Winters' Triumph-Second Attempt

I press my foot on the ridge of the spade, the blade slides easily into the soil. I pull back on the smooth wooden handle, gloved hands gliding down to grip the pole, lifting with a grunt, the rich black soil from the garden floor. I am transported back to teenage years, watching disdainfully as my mother, (younger then than I am now) performed a similar task, a bucket of garbage scraps waiting to sleep and disintegrate under the weight of the dirt. She embarrasses me, at times, with her country ways, her lack of concern for her appearance, her narcoleptic naps in her chair. Yet, one would be hard pressed to find a mother and a daughter with easier camaraderie than myself and my mother, at least in my teenage years. We waltzed around each other’s lives in the cramped, prefab house on Buffalo Street in North Manchester, Indiana. We never criticized; rarely argued, genuinely enjoyed each other’s company in short, sweet bursts.

As an adult, dealing with a multitude of mental gymnastics relating to addressing an eating disorder and a heartache addiction, most of what I read points an accusing finger at the personage of one’s parents. They are not mistaken, those experts, a scary thought being the mother of three children myself. But the crooked finger of accusation is focused not on my mother, but on my father and it is time I told a little of that story.

I was born on May 22, 1959 at Abbott Hospital in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the youngest of five children born to Carolyn Knowlton and Robert Winters. Waiting for me at home was a seven year old sister, Roberta, a five year old sister, Kathy, a three year old brother, Roger and a sweet, distracted 20 month old sister, Evelyn. My mother got her tubes tied after she had me.

Some of what I describe in the next few paragraphs comes from stories told to me. My memories started early, at age 2 and where I can find clear recall, I will use only what I remember. I do not portend to portray my childhood as my siblings or my mother may recall, but only through the eyes of the little girl who cannot forget. I ask my siblings patience and understanding in advance. These are my memories, told as intact as I can.

I remember washing dishes when I was two, standing on a chair in front of the sink, by hands buried in soap suds, the dishcloth caressing milk green coffee cups, fiesta ware plates, metal cereal bowls sporting a film of milk and sticky rice krispies. Evie and I worked side by side, and from that early age forward, I remember doing the dishes together with her. I remember sisters assisting with other culinary tasks, and my brother laboring over the lawn mower but dishes were the domain of my sister and I.

We lived in a second story apartment at 2200 Garfield Avenue South. Dirty red carpet covered the stairs leading from out of the door to the apartment down to the street. I remember the scent of burning plastics, antics of the rough boys who lived nearby who loved to torture our dolls.

The living room was a dirty beige, housing a broken down couch and a food stained green chair, which my brother set on fire when I was three. The kitchen had no windows, a mirror stood over the sink, secured by plastic daisies in all four corners as well as a few others at the edges for good measure. Two bedrooms hid in the back, although I have virtually no memories of either room except for my crib which sat just inside the door to my parent’s room. It was in that room that my father began his incestuous assault on my two older sisters, ages 6 and 8 at the time.

I have almost exclusively happy memories of that time, my siblings serving as playmates and parents because my mother worked all the time and my father was not charmed by the company of young children. We did our best to stay out of his way. My siblings squired me about, giving piggy back rides, reading me stories, teaching me the intricacies of hand jive games, playing pick up sticks and tiddly winks. They warned me of my father’s temper, sheltered me as much as they could from the wrath of his anger. I see the sparse collection of photographs from that time and I see scrawny, grimy children in ill fitting clothes, grinning stupidly at the camera if my mother held the lens, cowering a bit with nervous smiles if Dad held the camera.

We were a tight knit group of little kids, using prior transgressions as manipulative tools in our negotiations with each other for coins and bubblegum and assistance with chores, but not once, in my entire childhood, do I remember anyone ever following through on a threat to “tell Dad”.