Turning Thirteen Years Old… A Painful Milestone

Little Girl Soul often wished the years would fly by fast. She wanted nothing more than to be an adult and be on her own. She wanted to move away from home as soon as she could, where Gnashing Teeth couldn’t yell and spit on her.  Maybe then she wouldn’t have to be so careful about everything she said and did.  Mother told her that a kid could legally quit school at 14 years of age, but she hoped all of her kids would go on to graduate.  If a person didn’t graduate from high school, they could never get a good job.  Mother went on to say that there was nothing wrong with being a waitress, babysitting or working in a clothing or grocery store, but those jobs never paid well.  A person had to have a high school diploma to get a good job.  Little was ever said about college.  Little Girl Soul already knew that her family couldn’t afford college.  Besides, she would probably be too stupid.  She would probably only embarrass herself if she flunked.

When Little Girl Soul turned 13, she was excited to finally be a teenager!  At long last, she could get her ears pierced.  Mother said she had to be 13 before she could make that decision.  Little Girl Soul knew when she was 11 years old that she wanted pierced ears like all of the other girls in school.  She loved the idea of wearing sparkly earrings.  But every time she brought it up, Mother shot it down, saying she was too young.  And of course, when Mother was a little girl, it was a well-known fact that only the wild girls ever did something like that.  Little Girl Soul didn’t feel wild – whatever that meant.  She just wanted to have shiny hoops or sparkly posts in her ears that made her feel pretty.

The morning of Little Girl Soul’s 13^th birthday, Mother presented her with a small, square box.  Ooh, maybe this was a pair of earrings!  She hoped so.  Little Girl Soul had waited so long to have her ears pierced.

I still have this cherished ring. Mom seemed to understand the importance of being 13 years old. I was old enough to be responsible for a good piece of jewelry.

But it was not meant to be, at least on that particular day.  Inside the box was a beautiful ring.  Mother told Little Girl Soul it was a real Alexandrite stone, the birthstone for June.  Mother told her it was a very expensive ring, and that Little Girl Soul should always keep it safe and never lose it. She added that it was a real Alexandrite stone, which changed color when going from daylight to incandescent light.  Sure enough, Little Girl Soul took it outside and it almost had a green hue to it, but on going indoors it became a red or sometimes purple color.  Little Girl Soul felt like a queen!  A real piece of jewelry!  All of her other jewelry had come from the dime store.  This was real gold.  She looked up “Alexandrite” in the dictionary.  She found the stone was named in honor of a Russian Czar named Alexander II.  The Alexandrite gemstone was also thought to bring luck, good fortune and love.  Little Girl Soul sure could use a lot of all three of those.

A  few weeks later, Mother managed to sneak Little Girl Soul to the doctor’s office to get her ears pierced.  Mother had her own appointment that day, and asked the doctor if he could pierce Little Girl Souls ears at the same time.  He said he would be glad to.  Little Girl Soul didn’t know why they had to have the doctor do it.  Little Girl Soul’s friend from school said her sisters did hers by freezing her ears with an ice-cube and then using a sewing needle to poke the hole, and put a whole potato behind the ear so the needle wouldn’t poke her in the head… or something like that.  Mother thought that was ridiculous and said it sounded like a good way to get an infection.  No, the doctor would do it.  And so that day, her dream of having pierced ears came true.  It hurt.  In fact, Little Girl Soul thought she would faint after the first hole was poked.  But, she also knew she had to go through with the second hole because she wasn’t about to have only one pierced ear!  Her friends and all of the kids at school would laugh. When both ears were pierced, Little Girl Soul looked in the mirror that the nurse gave her.  Simple silver posts had to be worn for 6 weeks while the ears healed.  The nurse explained about keeping the holes clean with alcohol and not taking the posts out.  Little Girl Soul decided the “hot” feeling of the burn from her newly pierced ears was worth every bit of the pain.  She couldn’t wait for the 6 weeks to go by.  But of course, on the way home mother said she could only wear simple posts until she moved away on her own.  Hoops and earrings with a lot of dangle and sparkle were for the “wild and loose” girls and she wasn’t having ANY of that.

Another milestone on reaching the age of 13, was finally being able to eat a Teen Burger at the nearby A&W Drive Inn.  The A&W was one of two drive through joints that Gnashing Teeth ever took the family to.  Gnashing Teeth said kids couldn’t go into real restaurants because they didn’t know how to behave and how to sit still.  Little Girl Soul often wondered what the difference was because Gnashing Teeth required silence, sitting still and behaving while in the car at the A&W too.  Gnashing Teeth always did the ordering.  Each child got two Baby Burgers, which came with  a kid-sized mug of root beer.

This is the old A&W menu back in 1974 when I was 13 years Photo courtesy of old.http://www.oldlarestaurants.com/aw-root-beer/

The next time Gnashing Teeth took the family to eat at the A&W, he ordered the same menu he always did.  Little Girl Soul had been on the edge of her seat waiting to hear Gnashing Teeth order her a Teen Burger this time.  After all, she was a teenager now, and well beyond the “Baby” burger stage.  Thinking Gnashing Teeth must have forgotten about her being a teenager now, Little Girl Soul leaned over the front seat from the rear seat and tapped mother on the shoulder.  Mother gave her a look like, “ARE YOU KIDDING ME?? GET BACK ON YOUR SEAT BEFORE YOUR DAD SEES YOU!!” and she turned away.  Little Girl Soul tapped her shoulder again.  Finally, mother leaned back with another angry look on her face and growled, “WHAT?” Little Girl Soul whispered, “Don’t I get a TEEN burger now that I’m a teenager?”  Mother shot her a look that said she wasn’t going to bother Gnashing Teeth with the request.  After all, he was already ordering.  Little Girl Soul’s heart sunk.  Her stomach actually hurt.  This was the way she always felt any time she was in trouble, or Gnashing Teeth accused her of something she didn’t do.  Then, just as soon as Gnashing Teeth got off the intercom giving his order, he turned around, hissed in air and said, “WHAT THE HELL DID YOU WANT???  WELL WHAT???”  Little Girl Soul meekly squeaked out the words, “I thought maybe now that I am 13 I could have a teen burger”.  There wasn’t even a pause before Gnashing Teeth spit out, “JEEZUS FUCKING KURRIST!! What the goddamn hell you think I’m made of … MONEY???  You can’t be satisfied with a goddamn baby burger, you want a TEEN burger (mimicking like he’s a girl), that costs .25 cents MORE than a goddamn baby burger!! Hell, TWO baby burgers are LESS THAN ONE TEEN BURGER!!” He muttered some more slurs about kids asking for something when they were just goddamn lucky to get ANYTHING. JEEZUS KURRIST!

Little Girl Soul was humiliated in front of the soul kids.  Mother tried to explain the logic behind being a teenager and graduating to a teen burger… not thinking about the price or necessarily more food – it was just the idea that being a teenager warranted a teen burger.  Gnashing Teeth wasn’t listening.  The whole evening was ruined because his goddamn kid needed more and had the gall to ask for more.  The soul kids were all nothing but goddamn PIGS.  They didn’t appreciate the cost of anything!

The food was delivered shortly, and the soul kids all sat quietly, eating their burgers.  Little Girl Soul tried to eat the first baby burger and couldn’t eat the second one so she gave it to her brother.  Little Girl Soul cried silent tears. Every time Gnashing Teeth glared at her, more slurs about being a goddamn PIG spewed from his mouth.  When the attendant came on the intercom to ask if anything was needed from the Take Home menu, Gnashing Teeth yelled in the speaker, “GODDAMMIT NO!!! If I wanted something I would have ordered it in the first goddamn place!!!”  As soon as the root beer mugs and trash were placed on the tray for pickup, Gnashing Teeth started the car and revved the engine. The attendant came out with a horrified look, grabbed the tray and Gnashing Teeth yelled, “WHAT THE GODDAMN HELL YOU LOOKING AT?”  He put the car in reverse to back out, then slammed it in drive and laid rubber heading out to the highway.

Little Girl Soul felt sick.  The whole night was ruined. Everyone sat in silence while Gnashing Teeth drove too fast and yelled the whole way home. Every so often he’d step on the gas and say he was going to kill everyone! Mother would softly ask him to stop because he was scaring the kids.  Little Girl Soul wasn’t scared. What bothered her the most was watching  her siblings get anxious; the littlest soul girl was terrified.

All the soul kids were sent to bed when they arrived home.  Little Girl Soul lay in her bed; her sisters tried to console her saying they agreed she should have gotten a teen burger.  All Little Soul Girl could think of was how much she hated Gnashing Teeth.  She considered how another 4 years to finish school was going to seem like an eternity.  How would she manage?  She HATED HIM!

Learning the Ropes of Dishonest Shopping

Perhaps the most embarrassing times for Mother and the soul kids were the trips to town to go shopping.  First, there was the announcement at the last minute that the family was headed to Lincoln.  The soul kids were excited to go to Lincoln.  It was a big city, and there was always a lot to see along the way.  Little girl soul often thought about living in a city someday.  Anywhere that was far away from Gnashing Teeth would be fine with her.  He might never find her in a big city.  Mother told her that she had to graduate high school and then Little girl soul could move anywhere she wanted to.

Generally, when Mother gave the word to “get ready to go to Lincoln”, there was a scramble to change clothes, find shoes, and be the first to get hands on the front door for exit.  Which ever of the soul kids got to the door knob first, or was the strongest to fight for the door knob, was guaranteed a window seat in the car.  Occasionally, one of the soul kids had the wrong shoes on, or a mismatched sock, or hadn’t combed their hair. Back to the rear of the line they went.

Once Mother or Gnashing Teeth gave the order “Let’s Go!”, out the door the soul kids ran, yelling and punching during the run to the car. It was a mad scramble to the backseat of the car to secure a window seat.  Once in the car, the two winners held tight to their window spots in the back seat.  The losers sat in the middle.  Occasionally, it worked for a loser to stand just outside the car and repeatedly say, “MOVE OVER!!”  until Gnashing Teeth came out.  Sometimes Gnashing Teeth made the winning kid move over, but sometimes that ploy backfired and Gnashing Teeth gave the whining kid a kick with his pointed cowboy boot and “helped” the soul kid in the car. This was followed by a lot of cussing, spitting and, “GEEZUS KEYRIST, you make a goddam production out of getting in the goddam car!  You think I got all GODDAM day for you to get in the fucking CAR? Now SIT and I don’t want to hear a GODDAM PEEP out of any of you, GOT THAT?” Nods wouldn’t do.  The soul kids knew to say “Yes” in a meek tone.

That wasn’t the end of it though.  Slyly, the soul kids carried on pinching, hitting, elbowing and wiping a booger on the winners, attempting to get even with the winners of the coveted window seats.  Most of the time the window winners tried to ignore the irritations and sometimes a cleverly whispered, “Ha ha ha ha haaaaa” escaped their mouths.  Of course this was all done, hopefully, without Gnashing Teeth or Mother noticing.  Gnashing Teeth demanded quiet and sitting still.   Any violation of this rule was met with a sharp hissing intake of air into Gnashing Teeth’s mouth and a swinging of his right arm into the back seat area, asking if anyone wanted a spanking and to SHUT THE HELL UP back there!  The contorted look on his face was often enough to keep the soul kids from acting up too much after that.  No one really wanted to deal with his wrath, or possibly feel the spit from his mouth landing on their face.

Gnashing Teeth usually went into the stores alone.  Mother often sat with the soul kids in the car.  That was the best case scenario.  If for some reason, mother had to go shopping with Gnashing Teeth, it was mayhem in the car for the duration of time they were absent.  Usually, if someone got hurt, Gnashing Teeth came along and one or two public punishments proceeded in the parking lot.  It was always embarrassing to have Gnashing Teeth yelling, spitting and spanking the soul kids out in public where everyone saw the display.  The spankings didn’t hurt as bad as the embarrassment, humiliation and wounded pride.

The grocery store was a monthly shopping adventure the soul kids didn’t mind… at least until checkout time.  The “Warehouse Market” on the west side of Lincoln was a sort of poor man’s version of discount shopping.  Back then, people were trusted to mark their own cans or food packages with a crayon-type pencil.  Gnashing Teeth and Mother would each get a dolly cart to load cases of food on, while the older of the soul kids were allowed to get a marker from the giant box of marking crayons.  As Gnashing Teeth loaded groceries on the cart, the soul kids marked cans.  When Little Girl Soul was old enough to know that the prices Gnashing Teeth told her to write on the cans were much less than what the price on the ticket said, she felt bad.  She knew what she was doing was wrong.  It felt bad to her. She never asked Mother about this.  Sometimes she understood that Mother was as helpless as the soul kids.

Sometimes the mark downs were just a few cents.  Sometimes it was a nickel or a dime per can.  Sometimes Gnashing Teeth slipped items inside of other items so he would only have to pay for one.  Sometimes he switched labels on things.  Little girl soul always worried at the check out. Her stomach felt bad and her heart raced.  She felt all wired up and crazy, like other times when she worried a lot. She almost felt like she would throw up. One time, the clerk questioned the price of some canned goods.  Gnashing teeth never batted an eye… he said he didn’t know… that the kids had marked some of the cans.  Maybe they messed up. He gave the soul kids “the look”.  A store helper came back with the correct price.  Gnashing teeth yelled at the soul kids.  He snatched their pens away, yelling, spitting and screaming about how stupid, dumb and incompetent they were.  He apologized to the clerk. His voice got soft as he wrote the check, and he shook his head over and over about how dumb kids were these days and they didn’t teach them anything in school.  He tried to stick a laugh in the conversation and he smiled at the clerk a lot.  Little girl soul felt the anger creep up inside.  Gnashing Teeth was a liar.  A BIG FAT LIAR!!

Mother walked through the line embarrassed, her head down.  Taking the youngest soul kids by their arms, she whisked them from the store. Little girl soul didn’t know if she should stay with Gnashing Teeth or go.  She decided to go with Mother and the soul kids.  Better to have him yell at her in the parking lot for being incompetent and no good rather than to have him yell and spit on her in the store in front of all of the people watching.  Mother hurried to the car and told the soul kids to wait, then walked back in the store to help Gnashing Teeth with the carts of groceries.

Once the car, she yelled at Gnashing Teeth.  She was embarrassed and angry.  She said they would never be able to shop in there again and that he hadn’t fooled anyone, that they knew little kids wouldn’t do such a thing, and how could he blame his own kids?  Mother sometimes didn’t know when to stop talking or didn’t care to stop talking.  Gnashing Teeth didn’t listen to her very long.  He hissed air in his lungs, bit his lower lip and the ugly look came on his face.  His fist came out and popped Mother in the mouth.  She cried all the way home.  The soul kids sat in the back seat not saying a word.  They knew better.

Strange Relatives

Gnashing Teeth had an Uncle Clarence who was married to a woman named Lela.  The soul kids never really liked going to visit  Uncle Clarence and Aunt Lela. They lived far away and it took a lot of driving to get there.   They were weird people and there were a lot of rules at their house.  When Gnashing Teeth got close to the  house, he yelled at the soul kids, reminding them that they couldn’t talk at all or move from the couch unless they were told it was ok to move.  He said if anyone acted up they would be spanked and grounded.   There were no toys to play with like at Grandpa and Grandma’s house.  The soul kids would have to sit and be quiet, and not fidget. No funny business was allowed.

Uncle Clarence was an odd-looking man.  He had plump lips that seemed too red for his pale complexion. His lips stuck out like he was pouting.  His didn’t have much hair on his head but what he did have was dark, and kind of circled around on top of his head to look like he had lots of hair.   His eyebrows were scant but dark like his hair.  His face was round and his eyes squinted all of the time.  He wore thick glasses that made his eyes look like a bug.  He was a fat man and he moved slowly… he even spoke slowly. He breathed loud too. Little girl soul thought he smelled strange.  Mother said it was “moth balls”. Little girl soul did not ask what moth balls were, because she knew Gnashing Teeth would give her that look and tell her to shut up.

Uncle Clarence and Gnashing Teeth talked about crops and farm implements.  They both had the worst luck.  Something bad was always happening with their farm equipment or the crops.  Usually it was a problem with crop pests.  Those had to be the worst problem of any farm.  And of course, the weather was never agreeable.

Gnashing Teeth never swore or cussed around Uncle Clarence.  There was a bible in their living room.  There was talk of their visits to the holy land in some other country where they went to a weeping wall and Clarence had an “experience”.  One time, on the way home from Uncle Clarence’s house, Little girl soul asked what that experience was?  Gnashing teeth said we didn’t need to ask questions about those “goddam bible thumpers” and so Little girl soul always wondered what experience Uncle Clarence was talking about.

Aunt Lela was interesting to observe.  She was a strong farm woman and well-tanned from the sun.  She moved fast.  She talked fast, and she talked all of the time like a clucking chicken.   Her hair was dark and very curly.  She often had it clipped with barrettes to keep the wild curls to the side of her ears.  She had a dark mustache and bushy eyebrows over beady brown eyes.  She wore glasses that made her look stern.  She always wore dresses, because “God fearing women wear dresses”.  She had a way of laughing that sounded a little sinister.   She liked to ask the soul kids questions and then seemed to enjoy tormenting them about the answers given.  Little girl soul always felt like she gave the wrong answer.

Little girl soul heard Gnashing Teeth and Mother talking about Clarence and Lela adopting kids after Lela was said to be barren.  Little girl soul had questions about that and later asked her mother.  Barren was not being able to have babies grow in Lela’s tummy.  Mother explained that it made Lela very sad to talk about so we should never mention it.  Clarence and Lela had adopted two kids from what sounded like a bad family.  A family where the dad beat up the mom and the kids, and all the little kids were split up.  The younger ones went to live with relatives and the older one were taken away to an orphanage.  Little girl soul didn’t want to think about that happening to her and the soul kids.  That is why she didn’t talk about Gnashing Teeth yelling and screaming and hitting everyone.  She heard orphanages were terrible places and she couldn’t think of her and the soul kids going to one of those places to live.

Clarence and Lela went to the orphanage and picked a boy and a girl to help with farm chores and house work.  Aunt Lela told Mother that Susan was a good helper and worker, but that Uncle Clarence had all kinds of trouble with Johnny.  She said Clarence had to spank him and punish him all of the time.  Johnny told them he was running away and that he hated them.  Aunt Lela said sometimes they wished they had not adopted Johnny.  He was “ruined” she said.

Little girl soul was fascinated about Susan telling the story of  her real dad throwing a knife at Johnny, who ducked and the knife stabbed Susan in the side of the head.  Susan showed the soul girls her scar. It was a big, white scar on the side of Susan’s head.  Little girl soul thought where the knife hit should have sliced her brains but Susan said she was smart in school and the doctor stitched her head so her brains were fine.  Susan said she wasn’t supposed to talk about her old family.  She said her new Mom and Dad told her it was better to forget.  But Susan said she was sad.  She worried she  might never see her real Mom again.

Susan had the biggest dolls the soul girls had ever seen.  They were big grown up girl dolls, one with real blonde hair and the other with long brown curls.  They each had  pretty dresses and pant outfits.  One doll had a hat.  Susan said the soul girls couldn’t touch them though because we didn’t know how to handle them right.  Little boy soul went with Johnny but came back crying and said Johnny pinched him in the arm and said he was an ugly boy.  Little boy soul never wanted to visit Uncle Clarence and Aunt Lela because Johnny was always mean to him.  There were rules at their house about girls only being with girls and the boys being separate.  Susan said it was because boys sometimes did bad things to little girls.  Little girl soul thought about this wondering what bad things boys could do.  She guessed it meant them slugging girls because that’s what little boy soul did to the soul girls sometimes.  He could hit hard!

Aunt Lela was a terrible cook.  Gnashing Teeth and mother always made an agreement before they arrived at Clarence and Lela’s farm that they had to leave by a certain time so they didn’t have to stay for dinner.  They always ended up having to eat some kind of cake and fruit or a dessert of some kind.  Lela insisted.  One time Lela offered a cherry pie.  The soul kids loved cherry pie.  Little boy soul especially liked cherries.  So, Lela put a big smile on her face and cut each a piece.  Little boy soul wanted the biggest piece!  Everyone took the first bite and CRUNCH!  Much to their dismay, Lela baked her cherry pies with the pits in them!  Her pie juice was runny and the cherries were watery.  Mother’s pies had plump, pitted cherries in a thick filling. Mother knew the soul kids didn’t want to eat Lela’s pie anymore but she made them eat it anyway.  She chatted with Lela about how tasty Lela’s cherries were and that when one had a farm this big who had time to pit cherries?  Little girl soul and her brother ate all of their pieces of pie because they were older and were expected to clean their plates.  Little girl soul ate her pie, swallowing whole chunks at a time, but was careful to extract the pits without making a mess. If Gnashing Teeth saw a mess, the soul kids would be spanked and yelled at in front of everyone.  Susan and Johnny were very neat and ate all of their pie, having good manners to say “Please, thank you”, and “May we be excused from the table?”.  It was the worst pie ever.  Gnashing Teeth made all the soul kids lie and say it was good.  Aunt Lela beamed.

On the way home, Gnashing Teeth was always in a bad mood.  He went back to cussing and said “those goddam bible thumpers” in every sentence.  Little girl soul thought about religion a lot.  She never felt good in church, and she never liked Sunday School much except when they talked about  God the Father’s son, Jesus.  If  Uncle Clarence and Aunt Lela were bible thumpers and full of religion, Little girl soul did not want anything to do with religion.  But she did wonder about the “experience” Uncle Clarence had.  He got all dreamy looking when he talked about that.  She never asked about it.  Gnashing Teeth wouldn’t have anything good to say and he’d just spit and yell at her, telling her to shut her goddam mouth!

Hard Work to Prove Myself

Little Girl Soul did whatever her mother asked.  She liked getting praise from her mom and hard work made her feel good.  It made her mad when the other soul kids came in the house and messed up her nice work though.  They were always making messes.  Little girl soul liked everything to look perfect and be clean.

Mother was always cleaning, cooking, painting inside the house or one of the buildings outside, working in the garden, or ironing.  Little Girl Soul wanted to be just like her mother.  She wanted to have a lot of kids just like her mother too.

Little Girl Soul soon learned that working hard made a difference with Gnashing Teeth too.  Sometimes it earned the soul kids a little praise.  Most of the time, however, he just yelled that they weren’t any help at all.  They did everything wrong.  They were just goddamn beeps and idiots.

The worst part of helping Gnashing Teeth with any project was not understanding what he wanted.   He just yelled and spit out cuss words.  Gnashing Teeth worked on cars and trucks a lot.  He had the worst luck with cars.  It was the soul kid’s job to help with tools.  The soul kids had to run to the tool shed while Gnashing Teeth was under the car yelling about what a goddamn piece of shit the car was.  He would yell for a tool but he never explained what the tool looked like or where it might be.  The soul kid trying to help would go running, scared to death because they didn’t know what a ¾ socket wrench was or a Phillips screw driver was… or a crescent wrench was.  The soul girls often hoped maybe their brother was in the tool shed and could help.  He knew some of the tools by name because he got stuck working with Gnashing Teeth a lot, because he was the boy.  He was supposed to grow up and be a man like Gnashing Teeth.  We all knew little boy soul would never be like Gnashing Teeth.  He was not mean and he was just as scared as the girl souls were.  It was a relief to be sent to the tool shed and find little boy soul there.  He understood being scared.  If he didn’t know what tool Gnashing Teeth was asking for he would send 2 or 3 different ones in hopes one of them would be right.  The soul kid helping Gnashing Teeth would run back to him as fast as they could.  If they didn’t run fast, Gnashing Teeth would spit and yell more about what  goddamn good-for-nothing idiot beeps they were.  Sometimes the youngest soul girl got called a goddamn clod.  She was more clumsy than the others and sometimes she fell.  She cried a lot too.  Gnashing Teeth always told her to shut up and quit being a goddamn baby.  She was the most scared of all the soul kids.  She was too little to know it was just the way it was and she was going to have to get used to it.

Gnashing Teeth always picked the coldest days to work on projects.  Every year we had to put plastic on the windows to keep the heat from escaping and to keep the cold air out.  Gnashing Teeth never chose to do this until the snow started to fall.  Usually two of the soul kids would have to hand Gnashing Teeth the strips of cardboard and nails while he pounded the plastic to the windows.  The soul kids couldn’t wear gloves or mittens because they had to hand the nails and strips to Gnashing Teeth when he yelled for some.  They never did that part right either.  The nails had to be pointed end down and the strips had to be handed to him vertical.  Of course in the beginning, no one knew what vertical was.  One never forgot after the first harsh lesson with yelling and spitting about how they “Never teach kids anything in those goddamn schools anymore!”.  The soul kids were cold and their fingers red and chapped from the bitter-cold temperatures.  Little girl soul would think about how the air drawing in her lungs bit sharp and she wondered how long it would take to die out there, freezing to death?  She wondered if that ever happened to people?  She remembered Grandpa dying of a heart attack after coming in the house from the cold temperatures and she wondered if the same thing could happen if they were outside in the cold too long.  Maybe that would happen to Gnashing Teeth.  He was older than the soul kids.  Maybe since they were young they might have a better chance of living.  She wouldn’t cry if his heart just burst, coming in the warm house from the cold outside.  She pictured him falling on the floor and a scream coming out of his lungs like what happened to Grandpa the night he died.  In her mind Gnashing Teeth was just as scary lying on the floor dead.  Little girl soul didn’t have long to think about that scenario.  Gnashing Teeth was yelling at her, telling her what a goddamn beep she was for not handing him the next strip!  “Jesus Christ I haven’t got all goddamn day… give me the goddamn strip you idiot!  God, you’ll never amount to ANYTHING… you haven’t got the brains God gave a jackass!”

Gnashing Teeth was always proud and bragged about how he stole the cardboard strips from the book bindery where he worked.  He cut strips on the big cutter from the large cardboard squares used to make book covers.  He hated his boss.  He said his boss owed him for being an asshole.  Every year the soul kids had to help put up plastic on the windows, they had to listen to Gnashing Teeth brag about the strips.

When the soul kids got older the work became harder and  the yelling increased.  The second soul girl said we were just slaves.  That made sense since by now there were 5 little soul kids.  The older ones had to do most of the work.  The soul kids were always stupid.  One time Gnashing Teeth told them to take the opened paint can in the garage and go to the bicycle shed and paint the West side of the building.  He said the brushes were in there too. The soul kids found 4 paint cans but none appeared to be open.  They looked and looked.  Finally, little boy soul thought one of them looked like the right one so he picked it up.  Usually, he was right, because he worked with Gnashing Teeth more than the other soul kids.   Everyone found a paint brush and off they went to the bicycle shed.  However, after great discussion no one knew what side was the West side.  Finally, little girl soul made a decision.  It felt like the right one.  It wasn’t.  After the soul kids began to paint, Gnashing Teeth came out yelling and spitting, “ Goddamn Jesus Christ what in the SAM hell are you doing?  That’s the goddamn NORTH side, I SAID THE WEST SIDE!  Don’t they teach you goddamn idiots anything in that goddamn school we pay for? Doesn’t old HEIDORN (the principal at school) even know enough to teach goddamn directions?  Jesus Christ!  I might as well have done this myself.  You’re just a bunch of goddamn idiots.  How in the hell do you expect to amount to anything?”  And so he ranted, going on and on about how the soul kids would never amount to anything.  Gnashing Teeth finally showed everyone the West side and proceeded to explain how in the hell to tell directions using the sun as a guide.  Gnashing Teeth muttered all the way to the garage leaving the soul kids feeling stupid and worthless.  Not one minute after disappearing he came pounding back with angry steps declaring the soul kids had grabbed the wrong goddamn can of paint and “Jesus Christ you’re the goddamn most stupid no good idiots I’ve ever seen!  Where in the fuck did you get those brushes and I thought I told you to get the OPENED can of paint and you took a goddamn new can.  Jesus fucking Christ do you think I’m made of money that you can just waste a good can of paint?  I SAID DO YOU THINK YOU CAN JUST WASTE FUCKING PAINT????  ANSWER ME!!”  In unison the soul kids meekly answered “no”.  Eyes downward, posture sinking, the soul kids took their verbal lashing… but the mind of little girl soul was struggling with angry thoughts.  She wanted to sling that can of paint at Gnashing Teeth and hit him in the head and make him bleed.  She wanted to knock the teeth from his mouth and make him shut up forever.

Childhood Socializing and the Discomfort of School

Little Girl Soul felt lonely at school. She was picked on.  She was too skinny and she wore the wrong kinds of socks and the “cat had her tongue” all of the time.  She had one good friend who never hurt her or teased her.  Her friend’s name was the same as Little Girl Soul’s. She knew a boy, who was kind and the kids picked on him a lot too.  They called him Meathead.   She did not understand kids being cruel and tormenting others who seemed to be gentle souls.    She missed her mother during the days at school.  But as much as she missed her mother and her siblings, she feared going home after school to Gnashing Teeth with his cutting eyes and always yelling and spitting.

Gnashing Teeth went to bed early every night. Dinner was served about 6:00, homework was finished and then it was off to bed.  The soul kids wanted to stay up but Mom said they all had to go to bed and be quiet or they would get spankings.  Everyone knew they didn’t want a spanking from Gnashing Teeth.  The spanking wasn’t the worst of it… it was the yelling and spitting that hurt the worst.  Gnashing Teeth said all the kids were bad, stupid and idiots.  They would never amount to anything.  He took away their freedom a lot.  No going outside, no riding bikes, no playing at all, no talking, and lots of chores.  Sometimes they went to bed with no supper.  Sometimes that was a better place to be.  The soul kids were supposed to think about the bad thing they did when they were sent to their bed.  Little Girl Soul only thought about how much she hated Gnashing Teeth.

Bedtime was lonely and only made Little Girl Soul think of things she knew she shouldn’t think of.  She wanted gnashing teeth to die.  She didn’t want to kill him herself because the preacher said you go to hell for that.  She often thought of him dead just the same.  They would all be better off.

Sometimes Little Girl Soul contemplated how it would be if he was dead and decided it might be embarrassing not having a dad.  That would give the kids at school one more thing to poke fun at her about.  She didn’t need any more grief, that was for sure.  She also knew that she could never tell anyone at school about Gnashing Teeth and his anger and meanness.  The kids would make fun of that too.  Meathead’s mother had something called a nervous breakdown which Little Girl Soul had heard about.  They said her brain just went crazy and now Meathead’s mother was just a vegetable. She couldn’t do anything anymore. The dad had to do everything. The kids at school found out and they told Meathead that was the reason he was a Meathead… his mother was meat for brains.  It made Meathead cry.  Little Girl Soul was afraid if anyone found out about Gnashing Teeth they would pick on her worse.  So she kept it a secret… sort of.

Little Girl Soul’s friend with the same name knew a little bit about what went on at home.  Little Girl Soul had been invited to her friend’s home on several occasions.  It was fun, but Little Girl Soul worried all of the time.  She didn’t know how to be around other people.  Her friend’s Dad was always teasing her… but she didn’t understand teasing.  It never happened in her own home so she thought they were picking on her.  Her friend tried to explain teasing meant they liked her, but teasing even in a nice way didn’t make sense to Little Girl Soul.  Her friend’s sister and  Mom said Little Girl Soul was too serious and that she needed to loosen up and have fun.  She didn’t have any idea what loosening up was.  Everything was scary to her and she worried about everything. She worried she would do everything wrong, and she did. Her friend’s family prayed before meals.  Little Girl Soul’s family never did this… so when the family prayed at a meal, Little Girl Soul was horribly embarrassed that she didn’t notice everyone else was waiting to pray and here she was already eating.  Everything was embarrassing.  Gnashing Teeth was right – she was stupid, an idiot and would never amount to anything.  She cried herself to sleep.  She wanted to be home.  At least at home she knew how to be and how to behave.  It was better than not understanding teasing and loosening up.

After a while Little Girl Soul’s friend with the same name asked why she hadn’t been invited to Little Girl Soul’s home.  She didn’t want to tell her friend why.  She knew it was a bad idea but her friend kept asking.  It made her friend feel bad that she had never been asked to spend the night so finally Little Girl Soul asked her mother.  Her mother understood but was worried too.  She said they would work it out.  She heard her mother ask Gnashing Teeth that night about having the friend over.  Gnashing Teeth asked, “Why the hell do we have to have that PIG over here?  You know she comes from a bunch of PIGS”.  He spit the “P” out when he said pig. It made Little Girl Soul sick to her stomach.  What she later heard her mom and Gnashing Teeth talking about was that her friend’s brothers were boys who stole things and got in trouble.  Little Girl Soul did not understand what that had to do with her friend.  Her friend was a good girl.  So the next morning her mother said it was okay to ask her friend with the same name over.   Little Girl Soul was excited to tell her friend to come the next day to spend the night.  It was a time they would never forget.

After school Little Girl Soul and her friend played and had a good time.  That was, until Gnashing Teeth came home.  Little Girl Soul didn’t remember what happened, or maybe the horror of what Gnashing Teeth had to say made her forget what brought it on, but in the front yard, where all of the neighbors could hear, and all of the little soul kids could hear, Gnashing Teeth called her friend a pig, her family a bunch of pigs, and called her brothers names. Little Girl Soul was mortified, and as Mother came out to yell at Gnashing Teeth, she noticed her friend stood still and didn’t say a word.  She looked like she would cry but she didn’t at first.  Not until Gnashing Teeth walked away yelling at Little Girl Soul’s mother did her friend ask why he had said those terrible things about her family and why did he call her a pig?  Little Girl Soul told her what she had heard the night before but her friend said it wasn’t true.  Her friend cried.  Little Girl Soul had to tell her that was why she was afraid to invite her, and that it was always like that when Gnashing Teeth was around.  Mother called everyone to dinner.  Nobody said a word as they ate their food, cleaned their plates, and asked to be excused.  Little Girl Soul and her friend did the dishes but didn’t talk.  Everyone went to bed at 7:00 just like always.  Her friend asked why so early?  Little Girl Soul said it was that way every night and it was to keep everyone quiet so Gnashing Teeth could sleep.  Little Girl Soul knew her friend would never come back.  She never did… and Little Girl Soul never asked her mother to have anyone overnight again.

From that time on Little Girl Soul’s friend became her closest confidant.  She could tell her all of the ugly and hurtful things about Gnashing Teeth.  Somehow it felt good to be able to talk to someone about it.  Her friend seemed to sense when things were bad at home, and she took up for Little Girl Soul when kids said mean things at school.  One day Little Girl Soul came to school but she couldn’t sit.  She tried to shift from side to side but it was painful.  She wished she had bench to sit on instead of a chair.  Her friend asked what was wrong. Little Girl Soul didn’t always want to talk about the bad things that happened at home.  After a short interrogation her friend guessed it.  Little Girl Soul explained that Gnashing Teeth had come home from work the day before and Mother had disappeared.  He asked where Mother was.  None of the soul kids knew.  He become very angry and said someone had to know something.  Little Girl Soul explained that Mother had left the house to visit a friend probably, and that it was all of the soul kids faults because they had been acting up since after school and made Mother mad and she just left not telling them where she was going.  Gnashing Teeth stomped off.  The soul kids were scared because they heard him yelling in the basement and he was in a rage.  He stomped up the steps.  Little Girl Soul faced him but didn’t look at him.  She saw first what was in his hands.  It was some kind of 3 or 4 ply wire with nuts strung on it in a loop.  It looked to be some kind of hand-made whip.  He yelled something at her.  Was she the only one who had angered mother or were there others?  She knew to take the blame herself.  For if she named the others, they would be beaten as well.  He asked her to turn around and pull her pants down.  She didn’t want to.  She was 14 years old.  He humiliated her further by saying HE would pull them down if she didn’t. She pulled them down a little way. She did not want him to see her pubic hair or her butt.  It wasn’t good enough, “FURTHER down you goddamn bitch” he spit and she knew he was beyond reasoning.  She cried out each time he lashed at her with the homemade whip.  It stung, but it wasn’t the pain of the lashes, it was the humiliation that he did it in front of the other soul kids, and with her pants down.  He asked the others if they needed a whipping and what the hell were they looking at?  No one answered.  He yelled that everyone was grounded to their rooms until dinner and he walked out.  The second soul sister came to Little Girl Soul and cried with her.  Little Girl Soul’s friend with the same name was furious when she heard what happened.  She wanted to tell her parents.  She said Little Girl Soul should go to the police, or even the teacher, but Little Girl Soul would not and she begged her friend not to tell anyone.  She knew if she did, things would be even worse at home and her mother and everyone would pay.  Gnashing Teeth would do something even more horrible.

Considering Death

Little girl soul did not question much about her life.  She knew it didn’t seem fair and she hated living in fear.  Nothing ever seemed to feel comfortable to her.  She was afraid of being at home when Gnashing Teeth was near.   She didn’t understand his anger and wrath.  Gnashing Teeth was mad most of the time.  He never had good days at work, and everything was wrong when he got home.  He accused the soul kids of doing things they didn’t do, and if they did do something bad, they were afraid to say they did it, so they would lie and then gnashing teeth would be really mad.  Little Girl Soul was always worried and scared.  Sometimes her stomach churned; sometimes she felt a crazy kind of wired feeling run through her arms and legs.  Sometimes it felt like her brain was going to explode, and sometimes she felt like she would die. Sometimes she wished she could die.

She thought about death a lot; mostly because she wished Gnashing Teeth would die.  Little Girl Soul had never heard of death until one morning when she and the soul kids went out to play.  The front porch was always their favorite place to play “house”.  There on the porch that morning laid Tipper the dog.  Most of the time Tipper wasn’t around, and Mother had warned the soul kids never to bother him.  Tipper might bite so everyone was afraid of him.  But this morning Tipper was still.  His eyes didn’t move, his mouth didn’t move and flies were all over him.  Something was wrong with him, so Little Girl Soul ran to her mother and described the way Tipper looked.  Mother came out and declared Tipper dead.  She told everyone to stay away from him and not to touch him or they could get a disease.  Little boy soul asked what a disease was.  Mother said it was really bad, a terrible kind of sick.  Nobody touched Tipper.  Mother removed him from the porch in the little wagon which made Little Girl Soul worry that the disease would be on the wagon and it would get it on the soul kids.  She asked her Mother what she did with Tipper but she only said Gnashing Teeth would bury him later. Little Girl Soul wished that Gnashing Teeth was still and dead like Tipper.  Then he couldn’t hurt anyone anymore.

It was scary the first time Little Girl Soul knew death for real with a person.  Gnashing Teeth’s best friend Mr. Boyd died of something called cancer.  Little Girl Soul loved “Rollie” and she did not understand why Gnashing Teeth and her mother would not let her see Rollie when he got really sick.  It was early autumn because leaves were falling from the trees, and the breeze was cool.  The soul kids all had to sit in the car while Gnashing Teeth and their mother went to visit Rollie.  She watched Gnashing Teeth cry the last time they went to the Vet’s hospital to visit.  The soul kids got quiet watching him and stared at him. They rarely saw Gnashing Teeth show any emotion but anger.  It must have made him angry to have all of his kids staring at him because he stopped crying and became mad.  Even Mother didn’t talk to him.  She was sad too. Everyone knew Gnashing Teeth was just sad and not really angry with them. Then there was the day of the funeral.  Little Girl Soul stuck with her Grandpa and Grandma, Gnashing Teeth’s parents.  When they were walking into the church, she heard two old ladies in front of her talking about how “green” Rollie was.  They said it was the cancer that made him look green. “He was a heavy smoker you know, and it was lung cancer”, one of them said.  Grandma told Little Girl Soul to be brave when they walked by his body, but she didn’t have to look if she didn’t want to.  She panicked at this. They kept walking closer and she didn’t know what to do.  She saw a fancy box, and something inside her knew Rollie was in it, but she didn’t want to see him green, and she was scared, but she looked anyway.  He didn’t look green to her.  He looked like he had colored powder on his face like old ladies wore, and he didn’t look right. They stuck some glasses on him that she had never seen before. Why was he wearing glasses if his eyes were closed? Grandma scurried Little Girl Soul and her brother along saying it wasn’t polite to look at the body too long.  Why did she keep saying “the body” when it was her friend Rollie in there?  Why couldn’t she call him Rollie anymore?  All through the funeral Little Girl Soul got sad thinking she would never see Rollie again.  He always took Little Girl Soul to the grocery store after school and bought her orange slice candies or whatever candy she wanted.  He would talk to her while he worked at the book bindery where Gnashing Teeth worked too. Rollie pounded on the books a lot with a hammer and pressed a pedal on the floor that made two bars squeeze the book.   He asked Little Girl Soul lots of questions about her day at school.  He made her smile.  Little Girl Soul was shy but Rollie always made her feel good.  She felt loved by him.  He talked a lot about his son Jim, and his daughter Nancy.  Nancy was studying to be a nurse and someday Jim was going to be a doctor.  Rollie smiled when he talked about his kids.  He asked Little Girl Soul what she wanted to be.  She wanted to be a Mom.  She wanted to have 4 kids.  Rollie laughed and asked what she would name all of those kids… and so the conversation went on and on. He never ran out of questions or smiles.  Then Gnashing Teeth would come up front and everything got bad again.  She knew she would have to hurry and get to the car so she wouldn’t be scolded about being a clod for being slow, or a goddamn beep for being stupid about something.  She always worried about doing the wrong thing around him.  She didn’t want Rollie to hear how stupid she was and it was embarrassing to have Gnashing Teeth to yell at her in front of all of the people at the bindery, so she did the best she could to be a good girl.  Now she would miss Rollie and his talks… and his smile that warmed her heart and made her feel good for a little while.

Her second meeting with death was her Grandpa; gnashing teeth’s Dad.  Little Girl Soul was 13 years old.  There was a blizzard that day and by the time Gnashing Teeth got home from work the roads were closing.   The whole family sat down for a fried chicken dinner.  Little Girl Soul was always very hungry and she loved the mashed potatoes and gravy that accompanied chicken dinners. There was frozen corn from the garden too.  Corn was her favorite vegetable.  The little house smelled good and was toasty and warm from Mother’s cooking.  The phone rang and Mother looked funny after she answered it.  She handed it to Gnashing Teeth who listened a bit and said he was on his way.  Mother told us Grandpa had a heart attack after he and Grandma had come in from feeding the cats in the barn.  She said he walked in the house, took a deep breath and fell to the floor, exhaling with a scream.  It must have been the temperature change, coming in from the cold into the warm house that caused his heart attack Mother said.  The soul kids had a lot of questions but mother was in no mood to answer.  She said she didn’t know anything.  She told us to eat, but who could eat when you just found out your Grandpa had died?  Visions of Rollie’s powdery colored face crept back in Little Girl Soul’s mind, and she remembered how sad she was when Rollie was gone and she didn’t see him at the bindery anymore.  Now she wouldn’t have Grandpa anymore.  Her stomach felt horrible, and she cried and cried.  Even when Grandma came to the house that night to stay with them Little Girl Soul couldn’t be comforted.  Later, when Gnashing Teeth returned home, Little Girl Soul heard him talking about how bad the roads had been and how a snow plow had to cut a path on the highway to get the ambulance to the farm and then plow a path back to the hospital. He talked about them cutting into Grandpa’s chest, and the blood, and no response.  He was mad at the doctors who were idiots.  He was mad at the nurses.  Grandma had come to spend the night but she didn’t say much.  She said she would sleep in the chair. She talked in hushed tones about where Grandpa died on the kitchen floor and how horrible the scream was that came from his lungs.  She said she tried to get the nitroglycerin pill under his tongue but his teeth were clenched.  Little girl soul pictured the place in the kitchen where he fell, and the scream played in her mind a million times over and she tried to picture him with his teeth all tight together.  She didn’t know if she could go back in the farm-house knowing Grandpa died there on the kitchen floor.  It all seemed too creepy and scary; especially the scream.

For the next 3 days Little Girl Soul cried.  She couldn’t stop.  She couldn’t eat.  She prayed that God would bring Grandpa back.  She tried to bargain with God. She listened to Grandma telling her she had to eat to stay strong, but Little Girl Soul didn’t care. Food had always been a comfort and a joy.  Now it only made her feel ill.  She wanted her Grandpa back and she couldn’t eat.  Her stomach hurt.  The night they went to see Grandpa after they “laid him out” Little Girl Soul hurt even worse.  She just knew she saw his chest move.  Maybe he wasn’t dead, or maybe he was doing it just for her?  She was confused.  Grandpa looked fine to her.  Not like Rollie, who had powder all over his face.  Maybe he WAS green under all of that powder and they did it to cover up the green.  Everything was confusing to Little Girl Soul.  Then Gnashing Teeth began to cry and cry and cry.  He cried like a baby with deep coughing and sputtering. He wailed out loud and threw himself over Grandpa.  He kissed Grandpa and then told the soul kids they needed to kiss Grandpa on the forehead one last time to tell him goodbye.  Little Girl Soul didn’t want to kiss Grandpa.  She was afraid of the disease Mother talked about when Tipper died.  She looked at Mother for help and Mother finally told Gnashing Teeth not to make the soul kids do anything, that he was scaring them.  Finally, Gnashing Teeth settled on having them kiss Grandpa’s hand.  Little Girl Soul didn’t want to, but she didn’t want Gnashing Teeth to get mad at her either.  In a way she felt sorry for him.  She had never seen him so sad before.  She was worried for a long time that she would get that disease Mother had told them about.  Luckily, none of the soul kids got it, whatever it was.

The day of the funeral Little Girl Soul was numb.  She had cried so long that nothing came out anymore; at least not until they got out to the cemetery. There weren’t many people there because the snow and wind kept most of the roads impassable and another snow storm was brewing.  The burial was at an old country cemetery miles from town. They all got to ride in a big black car with lots of room for everyone including Grandma.  A big road grader plowed the way down the gravel road but the wind whipped the road shut right behind the procession.  At the grave site everyone gathered around and huddled close.  It was freezing and the wind bit sharply.  Little Girl Soul trembled under her fuzzy brown fake fur coat.  The minister said a few words and it was over. Little Girl Soul was sad thinking Grandpa was going in the cold, hard ground where he would be forever.  Grandma said he would sleep until the Lord came to call him on Judgment Day.   On the way to the car the third girl soul asked, “Don’t we get to see him get buried?” This sent Little Girl Soul back to tears.  What a gruesome question to ask?  What was wrong with her?  Little Girl Soul wiped her eyes and saw blood on her hands.  Her lips were chapped and bleeding.  Mother gave her a tissue and she dabbed at it. Then she looked at her hands.  Her knuckles were cracked and bleeding too.  What a cruel day… what a cold, bitter end to her Grandpa. He was loving and gentle.  A man whose son turned out nothing like him. When Gnashing Teeth got in the car he saw the blood on the tissue and gruffly asked, “What in the hell is wrong with you?”  Mother interjected with an explanation.  Little Girl Soul worried that she might look stupid or even worse had done something so stupid as soiling her dress with her blood.  Sometimes he didn’t explain what she had done to upset him, he just gave her that “look”.  A mean look was always better than having to hear what poured out of his mouth.  Little Girl Soul just looked down at her lap.  That way she didn’t have to see his ugly, mean face… and he didn’t get to see her tears.

Sometimes Little Girl Soul thought about her own death.  She looked at herself in the mirror with her eyes mostly closed and her hands folded in front of her. That’s the way Grandpa and Rollie were “laid out”.   That is what she would look like dead.  Gnashing Teeth would be sorry then.  He would cry like he did when Grandpa died.  And she would never have to see his gnashing teeth, or hear his yelling, or look at his mean eyes, or feel him spit on her face while he was yelling.  He could never hit her or spank her again.  Little Girl Soul knew deep down though, that God probably wasn’t going to let her die.  Mother said everyone had a purpose in life and that we couldn’t die until we had done everything we were supposed to do on earth.  Little Girl Soul supposed she would live a long time.  Most people did.  She didn’t know what her purpose was, but she hoped she could figure that out when she moved away from Gnashing Teeth.  When she got out of school she was moving far away and never coming back.