Do Tampons Take Your Virginity? A Catholic Girl's Memoir

by Marie Simas

  Do Tampons

  Take Your

  Virginity?

  A CATHOLIC

  GIRL’S MEMOIR

  Marie Simas

  © Copyright 2011 All Rights Reserved. No portion of this book may be copied, retransmitted, reposted, duplicated, or otherwise used without the express written approval of the author.

  ISBN: 9781453799758

  Author: Marie Simas

  Cover and Interior Design: Joel Friedlander

  www.TheBookDesigner.com

  Editor: Keith Popely

  Official website: www.MarieSimas.com

  A most entertaining collection of childhood stories that will both shock and delight you.

  —Patricia Fry, Author and Editor

  Good, intelligent writing here—not what I expected... Keep it up because the work’s good. Incidentally, the only ‘craziness’ I detected was of the ironic variety. I’m afraid you’re burdened with a sharp sanity and a facility with words to match it.

  —RS Janes, Author and Blogger

  Your writing is just so open and fresh; it’s so much better than reading something sugarcoated.

  —Lexi Losch, Writer and Blogger

  I gave this book to my co-worker who is a notorious hater, (meaning he hates and rips everything to pieces). That said, I made him read it . . . needless to say he laughed and laughed and uttered, “this is true, you know.”

  —Esperanza Eterna, Face it Without Blinking

  A coming-of-age story about growing up in a Portuguese Catholic household, this book will startle and amaze you. Sometimes harrowing, often hysterically funny, it’s the real story of a girl who refuses to give up on her hopes and dreams. Well written and highly recommended.

  —Joel Friedlander, Author

  Contents

  Little Smart Ass

  Our Trips back to the Old Country

  Back Home Again: Teenage Virginity Hell

  The College Years: Crazy Bitch!

  Later... It’s Life

  CHAPTER 1

  Little Smart Ass

  Ass Towels and Face Towels

  1979, AGE 6

  In my house, there was an ass towel and a face towel.

  Yes, it’s exactly what you think it is. The ass towel wiped your ass, and the face towel wiped your face. My father believed that daily showers wasted too much water, so we were only allowed to shower three times a week. However, we were encouraged to wash our faces and our “private parts” every day. There was a little yellow tub under the sink for us to wash our butts in. Every day, each family member took turns putting a few inches of warm water in the “butt tub” and we washed our butts. Then we would grab the “ass towel” to dry off. Then we washed our faces and brushed our teeth in the sink, and we made sure to grab the “face” towel in order to dry our faces.

  This is how it was in my house during my entire childhood. We all shared the same two towels, and each one was designated to a certain part of your body.

  We grew up with a shortage of luxuries, like bed sheets and bath towels. My father found an easy solution to our linen shortage on a family trip to Portugal.

  I was six. We’d been invited to dinner at the home of my father’s distant cousin. The house was nothing more than a tiny cottage built from volcanic rocks and cement. There wasn’t room for us to sit anywhere, so we ate outside and went inside only when the mosquitoes became intolerable.

  I had eaten corn-on-the-cob, which was cooked directly on the fire. My face was covered in butter, so my father rinsed my face and hands in a bucket, then grabbed the nearest towel.

  Alarmed, our cousin jumped up and said, “No! Not that towel! That’s the ass towel!”

  I could tell she was embarrassed. She handed my father a cream-colored towel that looked much cleaner.

  “Oh, it’s no big deal,” said my father, declining the clean towel.

  That legendary shit-speckled towel was dark blue—I remember it very clearly. Father ordered me to sit on the floor. As the towel neared my face, I could smell a strong fecal odor emanating from it. I grimaced as Father smeared my face with millions of shit particles.

  My face and hands smelled really bad.

  In those days, only the wealthiest households in Portugal owned washing machines. Therefore, towels were usually washed only once a week. The ass towel was rock-hard with a week’s worth of filth.

  Later that evening, Father discussed the fascinating subject of separate towels for your ass and face. He became enamored with the idea. The first thing my father did when we got back to our hometown was put up two parallel towel racks and designate a dedicated ass side and a face side.

  He suggested that the ass towel should always be a dark color, such as brown or navy, so the shit streaks wouldn’t show. The face towel, on the other hand, could be white or pink. It made it easier for us to remember. We shared these towels throughout the week, and my mother washed them on Saturday. That’s the way it was at our house from then on.

  This left a lifelong impression on me. Even today, when I go to someone’s house, I catch myself sniffing their towels before I wipe my hands. Just to be safe.

  Now that I’m an adult, I’ve purposely done away with dark towels in my house. All of our towels are white. I wash them often and I use bleach every time. There aren’t any ass towels and I get to use a clean towel with every shower. Ah, the extravagance!

  If you ever come to my house for a visit, you won’t have to sniff the towels to find out which one is safe to wipe your hands on.

  “N” is for Ass Beating

  1980, AGE 7

  The realization that my family wasn’t normal came to me rather slowly.

  As a child, I naturally assumed that my own upbringing was ordinary. Awareness of our familial weirdness didn’t happen until I started going to school and discovered that certain experiences weren’t normal. Behaviors that seemed perfectly reasonable at home were frowned upon by my teachers.

  As early as first grade, my parents received calls about my violent outbursts, hostile behavior toward other children, and my inability to work in groups. My teachers spent much of their time just trying to get me to sit still.

  I tried to control other kids. Whenever there was a group, I positioned myself as its leader immediately. Anyone who disagreed was punched, slapped, and kicked until they either submitted or went elsewhere to play.

  My parents were embarrassed by my behavior problems, and my father’s solution, as always, was more beatings.

  The teachers agreed that I was very bright. I was advanced in all subjects. At one point, the school even toyed with the idea of skipping me forward a grade. But my increasingly wild behavior prevented them from doing so.

  My first grade report cards all had high marks in English, math, and science, but the mark for behavior was always “N,” which meant “not acceptable.” Every few months, I brought home another report card with an “N” on it. I promptly realized that when I saw an “N,” it meant that I would receive a sound beating. I cried uncontrollably whenever I got a report card.

  Eventually, my teacher asked, “Why are you crying, Marie?”

  “Because my report card is bad, and my father is going to hit me with a belt!” I wailed. I was LOUD. I couldn’t stop crying; I disrupted the entire class. Distressed, Mrs. Cooney sent me to the school nurse. I sobbed. I couldn’t speak—I was shaking with hiccups, rivers of snot pouring down my shirt. The school nurse left the room and whispered something to the other women in the office. They all knew that my father was a teacher for the district.

  That afternoon, I walked home from the bus s
top in terror. My hands trembled, holding my report card. I was quiet all night because I knew what was coming. At the dinner table, my father snarled silently at me over his plate. My mother, as always, looked at the ground. She knew what was coming, and she felt powerless to stop it. My brother, still a toddler, smiled and ate happily, unaware that he was surrounded by lunatics.

  Dinner was over. I thought that I had escaped punishment, so I went into my room to play. But I was wrong. My father came out of his bedroom with his belt doubled over. He snapped the belt. He snapped it again, even louder.

  “Why do you have an ‘N,’ Marie?” Father asked.

  “I have to go to the bathroom,” I said, hopping on one foot. I felt an urgent need to piss.

  My father was silent. His lips curled inward until they were invisible. His body was enormous in the hallway, blocking any escape. I tried to run around him, but he grabbed my right arm. He started belting me in front of my mother and little brother. They both stood there, frozen like statues. I screamed and tried to cover my butt with my hands. The doubled belt hit my hands, which hurt even more. He gave me seven lashes.

  My father released my arm, throwing me to the floor. I sprung up immediately, avoiding a kick. I ran into my room and cried. My mother did not come in to console me.

  This event would be repeated. Father told me that I would receive a beating every time I brought home an “N” on my report card. I usually got seven lashes, and a kick at the end.

  Father probably decided that seven was a good number because the marks on my legs would be gone by morning. Anything more might leave a long bruise that would be difficult to explain. I already wore pants most of the time, and I owned a lot of long-sleeved shirts.

  But as I mentioned before, I had a big mouth. I promptly went to school the next day and announced that I had received a beating. I marched right up to Mrs. Cooney’s desk and confronted her.

  “It’s your fault, Mrs. Cooney! You gave me an ‘N’ and Daddy hit me with a belt!” I directed all my anger at her, because she was the only real target I had. I pointed my finger accusingly. I may have even called her a bitch. Mrs. Cooney squirmed in her chair, not meeting my eyes. She didn’t say anything.

  After that fateful meeting with my teacher, my behavior grade went from an “N” to an “S” for “Satisfactory.” Still not perfect, but better. I received no more beatings that year because of my report card.

  I don’t think my behavior actually improved. In fact, it probably got worse. But Mrs. Cooney couldn’t live with the fact that this little girl was going home to a beating. I guess she decided that if I was going to get a beating, it wasn’t going to be because of her.

  Thanks, Mrs. Cooney.

  Child Protective Services

  1980, AGE 7

  At school, some of the guidance counselors suspected abuse. But my father worked for the school district, so none of them felt comfortable confronting him. They had to work with this asshole every day, and the teacher’s union was powerful back then. It’s doubtful that my father would have been reprimanded unless he was actually convicted of child abuse, and that was never going to happen.

  I never spoke directly with Child Protective Services, but someone must have. I suspected one of my teachers called them.

  Father took me aside. He told me that Child Protective Services came to the house. He squeezed the back of my neck until I cried out.

  “Listen, you little bitch,” he spat. “If the police arrest me because of your big mouth, they will find your dead body swinging from the ceiling by the telephone cord.” I peed myself. He released my neck and kicked me down the hallway. I ran into the bathroom and locked the door, hyperventilating.

  Father was very conservative. He believed that rapists and murderers should all go to the electric chair. I’m certain that he didn’t include himself in that group.

  A lot of people who commit crimes do so because they’re on drugs, or because they want money. My father was horrible simply because he loved being horrible. He didn’t drink, so I couldn’t blame alcohol.

  He was just a bad seed... rotten inside like a maggoty apple.

  Now that I’m older, I wonder whether he became sexually aroused during the abuse, because it was so unsystematic and random. He would be happy one minute, then a raging lunatic the next. I was usually beaten with a belt, but sometimes with other things like a doubled telephone cord.

  I blamed Mother for a long time. I felt that she should have protected me more. My little brother rarely got beaten, but he had his own set of problems.

  All of us would have turned out wonderfully if my father had been crushed by falling rocks.

  The Fun Wedding

  1981, AGE 7

  When I was seven, I went to my first wedding in the Azores. To this day, it’s still the most fun I’ve ever had at a wedding.

  A Portuguese Catholic wedding is a huge affair. There must have been 300 people in attendance—everyone in the village was there. The bride wore a beautiful handmade dress; it was a simple gown made from white cotton. The handmade lace on the dress was exquisite.

  The bride was our distant cousin (like everyone in the village). I remember how happy she was; she laughed the entire time. She was a plain girl in her early twenties with frizzy brown hair. She wore brown horn-rimmed glasses, and she was missing four teeth in the front. I could tell because her bridge was not well made and the false teeth were obvious, at least to me.

  The groom was a tall, thin young man who smiled a lot and spoke very little. They looked really happy together.

  The actual church ceremony was boring, as it would be for any child. I squirmed in the pew and my father kept pinching my legs so that I would stay quiet. He would grab the outside of my thigh and twist until it bruised. But I still wouldn’t stop moving.

  After the ceremony, we threw rice at the bride and groom when they exited the church. Then everyone crowded into the back of panel trucks and on motorbikes and went to the reception, which was in a large hall at the top of the city. Everyone arrived together and the women swept inside, donned housecoats and aprons and began preparing the food.

  All of the men stayed outside to ready the meat. They had slaughtered a cow for the reception, which was shot and dressed.

  My parents would not let me watch the slaughter. I heard the gunshot, and then there was silence.

  An hour later, I was finally allowed to go outside. I saw the cow’s head on the ground. It was skinned, but I noticed that the eyes were still twitching.

  “Daddy, why is the cow’s eye still moving?” I asked.

  “It’s the nerves. They just do that. Don’t touch it,” he said, slapping my hand away.

  I stared at the cow’s head for at least thirty minutes, convinced that it was still alive, perhaps trying to communicate with me. I said a little prayer for the cow. I thought it might be in pain. After all, it was still moving.

  The men all talked outside, smoking tobacco in pipes and drinking homemade wine in mismatched cups.

  The women chattered away inside, cooking and gossiping. When everyone was finally seated for the reception, the bride and groom appeared in different clothes. They had changed out of their cherished bridal clothes, which were already tucked away in a cedar chest, never to be worn again. They sat down at the main table. There were some speeches made, the exact details of which I don’t remember.

  Each table had multiple carafes of red wine, all homemade and of varying shades. Each place setting had a little bom-boniere of five Jordan almonds wrapped in pink tulle and tied with a little satin ribbon.

  The women served us steak from the freshly slaughtered cow. It was the best meat I had ever tasted. During the meal, the bride took her front teeth out a few times because meat got stuck in her bridge. She and her young husband kissed during the meal. They seemed so happy with this simple life. It was the first time I had seen what looked like a truly happy couple.

  I played with the other kids. We ran around outsid
e and all over the place. Then I discovered the alcohol table, which had dozens of colorful bottles of flavored liquor. I remember sneaking under the table with the bottle of banana liquor, which was incredibly sweet and delicious. I took long swigs throughout the evening. I was drunk and smiling when I finally went home. My parents were busy gossiping, so they never noticed. I slept soundly that night.

  That night, I dreamed about the wedding. Could this be what the rest of the world was like? Could it be that some married couples were really happy?

  I remember having a fun time that day and I felt hopeful that I could be happily married one day, too. Not every marriage was a miserable goat fuck like my parents’ union.

  Grandma’s Boxing Match

  1982, AGE 9

  When I was growing up, we had some wonderful Portuguese neighbors: the Bettencourt family. Mr. Bettencourt was handsome and his wife was attractive and friendly. Mr. Bettencourt was known to work “in the garbage,” which means he worked for the local waste disposal company. It was a great job, with union pay and benefits. They had two children, a boy and a girl, just like our own family.

  Their son, Daniel, was my best friend. We were the same age, and played together every day. His little sister, Lucy, played with my little brother.

  The Bettencourt were an upwardly mobile couple and soon left their rental apartment for a nice stucco home by the beach. Even after they moved, we still visited them a lot. Mr. Bettencourt raised pigeons in the backyard and his wife entertained guests frequently. I liked the way their house smelled.

  They didn’t come to visit us very much. I think my parents were jealous of them. My father thought of Mr. Bettencourt as his “best buddy,” but I don’t think the feeling was mutual. Mr. Bettencourt was a likable man and he had many friends. Overall, they were a happy family.

  Mr. Bettencourt thought my father was a little strange. Which of course, he was.