The Brett Incident

I had spent much of my teenage years wanting to be an Oceanographer, like Dr. Bob Ballard.  I even ran my bath scalding hot, so I might prepare for diving in the hot water around the underwater volcanoes.  When I tried to get into LSMSA, see Cold Hands, I had to take the SAT’s.  I began to understand I was smart, but not that smart.  Math is the bane of my existence.  I also began to understand I would have to leave the state to study, something I was not prepared to do.  I did not want to leave my family.  I also did not want to leave the area, go away, build a life, get married, have kids, own a home, and have to give up everything many years later, to come home and care for aging and dying parents.  I am an only child.  I don’t get the luxury of handing it off to another family member.  It is going to be me, doing it all, in the end.  I was brought up to believe you do not put your loved ones in a nursing home.  It is dishonorable and distasteful. 

So I knew I could not be an Oceanographer, although I loved writing, I figured I could never make a living at it, besides I knew I wasn’t very good at it.  I knew people who could write circles around me.  I didn’t want to be a teacher like my mom was working on becoming, and two of my Aunts were already.  I didn’t want to be a nurse like my other Aunt.  I had been training in the wifely arts of cooking, cleaning, sewing, and hand work since I could remember.  My mom always said she wanted to prepare me.  So I thought I am a pretty good cook and I love food, maybe I will be a chef, so that is what I started out going to college to do.  I was also in love with the Frugal Gourmet about this time.

As my senior year approached I began to look at colleges.  My father then stepped in and said, “You may only apply to colleges where I may get to you in less than a day’s drive.”  That sealed the deal, no Oceanography for me.  I remember measuring off the distance and marking my large US map with my compass and setting up the radius.  I decided to apply in state.  I asked, my family, for help filling out the forms for both financial aid and college applications, they refused.  It taught me how to do them though.  I always found it odd some colleges required you send a picture.  What the hell did that tell them about your brain or who you were???  I applied all over the state: to Northwestern in Natchitoches, LSU in Baton Rouge, USL in Lafayette, Louisiana Tech in Ruston, NLU in Monroe, Southeastern in Hammond, and McNeese in Lake Charles.  I got in to all of them.  I was very surprised I got into LSU, but I did. 

I was so ecstatic when my letter came from Louisiana Tech that I had been accepted.  My entire life my father had told me, “You’re going to college.”  I never had a say in it.  I wanted to go to Tech, desperately, like my father before me.  I have always wanted to be just like my Dad.  I still remember going into the living room to tell him.  He held the letter and said, “That’s great, but you can’t go there.  You will have no one to watch over you.  You can go to NSU, where you Mom is attending, and she can watch other you, or you can go to USL where your aunt can watch over you.”  I was devastated.  All that work, applying to all the other colleges, only to be told, again that what I wanted, didn’t matter.  I am sure he had his reasons, but he broke my heart that day.  Still makes me angry to this day.

I thought for a moment.  I wanted to get as far away from my mother as possible, and I knew others from my school were going to NSU.  I was terrified the bullying would continue there, so I said, “I guess I will go to USL then.” 

USL became my battle cry, it became my hope, and thinking of going there and getting away from the daily abuse, which was only getting worse now that Cajun Rink had been added to he bunch, became my refuge.  Cajun helped crank the daily taunts up to 11.  But I was trying so hard to be a good Christian and turn the other cheek, and to do what my parents asked.  But with every word he hurled at me, I died inside.  He even went so far as to paint penis on my car windows, in shoe polish. I am still thankful for the cheerleaders who helped me remove enough from my window, to drive home, with spit and a Kleenex, and held me while I cried.

Into my life came Brett.  He was beautiful or so I thought.  He had this long curly black mullet.  He was of Native American decent, and covered in pimples.  I didn’t care.  I was on him like white on rice.  He was fresh meat and I wanted him.  In my mind he had not been tainted by my tormentors.  So it was game on.  He was from Shreveport.  He was always crying, come to find out his father had recently died.  His mother had remarried.  She and her new husband had moved to Keatchie.  Brett and I became fast friends.  I was always trying to comfort him, rubbing his back and trying to help him through this difficult time. 

As I sit here looking at my annual, I don’t know that we were ever officially boyfriend and girlfriend.  I was invited to a bonfire at his house.  Our parents met and they liked each other.  They encourage us to be together.  I went to a Christmas party at his house, where he danced with me.  He gave me a cassette single of Dwight Yoakam’s “Fast as you.”  I spent hours listening to it, to see if Brett was trying to give me a secret message.  I hate that song now, it reminds me of all of this.

Brett was strange.  He spent hours on his hair and although it was my guess he liked me, he didn’t want to hold my hand, and kissed me only once.  When he kissed me it was not like Adam’s kisses, full of passion and want.  No it was like kissing a rock.  I was confused.  I liked him, was falling in love with him, but he did not seem to reciprocate.  I knew, deep down, it was going to be another one of my one sided love affairs.  I often fell “In love” with a guy and then waited for him to say he liked me, even tried to buddy up to some of them, but none of them ever got the hint.  So it was always on sided.

Brett, me and our families went out New Years Eve to the American Legion Hall dance.  Brett was prone to migraines.  He had one that night.  I would learn later he faked it to get away from me. 

Not long after we were due to give blood.  I talked all my friends into doing it.  It ended up that I could not because had an ear infection and was on antibiotics.  Brett, Sonya and some more of my friends gave blood.  A few weeks later Brett received a letter, or so I was told, that said he had a devastating medical condition.  I wrote him a letter and told him how much I loved him and I would stay beside him through this diagnosis.

Within a few days later I was given a note from him, by Sonya, he said wanted nothing to do with me anymore.  I was devastated.  For once in my life, I thought I had found love.  I have always said the worst thing about all of this, was that for a few weeks, I had hope that I was not this horrible, ugly, fat, crazy monster that everyone told me I was.  When I read his letter, all that hope was destroyed.

It was not just the relationship that hurt, what did the most damage is what came after.  Sonya, my best friend since 2^nd grade, was also friends with Brett.  What I didn’t know, is that many nights that I was on the phone with Brett, she was quietly listening in.  He had called her, before he called me.  I didn’t know until later that she was acting as a conduit to help get him hooked up to another friend, who Brett began dating a few weeks later.

This friend he dated, a few months later, when the relationship was over, turned to me in class and said, “He lies doesn’t he?”  I said, “Yes he does.” 

I still do not know what was said.  I don’t know what rumor was spread, but from the time that Brett broke up with me in January of 1994 until about a month before I graduated in May of 1995, I was basically shunned.  Suddenly none of my friends, or anyone for that matter, would speak to me.  No one would eat lunch with me.  I was treated like a pariah.  My only clue is what one friend said to me one day.  He had the courage to break whatever taboo they had set against me.  He said, “They have told me to hate you and I just can’t do it anymore.  You have always been nice to me.”  And he sat with me and ate lunch.  It was finally over.  He was the first, more would join us as they year drew to a close. 

I cannot tell you how desperate I was.  I cannot tell you how many nights I wanted to kill myself.  How I wanted to jump from the river bridge.  In one swoop I had lost everything I understood.  My people, my tribe, my friends, or however you want to call it.  My sociology professor years later, would call it a “social death.”  When I finally got up the courage to talk to my parents, tell them what was going on and I was suicidal, my Dad said, “Oh It’s just puppy love.  It will pass.”  Twenty-Two years later it hurts, almost as bad as it did when it happened.  At least I now have some understanding to go with all of this.

I stayed friends with Brett’s parents.  I have seen his mother several times over the years.  When I saw her, I told her all that had happened, and she confirmed for me what I had begun to suspect many years before.  Brett was gay.  I now understand what he did.  He used me for cover.  He was pretending to be interested in me to appease his family and hide his homosexuality.  That I could have lived with, and would have even happily participated in it had I known. 

I found Brett many years ago on Facebook, we discussed much of the above.  To say he has a different idea of what happened is an understatement.  He said we were never in a relationship and he never cared for me, that he has always been gay.  I am sure there is much truth to that.  I have known for a long time what I felt for him, was not reciprocated.  I had hoped for an apology, but that will never happened.  Never got one from Sonya either or knew what was actually said about me.  Would love to know now, if someone wanted to PM me, I would be open to hearing it now.  Ten years, after all this, I would see Sonya again.  Who just hugged my neck and could not understand why I was so mad at her.  What a Bitch!

While all this was going on, all I could do was pray and count the days until I would go to USL.  I was in Hell and I had to find my own way out.  I was like Rapunzel.  I was trapped in the tower, no one was coming to save me, I had to cut my hair and save myself. 

There was a young man in my class who came in everyday, with the most beautiful smile.  As corny as it sounds his smile, gave me hope.  Seeing him smile, and hearing him laugh helped me in ways he has no idea of.  I even developed a little crush on him, but my fate was sealed and I was too broken and afraid to try to find love again.  I was leaving for Lafayette after I graduated, and that was that.

I began what I called “Smile Therapy.”  I would force myself to smile, just for a few seconds every few hours.  I noticed when I did so I would feel better.  Turns out smiling releases all kinds of endorphins in your brain, that are good for you.  Slowly, ever so slowly I feel it began to pull me out of the worst of my depression.  The first few weeks were the worst.  I would get two or three seconds and then burst into tears again.  I cried so much during class, during this whole thing, me a woman who hates to cry and used to see it as a sign of weakness. 

A few weeks before we graduated someone told me something I would never have dreamed.  They said, “Melvin has been in love with you for years.  He would have done anything for you.”  I remember sitting in our drafting room, looking at him and just smiling.  I have no idea if it was even true, but it helped me none the less.  And today I regret not doing anything about it.  The idea that Melvin had once loved me, along with my friends smile, gave me comfort in one of the darkest times of my life.  Stupid and corny, right?  I know.  But I love stupid and corny. 

Ilsa

 

 

 

 

 

You can write!

By the time I was 12 I was settling into my new family well.  I knew all the players and all the places.  When I was nine, Pappy, Dad’s dad, died.  Although we did not have many years together, I was always sure he loved me and wanted me in the family.  By the time I was 11 I started doing genealogy on my new family.  Mainly I was trying to keep all the family stories straight in my head, but I also hoped it would appease Novelle.  It never did. 

My father, used to tell me the most extraordinary stories, of his Great-Grandfather who fought in the civil war.  I began to take my new families history as my own.  I was also hungry, to learn anything about Oma, that I could.  History was always alive and present in my life.  Both my Dad and my uncles were great history buffs.  I went to a historic church and lived in a very historical town.  Grandpa would also tell me wonderful stories, about the sea and all the different countries he had visited.

In 6^th grade I had a phenomenal teacher named Debbie Pace (now Debbie Silver).  She always had a smile, had bright red hair, loved science and lived every bit of her craziness and reveled in her wonderful weirdness.  She is the kind of teacher, that had a dramatic impact, on every student she taught.  She LOVED to teach.  It was not just a job to her, it was her calling. She gave us the beautiful luxury of letting us be ourselves, and never chastising us for it.  I remember speaking with an Australian accent for about 6 week and she never asked me to stop.  She just let me, be me. 

Many of us are still glad to call her friend today.  She would eventually leave our little school, and Louisiana for better opportunities in Texas.  She now teaches other teachers how to teach.  May you all be blessed, to have a teacher like her, in your life someday.

Ms. Pace taught all 6^th graders science.  But that year, I happened to have her for homeroom, which included literature and spelling as well.  She was also gifted in these departments.  Every day we started the day in the same way.  The pledge was followed by a few moments of silent meditation.  Before the meditation everyone was encouraged to say if they had, for lack of a better term “prayer requests.”  Although it was never called that.  You know pray for my mom cause she has cancer, or my dad pulled another drunk last night, or I am really scared about the test we are going to take today, etc.  You would not believe what came out of our mouths.  Kids talked about family members being sick, about being bullied, and I think even once or twice abuse was implied if not downright mentioned.  What’s tough about being that age, is that no one will listen to you.  The silent meditation helped us to get our minds off of what they were on, and onto our school work, and it showed in our grades. 

I am vehemently apposed to prayer in school.  You may think everyone should be fine with shoving Christianity down everyone’s throat, cause you think everyone should be Christian.  But what about the little Buddhist boy in the corner or the Jewish girl sitting at head of the class? Everyone’s faith should be respected and I believe in the separation of church and state.  I, however, see no harm in a few moments of daily meditation and stillness. You could pray or simply sit quietly, it was your choice.

Also you have to remember I went to small school.  No nurse, no security guards, no councilor, no art and no sex ed.  A loving teacher was a godsend to us.  She listened to us.  And not only did she believe us, she believed in us.  I was not a writer until that year.  She had us working on stories for something and I started getting upset.  She came over to me and I said, “I can’t do this.”  She held the pencil in my hand and said, “Yes you can write.”  She was the first to believe in me.  I know many others who felt the same way. 

Although it was widely known in my family that I wrote, it was never encouraged.  Nor was it ever mentioned, to me that I should or could write for a living.  Even when I was in college, I was not encouraged by the family, to study more about writing.  I always believe I was not good enough.  I knew my spelling was awful and my grammar was not the best.  I believed no one wanted to hear what I had to say.  I still struggle with that.  I have even had moments of that this week, where I thought about deleting this blog, because I feel no one wants to listen to my boring, and ordinary life story.  I have resolved I must soldier on, at least for the moment.

I was having trouble with boys about that time as well.  The year before I had been put in braces and developed breasts, now they didn’t just come in as A’s, no they couldn’t do that.  I never remember being in a training bra.  Nope mine grew in as B’s.  By the time I was in 6^th grade they were C’s.  So having large breasts has always been part of my identity.  Boys began to want to touch my breasts, and pop my bra.

I had braces, so I had to go after lunch every day and brush my teeth.  I don’t know if you remember the first pump toothpastes we had.  I think mine was Aquafresh.  It was in this hard ass plastic bottle.  Now I used to care that pump in my blue jean purse, along of course with my book.  The boys would go to touch me, and I would wind up my purse like a sling and PAWYAH!  I would hit them with it.  They would just start screaming!  “What have you got in there a brick!”  Serves them right.

About the time I got breast I got my period as well.  Thankfully my mother had had the talk with me, and I knew what was going on.  In those days I would often hide out in the bathroom after brushing my teeth, because I did not like my 5^th grade teacher, and did not want to go back to class.  I often heard girls go in the stall and begin to scream.  They had started and had no idea what was going on.  Many of the believed they were bleeding to death.  I would calm them down.  Explain this was natural, that they were not dying, and that they should talk to their mom when they got home.  I would them give them a Kotex and show them how to use it. I would continue to carry extra protection with me, until well into high school.  I became know as the one to come to for such things. 

As gross as the above story may seem, I want you to understand that women often do not understand how their bodies work. For many of us in Louisiana, we were denied that right to learn about our own bodies in school, by people who put their morals ahead of our education.  Some girls never got the talk about their bodies, or much less about sex.  The hormones that accompany puberty were never explained to me.  I remember, that even the encyclopedias that contained pictures of sex organs, were not on the shelf at my local library.  They were kept under the desk, and you had to be a specific age, or be researching something in that particular book to even see it. 

In 6^th grade I had my first official boyfriend.  His name was Melvin.  He had lovely dark black hair, light eyes and little ears that stuck out and turned red when he was embarrassed or cold.  He was so cute.  We were set up by friends.  He was a very nice fellow, but I didn’t feel anything for him.  He was terrible shy.  I don’t even think we held hands.  It lasted all of 6 weeks.  Melvin gave me two bracelets.  One was metal and one was some simple black beads on a string.  To break up with him, I public cut the bracelet off my wrist, in front of him on the bus.  I was not really mad at him.  I was mad at my friends, who kept whispering in my ear about the two of us.  I could not stand the pressure. 

I did not know until much later that Melvin was very poor.  I have no idea where those bracelets came from, or what they meant to him.  I also did not know until years later, when one of my guy friends told me, that Melvin had been in love with me for a long time.  Finding out somebody loves you changes you’re perception of them.  I began to develop feeling for him a few week before we graduated, but by then it was too late.   

I was attracted to dysfunctional, bad boys, who used, abused, or worse ignored me.  The kind of love Melvin offered me was quiet, and slow, and healthy.  Things I was not used to.  So I passed him by.  Something I almost did with Jay as well.  When I married Jay, I realized that he and Melvin shared many characteristic.  I finally understood how much I may have hurt Melvin. 

I had the opportunity, at my 10 year reunion to apologize.  But I was so nervous I could not do it to his face, and so I instead apologized to his wife.  She carried the message for me.  I saw him recently at our 20^th year reunion.  We hugged and we were glad to see each other.  He has been happily married for many years, to the same woman, and has a family of his own now.  I continue to wish them all the best.

Ilsa