Finding My Thunder

by Diane Munier

  And I was humbled. And I lost any sense of being alone. And I knew, sitting there in Temple, letting their brown hands, calloused hands with nails done sometimes, with sweet smelling lotion, with rings or with nothing, just hands that gripped mine, and pats and kisses and hugs and whoops of joy, what I knew as they prayed over me and around me and we were undone together, and we had cried and celebrated, it wasn't anything I would go through that mattered more than how I reacted to it.

  Reaction was always a choice. Reaction was always my power.

  I hear you God…and Dr. King…and Jesus…and Naomi…and all of those great lovers who shared their stories and their pain. I heard.

  The greatest of these..is love.

  Finding My Thunder 52

  We had Thanksgiving at the Temple and it was always a three turkey deal, white gravy, brown gravy, grits and cornbread stuffing, greens and corn, and corn pudding and noodles, and biscuits and cauliflower, and green beans and mashed potatoes and sweet potatoes, and Jello salad every color of the rainbow, and peach, pumpkin, and cherry pie. Soul food table, long on fat and flavor, so good your eyes would water, and your mouth surely would. And Derrick, a black intellectual now, formidable and familiar, amused and saddened by my fat stomach, understanding and judgmental.

  We hugged and I gave him an extra pat. "They still got the fist, I see," he said laughing. "Yeah, and the bird with the cocky eye."

  "My mother tell you I just got back from Africa?" he said.

  "Like we wouldn't know?" I said. "Who you think prayed you home?"

  He laughed.

  "And I guess you heard about all my adventures," I said.

  "You're always the biggest news," he said.

  "Yes, the mental ward is hard to beat for sensationalism," I said.

  "Looks like the Christ child will be here soon."

  "I suppose it must come out," I conceded. He asked if he could feel my stomach and I agreed. He got a kick against his hand, which in Africa was akin to an elephant sighting, he informed me. So it was good to see him. He'd made me laugh and feel somewhat normal.

  Well, I could almost hide my pregnancy right up to the end, least-ways I didn't look ready to birth at nine months, but seeing as I spent so much of it in my bathrobe in the hospital, I didn't have to worry about how big I got, or finding clothes.

  I sat up late in Naomi's recliner with my stomach hurting. When it didn't go away, I stayed upright dozing and waking miserably. As I waited that out, I ended up hurting worse than ever. Naomi got up to check on me and she said, "We need to get ourselves to Corning."

  "This can't be it," I said all panicked. I didn't want to go back to the hospital, and I didn't want to give birth. I was only seventeen. Wasn't I supposed to be at a sock hop or something? I didn't want to be the girl in that Red Cross movie we'd all screamed at.

  I wanted Danny. If I could just touch him, just feel his skin, his hair in my hands, I could go through anything. I didn't let it well up, not ever, I carried it in me, but I didn't let it talk to me or move around, and now this baby…well I couldn't imagine it. I couldn't imagine it. I wanted Danny. I was tired of waiting…I wanted him. Right now. "I want Danny," I moaned.

  And Sukey…fuck Sukey. I hoped Danny killed him and brought me his pecker in a Cracker Jack box. "Oh God," I said doubling over with pain. "This is the curse," I yelled.

  "It's not," Naomi said, sounding more lame than I ever knew she could. "It's…a great blessing." She patted my back and that had to stop right now.

  "I ain't going to that hospital. I ain't gonna do it," I said to her wild.

  "This is a heck of a time to tell me this," she said back.

  "Get Sister Debra. You and Debra can bring this baby in. No one else. You've done it before. You've told me. Get all the sisters, I don't even care. They can get it out. They can pray it out."

  "Hilly, listen to me…you are more like your mama than you even know. Now you listen here…you are going to get up off that chair…"

  "I ain't gonna get up. Not this time. I am hanging on right where I am…," I howled as another pain hit. "How bad does this get?"

  She didn't answer. Then, she didn't know. Not firsthand.

  "I ain't going to Corning and putting up with all their looks…oh the unwed mother, the one went crazy…and look at her poor baby…we know what this is…I ain't going."

  "Do I have to call officer Bixby? Is that what I must do?'

  "Go on. I'll strip down naked and sit here and wait for him." Then another cramp hit and I was doubled over again. "Oh crap," I said, panting as it left off squeezing me.

  "You are not giving birth in that recliner. I'm calling an ambulance."

  "Naomi…you better listen…I am having this child…in this house. Now get some help on the phone cause," I got on my feet and a big gush of water came out like I'd peed my pants. "What in the world?" I said.

  "Your water broke!"

  "What water? My bladder?"

  "The embryonic fluid," she said. "Didn't you read that book?"

  I hadn't. I meant to…but I hadn't.

  My goal was to make it back to my bed, her bed, Eugene's bed. And I gathered my wet Thanksgiving dress in a bunch in front of me and went in the bathroom. I changed out of it in there, cleaned myself up best I could and put my soiled laundry in the corner. Then I grabbed some towels because if I remembered correctly from that movie it could be a bloody affair. I went in Eugene's old room then. I didn't want to ruin Naomi's big bed.

  "I'll just have it in here," I called like I was going to lay an egg in a few minutes and get right back to my television show or something. "I'll wash that stuff in the bathroom later," I said, cause body water was gross and she shouldn't have to touch it. Well, I was just in my bra. I wasn't so free normally, but Naomi was on the phone anyway and I ended up putting on one of her nightgowns cause you can't have a baby in your underwear, that I did know, and I needed to cover what I could until I couldn't.

  "Better not be calling an ambulance," I called climbing into the bed.

  "Sister Debra is on her way. With Tad."

  "We don't need him," I said feeling the grip of those giant squeezing fingers. "Holy crap," I said.

  "They stronger?" she asked.

  "Shit," I said panting, then, "Sorry."

  She ended up sitting beside me. "These pains are five minutes apart. We got to get serious now. I have to think for us. Tad is going to get you in the car and Debra will sit in back with you. Soon as they get here we are going to Corning."

  "We won't make it," I said. "I ain't having this baby in a car. Help me do this."

  She was shaking her head fast. "I can't."

  "Yes you can. It's practically out now. This can't get much worse."

  She didn't answer.

  But she sat by me, then she paced, back and forth from bed to window. Finally, Tad and Debra pulled up and she hurried in to the living room like the reinforcements had arrived.

  I got up and closed the bedroom door and clicked the lock. Tad could snap it pretty easy, but I took to pushing the dresser there, too, no easy feat, but determination made me strong. Then I half fell in the bed cause another buttload of suffering was on its way.

  It was a man's knock on the door. "Open this Hilly," Tad said. "Don't be disrespecting your grandmother this way.

  "I ain't going to the hospital," I said loud, then another pain was there and this was the worst yet, so that made one on top of another. I tried to remember the breathing, but it was too confusing, and I tensed up and just tried to bear it.

  But it lingered like it had a tail that wouldn't let me go. They were talking at me through the door, but I couldn't think on any of it. I wished it was quiet.

  "Danny," I whispered. He didn't know how I suffered. He didn't know about this.

  But as soon as that last pain came and went another took its place it seemed. I had no idea how long I'd been doing this. Since after supper while we were at Temple. Even earlier if I thought. Well I didn't feel ri
ght when I woke in the morning, but then I often didn't.

  The clock on the nightstand said two am. Well that pain blew up slow, and blew, and blew, and I blew out my breath, and gripped Naomi's sheets. And I was locked in this agony and I felt more liquid come out of me. "Oh shit," I said, glad I'd put towels there.

  I looked up at the ceiling to appeal to God, but I couldn't bear to look at it, painted that green, and that crack running, and it gave me no relief cause here was another one, and my legs were open cause it just felt better. And I was riding the crest of that one when I heard the dresser move, but I did not look because my eyes were closed, and he said, "Oh goodness," and I knew he'd never touch me, and the women were there then and talking, and I was just getting pummeled now, one pain on another, smearing the edges together and one long tunnel now, one big wave with no let up, and this was the curse and no one could tell me different as the overhead light grew big then small and it was that way then, them responsible, not me, me just hurting and pulled into a place like that movie, a bed to suffer and die in, the place he raped me, the place I would die of weary pain in. I would get up now, if I could, I would get up and run and run and never look back at this devil's lair.

  And Beatrice was there, and my legs were bent and she rubbed warm oil round and round the place where the head showed and finally they told me the head was there, and I didn't want to see so get that mirror out of there Sister Lavinia, and a cold rag on my forehead, on my lips, and me exhausted, and Naomi's prayer and tongue, that gibberish that I hoped said just the right thing, and oh such pretty hair and get her shoulders up and push, and push, and a noise coming out of me like I was trying to lift a polar bear, and ohs and ahs and shoulders are out and one more push and she ain't barely tearing, just look at that, and a sound like an angry bee, a bleating sheep and him in the air, held by Sister Beatrice and now we got praise meeting, oh hallelujah, oh praise God's, and another pain and delivery, are there two? No, afterbirth is all. And thank God, quit messing with me, and do you want to hold him? And I do not want another thing to do with him, truth be told, but I do want to look and try to believe he came out of me, such beauty, such angry red life, such black curly hair and full lips, such pumping blood and legs and fists…from me.

  Finding My Thunder 53

  I was a mother, seven months away from my eighteenth birthday. Seth Eugene Grunier, seven pounds, twenty-three inches of skin, bone and appetite. I couldn't believe how relentless motherhood was. It was killing to live so consistently for this other person. He was so beautiful. He was so perfect and so sweet and so scary and demanding. I worried I'd kill him so I had to double check everything with Naomi or Debra or Beatrice or any of the others who would listen to my endless stream of worries.

  I didn't want to nurse him. They were all pretty surprised. It just sounded weird.

  No, I wanted bottles. They were more modern. Nursing sounded backwoods. And selfish as it might be, my body was retiring from service, from producing anything other than normal stuff. I'd kind of had enough. So I got the new modern Playtex nursers because they were the latest thing and you didn't have to sterilize them cause the bottle held a pre-sterilized bag. You just had to boil the nipples and I could manage that.

  The sisters gave me gifts for the baby, some for me, and twenty two dollars in a card. They were so good to me. I had baby clothes others had outgrown, so many baby clothes. It looked like a nursery explosion in Naomi's room. My baby had everything. But a father. Or a mother who knew what she was doing. But aunties? It was ridiculous. You'd think he was the Christ child cause we were adoring him all the time.

  Mrs. Boyd came down to see him. She held him and her eyes were moist. She assured me there was no word from Danny, but I already knew everything from Dickens. But he was going to be released from the rehab hospital in Germany so they knew he was heading home soon. The last time she'd written, well he'd sent a message through his recruitment officer. He told her to leave him alone.

  That hit me hard, actual words, and then so brutal.

  But I knew what they meant. That was the same thing I'd said to Naomi while in the mental ward. It sounded pretty cold and heartless, but it wasn't meant to be.

  It was what you said when you felt like people wanted you to be fixed but you knew you weren't and you didn't know how to be. That's what I knew. He was full.

  He couldn't take in anymore. Something had to get rearranged or thrown off. He was stuck. He'd get here. I knew he'd get here. He'd told me he wouldn't forget. But his pathway home…I didn't know how convoluted or dangerous, but it might not be a straight shot.

  He wasn't out of the woods. No, his leg was just a part of it. And I didn't know what he knew. He hadn't called home after that one attempt where Dickens had said Sukey had hurt me. And the baby, far as I knew no one had said any of that, too afraid for him to know. We were looking through a dark glass.

  This baby was my consolation. Who could have imagined such? He was my love and my heart. This child…I didn't think there would be another. I couldn't imagine going through that again. Looking at Mrs. Boyd knowing she'd gone through birth multiple times, her body opening to expel a whole endless crop of watermelons, no thank you. She had my utmost respect. But here's the thing, my baby, my boy, worst thing in the world the way I got him, but my biggest most profound accomplishment…him.

  He made me hopeful. And more tender to the plight of the world. With all the boys we were losing in this war, over thirty-three thousand to date, more than in Korea…and them loved just as much as I loved this boy of mine, just as splendid, full of just as much potential and fire and want and life. How did a mother lay her son on that altar? How did she let go?

  I was grateful to be able to hold Seth in my arms. I wanted to protect him…from everything. I was so grateful to have him to hug and kiss. I wished Danny could get here and hold him, and feel his life and trust. He would love Danny back from the grave he was just so happy and pure.

  But after Mrs. Boyd left, I put Seth in his bassinet and asked Naomi to watch him while I went out for a minute. I had not driven for a long time, but I found the truck keys and fired it up and drove away slow. I went to Temple, and I went inside and didn't even bother with the lights. I went up on the platform and knelt behind the pulpit and I bent over and put my spread hands on the floor there and I said to God, forgive me for my foolish deals in the past…foolishness I can't live up to anyway. I knew Danny thought he wanted to be left alone, but I also knew we were never alone. We were never, ever alone. And he wasn't. He had a whole bunch of people here who loved him. I asked God to send him home to us, not because of some stupid deal, but because he was God and I truly believed he could do anything.

  I was there for a few minutes when the lights flooded on. It was Tad. "Hilly?" he said, like he wasn't sure what kind of madness I was up to now.

  I straightened. "Oh hey, Tad. Just praying."

  He laughed a little. "You scared me for a minute." He stood there and I was done so I got up and walked toward him swatting at my knees.

  "You know anything about some tools stored out back in the shed?"

  Well, he would be the one to find them.

  "Yes…I do. They belonged to my dad and I'm going to use them to start up a welding business."

  "That right?"

  "Yes."

  "Okay. Just making sure Naomi wasn't heading up a ring of some kind." Well we laughed pretty much over that.

  "What you doing around?" I asked.

  "I check it over every night. Sometimes more than once. Since I been home…."

  I nodded. I knew he had a hard time since Nam but he handled it well. He looked out for things, protected the neighborhood.

  "Danny…he won't communicate with his family. Or me. The hospital communicates through the recruitment officer and that's all we have. He said as soon as he knew Danny was on U. S. soil he would tell the family."

  Tad nodded. "Maybe he wants to control it…how he comes home."

  I n
odded. "Is that normal?"

  He smiled. "What's normal about war? He's wounded on top of it. And the trouble…," he let his hand flop at me.

  I nodded and it got awkward. "You glad you went?"

  He shrugged. "I wouldn't take nothing for it. It takes a while to calm down. But…you make it through it's yours. You see things…a whole new way. It's up to him."

  "You think that?"

  "It's up to Danny kind of man he's gonna be now," he said. "Don't give up on him. I didn't have Debra…she's helped me. He'll figure it out. He's got a family…he's a blessed man already. He'll figure it out."

  Well that's just what I'd been thinking.

  Debra had lost her baby while Tad was overseas. I could feel Debra's ache every time she held Seth. They truly saw Seth as the dear baby he was. They had no idea how much their strength blessed me. They gave me hope. I tried to tell him and it sounded dumb and butchered, but he was kind and he bumped my shoulder and told me to get home.

  I drove home quiet inside. If this kept up I might start listening to music again. So motherhood did help take some of my worry off of Danny. I could barely think of anything but bottles and formula for the bottles and diapers. Then I had to go to the doctor's right away and get checked and lectured about my home birth that was actually very successful. And the baby was fine too, but they had to circumcise him and give him some crazy test for food allergies. I hated them for sticking him.

  So we welcomed in nineteen hundred and sixty-nine, still not hearing from Danny. Naomi was in bed but I had sat up and listened to the sounds of guns being fired all around town. Bixby would be going crazy about now. Seth Eugene, my son, had finally fallen asleep and I was really afraid to move him. When the phone rang his little arms flew up, but his eyes did not open cause I snatched it up on the first ring.

  This phone rang at odd hours. That was a fact of living in a pastor's house. She used this house for ministry, but now it was filled with me and Seth.