

I think it's why I write. Why I dream in words more often than pictures. Letters from the alphabet floating out of dreamy kissable mouths. I still have things to say. And I find my self talking in decibels that would deafen a construction worker. I'm always afraid someone is going to come along (yet again) and shove my face into their arm pit to shut me up, sit on my head, or strategically place a pillow over my face and bet chiclets how long it would take until my body lie still.

Family meetings were a time of yelling, arm waving and subtle but painful pinching. Why I even wasted my time pedaling home is beyond me. When I did manage to scream something into those brief moments of silence, 7 heads would turn to me with raised eyebrows until I slunk back to my corner and dug under the table for a chunk of silly putty.

I am ashamed to admit that it took me years to realize that this was not a mistake on their parts, but with purposeful and malicious intent that was not likely to change any time in the near future. I cannot count the times a hand was clamped over my mouth while my brother Tom would loudly ask….Does anyone else want the last of these fries?” And I would watch in rage and frustration as the older kids divvied up my tates.

I soon learned that my hair was directly connected to my mouth. Every time I tried to open my mouth and say something, someone yanked my hair. Before you feel too sorry for me, I will say that baring a few concussions and stitches, they never broke any of my bones. I however, managed to break a few of theirs.

As much as my father loved me, I suppose it did become old to have all those kids making all that noise all the time. I lived for being able to go places with dad alone. I always thought he was an incredibly patient man. I now know he was just fabulous at tuning things out. And I would read to him as the miles rolled under the wheels of that old Ambassador. Nancy Drew and Trixie Belden at the age of 5, and then “Freckles” by Gene Stratton Porter at the age of 6. Once on the way to the east coast and twice on the way back. Like I said, the man was a saint.

He soon went and got me a dog of my own. I never knew if it was so that I would have something to talk to, or if it’s because of the trauma of the previous summer. If you read “Daddy’s Girl” you know how that all played out. And I would sit and read aloud to that poor dog who would follow me every where and listen patiently unless there was something dead to roll in.

And time after time I could have saved family numerous problems if they had just listened to my voice. Tried to pick me out of the din. "Daddy, the car's on fire." "Daddy.....The car's on fire." "DADDYTHECARSONFIRE!!!!"

And he reached between the two front seats of the VW, grabbed my chin and yelled "You had really better have to go this time!". Granted, I had the bladder the size of a pea. And my needing to go at the most inappropriate times was legendary.....but still, how does that pertain to a fire? He looked past me, grabbed my by my neck and yanked me between the seats and out the door in one swift movement. And there we stood watching flames leap out the open door. It's the warmest that damn car ever got in winter I can promise you that. He looked down at my feet and said, "You lost a shoe....wonderful." And I somehow suddenly felt responsible for the whole damn thing.

I think that is why I fear dating so much. What if they ask me to tell something about myself. What the hell would I say? And once I got started, how the hell would I ever stop yabbering? I fear that once this Pandora's box is opened, no one would escape with their lives. Wouldn't it be great if we could just write our way through relationships? And maybe that is why I continue with this fiasco called online dating. It allows me to communicate in the best way I know how.

And it is to my father that I must thank for this obsession that I have. I think those long, long trips to the coast alone with me were a bit more than even a man of his patience could take. And to have someone pull over at a Walgreens and come out with 2 colored notebooks and a pack of pencils all my own (which I loved to watch him sharpen with his knife) was nirvana. And he told me to write it all down, and he would read all of my stuff the next time he went away on a trip. And so that is what I did.

I wrote and wrote and wrote. And found that sometimes in the dark of night the urge would come on me so strong that I would sit outside in the snow and write there so as to not wake anyone up and be yelled at. And he DID take those notebooks with him when he went. And as the years went by, more notebooks and loose leaf pages. And when I eventually moved away, manila envelopes crammed with pages typed on an old wonderful IBM typewriter would be sent home to him. The only man I ever trusted to read my stuff. My ego much to fragile to trust my heart to anyone but a man who would give his very life for me.

And when he died we found boxes of my profound thoughts. In the basement, in the garage, under the mattress on his bed. And I wept that he loved me so much that he had kept them all those years. That he had found me worthy and even more than that, interesting.

And over his work bench he had stapled one of my many loose leaf pages. And he had circled one sentence with a wide fat carpenters pencil circle. "To write is to live". I remember typing that. And I am still amazed that he could pick out off all those hundreds of pages the key to my soul. And I gathered them all together except for that one circled page and burned them in a glorius fire, sprinkling the ashes over his beautiful garden. That maybe even in his death, my words could come to life.

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Blogs by LaughTillYaPuke: Daddy's Girl Enough Already Trees Around My Heart The Mother Tree Colors The Most Beautiful Place on Earth Mother Barn In The Beginning TESTIFY!!! She's a Real Mother Alright..... Sharp Dead Toe Nails Melee Come to Life The Game....Part III The Game....Part II The Game....Part I Portrait........Portrayal Cold Puke in Blog Land