This is from the My Life in Vignettes series No.

21 D

Stumbling to Matrimony The chapters that follow this constitute a fragment of my many attempts to put my life to paper. 1959-1962 Sue and I wanted to be married. We just didnt know how to do it. When youre fifteen its not the sort of thing that normally enters the grey matter in your brain. We both had things in common without realizing it. Its a funny thing; you can be attracted to someone for reasons that defy explanation. I know now; I can be at a party with 100 people and the craziest woman in the room will be attracted to me. At least at that stage in life everything was simple yet complicated at the same time. Her family seemed fairly normal. While my family was total fiction. My brother and I have many aunts and uncles who really dont know anything about our family in the real sense. They circle on holidays but never really enter. Aunt Flo I was particularly fond of. My fathers sister. A gentle soul if there ever was one. She was going through electric shock treatments that terrified her. Flo is crazy; she needs to be locked up. I dont know what constituted mental health problems at that time. I think families manufactured them. My mother was very jealous, Florence knew how to drive and she didnt. It was easy for her to make fun of her driving skills. If you dont drive yourself. I had no self-worth or confidence. Yet at the same time I somehow knew I could do anything in the world. Nothing seemed impossible. I could dream anything up. Im going to build a go-cart and drive to grandmas in the Ozarks. Forget the rules of the road. And, the fact that I have no money. I study maps from the gas station, draw the route. Ill never come back, ever. Youll never amount to anything. All you have are big pipe dreams. Well sir, I survived on pipe dreams. I was a pipe dream manufacturer. I had patents on pipe dreams. They would take me where I needed to go to survive. I had a tree to sit under in the wilderness. My guardian angel was at work on me. My mother was very jealous and automatically hated any female who I was interested in. Or, was interested in me. Whether she even knew them at all, it didnt matter. Women are destroyers. I could rob banks for a living and it would be just fine. But if I robbed banks with a woman, Id be going straight to hell.

My fathers point of view on the subject was simple and to the point. All women are sluts. I have searched my brain for 68 years and thats the only piece of advice I can remember ever receiving from him. One thing they had in common. They both hated women. There are a lot of people who have walked this planet that should never have become parents. Theres no test to become a parent. You can be destitute and illiterate. As long as youre male and female, and healthy. This does not, of course, include people who adopt children. Being a parent is the most important job there is. Im sixteen and I take my driving test. Reality is Id been driving for years without one. I dont have a wallet so I carefully put it into a plastic sleeve. I am so proud of this license. This is my key that will unlock the door. I have accomplished something. Sue and I break-up, then we make-up. Break-up, make-up, break-up, make-up. Were living a soap opera. We write long letters to each other. Were writing our own Greek tragedy. And were not even Greek. I have to go to summer school, 1961. Theres no way out for me. What a joke this is going to be. I spend time making out with a girl on the third floor because the school is deserted. Except for us misfits. This is suddenly fun. You can flunk summer school. Even though everything is so watered down a Cocker Spaniel could pass. Somehow, and I dont really know how, I get promoted. Really, now. That fall its back to the books. Im a book basket case. I cant go home again. My brain is racing at a speed my body can never catch up with. Im a total fictional person, and I know it. I can convince someone I went to the moon last week. Music sustains me. I can hear one note of a certain song and get emotional. Listen to the whole song and Im a basket case. I know exactly where I was the moment I first heard a thousand songs. I think out of the other side of my brain. I only need to realize this. Numbers are not for me. They sometimes baffle me. Music and art I understand in a complex way. Its all about color and form for me. That summer I took a girl on a date to the Art Institute of Chicago. We took the train. I didnt want to leave. She said; Youre very intellectual, you must have a good home and great parents. She said this to me, I swear. Lynn, she was beautiful, and totally confused. It was incredibly romantic for me. My parents cursed like it was an actual language. Every other word. To this day I cannot curse. Its something that is just not in me. Its alien.

Abusive childhoods go one of two ways. You either become abusive, or you become a protector. Evil will never walk through the door again. Im a protector and a nurturer. I just needed to find the door. Guardian angel is on duty. John Brandt Copyright 2011 John Brandt