Childhood Struggles with Family and Religion

Childhood Struggles with Family and Religion

In 1955, a measure of grace fluttered into my life, carrying the perfume of waxed wooden floors and fresh ink. My grandmother, wearied by my constant presence, had successfully implored the headmaster at Dover Area School to make an exception for a five-year-old child. A new uniform materialized as if summoned, and my school shoes gleamed with an impossible darkness. My aunt even called to inquire about the well-being of the “schoolgirl.”

I was the child of a mother who had vanished into the geography of elsewhere, a fact my grandmother invoked like a recurring chorus. But the world of school offered new scenery and new players, and for a time, it was enough. Plasticine and paints became my favorite in that Grade One A class. They were not objects to be found in the drawers or on the shelves of my grandparents’ home; they belonged solely to this new stage on which I found myself.

In those days, I sensed the boundaries that demarcated the acreage of my grandparents’ kindness. Back then, they were still well, still sufficient to themselves. Their resentment towards me had not yet calcified. I painted and drew with the abandon of someone who believes that each stroke can change reality. Each color could repaint a past or sketch a future. My masterpieces, however, were considered worthless ephemera by my grandmother, destined for the burn pile. Our trash was as meticulously curated as a museum exhibition — some to be dug into the earth, some…