The Center of His Attention
Remembering is a powerful gift. It brings both clarity and healing if we take the time. I am in the process of learning how to write a Memoir, such an ambition seems daunting. The first reccomendation from the book, Your Story Matters, by Leslie Leyland Fields was to write out a timeline of my life. This story came from that excercise of remembering.
Little finger nails, the color of watermelons, ran across the new dress. The teal fabric with tiny adorable hearts in red, yellow, orange, and green were too cute not to love. It hung quietly waiting for my special day. With excitement I pulled it from the plastic white hanger to swing it around, I giggled. Back then, my closet was unique and mysterious. Because it held the space above the stairs it was the biggest closet in the house. It felt like a secret passageway into another world with three levels a kid could climb up into. I was a little scared of it, so I quickly stepped out and shut the door behind me.
I was turning five years old. For the first time I was having a birthday party with friends. My best friend Christy Hawker with the cute little freckles would be coming, and so would my cousin Stacey with her long blond hair, smooth and straight. The dress I held up to myself as I looked in the Vanity was perfect for the occasion.
Outside my window, I could hear Dad mowing the lawn. It was already a warm June day as the sunlight made the pink walls of my little bed room glow. The carpet under my bare feet was cleared of toys. To prepare, I had meticulously picked up all my Barbie dolls and accessories, stuffing them in the old changing table I used as their apartment complex. It was on this raspberry shag carpet in front of Barbie’s home I whispered the word, “sexy.” I wasn’t sure what it meant, but Barbie knew and she was not happy with Ken doll about it.
I could hear my brothers David, Mark, and little Jonny cake, already causing raucous in the kitchen. The clammer they made as they poured the rushing Captain crunch from the box into their cereal bowls, got my attention. My stomach growled with hunger as I heard their spoons hit the bowl. I quickly took off my pajamas to slip on my Birthday dress.
As I looked in the mirror I liked how the dress hung on my little body. I wondered how I would someday grow up to look like my mother. I sucked in my stomach and arched my shoulders back pretending I was grown. How did ladies grow breasts? Letting out my breath, I thought about it as I traced the white ruffle from the top of my shoulder down to my waist. The white ruffles on each shoulder gave the dress an even sweeter touch, I thought. I reached my arms back as far as they would go to button myself up, but my arms grew tired trying to reach.
“Mom,” I called out.
I heard her muffled voice a moment ago in the kitchen. I opened the door of my bed room making eye contact with Mark as he gobbled up a spoonful of cereal. He stopped to give me a milky grin. He was almost seven years old, but he always seemed older. My nose perked up to the hot smell of butter and fried eggs as I spotted Mom, in her dark blue housecoat flipping eggs at the stove.
“Mom, can you button up my dress?”
She turned to look at me, “Honey, your party isn’t until three P.M. this afternoon…”
Just then Dad came through the back door singing Happy Birthday. Quicker than I could even turn around, he scooped me up in his strong arms.
“Happy Birthday Sissy! Look at you in your pretty dress.” With tickles he continued to celebrate my special day. I laughed until I couldn’t catch my breath.
David, the oldest, continued to eat at the table, but the other two ran to join in. Mark lunged for Dad’s wide shoulders as Jonny attached himself to Dad’s long legs. Without missing a beat he lugged all three of us litle monkeys as he vocally became the marching band and singers in a grand Birthday parade around the kitchen. Playfully he slapped my mother on the rump as we passed by.
Meanwhile, mom with bed-head hair, gave him a look of warning as she said, “Stephen!” But we giggled at the little smile on her lips. Before she returned to her work over the stove, she remembered my dress.
“Steve, can you button her dress?”
“Dianne, don’t spill anything on that dress, it is for the party.”
“Boys, now get down from your Father and eat, we have a lot to do today.”
My Dad set me down on the brown linoleum floor. I stood still as he reached down to button up the back of my dress. His hands seemed so huge as he continued to talk to me in a sing songy voice. Dad could make any moment feel like a day at the circus. When he finished he turned me around by my shoulders to look at me. As he crouched his six feet two inch body to meet his little five year-old daughter’s small stature he wore a huge grin showing each perfect white tooth in his beaming smile.
He was handsome. The look in his brown eyes was simple admiration, and I couldn’t help but feel the warmth of his affection like little hearts covering my soul. In that moment I was the center of his attention.
“Well, Sissy you look beautiful,” he said.
and I believed him.
Remembering can feel scary. You might feel like you are decending into a mining cave through a narrow doorway. What lies inside that I have forgotten about?
As I recalled my fifth birthday I was surprised by the gift remembering gave me. I had forgotten the fun I used to have with my Father. He was the love of my young heart. It was good to bring that moment back to life. I felt a little more whole, a little more loved.
Take time to remember.
“Nothing is ever really lost to us as long as we remember it.”