Learning the Hard Way

July 30, 2008 at 8:52 pm (Slice of Life Sunday)
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Slice of Life Sunday is a meme dedicated to preserving the accounts of events cut out of the lives of average people just like you and me from all over the world. And like having ice cream with your pie, there is more to this meme than meets the eye - it’s a meme a` la mode. I hope you will join me and share a Slice of your Life.

 

As I reflect on my life, I remember many times where my will to accomplish a goal far exceeded plain common sense. My maternal grandmother warned me on several occasions, “Cricket, that Myers stubbornness is going to be the death of you!” I will have to say my commitment and diligence to a project have been one of my greater strengths for much of my life. But, depending on the quest at hand, that strength can become a weakness – something I learned at a very early age.

 

I was fortunate to have Grandma Wilson in my life. She was a kind and loving grandmother. I spent the biggest part of every summer with her during school break. She was not the type of grandmother who would sit and play games as she was much too busy. Being a farmer’s wife, the chores were never done. Her mornings began before the chickens would crow. I would wake up to the aroma of fresh ground coffee perking and homemade bread coming out of the oven from the wood-burning stove. After breakfast, we would head to the barn to help with milking and feeding the animals. I didn’t mind helping with the chores. I loved all the animals, which were more like pets than farm animals. I really liked gathering eggs. It was like finding little surprises left behind when the chickens would leave their nests to go outside to eat the grain I threw on the ground. Sometimes the hens would not leave their nest, which meant there would be baby chicks soon. Of all the baby animals, I loved the baby chicks the most. It was more than just how cute and fuzzy they were that caught my attention, but more because I wasn’t allowed to hold them. I had been permitted to hold the baby pigs and pet the baby calves and I didn’t understand why I couldn’t hold the baby chicks. Telling a six year old they could not do something they really wanted to do was like lowering the green flag at the Indy 500, the race was on!

 

I was sitting under the apple tree that fateful summer day, snapping beans while grandma was in the back yard hanging clothes on the line. The mother hen and her parade of chicks came walking by, within only a few feet from where I was sitting. I watched as they walked past and noticed one baby chick was slow to keep up with the rest. When it finally walked to within a few feet of me, and I could see the mother hen was further up the yard, I tossed an end piece from the bean I was snapping to the baby chick. It immediately pecked at it, so I threw another piece, but this time having it land closer to me. The third piece of bean brought the baby chick to within a foot of me. As it was pecking at the bean, I looked to see where the mother hen was and knew this was my chance. I quickly picked up the chick and began to pet it as it began to chirp loudly. I didn’t see the mother hen. It was if she came out of no where. But I felt her! She jumped on me and began pecking me; my arms, my chest, and even my face. I began to scream and tried to get up, but the pan of beans was on my lap and I didn’t want to let go of the chick. Grandma also came out of no where. She pulled the mother hen off of me and yelled at me to put the chick down, which I did. The chick went running and grandma put the mother hen down, who went running after her chick. Just when I thought I was out of danger, I noticed grandma’s eyes. I began to wish for the mother hen to come back.

 

My grandmother was very good at holding her temper, something that took me quite a few years to master. But one would only need to look into her eyes to know when she was angry. And, she was very angry now. In a way too calm voice she said, “Cricket, if I’ve told you once, I’ve told you a dozen times to leave those baby chicks alone.”  With my lower lip quivering, tears streaming down my face, and in my most pathetic voice, I chose to make a bad situation worse. “But grandma, I was just sitting here and snapping the beans like you wanted me to. The baby chick came up to me. It wanted me to hold it.”

Now her eyes began to twitch. I had never seen them do that before, but my instincts told me it was not a good thing.

 

Grandma took me into the kitchen where she washed my scraps with soap and water, then dotted red ointment on each of the peck marks, never saying a word as she nursed my wounds. Her silent treatment was making me nervous. When she finished, I went to the sink to look into grandpa’s mirror he kept there for shaving. I began to laugh at the small red dots on my face and thought I could get grandma in a better mood by saying, “Look grandma, I have chicken pox!” Grandma didn’t laugh. Instead, she told me to come over to the table and sit down.

 

“Cricket, I am not going to punish you for holding the baby chick, even though I have told you many times not to pick them up. I think the mother hen has taught you better than I why you should leave the babies alone. I am very unhappy with you, not only because you disobeyed me, but also because you lied about disobeying me. And, you did lie, didn’t you?”

 

For the second time that day, I saw a look in grandma’s eyes I had never seen before. This time it was not anger. It was a look of disappointment in me. A look I never wanted to see again. I confessed to how I coaxed the baby chick to come closer to me with the beans and I said I was sorry for lying about it. My punishment for lying was getting my mouth washed out with soap, which was basically holding a wet bar of homemade soap in my mouth for a few seconds, just long enough to get a good taste of it. After helping me rinse the soap out of my mouth, grandma explained, “Cricket, when you tell a lie to cover up something you have done wrong, you just make the whole matter worse. I made you put that nasty soap in your mouth because I wanted you to remember the next time you think about lying to me that telling a lie will leave a nasty taste in your mouth and it will leave a nasty taste on my heart.” I never lied to my grandma again.

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The Case of Unfulfilled Dreams

July 26, 2008 at 6:59 pm (Slice of Life Sunday)
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Slice of Life Sunday is a meme dedicated to preserving the accounts of events cut out of the lives of average people just like you and me from all over the world. And like having ice cream with your pie, there is more to this meme than meets the eye - it’s a meme a` la mode. I hope you will join me and share a Slice of your Life.

I have spent most of the week painting, yes, again. I can hardly believe it is Saturday. I have another week or two, and then I should have more time to devote to visiting everyone’s blogs or a more frequent basis.

 

A jury consists of twelve persons chosen to decide who has the better lawyer.

                                                                               Robert Frost

 

 

Sitting in front of our television screens in the 50’s and 60’s, our world was opened to many dreams of fame and fortune. The Dick Clark Show allowed some to dream of being the next rock and roll singer while Dragnet ensured an exciting career in law enforcement. Lost in Space created visions of being an astronaut and That Girl gave ideas of freedom and excitement if we moved from our small rural towns to big cities. I was most influenced by Perry Mason. He not only saved his innocent clients from a certain conviction, but did so through honesty and fairness. I was confident I could be the absolute best female lawyer and enrolled in college prep courses as soon as I entered high school. Three years later my dreams of college and becoming a defense attorney ended with an unplanned pregnancy and an unwanted marriage. Little did I know at the time that the courtroom would play a significant role in my life and change my views on the integrity of lawyers.   

 

My first encounter with the court system came in my late 20’s when I received a notice I was selected to serve on a jury. For many years I heard friends and relatives complain about jury duty. They believed if someone was arrested and put in jail then they must be guilty, so why waste their time sitting through a long trial. But I had watched many Perry Mason episodes and knew sometimes people were innocent. And I believed a trial by jury was the best way to prove innocence or quilt. After all, the court system was all about getting to the truth of any given case. Right?. . . Wrong! I was to learn I was as naïve about the justice system being about truth as I was about marriage being about fidelity.

 

I was a member of a twelve person jury selected to decide the guilt or innocence of a man accused of molesting and raping the eleven-year-old daughter of his girlfriend. Given my past of molestation and rape in my youth, I should have disqualified myself from this trial, but I kept silent. I have often thought the reason I decided to go forward was because I wanted to help one girl who had endured the same torment and fear as I many years before she was ever born. What I was not prepared for was how my integrity would not permit me to levy my need for vengeance against this defendant, who I truly believed was guilty of the crimes he was charged.

 

I was stunned to learn that not all attorneys lived by the same code of seeking truth as my hero Perry Mason. A technicality of the law in the late 70’s required in cases of molestation and/or rape the exact time of the offense must be proven by the prosecutor. The combination of a frightened little girl, an unprepared prosecutor, an unscrupulous defense attorney, and the directives from a judge to the jurors that exact time of the alleged offences must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt resulted in this child molester being found innocent. I was the lone holdout for several hours of deliberation, refusing to vote for an acquittal. I knew in my heart this man raped this little girl. I also knew the prosecution did not even come close to proving the times of the offenses. The defense attorney tore the little girl apart on the witness stand and created confusion in her mind on the days and times over a one year period in which she was molested and raped. Her testimony ended in tears stating she didn’t know when, she just knew he did it. After four hours of deliberation, our jury foreman sent a note to the judge stating we were a hung jury. The judge refused to accept this and sent a letter back stating we were not to only focus our verdict on whether the defendant molested and raped this girl, but “did he molest and rape her on the dates and times listed in each of the seven counts.” I finally had to come to terms with the fact the dates and times were not proven. One of the hardest things I have ever done is sign my name to the Not Guilty verdict.

 

I left the courthouse that day and tore up the check I was given for payment for my time to set a guilty man free. My respect for our judicial system would be further reduced fourteen years later during another trial, which is a Slice of Life story in its own right. I am very disillusioned with our justice system. At times, I find myself reflecting on my childhood dream to be an attorney and like to believe I would have been honest and fair, seeking the truth in any case I defended or prosecuted. A reading of the local newspaper or watching the evening news covering high profile trial cases is evidence the vast majority of attorneys do not hold the same code of ethics as portrayed by Perry Mason.  I believe money and power, especially in politics, changes a person from good intentions of what they wanted to be into what they allow themselves to become. The lessons I learned during my encounters with the American judicial system taught me one of God’s greatest gifts is unfulfilled dreams.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Slice of Life - Splendour in the Grass

July 19, 2008 at 7:39 pm (Slice of Life Sunday)
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Slice of Life Sunday is a meme dedicated to preserving the accounts of events cut out of the lives of average people just like you and me from all over the world. And like having ice cream with your pie, there is more to this meme than meets the eye - it’s a meme a` la mode. I hope you will join me and share a Slice of your Life.

I have spent most of the week painting, again. Our property is really coming along but I have many more weeks of painting until I am done. I was inspired on Friday evening to write another post for the Slice of Life prompt: Losing my virginity.

Splendour in the Grass

 

 

One of life’s more memorable events, sometimes good and sometimes not so good, is losing one’s virginity. Today’s society often mocks those who make the decision to remain a virgin until their wedding night. To be a virgin is to be a nerd at the very least. Only the human race can take the symbol of strength and independence – as a virgin was a goddess who remained unaffected by the temptations of  Dionysus, the Greek god of seduction – and over the centuries turn it into the butt of a joke. All forms of media, especially television and motion pictures, portray the sexual experience an essential part of everyday living. Peer pressure in school leads many young girls to forfeit her power of virginity to seek love in all the wrong places, usually in the backseat of a car, or in my case, on the bank of a creek. Although technically my virginity was taken from me at age fourteen by an uncle who raped me, I like to remember “losing my virginity” as an event that occurred two years later when I voluntarily succumbed  to the temptations created by teenage raging hormones.

 

High School in the mid-60’s in rural Holmes County, Ohio was much different than the schools of today. We had strict rules for dress – boys wore “dress pants” not jeans with a collared shirt tucked in and girls wore dresses or skirts which came well below the knees. Only students who had a job after school drove a car, accept for some from very wealthy families, with rest of us riding the bus. Students were divided in social classes – the brains, the popular “in crowd”, the jocks, the farmers, the hoods, and the good girls. I was considered a “good girl”. This meant I did not have a “reputation” for being an exchangeable slip cover for the backseat of any given number of cars. I had a steady boyfriend all through my freshman year, who was kind of a nerd, but we never had a car date. We would meet at the local movie theatre every Saturday night and sit in the back row so we could hold hands and exchange a few kisses. On one of these dates our kisses became more intense and Danny’s hands found their way under my sweater. We were both immediately stunned and pulled apart quickly. The following Monday he broke up with me in a note which said, “We need to break up now. You are a good girl and I need to see other girls for a little while. We can get back together in a few months.”  At first I was very hurt and then I became very angry. How dare he say he was going to date other girls and then come back to me! I did not understand the twisted male logic of those days which dictated a “good boy” who was ready to explore his sexual desires did so with a girl with a reputation. It was an honor code of sorts to keep “good girls” pure for marriage and was meant as a sign of respect. Of course there were boys who did not honor this code - they were the hoods.

 

John was a member of the hoods. He rolled the short sleeves up a couple of notches and kept the top three buttons on his shirt unbuttoned. He smoked cigarettes and had even been expelled from school for three days when he was caught in the boy’s restroom. It was rumored he drank beer and played pool in the local tavern. And, he dated Shorty - who had a reputation for seeing more back seats than a rear view mirror. In early March of my sophomore year, John and Shorty broke up. She was pregnant by a “man” who was out of school. She dropped out of school and got married. For the next two months, John and I seemed to make eye contact at least once every day as we passed each other in the halls while changing classes. He began to wink at me during these encounters and my knees would go weak. Then the fateful day of our first conversation came in early May. I left my books with the apple I brought for lunch sitting on top on a chair in the student lounge area while I went to the restroom. When I returned, John was sitting in an adjoining chair holding my apple. As I approached him, he gave me a big smile and with a wink of his “Kris Kristofferson eyes” said, “This is very nice of you to bring me an apple for lunch.”  After a few minutes of my protesting the apple was for my lunch, John finally offered a compromise, “If you sit on my lap, I will give you your apple.” Had I known the story of Eve’s fall from grace over an apple I may have picked up my books and walked away. But, I hadn’t heard the story, and to be honest, there had been a silent building of sexual tension between us for several months, and I was ripe for the picking.

 

The next few weeks passed quickly. John and I would meet in the lounge several days a week and share lunch. It was the end of the school year for the Class of 1967 and much ado was being made about the newest fashion trend – the mini skirt. I had saved money from washing cars and babysitting and had purchased one despite my mother’s objections and threats to return it. During one of our lunch meetings, I told John about my mini skirt. He and his friends didn’t believe “Miss Goody Two-Shoes” had a mini skirt. Well, I was going to show them and said I would wear it on the last day of school. This news spread through school by the end of the day. It seemed everyone wanted to know if I was really going to wear a mini skirt to school. Not only was the length of the skirt against the school dress code, but I was a “good girl” and this was not what was expected of me. Looking back on it now, I know I mainly wanted to impress John and not necessarily be a trend setter or a rule breaker. John and I were polar opposites, at least on the social standing level. He was wild and free; I was timid and uptight. If it was wrong, he did it. If it was right, I did it. I was very insecure and felt I needed to prove I was worthy of his attention. On the last day of school, I wore my mini skirt, which was three inches above my knees. It was quite the event for a small rural school. By third period, the school principal tracked me down and said I would have to go home at lunch period and change or be expelled. John was the only person I knew who drove to school and he offered to take me home to change clothes. We laughed and talked on the way to and from my home. This was the first time we had been alone together. When we arrived back at school, he pulled me close to him and kissed me. It was not the kind of kiss I had ever had before. I had only kissed three other boys at that point, and I am quite sure they had all been virgins at the time. No, this kiss was definitely different. This was a kiss of a boy who had already come-of-age and who knew where a kiss could lead . . . and I was ready to follow.

 

Since my birthday wasn’t until August, and I was only fifteen, I was not permitted to car date. All through June and July, I protested to my parents that I was the youngest in my class because of a late summer birthday and all my friends were car-dating. But my parents would not budge on their rule of no car dating until I was sixteen. John and I would meet at the local swimming pool in the evenings because he worked during the day. We also met at the movie theatre on Saturday nights, where we would sit in the back row and make out. A few times, with the aide of my best friend, I was able to meet him and go for a ride which usually ended at a “parking location” out in the country. One evening in mid-August, just before my sixteenth birthday, we met at the swimming pool as usual. After swimming for about half an hour, John suggested we go for a walk over to the creek, which was also part of our no-car-dating ritual. There was a metal pole that straddled the creek which I often walked across as a short-cut to get home. We would cross the pole and then walk several yards down the bank of the creek. John would spread our towels on the ground and we sit down to talk and eventually begin to kiss, which would lead to some very heavy petting. That evening we talked for a few minutes and then began kissing. For the first time, I allowed him to untie my bikini top. On that warm summer evening, I learned where his kisses could take me.

 

Several years later, I saw the movie, Splendor in the Grass. I was struck by so many similarities between the love-struck teenagers, Deanie and Bud, and John and myself. Although there were many dissimilarities, including the fact the movie teenagers did not consummate their passions and went on to live separate lives while John and I married the next summer due to my becoming pregnant, the essence of the movie spoke to me and, I am sure, many other teenagers who struggled with the awakening sensuality of their youth. John and I were married for over twenty years, most of which causes very painful memories. But, when I think back on that summer evening, these words always come to mind;

 

 

What through radiance which was once so bright

be now forever taken from my sight,

though nothing can bring back the hour

of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;

We will grieve not, rather find strength in what remains behind.

 

                                                                                     William Wordsworth

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Slice of Life - A Necessay Evil

July 12, 2008 at 11:09 pm (Slice of Life Sunday)
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Slice of Life Sunday is a meme dedicated to preserving the accounts of events cut out of the lives of average people just like you and me from all over the world. And like having ice cream with your pie, there is more to this meme than meets the eye - it’s a meme a` la mode. I hope you will join me and share a Slice of your Life.

 

 

If I were asked to describe myself in one word, that word would have to be accommodating. I like to think of myself as one who enjoys helping others with most anything they need done as well as one who gives the red-carpet- treatment to visitors to my home. Although I am quick to come to the aide of others, I am reluctant to ask for help on my own projects. I assume this comes from developing a sense of self-reliance over the years. I also believe it is due to childhood brainwashing. My maternal grandmother is well remembered for a phrase she used on a daily basis, “If something needs done, just do it and get it over with.” She often referred to those things we really dislike to do but have to be done nevertheless as “necessary evils.”  For her, doing dishes was a necessary evil. She called this chore evil because it was constant and never ending. Although I would rather have a dishwasher, and I really dislike grocery shopping, the one thing I truly detest doing and have always considered a necessary evil is painting.

 

I realize the value of painting, both for protection of items as well as for the decorative look it provides. I have always admired others who are so creative in coordinating colors. I will admit one reason I think of painting as a necessary evil is due to the fact I am not very good at it. I tend to use too much paint on my paintbrush which inevitably ends up on me. I learned many years ago to have painting clothes. The standard comment I receive while in the mist of a painting project is, “Did you get any paint on the wall?” As messy as painting is for me, I think the main reason it is a necessary evil is because it is never ending. I recently painted my porch furniture and the shutters and window sashes. Once these items were all new looking, I needed to paint all the trim on the porch which led to painting the entire front of my home. And the worst part is, this painting evil all began because I need to paint my picket fence, which isn’t even started yet!

 

My distaste for painting led to something I absolutely love – wallpaper. I purchased my first home in 1977. It was a huge century 12-room farmhouse, with  original unpainted oak woodwork including a beautiful open staircase. All the walls in every room was wallpapered – many times over! My Uncle Jake fell in love with the house and offered to teach me how to wallpaper over the protests of my husband who just wanted to “throw some paint on the walls.” After stripping off all the wallpaper, sometimes up to six layers, I ended up wallpapering every room. My love of wallpapering led to my being offered a position in the paint department at Lowe’s Home Improvement many years later while I was in college. When asked during the interview if I knew much about painting, I responded, “Enough to know it is a necessary evil.” Once we both stopped laughing, I explained my love of wallpapering and was immediately hired because the store was down on its sales budget for the wallpaper section of the Paint Department. Within six weeks, wallpaper sales had more than tripled and I was promoted to the Assistant Department Manager position.

 

While working in the paint department I learned several painting techniques commonly referred to as faux finishes. And even though these finishes are very attractive on other people’s walls, it is still painting to me. I believe I am the only person in the entire world who can not sponge paint correctly. My granddaughter had to correct what I doing when I helped her repaint her bedroom a few years back - she was eight years old! I decided then and there to stick with regular painting.

 

I hope to be finished with the front of my house tomorrow. Of course this means I will need to re-hang the shutters and do some touchup painting on the windows because I got house paint on the window trim paint. Oh well, I’ll just do it and get it over with!

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Celebrate Freedom While We have It

July 3, 2008 at 10:24 pm (Cricket Chirps)
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July 4th has been a fun holiday for our family. We celebrate our country’s freedom with a family bbq followed by a group outing to the local fireworks display. Everyone brings their favorite summer foods and we have quite a feast. This year will feature much of the same and I am looking forward to being with family. I must admit I am feeling a little down this holiday though. I have been quite concerned with the lack of quality candidates for this year’s presidential election. I do not believe any of the candidates have a real plan to get our economy back on track or our troops home without jeopardizing our country as well as others. Without going into a long analysis comparing end times to current events, I do want to say I believe the lack of a solid Christian leader for our country is sign tribulation is upon us and America as we currently know it will cease to exist and be overtaken. Although I know this has to happen for our Lord to return, and being a Christian there is a better place being prepared for me, I am still saddened my grandchildren will never know what America used to be - the home of the free and the brave, the land of opportunity for all its people. Today as my family celebrates in our traditional July 4th holiday, I will also pray for those who have transformed the land of opportunity to the land of opportunist - may God have mercy on their souls.

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