by Chely Wright
I continued to pay close attention to others around me in hopes that I might be able to find someone else like me, but I saw no signs that would lead me to believe that I wasn’t alone. Being a homosexual was not a phase, as I’d hoped it would be.
If there were other girls in Wellsville like me, I didn’t know how to find them. I knew of no books in my school library or our little city library that addressed homosexuality. If they existed, I never would have dared check them out anyway, for fear of someone noticing.
I was a tomboy who liked to go hunting with my dad and play quarterback in tackle football games with my brother and his friends. Chris would always suggest that I be the cheerleader, but when push came to shove, he’d give in because he knew I was just as good as the boys. I recall one time in the front yard of the Old House when some of his friends had come over for a game, and one of the boys cried out, “Oh, no, we’re not letting a girl play!” Chris replied, “My sister’s playing with us—she’s way better than you anyway.”
But I also liked dresses and dolls. Other than the fact that Jeny and I would cut our dolls’ hair with pinking shears and paint their eyelids with fingernail polish, we cared for our babies as if they were live humans.
“House of the Rising Sun”
Loretta, Buck Owens, Tammy Wynette—those Nashville legends were like members of my family. We didn’t have money, but we always had music in our home. My folks declared that our family identity was Country, just as some people identify themselves as Democrats or Republicans. Because of that, I grew up thinking all the music played in our house—including the Beatles, Chuck Berry, and Elvis—had to be country music.
I loved it when my dad would strum his twelve-string acoustic or his Gibson J-45. Like most members of my family, he was self-taught, but he was one of the steadiest rhythm guitar players around. Mom sang and kept a three-ring binder full of handwritten lyrics to her favorite songs that she’d had longer than she’d had me. While she took the melody, Dad would sing on the choruses and try to do a little harmony. I’d join in to help him out, and he’d smile and say, “That sounds good, Squirrelly!” I could also sense my mom’s pride in my singing ability. I don’t think my folks were ever happier than at times like those, and neither was I.
On Saturday nights at our house, we’d often have a pickin’ party. A dozen people would cram into the TV room singing Hank Williams, Sr., and Tom T. Hall, the cigarette smoke hanging above them like a cloud. I was the only kid interested in being where the adults and the music were. I hated the smoke, but I was drawn to the songs and camaraderie in that room. I started playing piano at four years old—lessons were an extravagance my parents somehow managed to pay for—and I loved it when the grown-ups would invite me to take part in those jam sessions. The first time I had the chance to sing a solo, I was around six, and I belted out the tune “House of the Rising Sun.” I have no idea why I settled on the 1964 pop hit by the Animals, but my dad played it on guitar and I thought it would sound good to play the piano along with him while I sang. I walked over to the Henry F. Miller console piano that sat against the wall, opened it up, and wailed out the blues classic about a lost soul abandoned in a New Orleans brothel.
When it came to the piano, my fingers just seemed to know where to go. At the time I sang “House of the Rising Sun,” most of the songs that I knew had three chords, sometimes four, but that tune has five or six. The progression started out in a minor chord and that would set the musical tone for the entire song. I loved how dramatic those chords felt, and I was proud that I needed all ten of my fingers to play the arrangement that I’d constructed. I gave myself over to the lyrics and relished how good the words felt in my throat, letting the somber melody float on top of those beautiful chords. It makes me laugh when I remember myself as a Kansas farm girl singing the blues to a room full of my elders. Still, I sang with total conviction. I already knew being a singer was my destiny.
Bullies
I loved pencils, Big Chief paper, new Crayolas, and school lunch. Before I was old enough to start kindergarten, I’d get up in the mornings with Chris and Jeny and follow them around the house as they prepared for their days of scholastic adventure. I wanted to go to school so badly, and it was torture for me to be left behind. I persuaded my mom to help me stay up to speed with them, so she’d spend time with me each day on schoolwork. I was able to read and write before I started kindergarten, and I think that’s one of the reasons I went on to do well in school.
My pursuit of being a model pupil went smoothly for me until fourth grade. My teacher was Mrs. Lawyer and I was not only her student but her papergirl as well. That was the year I learned that some people are just plain mean.
There was a girl in my class that I was afraid of. It was better to be her friend than not. At the beginning of the school year, Jane had been my friend.
There was another girl in our class named Cecilia. She had always had a rough time in school, and fourth grade may have been the zenith of her misery. For some reason, Jane locked in on Cecilia and did her best to make her life hell. Jane took a small plastic box that held each student’s lunch ticket out of Mrs. Lawyer’s desk and kept it until Mrs. Lawyer noticed that it was missing. Once Mrs. Lawyer realized that the box was missing, she questioned the class; no one seemed to know anything about it. A couple of lunch-ticketless days went by, and it became a big deal in our grade school world. We’d all been interrogated, and at that point the issue became less about the box and more about the fact that someone had stolen it and was lying.
Then on the third day, during recess, Jane said to me, “Come on, come with me back to the classroom for a minute.” She opened her desk and there was the box. I screamed out, “Oh, wow, you found it!” With a determined look on her face, she grabbed my hair, twisted it hard, and told me that I’d better shut my mouth. Then Jane took the box over to Cecilia’s desk, lifted the top, and shoved it in. We went back to the playground, and I had to work hard to fight back the tears.
I have no idea how Jane got her information, but the minute we got back from recess, Mrs. Lawyer and another teacher informed us that our desks were to be searched immediately. They found what they were looking for in Cecilia’s desk, and she was in big trouble.
I’m not certain how long I wrestled with what I knew, but it was eating me alive. I kept trying to get up the nerve to tell on Jane, who was a charismatic leader and could get most anyone to do anything, while convincing them to abandon all judgment and fear of consequences.
I asked Mrs. Lawyer one morning, right before the bell rang, if I could talk to her, and of course she said yes. At some point during the day she put down her chalk on the little metal shelf under the blackboard and said in front of the entire class, “Chely, I need to see you outside.” In my head I was screaming, “What the heck did you do that for? Now Jane will know that I talked to you!” I got up, looked at Jane as if I had no idea why I was being called outside, and walked out the door.
We sat down on the concrete stoop of the building and Mrs. Lawyer said, “You said you needed to talk to me. What do you need to talk to me about?” I said, “Oh, I can’t remember. I forgot.” To which she sarcastically replied, “Oh, okay.” We just sat there for what seemed to be an entire minute, in silence. I asked her if I could go back in and she said, “Nope.” Another few seconds went by, and I just buried my face in my hands and began to sob. She put her arm around my shoulder and asked me if something was wrong at home. I told her no. “Chely, you can tell me anything,” she said, “and I will help you.” I took a deep breath and like a volcano of truth, I erupted. I told her every detail of what Jane had done.
She said that I’d made a good decision in telling her and that it took a lot of courage to do it. I didn’t feel courageous. I felt scared and sick to my stomach. I was so worked up after telling her that she sent me to the principal’s office to lie down for a few minutes to get myself together before coming back to class. She must’ve played it super cool when s
he went back into the room, because I don’t think Jane ever realized that it was I who told on her.
That Christmas, after the holiday break, Cecilia and I were both using the pencil sharpener that was barely clinging to the wall in the back of the classroom when I noticed she had on brand-new tennis shoes and some nice clothes I hadn’t seen before. I told her I really liked her shoes and her pants and asked if she got them for Christmas. She cupped her hand up by my ear and whispered, “Mrs. Lawyer got them for me and two more pair of jeans, but don’t tell anyone, okay?” I said I wouldn’t.
Cecilia was a nice girl and probably would have been a good friend for me to have, but I was too afraid to buddy up with her because she was a target of Jane and her cronies. I knew that she had gotten a raw deal, and I recall thinking that Mrs. Lawyer was like a superhero, righting the wrongs of the universe. I hoped there was a chance that I’d grow up to be a person who did kind things for others.
I had some more difficult times in my last couple of years in elementary school. I was torn between not wanting anyone to notice me and wanting everyone to notice me. I wanted to be the first one up in front of the class for speeches and oral book reports and the first chosen as a teammate for a game of kickball. I lived for the times Mrs. Cramer, our grade school music teacher, let me play the piano and sing a song for everyone in music class, yet I was terrified of being identified as different. I was full of shame, and brimming with confidence all at the same time.
Those were the years that boys and girls started getting crushes and going steady. This was a problem for me. I tried as hard as I could to have a crush on a boy, but it just wasn’t working. I could identify which ones were cute and which ones were cool. I wasn’t stupid—I was just gay. I followed the rules and never got into trouble. That is, until fifth grade.
The girls were fighting with one another over who was getting the attention from the boys. And when a boy paid attention to me, I felt the resentment and jealousy from the other girls. If only they had known I wasn’t interested. My main tormentors were a group of girls led by Jane, who would be my nemesis until the day I left Wellsville.
One day that winter, my entire class went to the school library to check out books. By then, cliques had formed, and I found myself on my own. I was standing by myself in an aisle of books, trying to choose one to take home. Without warning, a contraband snowball hit me like a bullet, right above the left eye. I looked up and saw the shooter: Danielle Green, surrounded by Jane and a gaggle of laughing girls. I will never forget the fury I felt. I lunged toward Danielle—she didn’t even have time to run. I grabbed her with both hands by the throat and tackled her to the ground. I was sitting on her chest, throwing punches at her head and face.
The other kids had gathered around us, and I could hear Mrs. Allendar, the librarian, yelling at us to stop. I didn’t stop, but as I was punching Danielle in the face, I remember telling myself not to hit her as hard as I could. I held back, not wanting to hurt her too much or make her bleed, but wanting those girls to see that I wasn’t going to take it anymore. Mrs. Allendar pulled me off of Danielle just as I began to cry. I hated that I cried; it weakened what I wanted them to hear: that I was not a girl to be messed with.
We were both sent to the principal’s office. Mr. Peterson sent me home with a note to my mom, who knew of the difficult time I was having with those girls. She and my dad held a pretty hard line on school and getting in trouble in school—it wasn’t allowed. However, we kids were told that if we ever got into a fight at school, they better not find out that we’d thrown the first punch. Those were Stan and Cheri’s rules of engagement. This time, I was able to make my parents understand that the snowball was technically the first punch.
My mom handwrote a response on the back of the note that was sent home with me, and I delivered it to my fifth-grade teacher. It said something to the effect of “I read the note and Chely told me what happened. If she was hit in the face with a snowball first, then I’m fine with her hitting Danielle Green. Thank you, Cheri Wright.”
My teacher, Mrs. Raugewitz, read the note and sent me to the office to give it to Mr. Peterson. He read it, sent me back to class, and that was the end of it.
I don’t even think the snowball left a bruise above my eye, but I felt battered. In sixth grade, the bullying continued. That year I started thinking that if I had the right clothes, I might fit in better. I wanted Jordache jeans and Nike tennis shoes so badly, but our family didn’t have enough money to get designer jeans or name-brand tennis shoes; our new clothes typically came from the JCPenney outlet store in Kansas City. Their inventory was factory seconds—pants with crooked seams and pockets sewn on unevenly, sweaters with holes in them. It was embarrassing, but it was the most my family could afford. Maybe if I’d had those Nike tennis shoes, I thought, sixth grade wouldn’t have turned out to be such a disaster.
I was eleven years old and filled with fear that there was something really wrong with me. At that time, I was convinced I was in big trouble with God. As I look at this picture now, I can see the burden in my eyes.
When the popular girls did let me into their circle, I couldn’t enjoy it. When they needed my book smarts or a solid softball or basketball player, I was included. And if they needed a well-spoken model student to make a plea on behalf of my peers to an adult, I was the chosen one. They recognized my strengths, but they also knew my weaknesses: I was sensitive, I was scared, and I was poor.
The playground for the Wellsville Elementary School was directly behind our classroom, and that year a huge new wooden jungle gym was being built right before our eyes. It was to be a couple of stories high, consisting of walkways, ropes, poles, chains, ladders, swings, and tunnels. The building materials were piled up and we played on them. There were huge railroad ties scattered about—the large pieces of wood treated with creosote that support the steel rails of a railroad track. Our class decided to build something of our own until the construction workers needed them for their project. We would use the two-hundred-pound Lincoln Logs to build a cabin.
The stacking part was fun but dangerous—one of us could easily have lost a finger or some toes. Again, we did this on the playground with teachers watching us. I have no idea why we were allowed to do it, but we were.
After about a week, on the day we were to finish the project, there was excitement in the air. We rushed to our work site to slide the last of the ties onto what we called the roof, creating a secure box that could capably house a lion or a bear. The spaces between the ties were only about five or six inches apart, so once the last roof tie was set on, there would be no way out.
I was on the crew to carry the last huge piece of wood to be slid on the top. Josh Miller and I were lifting that final beam. He had come to our school that year and did not fit in, and I suspect he was happy to be included in the project. We were putting on the last piece and the gaggle of girls observing shouted out, “Chely, Josh, get inside of it, and that way you can lift from underneath.” We hopped inside. The girls up on the roof slid it shut. We were trapped. They taunted me from above, then began spitting on us, leaving it on my face, my hands and arms, and in my hair.
The bell rang and everyone took off running to the classroom door. Not only was I angry about being trapped, the taunting, and the spit, but there was no way I was going to be late getting in that line. Without Josh’s assistance, I moved a railroad tie enough to squeeze myself up and out of my cage. My classroom was in an annex just off of the main school building, so it didn’t take long for me to run and get in the line. The girls gathered near the end of the line and laughed at me. I heard Jane say, “Don’t ignore me. I know you can hear me. Turn around when I’m talking to you. Chely is scared. You’re scared!!” I was covered in spit and dirt and was not about to turn around and let them see me cry. Then Jane instructed one of the others to make me turn around.
I continued to focus on the door handle. Then someone shoved me hard from behind. With a movement similar to w
hiplash, I crashed forward into the door handle, hit my chin and lip, and slid down the wall. I didn’t stay down long. I turned around, charged the entire group of girls without a single concern of who my victim would be. I beat one girl and left marks and blood on another.
My mother and Jane’s mother were called to the school for a meeting with Mr. Peterson. Predictably, Jane’s entire demeanor changed and she became submissive and polite to the adults. “Oh, I’m not sure what happened,” she said. “I didn’t see everything. I just saw Chely hitting those girls. I think it was a misunderstanding, but I’m not sure.” Jane’s mother offered my mother her opinion: I was too sensitive, and my mother needed to teach her kids to have a thicker skin. She said, “Chely, what you need to do when someone points out one of your flaws is to pick out a flaw that they have and say that back to them. If they have a big nose, just say, ‘Well, your nose is too big,’ and they’ll stop picking on you. Just point out what’s wrong with them.” She told me that her daughter and the other girls weren’t picking on me—they were just doing what kids do. She turned to my mom and said, “Don’t you think that’s the thing for Chely to do?” “No, I absolutely do not think that I want my daughter to pick out someone’s insecurity or weakness and throw it back in their face. No, that’s not what we’ll be doing.” My mother turned to Mr. Peterson and said, “I’ve got a load of laundry in the washer and I’ve gotta get it hung on the line, so I’m going to go home now.” Mr. Peterson excused us all.