Chapter 1

I was born September 24, 1947. This year, 2007, I will be 60. 1947 was the year when UFO's and Martians crash landed in Boswell, New Mexico. The first-class postage cost 3 cents. St. Louis Post-Dispatch dated January 1, 2007: The Dead Sea Scrolls were still a secret. Few people had heard of "The Diary of Anne Frank" or "A Streetcar Named Desire." There was no state of Israel. Recorded music came on 78 rpm phonograph discs, but not rock 'n' roll, which didn't exist. There was no such thing as an H-bomb, "Peanuts" or color TV. England had a king. Polio was incurable. Stalin dreaw breath. "Hillary" was a mountain climber, but Everest was unconquered.
The Topeka schools were segregated. Rosa Parks rode in the back of the bus. Jet travel was limited to military pilots and never faster than the impassable speed of sound. Submarines ran on diesel oil. Holden Caulfield was still in draft form, and so was Willy Loman. Babe Ruth was sick. Jackie Robinson was a minor leaguer. IBM was working on a computing machine, as big as a room, called UNIVAC.
This memoior is about me and how I felt unique and never that I fit into my family. I was born a lesbian for which I never knew or never had the term to describe the special feelings I had for girls with none of these feelings for boys. I felt isolated and on the outside looking in most of the time.
I was born into an authoritarian society one in which the church ruled politicans and society in general. Church rules were filled with extreme opposites: Heaven or hell; black or white..there was no gray area. Men has social rules to follow and women had their own. The classified section of the newspaper listed jobs for men and a separate list of jobs for women; jobs such as nurses, secretaries, teachers, librarians, telephone operators, and of course mothers and housewives was the preferred occupation. Women vowed to love order and obey...words written by the church. The church set the social norms for men and women and did not approve of birth control. To death due us part were the wedding vows of the church. The holier than thou almighty church! Controlling and manipulating..feeling people need to be tricked into doing their bidding.
I came from German decent on both sides of my family. My dad was a farmer as his dad before him; in fact they farmed together. They both spoke german and my father joined him in conversation laughing and poking fun at my mother in German. I sat there at the dinner table watching this male chauvinist display of belittlement. The angier she got the more they liked it and the funnier they thought it was. If they did speak English and she tried to join in the conversation they told her she was stupid and in so many words shut up. Those were the men of my family..controlling, belittleing woman haters.
Yes, cold German farmers walking behind the horse and plow. I remember seeing my grandfather in the fields all bent and slowing making clucking sounds to control the old horse slowing walking putting the single shear through the solid hard soil. I remember watching him and smelling the clean earth and watching the black birds shallow or carry off worans. My mother's side of the family were small farmers too and factory workers.
I was born in 1947 two years after World War II ended and women were encouraged to leave factory work behind and go back to the kitchens. Jobs were intended for men. Industry stopped making machinery and supplies for work and went back to producting their unusal products for American consumers.
We were poor country folks in four people in a one bedroom house. My brother a year older than I. The house was cold in the winter with no indoor plumbing. Only people in town had in side bathrooms. We only had an outhouse.
My dad liked to sit in the travern a few miles down the road. My mother made a grave mistake one day when she called there and told the bartender to have dad come home. Of couse, he had two more beers even if he was ready to leave for a man cannot be dominated by a woman. Other men like to laugh and make fun of men who got phone calls from their wives as they sat in the tavern. But, the first rule was never leave as soon as she called; but, rather show whose boss by having a few more beers. Men were heads of families and made all the decisions usually without consulting their wives. He made all the decisions of where to live and what car to buy because women were the weaker sex and besides they were too fragial physically as well as mentally to understand such matters. Mothers past these beliefs on to their daughters. A women needed a good man. And a good man was one who was a good provider and didn't beat or followed the rule of thumb which meant not to beat with any rod bigger round than his thumb.
This is the lifestyle that I was born into. My, I had my work cut out for me! Born into a male oriented authoriaian society ruled by religion where women hide the fact that they were pregnant, even the married ones. Doctor's delivered babies while fathers waited in waiting room helpless and maintaining distance without bonding with his wife and newborn. And not understanding or participating in the process of labor and delivery.
When I was born, women didn't have many rights or any credit. If a woman got divorced she usally ended up ostracized from family and friends. She was declared the fallen woman even if he was the one who cheated on her. It was always determined that if she was a better wife then he would have no reason to roam. For no matter what...the blame always fell on the woman. The priest and doctor was no help for they wrote the rules that woman had to follow.
Woman were indeed second class citizens and soon learned how to work the system. Even if she knew better she didn't let on and led her boyfriend, bother, father are whoever think that they were always right. I remember my mother telling me to always make him think it was his idea and to let him win. My brother beat on me constantly and belittled me which all went unseen by my mother. Her defense was boys have to be mean and tough so they can fight wars. Unspokenly, because I learned fast not to argue with either my parents. To argue was a no win situation and besides I was a stupid girl anyway.
I could never understand why a girl would want to marry a boy anyway? Why?
When I was very small my first memories were of being afraid of my father and being tormented by my brother. I remember as a toddler coming up to my mother's knee and wanting her to pick me up and hold me. I longed to be loved and held by her. She told me that I was too big and I knew in my heart that I would never be held or hugged. My father laughed when she said this; he was colder than she. I wondered out loud one day why they had me. She answered to help me in the kitchen and your brother to help dad outside. I was mortified. To work?
I remember an ache in my heart all of my life; a void; an emptiness. It was the lack of love. I felt unworthy. I felt unwanted. Children of that era were taught to be seen and not heard and to love and obey their parents no matter what because they were your parents. This was a great burden to put on a child.
I was never encouraged to try hard in school but just merely get by because I was only going to get married and have kids anyway. Having my future mapped out depressed me. My destiny was one of servitude, and entrapment and loneliness. I never liked or understood men; yet, I was supposed to be thrilled loving, honoring and obeying a man. I just couldn't understand why any woman would want that. Why couldn't she want me? Why couldn't I have her. I could not put words to these feelings; I just knew my life was doomed for loneliness and sadness.