Out of the blue, Don looked at me and said, “You really like Charlie a lot, don’t you?”
I answered, “Yeah, I really do.”
“But you know, Carol, there’s a problem—Charlie is never going to want you,” Don continued.
“Why not?” I asked. I know—I’ll dye my hair blond, I thought to myself. I know how that works. No, I know— I’ll become a cheerleader. Everybody wants cheerleaders.
But Don said, “Carol, you really don’t understand. Charlie is never going to want you because you are deformed.”
I heard it. I believed it. I lived it.
His words struck me. I became a first-grade teacher because I thought that would be a good place for someone with a deformity.
My first year teaching, I had a little girl in my classroom named Felicia. She was the most gorgeous little girl I’d ever seen in my life. One afternoon, we were all working on learning to write our A’s. To a first-grader that means a big fat red pencil, lined green paper and a concentrated effort to move the pencil “all-the-way-around–and-pull-down.” The classroom was very quiet as everyone worked diligently.
I looked over at Felicia as I did so often, and I saw that she was writing with her fingers crossed. I tiptoed over to her, bent down and whispered, “Felicia, why are you writing with your fingers crossed?” This little girl looked up at me with her enormous, beautiful eyes, and she said, “Because, Mrs. Price, I want to be just like you.
” Felicia never saw a deformity, only a specialness she wanted for herself. Every one of us has something we consider to be not okay—to be a deformity. We can consider ourselves deformed or we can see ourselves as special. And that choice will determine how we live our lives.
Carol Price
Little Red Wagons
To be perfectly honest, the first month was blissful. When Jeanne, Julia, Michael—ages six, four and three— and I moved from Missouri to my hometown in northern Illinois the very day of my divorce, I was just happy to find a place where there was no fighting or abuse.
But after the first month, I started missing my old friends and neighbors. I missed our lovely, modern, ranch-style brick home in the suburbs of St. Louis, especially after we’d settled into the 98-year-old white wood-frame house we’d rented, which was all my “post-divorce” income could afford.
In St. Louis we’d had all the comforts: a washer, dryer, dishwasher, TV and car. Now we had none of these. After the first month in our new home, it seemed to me that we’d gone from middle-class comfort to poverty-level panic.
The bedrooms upstairs in our ancient house weren’t even heated, but somehow the children didn’t seem to notice. The linoleum floors, cold on their little feet, simply encouraged them to dress faster in the mornings and to hop into bed quicker in the evenings.
I complained about the cold as the December wind whistled under every window and door in that old frame house. But the children giggled about “the funny air places” and simply snuggled under the heavy quilts Aunt Bernadine brought over the day we moved in.
I was frantic without a TV. “What will we do in the evenings without our favorite shows?” I asked. I felt cheated that the children would miss out on all the Christmas specials. But my three little children were more optimistic and much more creative than I. They pulled out their games and begged me to play Candyl and and Old Maid with them.
We cuddled together on the tattered gray sofa the landlord provided and read picture book after picture book from the public library. At their insistence we played records, sang songs, popped popcorn, created magnificent Tinkertoy towers and played hide-and-go-seek in our rambling old house. The children taught me how to have fun without a TV.
One shivering December day just a week before Christmas, after walking the two miles home from my temporary part-time job at a catalog store, I remembered that the week’s laundry had to be done that evening. I was dead tired from lifting and sorting other people’s Christmas presents and somewhat bitter, knowing that I could barely afford any gifts for my own children.
As soon as I picked up the children from the babysitter’s, I piled four large laundry baskets full of dirty clothes into their little red wagon, and the four of us headed toward the Laundromat three blocks away.
Inside, we had to wait for washing machines and then for people to vacate the folding tables. The sorting, washing, drying and folding took longer than usual.
Jeanne asked, “Did you bring any raisins or crackers, Mommy?”
“No. We’ll have supper as soon as we get home,” I snapped.
Michael’s nose was pressed against the steamy glass window. “Look, Mommy! It’s snowing! Big flakes!”
Julia added, “The street’s all wet. It’s snowing in the air but not on the ground!”
Their excitement only upset me more. As if the cold wasn’t bad enough, now we had snow and slush to contend with. I hadn’t even unpacked the box with their boots and mittens yet.
At last the clean folded laundry was stacked into the laundry baskets and placed two baskets deep in the little red wagon. It was pitch dark outside. Six-thirty already? No wonder they were hungry! We usually ate at five.
The children and I inched our way into the cold winter evening and slipped along the slushy sidewalk. Our procession of three little people, a crabby mother and four baskets of fresh laundry in an old red wagon moved slowly as the frigid wind bit our faces.
We crossed the busy four-lane street at the crosswalk. When we reached the curb, the front wagon wheels slipped on the ice and tipped the wagon over on its side, spilling all the laundry into a slushy black puddle.
“Oh no!” I wailed. “Grab the baskets, Jeanne! Julia, hold the wagon! Get back up on the sidewalk, Michael!”
I slammed the dirty wet clothes back into the baskets.
“I hate this!” I screamed. Angry tears spilled out of my eyes. I hated being poor with no car and no washer or dryer. I hated the weather. I hated being the only parent who claimed responsibility for my three small children. And without a doubt, I really hated the whole blasted Christmas season.
When we reached our house I unlocked the door, threw my purse across the room and stomped off to my bedroom for a good cry.
I sobbed loudly enough for the children to hear. Selfishly, I wanted them to know how miserable I was. Life couldn’t get any worse. The laundry was still dirty, we were all hungry and tired, there was no supper started, and no outlook for a brighter future.
When the tears finally stopped, I sat up and stared at a wooden plaque of Jesus hanging on the wall at the foot of my bed. I’d had that plaque since I was a small child and had carried it with me to every house I’d ever lived in. It showed Jesus with his arms outstretched over the earth, obviously solving the problems of the world.
I kept looking at his face, expecting a miracle. I looked and waited and finally said aloud, “God, can’t you do something to make my life better?”
I desperately wanted an angel on a cloud to come down and rescue me.
But nobody came... except Julia, who peeked in my bedroom door and told me in her tiniest four-year-old voice that she had set the table for supper.
I could hear six-year-old Jeanne in the living room sorting the laundry into two piles, “really dirty, sorta clean, really dirty, sorta clean.”
Three-year-old Michael popped into my room and gave me a picture of the first snow that he had just colored.
And you know what? At that very moment I did see not one, but three angels before me: three little cherubs eternally optimistic, and once again pulling me from gloom and doom into the world of “things will be better tomorrow, Mommy.”
Christmas that year was magical as we surrounded ourselves with a very special kind of love, based on the joy of doing simple things together. One thing’s for sure: Single parenthood was never again as frightening or as depressing as it was the night the laundry fell out of the little red wagon. Those three Christmas angels have kept my spirits buoyed; and even
today, over 20 years later, they continue to fill my heart with the presence of God.
Patricia Lorenz
My Father’s Lessons
My father was one of those old-fashioned country preachers who spouted verses from the pulpit of his little Baptist church and made the listeners tremble in their seats. He could recite whole chapters from John without ever glancing at the Bible clutched in his hand.
One afternoon after school, my father and I drove down an old dirt road to visit one of the elderly ladies of the congregation. I had just received my new third-grade reader. It was my first real hardcover book and I was very proud of it. I had already read one story to my father and was starting another one, when I came to a word that I did not know. I held the book up so Father could see it and asked him what the word was. He mumbled something about not being able to read and drive at the same time, so very slowly I spelled the word: “a-u-t-u-m-n.” My father drove on in silence. Angry, I yelled at him, “Can’t you read?”
My father pulled the car over to the side of the road and turned off the ignition. “No, Cathy, I can’t read,” he whispered softly. “No, I can’t read.” He reached over and took my new book out of my hand. “I can’t read anything in this book,” he said with such pain that even I, an eight year-old child, could feel it.
Very quietly, my father began to talk of his childhood, of the big family that survived by the physical labor of its members. If it was time to harvest the crops, school and books could wait. They had to hoe cotton in the summer and pick it in the fall. In the winter, they had to slaughter and preserve animals. There were many mouths to feed, and everyone had to pull his or her load. To make life even more difficult, my father had two brothers who were handicapped, so the others had to double up and do the work they could not. As a result of his excessive absences from school, my father failed several grades. His motivation to learn evaporated, and at the age of 16, he dropped out.
I will never forget the sorrow in my father’s voice as he told me this story. He seemed so ashamed and saddened to not have been able to help his five children with their lessons in school.
“But Father, how could you read whole chapters of the Bible aloud from the pulpit, without ever missing a word?” I asked. He explained that he memorized the passages that my mother read aloud to him over and over. When I heard that, I loved my father more than ever. He was a remarkable man and it was at that moment that I vowed to teach him how to read.
Whatever lessons my teacher gave me at school, I shared with my father. I taught him the sounds and patterns of language as I learned them. When I read a story at school, I came home and taught my father to read it. When I struggled with a new concept, he struggled along with me. In return, he helped me find mnemonic devices to memorize items that I needed to pass tests. Soon he learned to write simple stories and poems. Then he was able to write quotations and jot down notes that he needed for his sermons. The proudest moment of my life came when my father read the scripture—really read it— for his Sunday sermon.
In 1977 doctors diagnosed my father with terminal lung cancer, and he died nine months later. During those final months, he read the Bible from Genesis through Revelation. His proudest moment was when he closed the Bible, knowing he could read all that was written inside it.
Before my father died, he thanked me for the gift that I had given him. He didn’t realize, however, the gift that he had given me: I knew that just as he was called to be a pastor, I was called to be a reading teacher. Because of my father, I believe that if I can spare one child the heartache and humiliation of illiteracy, my career as a teacher is wholly worthwhile. Thank you, Father.
Cathy Downs
Who to Believe?
My doctors told me I would never walk again. My mother told me I would. I believed my mother.
Wilma Rudolph
Let me tell you about a little girl who was born into a very poor family in a shack in the backwoods of Tennessee. She was the 20th of 22 children, prematurely born and frail. Her survival was doubtful. When she was four years old, she had double pneumonia and scarlet fever—a deadly combination that left her with a paralyzed and useless left leg. She had to wear an iron leg brace. Yet she was fortunate in having a mother who encouraged her.
Well, this mother told her little girl, who was very bright, that despite the brace and leg, she could do whatever she wanted to do with her life. She told her that all she needed to do was to have faith, persistence, courage and an indomitable spirit.
So at nine years of age, the little girl removed the leg brace and took the step the doctors told her she would never take normally. In four years, she developed a rhythmic stride, which was a medical wonder. Then this girl got the notion, the incredible notion, that she would like to be the world’s greatest woman runner. Now, what could she mean—be a runner with a leg like that?
At age 13, she entered a race. She came in last—way, way last. She entered every race in high school, and in every race she came in last. Everyone begged her to quit. However, one day, she came in next to last. And then there came a day when she won a race. From then on, Wilma Rudolph won every race that she entered.
Wilma went to Tennessee State University, where she met a coach named Ed Temple. Coach Temple saw the indomitable spirit of the girl, that she was a believer and that she had great natural talent. He trained her so well that in 1960 she went to the Olympic Games in Rome.
There she was pitted against the greatest woman runner of the day, a German girl named Jutta Heine. Nobody had ever beaten Jutta. But in the 100-meter dash, Wilma Rudolph won. She beat Jutta again in the 200 meters. Wilma had just earned two Olympic gold medals.
Finally came the 400-meter relay. It would be Wilma against Jutta once again. The first two runners on Wilma’s team made perfect hand-offs with the baton. But when the third runner handed the baton to Wilma, she was so excited she dropped it, and Wilma saw Jutta taking off down the track. It was impossible that anybody could catch this fleet and nimble girl. But Wilma did just that! Wilma Rudolph had earned her third Olympic gold medal.
That day she made history as she became the first woman ever to win three gold medals in the same Olympic games. And they’d said she would never walk again...
More Sower’s Seeds
The Marks of Life
My teammates on the United States Disabled Ski Team used to tease me about the size of my chest, joking that my greatest handicap wasn’t my missing leg but my missing cleavage. Little did they know how true that would become. This past year, I found out that for the second time in my life I had cancer, this time in both breasts. I had bilateral mastectomies.
When I heard I’d need the surgery, I didn’t think it would be a big deal. I even told my friends playfully, “I’ll keep you abreast of the situation.” After all, I had lost my leg to my first go-round with cancer at age 12, then gone on to become a world-champion ski racer. All of us on the Disabled Ski Team were missing one set of body parts or another. I saw that a man in a wheelchair can be utterly sexy. That a woman who has no hands can appear not to be missing anything. That wholeness has nothing to do with missing parts and everything to do with spirit. Yet although I knew this, I was surprised to discover how difficult it was to adjust to my new scars.
When they brought me back to consciousness after the surgery, I started to sob and hyperventilate. Suddenly I found that I didn’t want to face the loss of more of my body. I didn’t want chemotherapy again. I didn’t want to be brave and tough and put on a perpetual smiling face. I didn’t ever want to wake up again. My breathing grew so shaky that the anesthesiologist gave me oxygen and then, thankfully, put me back to sleep.
When I was doing hill sprints to prepare for my ski racing— my heart and lungs and leg muscles all on fire—I’d often be hit by the sensation that there were no resources left inside me with which to keep going. Then I’d think about the races ahead—my dream of pushing my potential as far as it could go, the satisfaction of breaking thr
ough my own barriers—and that would get me through the sprints. The same tenacity that served me so well in ski racing helped me survive my second bout with cancer.
After the mastectomies, I knew that one way to get myself going would be to start exercising again, so I headed for the local pool. In the communal shower, I found myself noticing other women’s breasts for the first time in my life. Size-D breasts and size-A breasts, sagging breasts and perky breasts. Suddenly and for the first time, after all these years of missing a leg, I felt acutely self-conscious. I couldn’t bring myself to undress.
I decided it was time to confront myself. That night at home, I took off all my clothes and had a long look at the woman in the mirror. She was androgynous. Take my face—without makeup, it was a cute young boy’s face. My shoulder muscles, arms and hands were powerful and muscular from the crutches. I had no breasts; instead, there were two prominent scars on my chest. I had a sexy flat stomach, a bubble butt and a well-developed thigh from years of ski racing. My right leg ended in another long scar just above the knee.
I discovered that I liked my androgynous body. It fit my personality—my aggressive male side that loves getting dressed in a helmet, arm guards and shin protectors to do battle with the slalom gates, and my gentle female side that longs to have children one day and wants to dress up in a beautiful silk dress, go out to dinner with a lover and then lie back and be slowly undressed by him.
I found that the scars on my chest and my leg were a big deal. They were my marks of life. All of us are scarred by life; it’s just that some of those scars show more clearly than others. Our scars do matter. They tell us that we have lived, that we haven’t hidden from life. When we see our scars plainly, we can find in them, as I did that day, our own unique beauty.
The next time I went to the pool I showered naked.
Diana Golden
Soaring Free
It is not easy to find happiness in ourselves, and impossible to find it elsewhere.
Chicken Soup for the Woman's Soul Page 9