We watched dad in his skinny tie and crew cut, and mom with her bouffant blow out and apron, put the pot roast in the oven, tucking away the signs, call logs and VOTE Nixon buttons. Denial is tonights appetizer. Mom was a Nixon volunteer. His betrayal bounced off her bouffant and into the hope chest along with all the political swag. No words, no tears, no nothing, but a seething smile of acceptance. Something tells me the hope chest is a goldmine of discovery, where dreams go to die, or where they go to bury a lie.
Soon followed the impotence of Gerald Ford's run for President. The hushed shame of Betty Ford’s drinking is louder than those last helicopters heading home from Saigon. How am I so intimately aware of shame? Ah…..yes, it was the blanket my birth mother wrapped me in as she gave me away.
Mom and dad seem distraught but chase it down with tequila sunrises, teaching me how to measure the tequila just right. I can barely reach the counter, yet I am tasked with keeping their secrets and pouring the erasure of open dialogue.
Iran, Inflation, Billy Beer and sideburns are all the rage now, as the hinges start to fall off. Our parents, confused by this second wave of free love. Swinging and disco re-place square dancing and bridge. We still go to church, confess our sins, mom goes to Weight Watchers. My brother and I meet some woman named Barbie at Bob’s Big Boy. Mom isn’t there, but dad is grinning from ear to ear. Barbie has big boobs. Is this one of those ladies in dad’s magazines? I like her, and I wonder if she is going to be our new mom.
Hostages, Gas Lines, Charles Manson….pot roast is now ground chuck, and I still can’t chew meat. They feed me food, but I am still longing for my first taste of breast milk. I cringe at the word breast. My developing body has been fondled, poked and leered at. I wonder if Amy Carter feels like me….scared and worried. I am ten years old and write to her dad, the President, asking if he would please stop making everything so expensive. Maybe this will stop my parents from screaming and stop my brother from late night visits to my bedroom. President Carter never responds. I guess my dad is right about him not being able to do anything about anything! Those poor hostages…..if Jimmy can’t save them, he certainly can’t save me!!!
Mom and Dad go to Marriage Encounters. I think this is where orgies take place, or maybe they are finding my brother and I new parents, hopefully separately. My brother and I are left in a big empty room. What are we supposed to be doing?
Mom gets a job working from home but drives into Los Angeles once a week. I suffer these drives with her, hearing how much of a failure dad is. I don’t know what to say, I just know dad comes home late, and so would I, if I were him. She is intolerable.
TRICKLE DOWN ECONOMICS, movie star, governor of our home state, headed to the White House. Time for dad to shave those sideburns. Proposition 13 and public school busing are on the ballot. All I know is that my brother and I would have to wake up at 5:00am, to take a bus to a school in Watts. What is Watts, and why is everyone freaking out?
I become a spy, searching for my birth records, listening to conversations about divorce, staying hyper vigilant. I learn how to become invisible and leave my body.
The 80s are here. Arms deals are making fat cash, my parents delightfully lulled by wealth but still unhappy. Not a good time to tell them how my brother has been molesting me for years and is getting worse.
Marriage counseling isn’t working, disco isn’t saving us all. Berlin Wall, USSR, U2, Crack Cocaine, Crime, AIDES and Oliver North. Mom and dad talk divorce. We go to church less, dad brings home a girlfriend, mom moves out, yay, a new mom, she doesn’t look like a Playboy bunny, she looks like a folk singer. The 80’s are looking good.
My brother and I live with dad. We visit mom at her new apartment. I hate to go, it oozes with discomfort. I hate that I pity her, she seems less powerful and for the first time I see her as pathetic. Part of me enjoys this, it is my first taste of vengeance, and I lick my lips, unsure about the taste.
Dad looks defeated, mom moves back in, shit. I thought ol’ Ronny boy was going to fix everything.
I am the quiet observer, the drink pourer, no time for school or homework, dysfunction is my education. Multiplication tables are useless here. Mom and dad are disappointed in my grades. Why can’t they see that I am a good student of their lessons?
MR GORBECHOF TEAR DOWN THAT WALL. Punk rock, disco, heavy metal, new wave, wait….Neil Diamond? Sweet Caroline, what is this? Mom and dad are going to battle their way through, no divorce. Why can’t we do free love again? Stupid AIDES and Nancy Reagan’s magical thinking….JUST SAY NO. The government says AIDES only affects gay people and drug users, so I say, let’s just fuck this shit away. I am tired of numbing them, I am tired of numbing myself to my brothers visits. I need to feel something.
Mom and dad are committed to the trophy college prep kids and I laugh at their ignorance. My brother has other plans, getting kicked out of various schools for lighting fires and blowing up toilets. I change schools when he does and lose all friends. REAGAN and JOHN LENNON ARE SHOT. The world is heavy. Still not a good time to tell them I am being molested and that my brother tried to assault my only friend. I lose her forever.
Playboy Channel replaces dads nude magazines. It is indoctrination of something dark, piped into the mainstream. Hushed rooms of mad men flaunting the patriarchy in sexual images that are dangerous. This feels different than a bunch of naked kids dancing at Woodstock. I learned what a weapon of mass destruction date rape is before its ever uttered in a court room. JUST SAY NO wasn’t working. Should I write to the former First Lady and tell her? Oh wait, that was about “the war on drugs and homophobic racist misinformation.” Got it. Doesn’t apply to white rich young men. Carry on rape culture.
Sadaam Hussain, SNL, and Suicidal Tendencies swirl about. Dad smokes pot before church. Mom is President of Little League and a professional game player at home mind fucking us all. My brother is going to become a priest as he still molests me. Nixon betrayed mom and dad, Reaganomics fucked them, Bush could send their golden boy away. I can feel their discomfort, but DESERT STORM will unite us all. Let’s hunker down and ride it out.