Fifty Years On

I went to Sherman School, located on Union Street, in the now-bourgeois Marina District of San Francisco. There were still many economic levels represented, back then.  It was not the hipster Mecca we now know. 

I was in the first grade, a six year old dreamer. My few memories of Sherman School are terrifying. Being forced to square dance regularly, red ants invading the playground, and some older kids scaring us little kids with dry ice.  Why dry ice was scary I do not know, but it most certainly was. 

Our neighbors on Leavenworth Street were the Waldrons. They had one child, Sara.  We were fast pals, she being a year older than me.  Her dad often took us to school, and he had the coolest Volkswagen Bug ever.  It would  start without a key, which I found mysterious and exciting.

"That" morning, I remember the teacher telling us that President Kennedy was dead, and then all of the school's students being herded through the hallways and onto the playground.  Reactions were varied, depending on ages of the children. Us young ones seemed mostly frightened and confused, and some kids in the upper grades were noticeably upset.  All of the teachers and staff seemed to be wailing.

I was indeed confused, yet aware of the enormity of the unfolding event.  See, my parents were big JFK supporters, always.  Politics were already familiar to me-since I had heard grown ups discussing them from the time I could comprehend.  I still recall my father's disdain for Barry Goldwater.

At one point, after what seemed like an unusually long stint on the playground, an older student approached me, sobbing.  She said: "Why aren't you crying?  Don't you know the president was shot?"  Then she punched me in the stomach.  And I cried.  

School ended early.  Things were intense when I got home from school that day.  My parents were upset in a way I was unfamiliar with.  And although I had not yet reached the alleged age of reason (7 years), I knew that the reliable little world I had known would never be the same.  It was not. 

My second grade report card from Sherman School. 

What If

Photo of new sign on the door of the library where I occasionally work as a substitute. I call it the opposite of Aloha, and don't like it.. Especially since the library also serves a K-12 public school. I mean , I get it.  But it's still cold/vague/dismissive. Please define "nice"-- and which version of niceness are we going with?  

What if you finally woke up and realized you'd been manipulated and bullied and stepped on for most of you life?  And you accepted this as normalcy, since it was ever-so?  That's me.  Always in "Please like me/love me mode".  When and why did this start? Easy to blame Catholic Elementary School and Catholic relatives, but that doesn't mean my non-Catholic relations are clean.  The ones that still cling to their (closeted) Puritan values.  

What my family and the universe produced was a door mat to many.  Too many.  A large percentage of them unworthy of my energy.  I just kept accepting the role, beginning in early childhood.

Until I came to the life changing realization that I did not have to accept it anymore, and ceased.  Or am trying to cease.

It's true that I don't seem like the type to be bullied.  I was never bullied physically, save for the time my evil ex smashed my face.  But never in school, etc.  The bullying I mean is more subtle.  It's allowing oneself to be manipulated and not even realizing that is the case.  It's subjugating your own thoughts and ideas and needs for the purpose of the appeasement or favor of those around you.  Beware of emotional vampires, kiddies! 

"Can't please everyone, so you've got to please yourself." Rick Nelson

Jesus Died For Somebody's Sins...

But not mine.
Patti Smith

It's Good Friday. Never, ever understood what was good about it. It certainly wasn't good for poor Jesus. While in Appleton, Wisconsin for 5 years, I went to St. Mary's Catholic school. What an eye-opening experience that was.

The Easter season was particularly terrifying. We had to do the stations of the cross in church. Talk about child abuse! Sheesh.

Good Friday was always a school holiday. I have memories of playing basketball with neighborhood friends, all Catholic, naturally. We had to go home and be sad in the afternoon, during the time of the crucifixion. No television, talking or even smiling was permitted during that time.

On Easter Sunday, everyone was cosmically guilt-free again. We celebrated zombie Jesus with baskets of hollow bunnies, jelly beans, and hard boiled eggs. After Easter mass of course. One year, (1968) my mother put the 45 of "Lady Madonna" in my Easter basket. Now I'm racking my brain to recall the B side... Later on Easter Sunday, there was typically be a leg of lamb, asparagus and baby new potatoes at grandma's house. Strawberry shortcake for dessert. My Wisconsin grandma made the best strawberry shortcake ever.

When mother moved us back to San Francisco in 1970, I was quite relieved to go to public school again. Oh, and the B side was "The Inner Light."

The Dream

Around the time I learned what the word divorce meant, (I was seven.) I had a dream that remains vivid to this day.

I am in the city of my birth, San Francisco. In what seems to be my neighborhood of Lombard and Leavenworth streets not far from the Art Institute.

I am alone, wandering. I come upon a long stairway that goes downward. Hundreds of concrete stairs. It takes quite a while to reach the bottom. When I do, it's a dead end, with only enough room to turn around and climb up again.

I notice a kitten there, crying in the damp confines, and pick it up. I remember that I had been asking my parents for a cat, but they didn't want one. I decide to take the poor thing home with me and ask them again.

It takes a very long time to reach the street level, and I am feeling nervous about my dad's reaction. Finally, I reach the door to our flat, ring the bell, and someone buzzes me in.

I climb the additional stairs to our place and see my dad waiting for me at the top.
He is smiling. He has a razor blade and a box of band aids in his hands. When I reach him, he says nothing. Just quietly begins to make small cuts in my skin, all over my arms. He then methodically begins covering up the cuts with band aids. Never angry, just smiling gently. Silent.

That's where it ends. I never told my dad about this dream, but I have never forgotten it. My parents were divorced a few months later.

Gung Hay Fat Choy

Happy Year of the Snake!
As some of my readers know, I was born and mostly raised in San Francisco. My neighborhood was North Beach. Not only a Bohemian outpost for beatniks like Allen Ginsberg and Larry Ferlinghetti, it was originally home to new arrivals from Italy. (After all the original people were disappeared, that is.) North Beach is a stone's throw from Chinatown, and has long been a mix of the two cultures. That dichotomy was something I savored as a child. Chinese New Year in my hometown was more festive than anything I'd ever known, and I loved learning about all of it's traditions and celebrations.

Here on the Big Island, Asian culture is again part of my life. I've missed that more than I realized, especially after living in primarily white enclaves for more than 15 years! Feels like I'm home at last. Now I am craving dim sum!