I slowly got used to life in Minnesota. Even though I missed the mountains, I grew accustomed to the tall water towers in every city. I got used to the Minnesotan lingo and even started using some of the phrases we used to mock. I stopped hoping for snow days; Minnesotans are not phased by massive amounts of snow. I wore socks to bed and bundled up for school for months on end, including some summer months. There were really only two seasons in Minnesota: winter and road construction. I learned about wading/kiddie pools. I learned about the importance of hockey and hunting. I learned that tractors are usually the reason for traffic jams. I started to appreciate how beautiful Minnesota is, with the many lakes and endless farms. Everything was lush and green, so different from Utah.
I got used to being away from Dad, JD, and Esther. Es was attending college in Rexburg, Idaho and working part-time. She was busy but happy. JD was living with Dad in Orem, Utah. I have little memory of life pre-separation and thankfully, my Minnesota life wasn't as consumed with post-separation war as it had been when we lived in Santaquin, UT. Dad was hard to talk to, making it easier for me to accept how little he called. His calls always revolved around talking about how Mom didn't really love me, how much he was hurting, how my rightful home was with him and JD, and how she would burn in hell for destroying us. I would like to say that it was shocking that he so readily said these things, but it wasn't. He was so different than what I remembered. Sometimes, I would dust off my old memories and replay them, memories of him coming home and kissing Mom before dinner. Memories of waking up early to watch cartoons and say goodbye to him as he left for work. Memories of him teaching me how to weed and plant my little garden. Memories of him making fresh tea with the peppermint from our yard. Memories of sitting on his lap in church. Memories of seeing his car on our road and holding onto his handles as he drove up the driveway. Memories of late night snacks that he would share with all of us. Memories of a seemingly happy home with two happy parents.
After they separated, my friend taught me that my wish would come true if I made it at 11:11. I spent the day running around the old Santaquin house, counting all of the clocks. I also counted the ones in our cars. I counted a total of 10 clocks and so, I made this wish:
I wish my parents were back together. I wish my parents were back together. I wish my parents were back together. I wish my parents were back together. I wish my parents were back together. I wish my parents were back together. I wish my parents were back together. I wish my parents were back together. I wish my parents were back together. I wish my parents were back together.
I later revised it to:
I wish my parents were back together times 10.
10 years later, I caught myself saying it in my head while in a college class. It shocked me to realize that my wish had become habitual.
Our yearly summer visits to Utah were rough. To be fair, it must have been extremely difficult for Dad. He wasn't Dad anymore, but an entertainer. We didn't have a routine with him anymore and we no longer lived near our old friends. When visited him in his two bedroom apartment, we quickly realized how little we had spent with him when they were married. His work schedule took him away from us for hours at a time and we suffocated in the hot confinement of his apartment. We hated it and so did he. JD wasn't really there. He was physically there, but he rarely spoke and never left his room. He played computer games late at night, all night and then he slept all day. He always looked the same, unhealthily thin and pale with gray circles under his eyes. Every now and then, he would open his door and talk to us. It was always the highlight of the summer, talking to him, hearing him. He was so angry and unhappy. I think that anger is what kept him alive, helped him survive those depressing years. This new and unhappy Jeremiah overtook my memories of him. I couldn't remember what he was like before all of this happened.
Esther would come to visit us in Utah and in Minnesota. I didn't realize until I was older that she was forced to be an adult at a very young age. She always had a job and took care of herself. I think she knew that she had to; she didn't have a choice. She was the cool older sister and I quickly loved everything that she loved. It seemed like she always had a new hair color every time I saw her. She bought me my first CD, a Dido CD. I listened to it on repeat. She took me on a sister date; we went shopping and ate at Los Hermanos. I still have the blue sweater that she bought for me on that date. I remember watching her clean the downstairs bathroom of our Santaquin house. She had been trying to record Torn by Natalie Imbruglia on one of her tapes but had only gotten a partial recording. I remember hearing her cheer, because she finally caught it in time and recorded the whole song.
Santaquin became a memory. It wasn't home anymore but a past life. I stopped writing letters to my friends, stopped visiting them when I was in Utah. I stopped praying that everything could go back to the way it was. I looked forward to coming back to Grandma and Grandpa. I had moved on and loved my home in Minnesota.
Sunday, October 19, 2014
Tuesday, October 14, 2014
Grandma and Grandpa's House: Silliness and Young Love
Grandma's dry-heaving was sadly entertaining. We had heard the stories of how our uncles would tease her, making her gag. There was usually a booger involved or talk of one. Grandma couldn't handle that subject. Just the mention of one was Grandma's nightmare. She would immediately start to retch. Now, to describe Grandma's retching...It was much more than you would imagine. She would not only make the sound and movement of vomiting, but her whole body would be taken over by it, repeatedly jerking forward and upward. And while she was doing this 'vomit dance', she would start whooping. I have no idea why she whooped. She just did. Her whooping would start to come out faster, louder, and higher.
My first experience with this was when we were eating hamburgers for dinner. They were delicious; so, Grandma asked Grandpa where he bought the meat from.
"I got them from the booger shop," replied Grandpa, giggling.
"Whoop! Whoop! Whoop!!! Dennis! Whoop! You know better!! Whoop! Whoop!"
It was amazing how quickly Grandma's brain would shut off when she got tired. Her bedtime was at 8:00 PM. By 8:03 PM, she couldn't speak without stuttering on words or completely saying the wrong thing. One night, when we were getting ready for bed, she tried to quiet us down so that she could read us our nightly story.
"Girls! You need to be quiet before I can fart the....I mean start the story!"
We burst out laughing and she tried to battle against it, but she couldn't. She started to smile, her eyes wrinkling in the corners, and then giggle and then we were all crying from laughing so hard. We howled and groaned as we held our sore stomachs. We would find out later that she also told one of her students to, 'fart here'. Though she kept a straight face and didn't laugh then, she randomly laughed in the middle of her very next lesson while thinking about her previous blunder.
Grandma knew everything. She was this book that you could open and read. She knew something about every subject. She was also full of ideas and dreams. I loved reading her. She was there for my first church talk and my second and third. She was there for my school presentations and speeches. If she didn't know much about a subject, she would spend the day researching and learning. She would then come back, show me all of her sources, and teach me.
Grandma loved romance. She loved reading about it and watching it in movies. Grandma rarely let me see her room. It was crowded, piles and shelves of books, binders, and papers everywhere. Her room looked like something you would see in an episode of Hoarders. I don't know how she slept in there, because I couldn't even breathe. She had music everywhere and papers with her scribbles. She wrote notes on everything. There were receipts with her notes on them, notes about students, music, and religious topics. And then, smack in the middle of this mess was her bed. She dusted off the top of one of her shelves and handed me some books. One said, Harlequin Romance, at the top and then the title: A Girl Named Rose. This was the first of many Harlequin Romance books that I read. I almost always read Betty Neels' books, because Grandma and I preferred her writing. Hers was more old-fashioned, the kind where they finally kiss at the end after they get engaged. Betty Neels had a very similar story for each of her books. There was almost always a plain and quiet nurse who worked for a handsome but intimidating and sometimes rude Dutch doctor. They were always Dutch. They often had long and complicated names that I couldn't pronounce: Sybren Werdmer Ter Sane, Fulk Van Hensum, Coenraad Van Essen, and Gerard Van Doorninck. I loved them despite their simple layout and I read them often.
She showed me her movie collection. She had boxes full of tapes that she had recorded them on. Each movie had multiple movie titles scribbled on the front. She had hundreds and could describe them in detail when I would ask what a certain one was about. I fell in love. I loved the classic romances of the 1920's-1960's. I fell in love with Jimmy Stewart, Lawrence Olivier, Cary Grant, Gregory Peck, Fred Astaire, Rock Hudson, and James Dean. We suffered through Gene Kelly's bad acting to witness his perfect dancing. We sang alongside Judy Garland and pretended to dance like Ann Miller. We wanted the comic timing of Doris Day and the witty attitude of Katharine Hepburn. We loved watching Vivien Leigh, Maureen O'Hara, Greer Garson, Olivia de Havilland, Jean Arthur, Joan Fontaine, Cyd Charisse, Grace Kelly, Audrey Hepburn, Elizabeth Taylor, and Jane Powell on the screen of Grandma's small TV.
We memorized their songs and lines. She watched me as I practiced walking gracefully. We had tea parties where we talked like ladies. It was so fun! Some of our favorite movies to watch: The Harvey Girls, His Girl Friday, Seven Brides For Seven Brothers, Meet Me In St. Louis, Gone With The Wind, Singin' In The Rain, An Affair to Remember, The Pirate, That Hagen Girl, Gigi, Pillow Talk, The African Queen, Roman Holiday, To Catch a Thief, How to Steal a Million, The Philadelphia Story, The Quiet Man, Easter Parade, You Can't Take It With You, How to Marry a Millionaire, Brigadoon, The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer, Some Like It Hot, Charade...
My two favorites that Grandma showed me have to be Tammy and the Bachelor and Margie. They're both similar, sweet and funny. Tammy is about a simple and naive girl (Debbie Reynolds) who falls in love with a refined man who doesn't notice her at first. Margie is about a bright but odd high school girl (Jeanne Crain) who has a crush on her French teacher and one of her popular peers. She also has constant trouble with her pantaloons. I loved watching these two with Grandma. We would giggle and re-watch scenes just to giggle some more.
My first experience with this was when we were eating hamburgers for dinner. They were delicious; so, Grandma asked Grandpa where he bought the meat from.
"I got them from the booger shop," replied Grandpa, giggling.
"Whoop! Whoop! Whoop!!! Dennis! Whoop! You know better!! Whoop! Whoop!"
It was amazing how quickly Grandma's brain would shut off when she got tired. Her bedtime was at 8:00 PM. By 8:03 PM, she couldn't speak without stuttering on words or completely saying the wrong thing. One night, when we were getting ready for bed, she tried to quiet us down so that she could read us our nightly story.
"Girls! You need to be quiet before I can fart the....I mean start the story!"
We burst out laughing and she tried to battle against it, but she couldn't. She started to smile, her eyes wrinkling in the corners, and then giggle and then we were all crying from laughing so hard. We howled and groaned as we held our sore stomachs. We would find out later that she also told one of her students to, 'fart here'. Though she kept a straight face and didn't laugh then, she randomly laughed in the middle of her very next lesson while thinking about her previous blunder.
Grandma knew everything. She was this book that you could open and read. She knew something about every subject. She was also full of ideas and dreams. I loved reading her. She was there for my first church talk and my second and third. She was there for my school presentations and speeches. If she didn't know much about a subject, she would spend the day researching and learning. She would then come back, show me all of her sources, and teach me.
Grandma loved romance. She loved reading about it and watching it in movies. Grandma rarely let me see her room. It was crowded, piles and shelves of books, binders, and papers everywhere. Her room looked like something you would see in an episode of Hoarders. I don't know how she slept in there, because I couldn't even breathe. She had music everywhere and papers with her scribbles. She wrote notes on everything. There were receipts with her notes on them, notes about students, music, and religious topics. And then, smack in the middle of this mess was her bed. She dusted off the top of one of her shelves and handed me some books. One said, Harlequin Romance, at the top and then the title: A Girl Named Rose. This was the first of many Harlequin Romance books that I read. I almost always read Betty Neels' books, because Grandma and I preferred her writing. Hers was more old-fashioned, the kind where they finally kiss at the end after they get engaged. Betty Neels had a very similar story for each of her books. There was almost always a plain and quiet nurse who worked for a handsome but intimidating and sometimes rude Dutch doctor. They were always Dutch. They often had long and complicated names that I couldn't pronounce: Sybren Werdmer Ter Sane, Fulk Van Hensum, Coenraad Van Essen, and Gerard Van Doorninck. I loved them despite their simple layout and I read them often.
She showed me her movie collection. She had boxes full of tapes that she had recorded them on. Each movie had multiple movie titles scribbled on the front. She had hundreds and could describe them in detail when I would ask what a certain one was about. I fell in love. I loved the classic romances of the 1920's-1960's. I fell in love with Jimmy Stewart, Lawrence Olivier, Cary Grant, Gregory Peck, Fred Astaire, Rock Hudson, and James Dean. We suffered through Gene Kelly's bad acting to witness his perfect dancing. We sang alongside Judy Garland and pretended to dance like Ann Miller. We wanted the comic timing of Doris Day and the witty attitude of Katharine Hepburn. We loved watching Vivien Leigh, Maureen O'Hara, Greer Garson, Olivia de Havilland, Jean Arthur, Joan Fontaine, Cyd Charisse, Grace Kelly, Audrey Hepburn, Elizabeth Taylor, and Jane Powell on the screen of Grandma's small TV.
We memorized their songs and lines. She watched me as I practiced walking gracefully. We had tea parties where we talked like ladies. It was so fun! Some of our favorite movies to watch: The Harvey Girls, His Girl Friday, Seven Brides For Seven Brothers, Meet Me In St. Louis, Gone With The Wind, Singin' In The Rain, An Affair to Remember, The Pirate, That Hagen Girl, Gigi, Pillow Talk, The African Queen, Roman Holiday, To Catch a Thief, How to Steal a Million, The Philadelphia Story, The Quiet Man, Easter Parade, You Can't Take It With You, How to Marry a Millionaire, Brigadoon, The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer, Some Like It Hot, Charade...
My two favorites that Grandma showed me have to be Tammy and the Bachelor and Margie. They're both similar, sweet and funny. Tammy is about a simple and naive girl (Debbie Reynolds) who falls in love with a refined man who doesn't notice her at first. Margie is about a bright but odd high school girl (Jeanne Crain) who has a crush on her French teacher and one of her popular peers. She also has constant trouble with her pantaloons. I loved watching these two with Grandma. We would giggle and re-watch scenes just to giggle some more.
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