I tell so many people this story that it's probably time for me to write it down.
I spent the first few years of my life in a town called Morrow - population 500 or so, in south Ohio. My mother had married an alcoholic seven years prior, and three years after I came along, she knew it was time to move on. During the divorce my grandmother and cousins (who had become more like brothers) looked after me, while my mother was in the background, more like a sister than someone who spent 25 hours in labor with me. She worked a full day in downtown Cincinnati because of me, and because of her then husband - I never refer to him as my father, he was really more like a sperm donor - so I didn't see much of her. I missed her a lot as a child, and when she was finally offered a job in litigation in Houston, we both knew it was our chance to get out of that little town and make something of our lives.
The drive from Ohio to East Texas was arduous for a little girl who loved her mother dearly but barely knew her. I found myself singing most of the drive, until we stopped at Hardee's for lunch on the second day. I remember reaching up for the counter - very thirsty, really wanting my cherry coke - and being doused with scalding hot coffee. It was traumatic. But it gave my mother a chance to act like a mom and not a big sister. I didn't much feel like singing after the shock of the hot coffee all over my face, so the rest of trip home I let mom do it for me. We listened to Whitney Houston and Foreigner on the cassette deck until we reached Texas, and then I fell asleep.
When I woke up, I was lying on an air raft in our new house - apartment, rather. A few days later in dawned on me that it was going to be a while before we would have a table, or chairs, or a tv. She realized how bored I was, and decided to enroll me in nursery school rather than send me to a babysitter's. She was right - I began to form my own ideas about society at the ripe old age of four-and-a-half, and I thank God everyday that she sent me despite my protesting and crying when it actually happened. It was a financial struggle for her to pay for it, and even then I could appreciate it. I missed her horribly when I was there, though.
I spent the first day by myself, crying. The center was serving pancakes for breakfast the morning that I first arrived. I was a mess - crying in my breakfast and getting the maple syrup all over my hands and clothes (to this day, I avoid syrup on my pancakes because if my hands get sticky I will inevitably miss my mother). The next day, I played with blocks by myself. The third day, I played blocks with Matty Owens, who later became my first love. After that, Matty and I played on the seesaw and collected fuzzy caterpillars from the tree outside everyday (I used to like to bring them in and watch them crawl across the table), and when he wasn't there, I'd listen to music on the kiddie record player and spin around until I was so dizzy that I'd fall on the floor (and then get up and do it again).
Then one day, when Matty's family were on vacation for two weeks, SHE came. Pamela Sue Ryan. A name that is forever burned in the recesses of my memory.
Pamela had a collection of six Barbies. Maybe a few of them were Skippers and Midges - I'm not sure. But she had SIX. And a Barbie car, and of course a virtually tireless wardrobe for all of them. And she dressed just like them - always a pastel dress and pink pantent leather maryjanes.
And there I was, spinning around to Alvin and the Chipmunks, in my wrangler (before it was cool) jeans, white tank top, and ADIDAS (again, before RunDMC made them cool). It was only a few days before Pamela invited me over to play Barbies with her little group, but only because she couldn't find any boys to play Ken. It still amazes me how cruel little girls can be - even before the age of five, I was tormented by a popular girl. Where was Matty? When was he coming back?
My Adidas were too big for my feet. My mother and I had to do things that way because my feet were growing fast, and we didn't really have disposable income. We bought them at Academy on sale - we bought all of my clothes there. One day, just to appease Pamela, I wore my Christmas dress (in summer) to nursery school, but I didn't have pretty leather mayjanes to match. So I wore my Adidas. It was so much easier to catch caterpillars in them, anyway. Of course, Pamela made fun of me, and everyone laughed at me.
Matty came back from vacation with funny sunglasses and swimming trunks that he wore everyday, and we spent the rest of the summer playing with bugs and throwing mudballs at each other, pulling out blades of grass to see who could find the longest one and making crowns for each other out of weeds. We were King Matty and Princess Abby and we ruled the playground. Pamela was fuming. Somebody liked me more than her.
Then it was time for kindergarten. Matty lived in a different zone than I did, so I only saw him after school at daycare from then on. But Pamela lived in my zone. And, as luck would have it, we were in the same class. And I was wearing the same dirty Adidass I had been wearing all summer.
On the third day of school, it rained hard at recess. We were all soaked, and our feet were covered in mud from the playground. Our classroom floor had just been recovered with this ridiculous ABC carpet, and Miss Jones, our teacher, insisted on us taking off our shoes and leaving them in the restroom so the floor would stay clean and new. I was the last one in from the playground because I had been far off looking for caterpillars. As I was alone in the restroom, taking off my big dirty addidas, I spotted them out of the corner of my eye - the pink patent leather maryjanes. On the other side of them was a large, welcoming porcelain toilet bowl.
Thoughts began turning around in my head. I crouched over them and smiled. I took one tiny shoe, and creeped over to the toilet. I tried to imagine Pamela's face when she came back to get her shoes at the end of the day and found them in the toilet. It was truly the first time I had ever experienced rapture or bliss. So in went the first one - plop. And about to toss in the second when - OH NO! Miss Jones saw me.
In those days, Houston Independent School District still maintained a strict policy of corporal punishment, so my ass was red when I took my pink suspension slip home to my mom. She didn't say anything to me at all, except, "Would you like a new pair of shoes, Ab? Those are looking pretty muddy." And she smiled. Of course I said yes.
When we went to Academy the next day, Mom wanted to buy me a pink pair of jellies. Remember jellies? But I insisted on Adidas. They were more comfortable. When she asked why I didn't want the jellies, I told her, "Adidas are better for living, mommy. You can't catch caterpillars in the pink ones because you have to climb a tree."
It's only twenty years later that I realize I had made a social comment to my mom that day. In life, especially in American society, you can wear pretty leather shoes and play with dolls (or clothes, trust funds, magazines - whatever your poison is) and stay on the ground that you're familiar with, or you can tie up the laces of your muddy Adidas and climb your way up out of the playground to the place you're supposed to be. At age five, I was supposed to catch caterpillars. I was really good at it - it was a calling for me. At age twenty-five, I belong in New York City in a comfortable pair of shoes that I can pound the pavement with. I think I'll go buy a pair of new addidas today.
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