forgotten about it, but the instant Ben sees me on Monday, he picks up right where he left off.
I realize—you can’t make yourself invisible. You can’t even make yourself small.
Across the room from me at McDonald’s, I saw a father and a son, eating hamburgers and sharing a large order of french fries. They didn’t say much, but perhaps that’s normal, even in a healthy father-son relationship. I couldn’t help wondering what would happen if the kid was getting bullied at school, and he came home and told his father about it.
“What’s the name of the boy who’s picking on you?” the father would say.
“Ben.”
“Why don’t I have a little talk with this Ben?” the father would suggest, and then the next day, he’d either corner Ben in the parking lot and threaten him with bodily harm or else just beat the crap out of him. That would be wrong, of course, but it was a satisfying fantasy. It was even more fantastical for me than for most people, because I never had a father I could talk to about my situation in school.
My contact with my father, Mark, was minimal. He was the second oldest of four boys. He and his older brother, Terry, were adopted. His younger brothers, Greg and Rex, were not. His father, Dwaine, was an accountant for the Racine school system if memory serves me correctly, and his mother, Virginia, or Ginny, stayed home and raised the boys while being very active in communal activities. My uncles had fathered two kids each, and held down white-collar jobs, while my father remained blue-collar. The family would all get together for Christmas, and they still do. It struck me as odd that as dysfunctional as my mother’s childhood was, my father’s was the opposite, and yet he did not come out of it any more prepared to be a parent than my mother had from her family.
Mark was an X-ray technician, like my mother. They met in X-ray technician school. He was twenty-six years old when I was born, younger than my mom was. I have been told they divorced sixteen weeks after I was born. The obvious question then is, was my birth an intentional event, and if it was, was it ever welcomed?
He remarried soon after getting divorced to the woman he’d been having an affair with, according to my mom. Between the ages of four and five, I’d spend Wednesdays and Thursdays at his house with him and his second wife, Robin. She worked at the same hospital as my dad. Robin hated and resented me because I was the living representation of my father’s past connection to my mother. Either that or she was just a mean person. She was a cruel, overweight Wisconsin farm girl who was emotionally immature for her age and had a short temper—over two hundred pounds of pure intimidation to a small boy.
All I understood, those first few years that I went there after school, was that she terrified me. When I knew she was coming to pick me up, I’d be so afraid, I’d get physically sick to my stomach. In the car, I’d try not to make eye contact with her and stare out my window.
“There are things to see out my window, too, you know,” she’d say, as if she had the right to demand I look in her direction. So I’d time myself, looking out my window for three seconds, then hers for three seconds.
She served cottage cheese all the time, even though she knew I hated it, and she’d make me sit at the table until I finished it. It’s not uncommon, I realize, for kids to wrinkle their noses at certain foods, but she’d get up from the table and say, “That better be gone before I get back,” and I had good reason to fear her. One time, I saw her go to the door to call the dog in, a husky named Reagan, and when she wouldn’t come, I saw Robin grab a section of pipe my father had left by the door and was prepared to throw it at Reagan if she didn’t come as called. When Reagan finally came in, she told the dog, “You’re lucky you came back,” and put the pipe down, but I knew she was prepared to use it.
I
I realize—you can’t make yourself invisible. You can’t even make yourself small.
Across the room from me at McDonald’s, I saw a father and a son, eating hamburgers and sharing a large order of french fries. They didn’t say much, but perhaps that’s normal, even in a healthy father-son relationship. I couldn’t help wondering what would happen if the kid was getting bullied at school, and he came home and told his father about it.
“What’s the name of the boy who’s picking on you?” the father would say.
“Ben.”
“Why don’t I have a little talk with this Ben?” the father would suggest, and then the next day, he’d either corner Ben in the parking lot and threaten him with bodily harm or else just beat the crap out of him. That would be wrong, of course, but it was a satisfying fantasy. It was even more fantastical for me than for most people, because I never had a father I could talk to about my situation in school.
My contact with my father, Mark, was minimal. He was the second oldest of four boys. He and his older brother, Terry, were adopted. His younger brothers, Greg and Rex, were not. His father, Dwaine, was an accountant for the Racine school system if memory serves me correctly, and his mother, Virginia, or Ginny, stayed home and raised the boys while being very active in communal activities. My uncles had fathered two kids each, and held down white-collar jobs, while my father remained blue-collar. The family would all get together for Christmas, and they still do. It struck me as odd that as dysfunctional as my mother’s childhood was, my father’s was the opposite, and yet he did not come out of it any more prepared to be a parent than my mother had from her family.
Mark was an X-ray technician, like my mother. They met in X-ray technician school. He was twenty-six years old when I was born, younger than my mom was. I have been told they divorced sixteen weeks after I was born. The obvious question then is, was my birth an intentional event, and if it was, was it ever welcomed?
He remarried soon after getting divorced to the woman he’d been having an affair with, according to my mom. Between the ages of four and five, I’d spend Wednesdays and Thursdays at his house with him and his second wife, Robin. She worked at the same hospital as my dad. Robin hated and resented me because I was the living representation of my father’s past connection to my mother. Either that or she was just a mean person. She was a cruel, overweight Wisconsin farm girl who was emotionally immature for her age and had a short temper—over two hundred pounds of pure intimidation to a small boy.
All I understood, those first few years that I went there after school, was that she terrified me. When I knew she was coming to pick me up, I’d be so afraid, I’d get physically sick to my stomach. In the car, I’d try not to make eye contact with her and stare out my window.
“There are things to see out my window, too, you know,” she’d say, as if she had the right to demand I look in her direction. So I’d time myself, looking out my window for three seconds, then hers for three seconds.
She served cottage cheese all the time, even though she knew I hated it, and she’d make me sit at the table until I finished it. It’s not uncommon, I realize, for kids to wrinkle their noses at certain foods, but she’d get up from the table and say, “That better be gone before I get back,” and I had good reason to fear her. One time, I saw her go to the door to call the dog in, a husky named Reagan, and when she wouldn’t come, I saw Robin grab a section of pipe my father had left by the door and was prepared to throw it at Reagan if she didn’t come as called. When Reagan finally came in, she told the dog, “You’re lucky you came back,” and put the pipe down, but I knew she was prepared to use it.
I
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