Memoir ideas

Nightmares

As a child I would often times have nightmares about dying. They were mainly regarding my death and/or death of my Mom. I was so scared that my Mom was going to die thus leaving me to go to my Dad. Often times though I would wake up panicked about dying myself.

During these times my Mom would come lay in my bed with me trying to calm me down. She would tell me that it would be many years before she died and that I did not have to worry about my own death because I would outlive her.

As a child I was scared of not having a parent who cares about and can take care of every aspect of my daily life and keep their temper. I could not trust my Dad on anything that takes patience whether it is a homework question or whether or not I got my bed made. My Dad could and would explode at any moment without any warning.

I can remember the time that I had just started to read a book and asked him what a word was. I simply asked him, “Dad, is this word through or thorough?” He never answered me. Instead he got out a yellow legal pad and wrote through on one side and thorough on the other side then proceeded to throw the pad at me and told me to write the words all down the page. So I spent the rest of the evening writing the two words over and over again, all the way down the page. At the time I was still unclear what the word was and I never finished the book. I simply got sick in the stomach every time I see the book The Wind and the Willow.

Ever since that one weekend I was afraid to bring anything to him that was related to reading and or education. I definitely did not do any homework at his house. When report cards came out I would wait as long as I could before handing it to him. He loved to humiliate my sister and me by telling us that we were stupid and that we could do better if we applied ourselves. In other words, we were not as good as his stepsons. No we weren’t because we were not beaten if we made a mistake and given a nasty lecture if we did not do our homework within a reasonable period of time after school. By leaving with our Mom and not him we were allowed to be ourselves and do things at our pace without getting hurt over a little mistake.

****************************

I am more myself in solitude. For in solitude I am myself.
-(c)Melia Benjamin, August 2000

****************************