Chapter 3: My Father
My Father
The phone rang at about 11:30 pm, and I was loath to answer it. Who could be calling me in the middle of the night, how dare they. I mean, 11:30, don't they realize what time it is!
My brother says 'hey" in his usual gruff grumbly voice. He sounds very serious though, so I sit up in bed, and ask what's up. He knows better than to call after 9:00 p.m. So I know something is going on.
He makes one comment "dad died". All I could say at the moment was “huh, what do ya know. I thought he was dead years ago”. He wants to know if I want to come down to the Hospital to see the body before the Coroner takes it away. I say ”no, I will not, and I have to go now, so I will talk to you in the morning”, and say bye.
I tried to lay back down but could not. I got up and tried to shut my screaming mind down but it would not. I was confused. I had counted the man dead 15 years earlier in my mind, and this didn’t compute for me. If he was already dead to me, then why am I having these feelings now that the news has come that he is actually dead and how am I going to deal with this.
So, I get dressed and go down to the Hospital. Most of my brothers are there, as are his two remaining brothers and one of his sisters. His other sister lives out in Boston or thereabouts. I needed to see the man dead to actually believe he was in fact dead. So I went into the little room they had there, and saw him lying on the bed there.
They said he died suddenly of massive heart failure, and fell on is face on the ground outside his door. So, his face had some blood and damage there. It still looked like him after all these years. He was much more gaunt and frail looking than I had expected though.
I then went outside and stood with my brothers and smoked a cigarette. There we were, the four oldest boys standing outside a Hospital together and smoking cigarettes and no idea what to do. Like little kids again being helpless and lost. One of the boys started talking about how he saw him just last week, our father had given him a shotgun as if he knew he wouldn’t need it anymore.
Then the others chimed in and it started to be some sort of recollection party and I was getting more an more uncomfortable by the minute. I didn’t know any of them knew where he lived let alone were speaking to him or seeing him it was quite revelation for me. I was still holding too much hatred for the man, and was not yet willing to let it go.
After some time listening to them I had to leave as one of his youngest brother came out to stand with us, and was crying. He was going on about what a loss it is, and then his wife came out as well and was telling us how great the man was. I couldn’t hear it it it was all so much hypocrisy, so I got in my car and went home.
That night I did not sleep, I was in turmoil. Did he die penniless and who will foot the bill. Did he give us one more jab before leaving, and where will he be buried and should I even go to the funeral I did not want to. This went on all night and finally sometime in the early morning I fell asleep.
My first memory of my father goes way back. Back before my mother says I can remember, but I think she is wrong as the memory stands vivid and clear. Sometimes when I think it isn’t a memory but something I was told I think is a memory it comes back and the details are too strong to have been anything else.
There we are living on the farm for whatever reason, and he pulls in the driveway after having been gone for weeks. I run as fast as I can outside to greet him as he gets out of the car and I want him to pick me up. Instead he pushes me aside and gives me an extra little shove and I lean into the pricker bushes along the walkway and scratch myself. He moves on and goes into the house leaving me standing there crying silently.
Growing up, our father was not a family father as one might expect. I know, there are many fathers out there who are bad people, and I understand that. However, this one was mine, and it was whom we had to live with. He was a drunk his whole life or at least during all the years I knew him.
Oh, not just any drunk, but one of those drunks that when drunk become evil beasts. They hit kick and destroy everything around them. He was an ugly drunk.
A side effect of his drinking was that we got to move quite often. We moved because he would inevitably lose his job. Eventually the employer would no longer tolerate his arriving late, or simply not arriving at all, and fire him. So we would move on to the next town while he tried to find work again. Many mornings we would hear my mother screaming at him to get up. She would berate him until the inevitable hitting or shouting back at her to shut up.
And when he did find work, he usually spent the money on beer and cigarettes. He would come home with only a few dollars left in his pocket and my mother would go nuts. The usual crap, like, "how am I going to buy groceries" and or "how am I going to pay the rent" little things like that. So we moved quite often due to being evicted as well.
As the years went by, we became used to moving suddenly. We learned to not make friends because we could not get to know them, and if we did, we would lose them. We turned to each other for friendship and the like. We even became used to the beating, our mother, and ourselves received on a regular basis..
Though he didn’t usually hit us so much as he hit our mother, he would find small ways for his pleasure. He would come home drunk of course, and decide there were way to many toys laying about the yard. So he would methodically pick them all up and put them in the car and drive off. I mean all. He would work very hard to be sure that there wasn’t one single item missed. We eventually learned to hide toys in the woods and surrounding area's.
He would return hours later and they would all be gone. Same usually went for the cats and dogs. He would put them in the car drive off, and return without them. Sometimes though he took a shotgun with him, and we pretty much knew the fate of the animal. We came to believe we would eventually be driven off and not return. On one particular cold winter evening he didn’t like whatever the cat was doing. Most likely the cat was walking on the counters as they often did, as cats will do.
It was an all white Persian like cat, very fluffy and belonged to my oldest brother. My father picked up the cat and opened the trailer door and threw it like one would a football into a deep snow bank. We were all to scared to say or do anything at all, we ourselves being frozen to inaction.
After he left for work in the morning my oddest brother ran for the door to call for the cat. Not responding we all got dressed and went out to look for the cat knowing it was a very cold night and fearing for its safety. We need’nt have feared, it was right there in the snow bank exactly where it landed. Its fur was all pushed back and eyes open and it was quite solid. It died as soon as it went into the snow bank.
Another time one of the dogs for some reason got a hold of another of the cats, again a white Persian like cat, and chewed on it ripping out its innards. When our father came home and saw the results he simply put the dog in the car and drove. He came back home many hours minus the dog. I believe he got pleasure out of destroying the animals.
Many times we would get in the car with him, and literally crouch on the floor trying to hide for fear if he noticed we were in the car, he would dispose of us as well. We knew this might happen not just from the toys and animals, but he would remind us periodically that he was in fact going to do this to us.
He drove like he was possessed, and never without a six pack to get him started. He would drive fast and not slow down for the turns in the roads, the speed was steady and the car would screech around turns. As he consumed the beer he would open his window and throw then out over the roof to toss them to the passenger side bushes many time missing and the can or bottle would bounce across the roof. Sometimes he would try to hit the road sign, and he did succeed once in a great while.
One day he arrived home with a new truck. We'll it wasn’t new, it was new to us. He sold the station wagon, and decided a flatbed truck would be a better family vehicle for two adults and five children at the time. Yea, very comfy riding around in that.
We would all pile in and try to be comfortable and end up fighting. Some of us had to sit on others laps there was no way around it. Usually the smaller kids sat on the older kids laps and that didn’t go over too well. A good backhand generally settled any disputes quickly.
When he hit us we almost welcomed it, because if he was venting and hitting we knew we were safe from the "road trip". When he hit our mother though, there wasn’t much we could do. We were little and thought we were defenseless.
Normally she would antagonize him into it. I never really understood why she did it till later in life. She did it to protect us. If he was hitting her he was less likely to hit us. If he vented all his anger on her, he would have no energy left for us, but we didn’t know that at the time.
So, her beatings were sometimes brutal. He broke her jaw once, she still chews funny today from the hit. She was a large woman and he usually only pounded on her body knowing it wouldn’t leave any marks. But sometimes he forgot and would work her over on the face.
I never understood my mother, why she allowed herself to be beaten. She was stronger woman then a that, at least that is how I perceived her. One particular day we were in the car driving to the farm from one of the places we lived. During that drive, my mother was driving our father was not with us this day, we were behind a car.
Immediately we could tell something was wrong, as the car could not stay on the road, it kept swerving off the road and back on, swerving into traffic then back. We thought the driver was drunk, and he may well have been but that wasn’t what we were watching.
We were watching his passenger. He was grabbing her hair and pulling her down on the seat then he would repeatedly beat her with his free arm as he drove causing the swerving. This went on for miles and miles. Finally my mother stopped our car to call the police at a pay phone, she hurriedly tried to tell them what was happening. The car we were following had stopped by the side of the road and we were now ahead of it at the phone. My mother came back and we simply left.
The police informed her they were aware of the situation and could do nothing unless the woman called them herself, and this we did not understand. Why didn’t the woman call the police then we all saw our situation and understood. We were silent the rest of the way to the farm.
As we grew older, he would take us hunting with him. One occasion I had the desire that I might have a hunting accident, and I believe he knew my thought. He looked at me, and walked away. Then he tried to claim there was an animal on the other side of him, and that I should shoot it. If I took the shot, I could certainly have hit him, and it would have looked normal, and he knew that.
I don’t know if he wanted me to kill him or if he was taunting me. I don’t know to this day. Maybe he hoped I would have shot him. Maybe he wanted it to end as well. I don't know. He played those kind of mind games on us often. He would test us to see if we were willing to carry out our thoughts.
My mother left him many times, but she always let him back in. I have no idea why she let him back in. He was a good talker I suppose sweet as honey when he was sober. But those sober times were so few.
The story goes that she met him thorough his brother. My mother was 14 when she dated his older brother. His older brother was a James Dean kind of guy. One night he died when he was running from the local police, and crashed his car. The tree he hit still exists and still has the scar in it. We used to go see it from time to time with our mother. She would driver there and look at the tree and cry to herself. She tried to be silent but we always knew when she was crying.
So, one thing led to another and my mother then dated my father. She became pregnant at 15, and they married. Her life was a mess ever since. I am sure there are a hundred reasons she stayed with him and always let him back in, but I don’t know what they are. My mother will not talk about these things with us.
During these years, my mother tried to work from time to time. She would have to try to find night work as we were too young to all be left home alone. So she would leave for factory work once he was home.
On some of these occasions his anger would boil over and he would become violent. Something that did not register with me at the time, but did later in life was his words. As the beating began, he would use very careful words, like bastard child, imbecile, and stuff like that. It didn’t occur at the time that these words had a meaning, but later in life I was to discover the truth to those words.
So, we moved a lot, and we went back to the Farm quite often. Sometimes we would stay at the farm for a year, but many times less. There were a few very rare moments when he wasn't drinking and life seemed normal. But those moments were short, he would fall back to drinking and we would move again. His drink of choice was always beer though. Lots and lots of beer.
To this day not one of my siblings drinks beer. I do sometimes but not for drinking to get drunk. Funny thing how none of seven turned to drink, and none of us drink today.
Once my oldest brother finally left the house he joined the Army, we basically were left o fend for ourselves. My sister married and moved out as well. That left my next older brother and I to try to defend the little one. It was a hard task. My mother worked more, and mostly during the days now.
If he saw us when he came home he would make us leave his sight, so we typically were someplace else when he got home. That angered him as well though. If he didn’t have someone immediately available to punish he would get angry and take it out on my mother once she came through the door.
We learned to hide when he came home, and sneak back in the house after he passed out. My brother and I finally had enough we could not live at home while he was home and we schemed to run away to flee someplace and not have to live there anymore.
I discovered drugs at an early age as my cousin introduced me to them. Not that I didn’t smoke it, I did, but never to excess and not often at all. Mostly I did it enough so the crowd I hung with thought I did and thought I was one of them. Most of the time I had a small stash that I kept with me for appearance sake and nothing more.
There was an impromptu locker inspection at School one day they simply opened lockers and rummaged through them and through our coats. They found my stash. My teacher for some reason informed me that the search was illegal and they couldn’t do anything, so when I went to the office I informed the Principle of this. He dismissed me but said I would see him later.
Later came and he said I was to be let go for two reasons, One, the shop teacher talked out of turn, and for some reason this let me off the hook, and Second, he called my mother and she told him that there were some developing issues at home, and pleased with him to drop the issue.
When he mentioned he called my mother I was completely taken off guard, for some reason I did not think this would involve her. My mother never interacted with the School, well maybe once or twice. My next concern was what was this developing situation? I was anxious to get home though I knew I would incur the wrath of my mother at the same time intrigued what she would have said to cause the Principle to drop the issue.
When the bus dropped us off my mother was already home, waiting for us and I thought I was in for it good. My heart sank at the thought that I caused her more grief she had enough grief in her life. However she asked my brother and I to sit she had something to tell us, and she said she needed our help. She never asked us for help we were greatly concerned.
What she told us made us want to cry with relief and sadness all at once. We had overwhelming happiness and excitement, and I thought I would bust. She said something I waited most of my life to hear, and when it came I was not prepared. She said we were leaving. Leaving the monster behind we were going to move out and run and hide for a time. She said she had it all worked out and needed our cooperation and help to pull it off. These words were a new life. A new world a hope, the feeling of despair removed for the first time since I can remember.
Her plan sounded reasonable and she did have most of the details worked out. Looking back her plan wasn’t the best and there were flaws and we should have seen the biggest flaw but we were too overjoyed to see. She said she was fixing up the mobile home and moving it north. Only about 15 miles north to a trailer park she already put in a deposit. She needed our help to do some repairs to the place after School. And she needed us to keep our mouths shut until the time came.
So for the next week or two my older brother and I took the bus to the farm and worked on the trailer with our grandfather. We had to shore up the roof as it had collapsed from snow the year or two before. Our father was told we were simply helping out on the farm after school, not really a lie I suppose. He didn’t care, we were out from under his feet was his only thought.
The plan was to get the trailer ready and get it moved north to the park.. Get everything set up and then we could simply move out one day. What we didn’t know was how would we do this without him knowing. We didn’t know he had plans to go on a fishing trip with his brothers but my mother did.
When he came home he saw we were all gone he must have gone nuts, at least that’s what we told ourselves he would do. We didn’t know what he actually did was nothing but make a plan. He knew one thing about my mother. He knew she would eventually visit the farm. So unbeknownst to us, he set up shop in the woods across the fields across from the farm. He would sit in the woods day in and day out drinking and smoking. He knew she would visit the farm eventually and he had nothing but time on his hands as he quit work for his new task.
Finally one day sure enough my mother came to the farm. All he had to do now was follow her home when she left, and sure enough he did. He followed her to the new location. Without any thought he walked into the trailer and sat down. No knocking nothing simply walked in and sat down like he lived there all along.
I was dumbfounded. Instead of fighting, my mother simply sat down and cried. He held her and cried with her. I stood there absolutely dumbfounded having no idea what I was supposed to do. I left the trailer.
My brother was old enough and he himself had moved out by this time. He moved in with an older woman, and when I say older, she was 40 or 50 years of age. She had children at home my brothers age. He met her at Church she was a divorced woman and the Church organist.
I didn’t go back, I walked 30 miles to the farm and moved in. I called my mother and told her I was staying at the farm and going back to school there. I would not move back home as long as "he" was there. I had had enough, and feared for my life or his. I would surely kill the man if I stayed there. My heart was black and filled with hatred. I felt betrayed by my mother as well.
There I stayed for a while, on the farm. There I somehow found my way to my childhood church, and to the new Pastor there. There I joined youth group and looked for a way to rid myself of the anger and hatred I was holding.
One day I woke with pain in my stomach. The pain turned out to be a burst appendix, so I went to the Hospital and had it removed. This rendered me useless to my grandmother for a time. She said if I was of no of use to her I could not stay on the farm. I had to leave. I didn’t want to go to my mothers, I had no choice.
We’ll what else could I do, but move back in with my mother. As it turned out she was only to stay there for another year or so until she rented an apartment in town. My sister was to come home from Virginia and move into the trailer with her husband but that wasn’t for a year or so yet.
The next two years were fairly smooth. I spent little if any time at home giving me ample opportunity to find trouble. How I was able to stay away from the law I am not sure I think I had a built in boundary someplace. I seemed to know when something was over the top and when I should stop and move on. This instinct kept me away from the law for the most part.
That first year though my parents split again, and I ended up living with my father for a short time. I did that so I that first year I didn’t have to change Schools I wanted to stay in the School I was in and try to finish there
When I left the states by joining the Army, I closed the door on my father as well. I shut him out completely, I pretended he died. However, when I came home from Germany four years later, he was there to be dealt with yet again. He had been arrested a few timed for various things, and was now living with one of my cousins.
He had an argument with my cousin, so my cousin being the coke head he was, turned him in for parole violation, and told us to get him out. The man had changed, but now he looked like a wasted human. He lost his build and was beginning to look frail.
I went to his apartment with one of my brothers, and we packed up his stuff. Being that he violated probation, he had to go to jail for 30 days, mandatory. So we were to bring him to the county lock up the next day. But that night he had no place to stay so he stayed at my apt with my new wife.
She didn’t want him in the house neither did I My brother refused to let him stay at his house, so I had no choice. He slept on the couch and neither my wife nor I got any sleep that night. In the morning I drove him to jail, and out of my life forever. I learned that day the vengeance of a smitten German woman.
When I dropped him at the gate he never said a word to me. He did not look at me nor speak, he left the car and walked up to the front door, and that was it. He didn’t say bye, he didn’t say so long, nadda nothing. I drove away as cold as ice.
From that day on I had a rule in my house. His name was never to be mentioned nor was he ever to be discussed. He was dead as far as I cared. If one of my brothers wanted to speak about him, he would have to leave my house, under no circumstances was he ever to be acknowledged to exist.
So, when I got the phone call that night I was cold. My heart was like steel, I looked at the body, and had no feeling whatsoever. I wanted to shoot or stab the body to be sure he was in fact dead and not pulling off some game. I had to go outside the urge was so great to hit him, and I knew if I hit him, I would not stop.
He had nothing when he died. He received a Social Security check once a month and lived in a sleaze hotel. He rented a room there. We went there the next day to clean it out, and it was a pig sty Dirt filth and no clean clothes. Beer cans covered the floor and piled up the walls. We put everything in bags and took what little there was to the dump. My sister looked thorough some stuff to see if there were papers or anything. There was nothing.
We had to fight with Social Services to bury him. They wanted us to foot the bill, the final insult of insults. His last stab at us. But after much haggling Social Services conceded and they buried him. It was a battle we all felt we weren't going to lose. He wasn't going to stick us like that.
I am still waiting. Still waiting for something to feel. To feel like he is dead. Some emotion some feeling of some sort. So far nothing, I have nothing for him at all. I can only see the monster, the tormentor, the abuser, and the wife and child beater. I can not find any good moments. I cannot find a father or a man.
The phone rang at about 11:30 pm, and I was loath to answer it. Who could be calling me in the middle of the night, how dare they. I mean, 11:30, don't they realize what time it is!
My brother says 'hey" in his usual gruff grumbly voice. He sounds very serious though, so I sit up in bed, and ask what's up. He knows better than to call after 9:00 p.m. So I know something is going on.
He makes one comment "dad died". All I could say at the moment was “huh, what do ya know. I thought he was dead years ago”. He wants to know if I want to come down to the Hospital to see the body before the Coroner takes it away. I say ”no, I will not, and I have to go now, so I will talk to you in the morning”, and say bye.
I tried to lay back down but could not. I got up and tried to shut my screaming mind down but it would not. I was confused. I had counted the man dead 15 years earlier in my mind, and this didn’t compute for me. If he was already dead to me, then why am I having these feelings now that the news has come that he is actually dead and how am I going to deal with this.
So, I get dressed and go down to the Hospital. Most of my brothers are there, as are his two remaining brothers and one of his sisters. His other sister lives out in Boston or thereabouts. I needed to see the man dead to actually believe he was in fact dead. So I went into the little room they had there, and saw him lying on the bed there.
They said he died suddenly of massive heart failure, and fell on is face on the ground outside his door. So, his face had some blood and damage there. It still looked like him after all these years. He was much more gaunt and frail looking than I had expected though.
I then went outside and stood with my brothers and smoked a cigarette. There we were, the four oldest boys standing outside a Hospital together and smoking cigarettes and no idea what to do. Like little kids again being helpless and lost. One of the boys started talking about how he saw him just last week, our father had given him a shotgun as if he knew he wouldn’t need it anymore.
Then the others chimed in and it started to be some sort of recollection party and I was getting more an more uncomfortable by the minute. I didn’t know any of them knew where he lived let alone were speaking to him or seeing him it was quite revelation for me. I was still holding too much hatred for the man, and was not yet willing to let it go.
After some time listening to them I had to leave as one of his youngest brother came out to stand with us, and was crying. He was going on about what a loss it is, and then his wife came out as well and was telling us how great the man was. I couldn’t hear it it it was all so much hypocrisy, so I got in my car and went home.
That night I did not sleep, I was in turmoil. Did he die penniless and who will foot the bill. Did he give us one more jab before leaving, and where will he be buried and should I even go to the funeral I did not want to. This went on all night and finally sometime in the early morning I fell asleep.
My first memory of my father goes way back. Back before my mother says I can remember, but I think she is wrong as the memory stands vivid and clear. Sometimes when I think it isn’t a memory but something I was told I think is a memory it comes back and the details are too strong to have been anything else.
There we are living on the farm for whatever reason, and he pulls in the driveway after having been gone for weeks. I run as fast as I can outside to greet him as he gets out of the car and I want him to pick me up. Instead he pushes me aside and gives me an extra little shove and I lean into the pricker bushes along the walkway and scratch myself. He moves on and goes into the house leaving me standing there crying silently.
Growing up, our father was not a family father as one might expect. I know, there are many fathers out there who are bad people, and I understand that. However, this one was mine, and it was whom we had to live with. He was a drunk his whole life or at least during all the years I knew him.
Oh, not just any drunk, but one of those drunks that when drunk become evil beasts. They hit kick and destroy everything around them. He was an ugly drunk.
A side effect of his drinking was that we got to move quite often. We moved because he would inevitably lose his job. Eventually the employer would no longer tolerate his arriving late, or simply not arriving at all, and fire him. So we would move on to the next town while he tried to find work again. Many mornings we would hear my mother screaming at him to get up. She would berate him until the inevitable hitting or shouting back at her to shut up.
And when he did find work, he usually spent the money on beer and cigarettes. He would come home with only a few dollars left in his pocket and my mother would go nuts. The usual crap, like, "how am I going to buy groceries" and or "how am I going to pay the rent" little things like that. So we moved quite often due to being evicted as well.
As the years went by, we became used to moving suddenly. We learned to not make friends because we could not get to know them, and if we did, we would lose them. We turned to each other for friendship and the like. We even became used to the beating, our mother, and ourselves received on a regular basis..
Though he didn’t usually hit us so much as he hit our mother, he would find small ways for his pleasure. He would come home drunk of course, and decide there were way to many toys laying about the yard. So he would methodically pick them all up and put them in the car and drive off. I mean all. He would work very hard to be sure that there wasn’t one single item missed. We eventually learned to hide toys in the woods and surrounding area's.
He would return hours later and they would all be gone. Same usually went for the cats and dogs. He would put them in the car drive off, and return without them. Sometimes though he took a shotgun with him, and we pretty much knew the fate of the animal. We came to believe we would eventually be driven off and not return. On one particular cold winter evening he didn’t like whatever the cat was doing. Most likely the cat was walking on the counters as they often did, as cats will do.
It was an all white Persian like cat, very fluffy and belonged to my oldest brother. My father picked up the cat and opened the trailer door and threw it like one would a football into a deep snow bank. We were all to scared to say or do anything at all, we ourselves being frozen to inaction.
After he left for work in the morning my oddest brother ran for the door to call for the cat. Not responding we all got dressed and went out to look for the cat knowing it was a very cold night and fearing for its safety. We need’nt have feared, it was right there in the snow bank exactly where it landed. Its fur was all pushed back and eyes open and it was quite solid. It died as soon as it went into the snow bank.
Another time one of the dogs for some reason got a hold of another of the cats, again a white Persian like cat, and chewed on it ripping out its innards. When our father came home and saw the results he simply put the dog in the car and drove. He came back home many hours minus the dog. I believe he got pleasure out of destroying the animals.
Many times we would get in the car with him, and literally crouch on the floor trying to hide for fear if he noticed we were in the car, he would dispose of us as well. We knew this might happen not just from the toys and animals, but he would remind us periodically that he was in fact going to do this to us.
He drove like he was possessed, and never without a six pack to get him started. He would drive fast and not slow down for the turns in the roads, the speed was steady and the car would screech around turns. As he consumed the beer he would open his window and throw then out over the roof to toss them to the passenger side bushes many time missing and the can or bottle would bounce across the roof. Sometimes he would try to hit the road sign, and he did succeed once in a great while.
One day he arrived home with a new truck. We'll it wasn’t new, it was new to us. He sold the station wagon, and decided a flatbed truck would be a better family vehicle for two adults and five children at the time. Yea, very comfy riding around in that.
We would all pile in and try to be comfortable and end up fighting. Some of us had to sit on others laps there was no way around it. Usually the smaller kids sat on the older kids laps and that didn’t go over too well. A good backhand generally settled any disputes quickly.
When he hit us we almost welcomed it, because if he was venting and hitting we knew we were safe from the "road trip". When he hit our mother though, there wasn’t much we could do. We were little and thought we were defenseless.
Normally she would antagonize him into it. I never really understood why she did it till later in life. She did it to protect us. If he was hitting her he was less likely to hit us. If he vented all his anger on her, he would have no energy left for us, but we didn’t know that at the time.
So, her beatings were sometimes brutal. He broke her jaw once, she still chews funny today from the hit. She was a large woman and he usually only pounded on her body knowing it wouldn’t leave any marks. But sometimes he forgot and would work her over on the face.
I never understood my mother, why she allowed herself to be beaten. She was stronger woman then a that, at least that is how I perceived her. One particular day we were in the car driving to the farm from one of the places we lived. During that drive, my mother was driving our father was not with us this day, we were behind a car.
Immediately we could tell something was wrong, as the car could not stay on the road, it kept swerving off the road and back on, swerving into traffic then back. We thought the driver was drunk, and he may well have been but that wasn’t what we were watching.
We were watching his passenger. He was grabbing her hair and pulling her down on the seat then he would repeatedly beat her with his free arm as he drove causing the swerving. This went on for miles and miles. Finally my mother stopped our car to call the police at a pay phone, she hurriedly tried to tell them what was happening. The car we were following had stopped by the side of the road and we were now ahead of it at the phone. My mother came back and we simply left.
The police informed her they were aware of the situation and could do nothing unless the woman called them herself, and this we did not understand. Why didn’t the woman call the police then we all saw our situation and understood. We were silent the rest of the way to the farm.
As we grew older, he would take us hunting with him. One occasion I had the desire that I might have a hunting accident, and I believe he knew my thought. He looked at me, and walked away. Then he tried to claim there was an animal on the other side of him, and that I should shoot it. If I took the shot, I could certainly have hit him, and it would have looked normal, and he knew that.
I don’t know if he wanted me to kill him or if he was taunting me. I don’t know to this day. Maybe he hoped I would have shot him. Maybe he wanted it to end as well. I don't know. He played those kind of mind games on us often. He would test us to see if we were willing to carry out our thoughts.
My mother left him many times, but she always let him back in. I have no idea why she let him back in. He was a good talker I suppose sweet as honey when he was sober. But those sober times were so few.
The story goes that she met him thorough his brother. My mother was 14 when she dated his older brother. His older brother was a James Dean kind of guy. One night he died when he was running from the local police, and crashed his car. The tree he hit still exists and still has the scar in it. We used to go see it from time to time with our mother. She would driver there and look at the tree and cry to herself. She tried to be silent but we always knew when she was crying.
So, one thing led to another and my mother then dated my father. She became pregnant at 15, and they married. Her life was a mess ever since. I am sure there are a hundred reasons she stayed with him and always let him back in, but I don’t know what they are. My mother will not talk about these things with us.
During these years, my mother tried to work from time to time. She would have to try to find night work as we were too young to all be left home alone. So she would leave for factory work once he was home.
On some of these occasions his anger would boil over and he would become violent. Something that did not register with me at the time, but did later in life was his words. As the beating began, he would use very careful words, like bastard child, imbecile, and stuff like that. It didn’t occur at the time that these words had a meaning, but later in life I was to discover the truth to those words.
So, we moved a lot, and we went back to the Farm quite often. Sometimes we would stay at the farm for a year, but many times less. There were a few very rare moments when he wasn't drinking and life seemed normal. But those moments were short, he would fall back to drinking and we would move again. His drink of choice was always beer though. Lots and lots of beer.
To this day not one of my siblings drinks beer. I do sometimes but not for drinking to get drunk. Funny thing how none of seven turned to drink, and none of us drink today.
Once my oldest brother finally left the house he joined the Army, we basically were left o fend for ourselves. My sister married and moved out as well. That left my next older brother and I to try to defend the little one. It was a hard task. My mother worked more, and mostly during the days now.
If he saw us when he came home he would make us leave his sight, so we typically were someplace else when he got home. That angered him as well though. If he didn’t have someone immediately available to punish he would get angry and take it out on my mother once she came through the door.
We learned to hide when he came home, and sneak back in the house after he passed out. My brother and I finally had enough we could not live at home while he was home and we schemed to run away to flee someplace and not have to live there anymore.
I discovered drugs at an early age as my cousin introduced me to them. Not that I didn’t smoke it, I did, but never to excess and not often at all. Mostly I did it enough so the crowd I hung with thought I did and thought I was one of them. Most of the time I had a small stash that I kept with me for appearance sake and nothing more.
There was an impromptu locker inspection at School one day they simply opened lockers and rummaged through them and through our coats. They found my stash. My teacher for some reason informed me that the search was illegal and they couldn’t do anything, so when I went to the office I informed the Principle of this. He dismissed me but said I would see him later.
Later came and he said I was to be let go for two reasons, One, the shop teacher talked out of turn, and for some reason this let me off the hook, and Second, he called my mother and she told him that there were some developing issues at home, and pleased with him to drop the issue.
When he mentioned he called my mother I was completely taken off guard, for some reason I did not think this would involve her. My mother never interacted with the School, well maybe once or twice. My next concern was what was this developing situation? I was anxious to get home though I knew I would incur the wrath of my mother at the same time intrigued what she would have said to cause the Principle to drop the issue.
When the bus dropped us off my mother was already home, waiting for us and I thought I was in for it good. My heart sank at the thought that I caused her more grief she had enough grief in her life. However she asked my brother and I to sit she had something to tell us, and she said she needed our help. She never asked us for help we were greatly concerned.
What she told us made us want to cry with relief and sadness all at once. We had overwhelming happiness and excitement, and I thought I would bust. She said something I waited most of my life to hear, and when it came I was not prepared. She said we were leaving. Leaving the monster behind we were going to move out and run and hide for a time. She said she had it all worked out and needed our cooperation and help to pull it off. These words were a new life. A new world a hope, the feeling of despair removed for the first time since I can remember.
Her plan sounded reasonable and she did have most of the details worked out. Looking back her plan wasn’t the best and there were flaws and we should have seen the biggest flaw but we were too overjoyed to see. She said she was fixing up the mobile home and moving it north. Only about 15 miles north to a trailer park she already put in a deposit. She needed our help to do some repairs to the place after School. And she needed us to keep our mouths shut until the time came.
So for the next week or two my older brother and I took the bus to the farm and worked on the trailer with our grandfather. We had to shore up the roof as it had collapsed from snow the year or two before. Our father was told we were simply helping out on the farm after school, not really a lie I suppose. He didn’t care, we were out from under his feet was his only thought.
The plan was to get the trailer ready and get it moved north to the park.. Get everything set up and then we could simply move out one day. What we didn’t know was how would we do this without him knowing. We didn’t know he had plans to go on a fishing trip with his brothers but my mother did.
When he came home he saw we were all gone he must have gone nuts, at least that’s what we told ourselves he would do. We didn’t know what he actually did was nothing but make a plan. He knew one thing about my mother. He knew she would eventually visit the farm. So unbeknownst to us, he set up shop in the woods across the fields across from the farm. He would sit in the woods day in and day out drinking and smoking. He knew she would visit the farm eventually and he had nothing but time on his hands as he quit work for his new task.
Finally one day sure enough my mother came to the farm. All he had to do now was follow her home when she left, and sure enough he did. He followed her to the new location. Without any thought he walked into the trailer and sat down. No knocking nothing simply walked in and sat down like he lived there all along.
I was dumbfounded. Instead of fighting, my mother simply sat down and cried. He held her and cried with her. I stood there absolutely dumbfounded having no idea what I was supposed to do. I left the trailer.
My brother was old enough and he himself had moved out by this time. He moved in with an older woman, and when I say older, she was 40 or 50 years of age. She had children at home my brothers age. He met her at Church she was a divorced woman and the Church organist.
I didn’t go back, I walked 30 miles to the farm and moved in. I called my mother and told her I was staying at the farm and going back to school there. I would not move back home as long as "he" was there. I had had enough, and feared for my life or his. I would surely kill the man if I stayed there. My heart was black and filled with hatred. I felt betrayed by my mother as well.
There I stayed for a while, on the farm. There I somehow found my way to my childhood church, and to the new Pastor there. There I joined youth group and looked for a way to rid myself of the anger and hatred I was holding.
One day I woke with pain in my stomach. The pain turned out to be a burst appendix, so I went to the Hospital and had it removed. This rendered me useless to my grandmother for a time. She said if I was of no of use to her I could not stay on the farm. I had to leave. I didn’t want to go to my mothers, I had no choice.
We’ll what else could I do, but move back in with my mother. As it turned out she was only to stay there for another year or so until she rented an apartment in town. My sister was to come home from Virginia and move into the trailer with her husband but that wasn’t for a year or so yet.
The next two years were fairly smooth. I spent little if any time at home giving me ample opportunity to find trouble. How I was able to stay away from the law I am not sure I think I had a built in boundary someplace. I seemed to know when something was over the top and when I should stop and move on. This instinct kept me away from the law for the most part.
That first year though my parents split again, and I ended up living with my father for a short time. I did that so I that first year I didn’t have to change Schools I wanted to stay in the School I was in and try to finish there
When I left the states by joining the Army, I closed the door on my father as well. I shut him out completely, I pretended he died. However, when I came home from Germany four years later, he was there to be dealt with yet again. He had been arrested a few timed for various things, and was now living with one of my cousins.
He had an argument with my cousin, so my cousin being the coke head he was, turned him in for parole violation, and told us to get him out. The man had changed, but now he looked like a wasted human. He lost his build and was beginning to look frail.
I went to his apartment with one of my brothers, and we packed up his stuff. Being that he violated probation, he had to go to jail for 30 days, mandatory. So we were to bring him to the county lock up the next day. But that night he had no place to stay so he stayed at my apt with my new wife.
She didn’t want him in the house neither did I My brother refused to let him stay at his house, so I had no choice. He slept on the couch and neither my wife nor I got any sleep that night. In the morning I drove him to jail, and out of my life forever. I learned that day the vengeance of a smitten German woman.
When I dropped him at the gate he never said a word to me. He did not look at me nor speak, he left the car and walked up to the front door, and that was it. He didn’t say bye, he didn’t say so long, nadda nothing. I drove away as cold as ice.
From that day on I had a rule in my house. His name was never to be mentioned nor was he ever to be discussed. He was dead as far as I cared. If one of my brothers wanted to speak about him, he would have to leave my house, under no circumstances was he ever to be acknowledged to exist.
So, when I got the phone call that night I was cold. My heart was like steel, I looked at the body, and had no feeling whatsoever. I wanted to shoot or stab the body to be sure he was in fact dead and not pulling off some game. I had to go outside the urge was so great to hit him, and I knew if I hit him, I would not stop.
He had nothing when he died. He received a Social Security check once a month and lived in a sleaze hotel. He rented a room there. We went there the next day to clean it out, and it was a pig sty Dirt filth and no clean clothes. Beer cans covered the floor and piled up the walls. We put everything in bags and took what little there was to the dump. My sister looked thorough some stuff to see if there were papers or anything. There was nothing.
We had to fight with Social Services to bury him. They wanted us to foot the bill, the final insult of insults. His last stab at us. But after much haggling Social Services conceded and they buried him. It was a battle we all felt we weren't going to lose. He wasn't going to stick us like that.
I am still waiting. Still waiting for something to feel. To feel like he is dead. Some emotion some feeling of some sort. So far nothing, I have nothing for him at all. I can only see the monster, the tormentor, the abuser, and the wife and child beater. I can not find any good moments. I cannot find a father or a man.
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