Why had I hid under the dining room table to do my shredding? Because I knew I was up to no good and didn't want to get caught. Mother assured me that she and my father were there to help me make choices that would made me feel good about myself. "If you're not sure what to do, ask one of us for advice. The final decision will be yours to make, but ask us for help whenever you want it." Little did either of us know that that we'd spend hours talking about right and wrong, what should and shouldn't be. I did understand by the end of phase two of our discussion that I was responsible for what I did and didn't do. Just what did that mean? If I thought I should do something, well, I probably should do it. If I thought I shouldn't do something, well, I probably shouldn't do it. When uncertain, I should ask for help. Had it been okay to cut up the dress? No
Finally, we talked about out friend. When she was in Europe, she'd thought about me. She bought me the dress because she thought I'd like it. She wanted to please me. She could have bought a dress for herself instead. Could I have worn the dress when we were together to please her? Yes, I could have done that, but it was too late. It was too late to please our friend. The dress had been destroyed. My sorrow was genuine. I burst into tears and could not stop crying.
Mother recorded the details of what I did and of what the two of us discussed when they were fresh in her memory. She tried to recreate our conversation word for word. This particular entry in Spitz was read and reread, interpreted and reinterpreted.
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I apparently had a "thing" about belts. A few months later, Mother and I cut through a dress department in our local department store. Dresses for large women were on sale. That night when Mother was getting me ready for my bath, she found I had shoplifted a belt from a size 44 dress and stuffed in into my panties. Hmm. A belt at last? A belt at last! Thank God Almighty, a belt at last!
Do you still have the Spitz? If so it would be worth its weight in gold, at least to you. What an wonderful idea, leaving a journal of your child for your child!
ReplyDeleteSpitz and all my father's letters were destroyed in a fire -- a moving van crash. Spitz I know by heart, but the loss of my father's letters is unimaginable. He wrote every day I was in college, usually around 2 or 3 in the morning when he was at his quirkiest. He wrote in a teeny tiny script -- he could get 3 lines of script in between two lines of a legal tablet. Sometimes his letters were 7 or 8 pages long. Killers every one. In one he spent 6 pages, both sides, describing how our kitchen would be remodelled. Ghastly colors. Unbelievably awful wallpaper. Counter tops that clashed with everything. And a floor from hell. Page after page of his usual enthusiasm and I sat in my room in tears. No one would want to eat in a hole like that! At the very end he said: Oh, that's what it isn't. Here's what it will really look like. I think you'll like it. I did.
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