Old Me, New View Ch. 6
When I was about four years old, I asked my dad if I could have my own room. Only problem with that was it needed to be built. I got it eventually cause my daddy built it. Pawpaw and Pain helped. Like most kids I was scared to sleep in my new room alone, so I’d still go sleep with Mawmaw and Pawpaw sometimes.
By then the cousin that would kiss on my momma all the time stopped hanging around the house but there was another one not long after that. He didn’t really hang around much. I didn’t like him really. Definitely not like the first one. He seemed mean and combative. He drank a lot of beer too. He stopped coming by finally. Momma and dad were still together from what I remember. Momma got a job at the seafood factory with Pain peeling seafood not long after all that. I don’t think she was there too long cause one day she came back home real sick. She was vomiting a lot. I think this was for the May trawling season. Maybe lingering on from the month of April cause she told me once she peeled so many baskets of crawfish.
I guess it was about June or July my momma found out she was pregnant again. She cried and cried. I remember Mawmaw fussing her cause she would get on top the counter and jump off it. She would run up and down the steps real fast. I know Mawmaw told her to stop a bunch of times. Mawmaw had no control of her. Old Mawmaw and Pain came to the house and finally got her to stop. Well now I’m older its clear to me that she didn’t want either of us.
In August of 1993, it was the night before my first day of school. I was finally going to go to kindergarten. I was so excited. I was running in Mawmaw’s shot gun house. I was steadily running from Mawmaw’s room to my mom and dad’s room. They all told me to stop. I didn’t listen. I guess I got what I needed cause I never ran again in Mawmaw’s house. My dad swung his thick cowboy belt across my back. I screamed. Left me whelped up for a couple days. Mawmaw gave me some Tylenol right away. I was crying really bad and could hardly breathe. That night I went sleep with Mawmaw and pawpaw in their bed. Mawmaw put a cold wet rag on my back and passed her hand on it lightly till I fell asleep.
I remember my first day of school. My momma and Mawmaw cried the whole morning. They got in the car and followed my school bus to school. I remember the girl my teacher introduced me to since I didn’t know anyone. Her and I got close. Almost like sisters. My momma would dress us alike, buy us the same things, but treated us differently. Had a few people show up for my 5th birthday party that year. My momma put us in the same dress that year for Christmas and took us take Christmas pictures with Santa Clause. I remember the pink flower pattern with the bows on the dresses. Momma would always get us to practice writing our name or alphabets and numbers. I didn’t want to do those kinds of things with her cause Mawmaw and Pawpaw was teaching me already. But when I did participate in my momma’s little games, she would always make sure to tell me how my friend was so much better than me at whatever we were doing. From writing to basic mathematics, and coloring the friend was always better at it than me.
I’m not sure if it was this Christmas or the one before but supposedly my daddy left my momma and me to go be with his other family and kids in the state of Mississippi. I then learned I had another brother, an older brother. And I wanted to meet him. His birthday is on Christmas eve. That year my daddy got him a Green Bay Packers player’s outfit. I remember when the helmet came in, he was so excited to give this to him. Momma and dad both told me no I couldn’t. I remember my momma crying for a couple days. Not long after Christmas little brother was born.