Please visit www.omehgapoint.com.

August, continued.

Me, circa 1999, wearing the glasses with the wavy frames.






This is a sequel to August: a memory.

When we left off last I was traveling south with a trash bag of clothes and small miscellaneous boxes of the few belongings I could retrieve from the house in Limestone. Somehow I managed to keep the PlayStation that was bought two summers previously with the lump sum settlement my mother received (and promptly spent) from an accident she had years prior. I can't remember sparing anything else besides a shoebox of random LEGO pieces, a few action figures and the small yellow pocket monster I had found in a truck stop.

I remember beginning a very unique sibling rivalry that week. I pitied my younger brother and also despised him. His father took him to live at his house while I went to live with our aunt and the raw emotions of not having him as a parental figure were still fresh in my nine year old mind. I called him Dad for six to seven years at that point and to be shunted aside was easier dealt with than you'd imagine when combined with the stresses of being displaced in the way that I was. That year would essentially be the end of my relationship with my brother's father and when the divergence between my brother and I had begun to take shape. We always had access to something that the other didn't and we likely took our concerns over our situation out on each other.

While my brother's needs were, presumably, being met by his father and his new family across town I had become the responsibility of my Aunt and Uncle. Despite having a relatively new toddler in their home they obliged to take me in and found room for me on their third floor which was furnished but generally unused. With the help of my grandparents we acquired some new pants, shorts and shirts in time for me to go on vacation with my aunt, uncle and their friends to Ocean City, Maryland. Luckily for me, the self-awareness of being a burden and the associated guilt hadn't developed yet in that week and I genuinely had fun. When looking back I try to ignore the idea that I was quickly adopted into everyone's plans and I convince myself that my company was truly being enjoyed.

You can tell that I desired normalcy (and found it) that week by how quickly I latched onto strangers. It was slightly foreign to have a normal vacation with friends of my aunt and uncle who I had never met before but since they were nice to me I immediately thought of them as my friends too. Again, I try to ignore the idea that the extra friendly affection by those who had never met me before was due to being plucked from a hellish ordeal; I'm sure the knowledge that they were briefed on my situation was in the back of my mind but it never made an appearance until later years. It was made clear by everyone how much they needed a vacation. Both families were blue collar laborers who worked hard for what they had and I was lucky to be included in their down time.

I don't think anyone realized how much those few days meant to me though. In less than two weeks I went from eating macaroni noodles off of a Tupperware lid and talking to social workers to spending my days at the beach and perusing the boardwalk. I remember the simple glee of looking down at my new shirt glowing under a black light at one of the nicer restaurants we ate at. These little memories add up quickly.

A laser pointer was bought for me in one of the shops and it was probably the greatest thing on the face of the earth at the time. That night I went onto the balcony style walkway outside of the door to the condo with my uncle and his friend. They were smoking cigars I think and drinking a few beers as we watched the cars and bright signs light up the street just off the beach. I stood out there with them, feeling wholly involved,  soaking up the moment. The warm, salty air was perfect as we tried out my laser on the dark macadam below. I was amazed that it reached across the street, even with the bright lights, and was entirely amused by teasing the people waiting at the bus stop. I'm positive I made some childish joke about the Hooters restaurant that was lit up orange behind the bus stop in an attempt to fit in with the guys. The easy laughter and hair tussling satisfied my ego and topped off one of the greatest memories I have.

Against my best wishes, that week had to end. I'm not sure if I wanted the fun to continue or if I dreaded what waited for us back home, my new home. I don't remember crying the entire week at the beach but I could feel the lump in my throat and butterflies in my stomach when I thought about starting at a new school and wondering how long until something else changed or forced me to be uprooted again.

I don't know what kind of effort my aunt made to get me enrolled in the school district I would attend for that year. I don't remember even thinking to grab my birth certificate, social security card or anything like that; I was nine and generally competent but I don't think anyone expected that much from me. I do, however, vaguely remember starting school a few days late and that might have had something to do with the difficulty in signing me up.

My grandparents helped my aunt pay for a lot of the things I needed. It was quite clear that I needed new glasses. I don't remember expressing this concern but I was certainly open to the idea. I had that pair since I started wearing glasses in second grade and they were well past their prime and prescription. The hinges were loose or bent and one of the nose pieces were missing, rubbing my skin raw where the metal was allowed to touch my flesh. When we went to the mall I was pretty excited. One of the boys of my brother's father's new family had glasses with wavy frames. It was a gimmick and therefore I had to have it. I was allowed to get them and, combined with the new addition of bifocals, I thought my pair of glasses were the best thing ever (alongside that laser pointer, of course). Additionally, the bifocals made reading much more comfortable and fostered a renewed love of books which would shape my entire life in that year.

I started school and quickly fell into a routine. Every morning I would get woken up as my aunt and uncle left for work and to drop my cousin off at his babysitter. I'd call my grandmother as I got dressed. Every day she'd make the same joke about the Johnstown Flood as I used the toilet and everyday I'd make toast for breakfast and I'd eat it on my way to the bus stop down the street. Every single day I would come home before everyone else, I'd call my grandmother again for a little bit before I put on cartoons or music videos. I really liked the idea of being helpful so I'd sometimes clean up the living room and kitchen, start the dishwasher or set the table. I'd rush around getting everything done so I could enjoy the praise when my guardians got home. I definitely wasn't a perfect child and I often had a problem remembering to keep my room clean or perform the weekly task of bringing the trash to and from the curb.

No matter how far I fell into routine it couldn't help but being ruined by those who made me. My mother, still unmedicated properly, wanted my brother and I back. No one wanted to give us up, thankfully, because they knew it would be no time at all before we were back in the same situation. My brother's father sought legal custody of him and my aunt filed a protection from abuse order against my mother to buy some time to make a case for keeping me for the year at least. In this attempt I've gathered that my real father was contacted in Massachusetts and thus his interest in gaining custody of me was piqued. I can't remember if he visited me once in September but I do remember as September died and October of that year was born he came and nearly changed everything that my life would be.

In the first week of October my grandfather would turn fifty years old and we were planning a surprise birthday party for him. I like to think that I was helping quite a bit with the planning when my father came down that weekend to see me. In one of the most awkward moments I've ever experienced my biological father was invited to stay the weekend with me at my brother's father's new home. I had barely known my real father and called the other man "Dad" for most of my life. I remember not addressing either of them properly that weekend and using identifiers like "Hey!" and "You" quite often. I was annoyed that anyone would put me in this situation.

It was the night before the party and we were playing video games in their basement when they broke the news to me. My father was sitting next to me as my "Dad" was standing behind a couch near the entrance to the room when I was told that my father was taking me back to Massachusetts early in the morning. I felt my eyes well up as I said I didn't want to go. I stared at the Dale Earnhardt memorabilia on the walls because I couldn't look anyone in the eye as the tears streamed down my face. I explained that I already started school. I explained that I had a bedroom and I liked being near my family and being able to see my brother. It didn't matter. I was told that I wasn't allowed to use the phones to call my aunt, my grandfather, anyone who I thought could help me.

I begged my "Dad" not to let him take me. He said that it was best for me and that I should be with my father. I have never felt so betrayed in my entire life. I pleaded. I wasn't above frantic begging on my knees, crossing my fingers and shaking my little intertwined fists up at him not to let him take me. I went upstairs to the dining room, the phone wasn't plugged in. No luck. The cordless phones weren’t on their base. No luck. I begged my "Dad's" future wife to not let him take me. I could see she pitied me but offered no help. I sat and cried with her mother, who lived with them, who just kept telling me it would be okay.

I didn't talk to my father that night. He stayed downstairs in the basement where he would sleep. I stayed upstairs but I didn't sleep much. I laid in the bunk bed crying knowing that the boy with the same glasses as me was fast asleep below. I contemplated my options. I could run away, of course. There was a convenience store a mile or two away that I could call my family collect by using a pay phone. I was afraid of being caught. I was afraid of walking in the dark. I was afraid of making the phone call and waiting to picked up. How long would they take to drive there? What if they didn't answer the phone? What if the police found me? It felt like hours that I cried and silently panicked about what I could do. How long would it take for them to realize that I wasn't coming to the party tomorrow? The sick feeling was at its peak when I decided to climb  down from the bed and sneak out of the room. I'd have to find my shoes and then I could leave.

When I opened the already cracked door I found my "Dad's" girlfriend and her mother in the hallway. I was already caught. I started sobbing again and I tried once more to beg them to let me call my family, to stop my father from taking me, anything. They said they were sorry but they couldn't do anything about it. That was when I felt the vomit rise in my throat. I ducked into the bathroom and starting throwing up the pizza we had earlier that evening, the pizza I ate before I knew I was being kidnapped. I emptied my stomach quickly but didn't stop heaving. My tears and snot dripped into the water as I retched and pleaded at the same time. I think my “Dad” watched from the door but he didn’t say anything and I was too sick to look up. I don't know how long this continued or who was rubbing my back but eventually I cried myself to sleep.

When I woke up my throat hurt and my eyes stung. My heart felt like it hadn't slowed down a beat since the night before and tears instantly felt like they were a moment away. It is cliche to wish it was all a dream but I did and facing reality as it was made this wish stronger. All of the adults were in the living room when I left the bedroom. I hadn't resigned to going but I couldn't bring myself to start begging right away either. Something changed though. I was told to get a shower and to get dressed because someone changed their mind and the plans. I was still being forced to go to Massachusetts but someone convinced my father to let me go to the party to say goodbye to everyone and gather some of my things. Finally, hope.

The drive over to the party was scary and seemed to last forever. It was just my father and I in his vehicle. I wondered if he would follow the plan or if he'd change his mind and turn away at any moment. He took a different way than anyone else would have and I panicked. This was it, he was taking me without so much as letting me say goodbye to anyone. I was wrong. We drove onto a street that was familiar and eventually made it to my aunt and uncle's house. As we turned onto their street I was told not to say anything to anyone about leaving. I agreed but I'm not sure I had any intent to comply.

When we came around the bend in the road I could see all of the cars lining the street. Everyone was invited to this party. Each car that I recognized was another person I secretly hoped would stand up for me and not allow me to be taken. How would I do it? Would I whisper in someone's ear? Would I start crying and panicking, screaming not to let him take me? I was trembling. Would I be too afraid to say anything? What if I did say something and they couldn't stop him? Maybe he would keep driving. I'd see the party but we wouldn't stop. Another pang of hope; we stopped.

I can't remember many details after walking in the front door. I know I was greeted by people I didn't get to see often, I know I spoke to them but I can't remember a word that was said. It is all a blur. My eyes were stinging again and I was trapped in my own head.   Many of these people hadn't seen my father since I was a baby. They all pretended to be delighted to see him. I do remember sitting on the couch next to my father and he didn't talk to me. He must have known I was afraid. He didn't comfort me by saying that I'd like it as his house, that this was in fact better for me. Nothing.

When we went out the back sliding door to the rest of the party I saw my grandmother sitting on the patio. Someone was talking to my father, shaking his hand, questioning him about something trivial. I felt my eyes well up as I went to give my grandmother a hug. I blinked a lot to clear the tears and I almost whispered "He's going to take me." in her ear. I didn't have to though. My aunt showed up with my uncle and grabbed my hand. She said she wanted to show me something related to the party and pulled me back inside. My father was stuck talking outside and didn't follow immediately.

We walked quickly through the dining room and living right up the stairs. Now we had my aunt's two friends with us. Both of the women joined us in my aunt and uncle's bedroom and they locked the door behind us. I was being saved. I couldn't believe it. Somehow they knew already. The tears rolled down my cheeks as I hugged my aunt. I don't even remember what she was telling me. We watched out her window as a cop car pulled in behind my father's car, parking him in. We waited in the bedroom for a while. I was too afraid to look out the window, too anxious and still on edge from not being quite sure if I dodged a bullet. I guess I did.

From what I understand, my "Dad" alerted my family sometime in the night or as my father and I drove over to the party. Either way, they knew I was in danger of being taken and the plan was to get me to that party to prevent it. I still felt betrayed that no one stuck up for me all night long, letting me beg and plead and cry, but I am grateful that the effort was made to convince my father to go to the party and for the forewarning that was given to my family.

I don't think anyone really said anything to me about it during the rest of the party. In fact, it was as if everyone pretended it didn't happen which I really appreciated. Relief was the dominating emotion when I ate my grandmother's bean soup and watched my grandfather open his gifts. One of his gifts was a new camcorder which I was given to use for the day. It was my job to record the party. It was probably to get my mind off of the day's events but I was honored and I took the job seriously. For the second time in so many months I ignored the extra affection I was being given because of what I was put through and soaked it up as genuine appreciation for myself as a person. Out of these moments I fabricated another great memory of the closeness I felt to my friends and family that, even with crystal clear hindsight, I'll maintain forever.

August: a memory

It was August 1999, at the very end of a bizarre summer. Limestone, New York had served its purpose in entertaining me between school years, but those were simpler times. I was nine years old and completely indifferent to turning ten in a few short months. I was interested in dark cloaked vigilantes, international men of mystery and completely unaware that the seed had been planted for my interest in japanese pocket monsters when I lifted a small, yellow, cat-like figurine from a truck stop restroom.

My imagination aided in making that summer truly an enjoyable period for myself. I spent a lot of my time with a blue bucket of colorful interlocking bricks. I remember building a ship that would sail around the blue carpet in the living room. I hope no one paid any attention to how consumed I was. My entire family was on a precipice of understanding and we didn’t have the wit to realize it. I continued to play on the bank in front of our house, lurching over Parkside Drive, the road that looked down upon the small hamlet not unlike the way my mother, brother and I looked down our self-entitled noses on the little area and its few citizens. We had no right to do so.

We moved to the sad excuse of a town on the border of New York and Pennsylvania in February 1999 after a year of unrest for my mother. She had left her 75 year old  husband (another story entirely), for his brother-in-law, a much younger man than he, in the summer preceding. We moved quite often that year. She had a daughter die to my brother’s father that she kept hidden at the time and in October 1998 the old man that she was legally bound to had also passed away. Needless to say she was unhinged. Her undiagnosed bipolar disorder, along with being improperly medicated exacerbating the issue, allowed for her judgement to be dangerously skewed. For the fourth time that year we changed homes.

This time was different. We left the trailer that we had been living in (now hers because she was technically a widow) and almost everything in it. We packed what we could with six people (Yes, six people) into a Geo Metro. I grabbed the blocks and the Playstation, apparently the most important things. She told us that she got someone to take our cats but the truth was that she left them in the trailer. Luckily, the cats, likely driven by abandonment, found a way out of the trailer by crawling underneath a tub fitting, my aunt later told me. We were young, we worried about the cats and not for ourselves.

We arrived in the dead of winter to this house on the hill with essentially nothing. No furniture. No dishes. Nothing. Everything left behind because some grand scheme in her head. Her new boyfriend/future ex-husband apparently had been sleeping on his coat on a hardwood floor while he established a job. He too must have had some sort of mental disorder to think that it was a good idea to bring two young children, a woman, and himself to a house while leaving everything we could have continued to own nearly five hours away to be lost forever.

Fast forward five months and a series of Rent-A-Center stints later we find ourselves back in August. As I said, it had been quite a summer. My brother and I had an elaborate month and a half traveling with his father and soon-to-be-step-mother (and her mother and children). We went to Nova Scotia and New Foundland on the combined wealth of the soon-to-be-step-mother’s money from her previous husband blowing his brains out and her mother’s new husband’s established wealth. He had Multiple Sclerosis and largely had no idea what was going on as we wheeled him around Canada spending his money. Nonetheless, I cherish these memories.

Coming back we were plunged into the sorry state of affairs my mother was living in. She was fine, I suppose, to be living with a misogynistic, unhygienic, abusive man she would later marry and even later divorce (still pending I believe). I hated him. My brother hated him too. But we tolerated him because my mother knew she wouldn’t be able to support us without him and we understood that. This was a concept that she would maintain for the next eight years. He left and returned many times that summer; sleeping in his car in the parking lot of the place he worked at, returning to the house after a few days to pretend like he didn’t pour a can of soda all over my mother’s head while threatening to punch her in the face. We would pretend too so we didn’t have to deal with it again. We usually went out to eat and got a toy or something to help erase the memories. As you’d imagine, I don’t have a delete button.

This happened a few times until my mother slipped into a depression and he left for quite a while. By now we are halfway through August and my mother is desperately poor. Our child support checks came in erratically and, despite near incessant unreliability, she depended on that income to the day. She had the telephone number memorized and would ring them up every half hour to see if the money had been issued. The expected day of arrival would come and go and no check.

I remember we ate a lot of noodles. It was in her depression that we were finally allowed to cross Route 219 all by ourselves. By allowing us to do this we could go to nearest convenience store to buy food with the little bit of cash that she had. We didn’t mind because this also opened up the other side of the little village for us to entertain ourselves. There was a recreation center that was being operated by a friend’s mother that we would go to. I say friend loosely, I had/have few friends. They had pool tables, televisions and computers where we would would play Doom all afternoon and pass the time.  The tacky spray-painted walls, much expected from a low-budget, small town operation, are still seared behind my eyes.

It was getting pretty bad at home. My mother hadn’t left her room for a few days to eat or shower. I assume she used the bathroom but I can’t be quite sure. I did the cooking which consisted of buttered macaroni noodles because, after all, I was nine years old and didn’t have access to anything else. I think we ran out of dish soap so none of us washed the dishes, which resulted in my brother and I eating off of tupperware lids for a few days. It was probably as bad as it sounds but we were young and springy. We bounce back quickly.

The check finally came. My mother emerged from the bedroom. We had absolutely no money, the last of which was spent on our noodles, so we walked to the nearest town. We walked down Parkside Drive and over the state line into Bradford for what was quite literally hours. It was nearly six miles to the bank but we made it in time. She cashed the check and we went out to eat. It was probably Burger King, a detail that is slipping my mind at the moment. We got a toy at some strip mall store and bought quite a few groceries. She was almost instantly manic again. A complete one hundred and eighty degree change from just a few days earlier.

We rode a taxi home and she made a late dinner after our already late lunch. I remember her promising to do the dishes and clean up the next day as she washed only what she needed to cook that evening. The house was a complete mess. The laundry room floor could not be seen for the dirty clothes had been piled up and had been trampled on. The kitchen smelled horrible from the sink full of dishes, food and who knows what. The main source of stench was the pot on the stove containing some form of cabbage that she had made before the piece-of-shit significant other jumped ship. I’ll never forget that smell.

I’m positive we watched Wild America for the 300th time that summer before we went to bed that night. When we woke up we watched cartoons and she made us french toast. She always burned them a little but it tasted great because she cut them into pieces and poured just the right amount of syrup for us. It was an added bonus that we weren’t eating off of storage lids. She was stressing that morning about school starting shortly. She placed a big emphasis on new school clothes every year and she wondered how she’d afford them by herself. She stopped talking about it eventually. She gave us each $10 dollars to go to the recreation center so naturally we left in a hurry; our pockets were on fire. The house still hadn’t been cleaned when we left.

Six hours later the school nurse showed up at the recreation center. She tapped my shoulder to get my attention as I played on the computer. She was holding my brother’s hand and told me I had to go with her. I felt my face get hot. I knew something was wrong. She told us that our mother was sick and that we’d have to spend the night at her house. Her son was in my grade but we hadn’t really been friends. The awkwardness of the situation was only rivaled by my general confusion.

She told me that my mother took some pills and we couldn’t go visit her. She was fine but very sick and we weren’t allowed to go back to our house. I remember my first concern was that we would be taken away from her because someone had seen the house in its filthy state. I would eventually be proven right. Since we weren’t allowed back at our house we had to sleep in someone else’s t-shirts and someone else’s clean underwear. I have never felt so low in my entire life. My brother was too young to understand what exactly was happening and he played with the other kids to reflect that. I didn’t have that luxury. I played but I was stuck in my head the entire time. Everything was about to change. It most certainly did.

We had french toast again the next morning but this time I didn’t want to eat it. I didn’t want to cut it myself and I didn’t like how the nurse didn’t use milk with the egg when cooking it. Our clothes from the day before had been washed and dried overnight so we had something clean to wear that was our own. This helped a little when the social workers descended on the house to ask us questions. I can’t remember what they asked me specifically but I know I lied. I didn’t want my mother to get in trouble. I was quite convincing as I’ve lied often for my mother. I don’t know what my brother told them. We were informed quite plainly that the man who brought us to this fucking town didn’t want any responsibility for us and he reminded everyone that he had no legal responsibility to do so. He made it clear that he did not care what happened to us. I made sure I never forgot that.

I don’t remember crying but I remember wanting to. My grandfather and my brother’s dad drove up that night to retrieve us so there was some comfort mixed with the fear. We were going back to Pennsylvania. Without our mother. I kept my head bowed as we stopped by the disgusting house to get some of our things. I felt ashamed that they had to see it like that, like it was my fault. I know now that it wasn’t my fault but I can’t change how I felt then. They helped us pack our clothes into trash bags. The smell of the rotten cabbage was overpowering. For the fifth time that year I packed what I could and left a house I called home to never go back again. I don’t remember talking much on the way back to Lancaster but I do remember thinking. I remember thinking over and over again that she left us. She never cleaned the house either. The groceries still sat on the dining room table. She had left us.

I later learned to justify her actions. She was worried about us starting school. She was worried about buying pencils and backpacks and shoes. She was worried about being alone and taking care of herself and two kids. In her convoluted mind she found a solution. She’d attempt suicide. She would at least put herself on the brink and so she did. Surely this would snap her abusive partner into action, everything could go back to normal. She thought wrong. Nothing was normal again.



Note: I love my mother very much and she has come very far since the events in this memory nearly 12 years ago. I do not carry any hatred toward her for these things and I do not expect anyone else to either.