Parents and Memories





​​​​​I have commented in the past about how I try not to pay too much attention to annual cyclical holidays that most of us adhere to due to tradition, our spiritual beliefs and the simple nature of the cyclical calendar amongst other personal reasons. I prefer a more linear outlook on life and the evolutionary growth and learning process that comes along without too much repetition.

This is on my mind now because Mother’s Day is upon us. There is nothing more commendable to me than the wondrous phenomenon of Motherhood. Not to slight Fatherhood, but all of our lives spring forth from women and it is to me the most fascinating biological and perhaps miraculous phenomenon that I will forever be amazed by. The conception and development of human life can fill volumes of wonders. Add to it the instincts and nurturing and rearing of children and it amounts to years of fascination, reward, joy, pride, doubt, regret, fear, frustration, anger, you name it. It’s all in there. I have the utmost respect for committed parents. I can think of no other job so important and yet so intimidating. It’s probably for the best that I will not rear children because of the simple fact that I would be a nervous wreck. I have trouble taking responsibility for myself. And I’ve always believed that at that very moment when people create or adopt a child, they instantly begin living for someone else beside themselves. That’s the way it should be. It must be that natural instincts instill themselves in parents to keep them from becoming nervous wrecks in order to accomplish such a tremendous undertaking.

I have found that being middle-aged is a period of life that makes one question and analyze why we have developed the personalities that are now rooted within us. I bring this up not to complain or whine, but to look at child rearing factors straight in the eye and try to come to terms with them. I have also mentioned before that I couldn’t be prouder of the family that I come from and consider myself very lucky to have been raised in such a loving and devoted family fortunate enough to live in middle class comfort and to have access to private education. But there are usually detrimental factors lying below the surface of most average families, which do have a negative impact on childhood development.

Although my parents married and raised five children, they were not ideally suited for each other. I don’t know how many people are truly ideally suited for each other. That is something very hard to know with certainty especially at the early age in which most people marry. But I, like most everybody else, have persistent unpleasant memories that are detrimental enough for me to remember vividly to this day.

One incident that will forever stick in my mind happened when I was probably only about five or six. I can’t possibly know what the issue was that instigated it, but I recall my mother in a state of hysteria in which she threw a glass shattering it onto the floor with all her might with us in the room. I’m assuming it was shortly after that that she was temporarily institutionalized in a local mental health facility. I was too young to know why she was in the hospital and also too young to have it explained to me by anyone. I remember my father taking us regularly to visit her there. There were extreme mental patients restrained by straight jackets along the austere corridors. Some would erupt into violent outbursts and orderlies would come running to sedate them. One was named Eva and one was named Sadel. (sp?) I was terrified of them. Mom was not like them. I didn’t know why she was there. She seemed normal to me. I was just told that she was sick. The only thing I can remember asking my mother was, “When are you coming home?” I was never given a direct answer but I could tell it was breaking her heart and I’m sure very difficult for my father too.

Very early in the 1970’s, I remember my parents had invited my father’s mother and father to come to our house. This was unusual because we usually went to their house on Sundays for spaghetti and meatballs after church. The reason for the meeting was to tell them that they were going to get legally separated. My Grandmother, who was traditionally Catholic, broke into tears immediately. I had never seen her like that. I remember my sister Patty shouting at them at one point and running out of the room which was completely out of character. All I knew was that something was changing and my grandparents were not at all happy about it.

The trial separation didn’t last very long as far as I can remember. My father moved into this awfully cheap apartment not far from where we lived. It was the kind of place that had past tenant’s writings on the walls. It did have a pool though and it must have been summer because dad would pick us younger kids up to go swimming almost every evening which we loved and we’d always stop for a snowball on the way home. The saddest thing I can remember about that time is one day, I was outside in the front yard and I saw my father pass the house in his car as not to be noticed.

They decided to give living together another shot after that. The family moved to New Orleans East, which at that time, 1973 or 4, was brand new and we moved into a nice suburban apartment complex with a pool and good neighbors. We were excited. We made friends fast and integrated into our new school very easily. In fact, I must admit, I think 7th grade was the happiest time in my life. I was small, cute and almost everybody liked me. I played guitar at church, I was elected Citizen of the Year in 7th grade and was my 8th grade class president. But things apparently were not going as well for my parents because another detrimental thing I recall that will always stay with me is the memory of hearing them verbally fighting downstairs while I, unbeknownst to them, was sitting at the top of the stairs listening. The statement that sticks in my mind is my father shouting, “We’re going to stay together until these children are raised!”

We bought a really nice two-story house in 1975 or 6 on a very nice street in the East after that. I started high school and things seemed to be perfectly normal at that point. We made a lot of new friends, some of which we still know to this day. It was 1977 when my mother took my brother and me into my room and asked us what we thought about her and dad getting a divorce. Adolescents grow so quickly at that age, and of course I thought I knew most everything. I knew she wasn’t happy and I wanted her to be happy at any cost. With our approval, she decided to move to Pensacola, Florida. It was our choice whether to stay in New Orleans or to go with her to Pensacola. Both my brother Steve and I and my sister Peggy decided to move with mom to support her during the transition. I can remember the day that we left. I was in the car with Patty and her husband Charlie and I cried almost all the way to Mobile, Alabama. I think the crying was more about missing my friends than about my parents getting divorced. All I knew for sure was that I had a serious headache, they, probably too.

Knowing nothing but the world of New Orleans, Pensacola was a completely different experience. It was the first time that I had been enrolled into a public school. It was co-ed and I was in my sophomore year. We also started after the semester had begun which made us, my brother and I, the new kids. The people were friendly enough, but that is a time in adolescence when self-doubt and insecurity are at their height. Students wore their own clothes. There were social clubs that certain people fit into and others didn’t. I had no idea where I belonged. I felt extremely inferior to the status quo that had grown up in this atmosphere. Through a lot of time and through the help of a few good friends, I came to realize that I was not inferior to them, maybe even superior. I must mention here that I was also realizing that I was homosexual which only compounded my self-doubt and lonesomeness. I remember being so distraught one day that I couldn’t get out of bed to go to school. My mother didn’t know what to do. She called Patty, by then a professional psychologist, to come to help see what was the matter. I knew what the matter was. I just couldn’t verbalize it. They were asking me questions about what might be bothering me. Patty finally asked me, “Is it that you think you’re homosexual?” She hit the nail on the head and all I could do was cry. I think that gave them the answer. I remember my mom saying, and this is so important to me, “This is the day that I thought would always come.” That statement reaffirms to me that parents are always the first to know, or at least to suspect. If parents only knew how alienated their gay children feel by not explaining the entire spectrum of human sexuality, they would probably be more inclusive when they finally give “the talk.” This is another thing I remember about that time. I had finally dredged up the courage to tell my closest friends there that I think, even though I knew, that I might be gay. The across the board concerned response was, “No, you’re not.”

The semester ended and both Steve and I realized that we didn’t have much in common with the Pensacola lifestyle and decided to move back to New Orleans with my father. Mom seemed to be situated and we just wanted to go back home. Things were completely different with dad as the sole parent. We were pretty much allowed to do whatever we wanted. Not that we were troublemakers or undisciplined, but nobody stopped us from staying out late, having friends over at night, smoking marijuana and having a very good time. I have very good memories about that time, the ones I can remember.

I’ve taken the long way around the depot but I’m going to bring this train into the station. What it all boils down to to me is that somewhere within this time period, I feel my life somehow jumped the track. Not crashed, but slightly derailed. Who knows what my future would have been like had things transpired differently? There may have been no difference at all. I am left thinking that I wasn’t finished being raised and that I in necessity began raising myself at too young an age with not enough supervision. Some of my decisions I am proud of, others regretful. Children usually aren’t adequately prepared to do this properly.

Some people have told me in the past when I express my opinions about parenting that I have no business since I have no children. Be that as it may, I am very observant. And I was a child. That brings me back to the point at which I started. Parenting is the most important task that any human can embark upon. It deserves the utmost respect. My hat is off to all to you mothers who are doing such a magnanimous job. (You fathers will get your turn.)

Mom eventually moved back to New Orleans. I was in my self-centered twenties and spent much of my time enjoying my independence and now regret how little time I spent with her. She was diagnosed with cancer at the beginning of 1990 and died in October of the same year. My father was amazing. Even though they were divorced, he took care of her right up till the end. I remember visiting my mother in a hospital shortly before she died. I was trying to get as many questions answered as possible during the time we had left together. I don’t know if it was the drugs talking, but she told me something that I will never forget. She felt somewhat uncomfortable relying on my father when he didn’t legally owe her anything. She told me that dad told her when she expressed her feelings, “Rita, I love you as much today as the day I married you.”