Lessons I Learned from the fears of my mother
My mom suffered from agoraphobia. This is often defined as a fear of open spaces, but that’s not entirely correct. For her, it was a fear of being away from home. She would be certain that something awful was going to happen unless she stayed home, or at least got home. In the 1950’s, this condition would have largely gone unnoticed except that she was also a divorced, single parent who had to work for a living.
Our world was rather small. She worked across the street in a diner, where she could see her home from work. I did not know why my mother had never taken me to school, like the other kids’ mothers did. My first day of school, I tagged along with a neighbor’s kid and her mother. After that I went by myself. It took many years for me to figure why my mom never went to school or ever picked me up. That was just something that other parents did. My home was different.
Until I was nine, my mother had a boyfriend who she wanted me to pretend was my dad. I refused. I remember her crying and saying, “You don’t understand how much we need him.”
Divorce only happened in New Jersey when both parties agreed. Her boyfriend’s wife was very Catholic and would not agree. The boyfriend wanted to take her to Las Vegas, where he could get a quickie divorce and they could be married. My mother could not manage to go. If he was divorced and remarried in Nevada, the state of New Jersey would recognize it. However, they would not recognize the divorce in order for her to be married in our state. He told her that because she could not go, he had to leave her.
I learned how much she needed him after he left. My mother was put into the hospital; she lost her job. We lived on the support checks from my father. Unemployment paid $12 every two weeks. There were nights when we ate with relatives because we had no food. A dinner invitation was a relief. It was my job, to go to unemployment every two weeks to stand on line with her. She would tell me that I did not have to go to school.
Her ex-boyfriend allowed her to buy back a car that she had helped pay for. My mother borrowed the money to buy it. Wherever she went, it was my job to go with her. When she would start to shake and cry, it was my job to tell her that we were going to be ok. It was my role to say that she could do this. That I knew that she was going to win this time.
On the same day that we went to unemployment, we went to Presbyterian Hospital, where my mom saw a psychologist. The waiting room was bright with a few soft chairs, but mostly hard-backed wooden ones. I was allowed to go to the cafeteria and have an egg-salad sandwich. I like egg-salad to this day. They would let me sit there and no one would know that my mom was damaged because I could be there for any reason. Maybe somebody old and very sick would not allow children in the room and that was why I was in the luncheonette that day.
I would always wind up on one of the hard chairs though. Once I tried to go to the gift shop, but they watched me and approached me and then asked me to leave because I was touching things. I didn’t go back because I was afraid that somehow if I got reported that my mom would get in trouble with them. Once in a while, the therapist wanted to see me. I was never sure what I was supposed to say. Was it my fault that my mom was always afraid? I tried to make it better.
I watched them watch me. It was weird then. You’re a kid and your body does things that you aren’t thinking about. But inside, I knew that was because I was a kid. They had all the advantages, so I might as well use being a smart kid. It was my only card to play. It worked. They always said good things to my mom about me and she was proud. I hated it. Silence made the time go even more slowly, like being made to sit quietly at your desk with your hands folded.
When my mom was well enough to work again, I missed a lot of school going with her to look for work. She worked in a jewelry store and then she worked in a clothing store. She got herself to work in the morning by scouting the bus stops and making friends with people who were there at the same time. At night, it was my job to get her home.
There were times when my mom panicked and left early because someone offered her a ride. Sometimes I was already on my way to meet her. I knew that she would never do that to me on purpose, but the fear had been too great. Her fears went back so far.
As a small girl, she had no memory of her father. Her mother died when she was only nine years old. My great-grandmother and her daughters designed a fantasy about how their poor sister lived and died, but my mother had island memories that conflicted with their stories.
She remembered her mother’s larynx had been removed and that she made gurgling sounds when she had to replace the tubes. She remembered that she could not smell or taste rotted fruit and that peddlers took advantage of her. She remembered that there were men with rough voices and actions. She was told that her mother died of lung cancer but she didn’t believe it.
She asked around until she found the men who had known her father. They were in prison. She went to the prison, in Rahway, alone, and visited them, but was told more lies. “Your father escaped but now he is dead.”
She began to search the library records for old newspapers stored on microfiche. She learned that her mother was beaten to death and bled out on the street. She learned that there were few records of her father’s existence and that they led nowhere. She kept at her search for the next thirty years, but did not ever find her answers. Her father had been someone who everyone was willing to forget except for her.
When my mom remarried, a new nightmare began. My stepfather and I did not get along, ever. I had given my love to her other boyfriend’s family and when he abandoned her, they abandoned me. I was not about to make that mistake again. Besides, they were not interested in a sullen, solitary boy who was not one of them. I was twelve, I had been without supervision for a very long time and was not about to accept his or theirs.
He did not know how to handle my mother’s fears. He screamed at her and she screamed back with a strength that was rooted in her fears. My job was still to get her home from work every day. I had a system down. I could race home from school and play hard. Anything to get the anger, that had been converted to energy, out of me! Then I would race home and try to make myself presentable again and hop on the bus.
I liked the bus as it rumbled down Broadway until it merged with Bloomfield Avenue and became Broad Street. There was a large bank called the National Newark and Essex Bank at the joining of these two roads. It meant that I was almost downtown. The bus was always at the stop under the train tracks for the longest time. There was a news stand there and the drivers would sometimes jump off for a few minutes to take a break.
Downtown was a different world. There were a dozen movie theaters, cafés and store after store. It was endless. If I was early, I would get off at the train station and walk the length of downtown. There were the old stores, some of which had barrels on the sidewalk in front of them. There were lots of new buildings. They seemed so much stronger. There was endless traffic on the streets. The many walks on all the streets of downtown Newark helped to mold me. It was my identity. It showed me who I was. That is what is meant by street sense on a physical level. It becomes part of who a city street-kid is.
My mom had been a sheltered city kid who went to church. Going to church was a place where my mom felt safe. I liked church. I liked Jesus because my mom was so devoted to the need to go church. I was a young star at Sunday School because I could memorize the longest pieces to recite for the congregation on special occasions.
But then my great-grandmother, in whose arms I lived as a baby, with whom I shared a room died when I was seven. Two years later, her church closed up its doors.
While I was in my sophomore year of high school, my mom engineered the unthinkable, we moved. Glen Ridge is an upper middle class suburban town, two towns out of Newark, but an entire world away. Nobody dressed or thought like I did. These kids came from rich families. They viewed me as someone from a strange land with a different culture. My mom told me that getting of Newark was something that she had done to make a better life for us all. It was a difficult transition.
But she was right. There were no street-corners for me to hang on anymore. Riots broke out in Newark the year after we moved. The kids in my new high school talked about Newark as if it were Mars. My mom told me that it was behind me now and that I needed to make new friends in a new town.
It was around then that my mom taught me to steal. I became a stock-boy at her clothing store and we worked scam after scam to take money and clothing. We were never caught.
Next to the police station on the corner of my street was an old-style A&P. It was a throwback because it was run by one clerk who had worked there for his entire career. The bakery deliveries came about 11 pm. My mom would send me down to swipe cake and other bakery items that were delivered at that time. I carried money and if I was caught, I was to say that I was leaving the money behind to pay for what I took. I was never caught and never left any money. My mom was proud of my skills but cautioned me never to tell anyone what I was doing.
My mom opened her first business in a store on the corner. She found a new psychologist who lived a few blocks away and saw patients in his home. I was no longer needed to get my mom home or to get her to therapy. I was free but stuck in a place that I did not understand.
My mom’s fears taught me to do the one thing that she could not do; they taught me to be alone. They taught me to live inside of my own head. I could live without friends and that was good because I didn’t have any.
Every child learns from their parents, if they have them. I learned that adults could be more afraid than children. I learned that it was my job to not be afraid so that I could protect my mom.
My step-father was a printer. They printed a tabloid called The Enquirer among other things. This weekly publication was sold on Newsstands and in grocery stores. There were no newsstands in Glen Ridge and they were dying out everywhere.
My mom read a story about a woman from England who had not left her house for twenty years. They began a correspondence that lasted a long time. They sent each other caseate tapes instead of writing letters. For a while, my mom had the dream of one day going to England to meet this woman. She never did.
She also wrote to people in prison. One such woman had gone on a killing spree with her boyfriend when she was a teenager. She was about to get out of prison after serving more than twenty years. My mom invited her to come to see us. My step-father was outraged and refused to allow it. He demanded that my mom stop talking to people in jail. Later in her life, my mom conducted a prison ministry, writing to people on death row and advocating for them. My mom was stubborn about her dreams.
She found a new church and became active. It was there that she meant Millard Fuller, who eventually went on to create Habitat for Humanity. Fuller had not done that yet and was visiting the congregation in Glen Ridge. I am sure that he was looking for donations for his upcoming project, but my mom made friends with Millard and his family. They shared meals at our house. My mom begged me to stay home for these visits.
“You know your step-father hates to talk. I need you to carry the conversations at dinner. You know how to talk to a man like Millard Fuller, your step father will just offer him drinks.” So, I stayed for these dinners and we spoke about the Bible and Christianity. Fuller prayed that “a mind like yours will find its way back to God.” I responded that I was pretty sure that God did not want me and that if he did not want me, I saw no reason to worship him.
“Why do you think that God does not want you?” asked Fuller.
“Because I disagree with all of his people so completely,” I answered.
“Why?”
“Because you have stolen people’s cultures. Missionaries took their songs and gave them Christian meanings. You teach that people are never good enough but good is defined as being like you.” Strangely enough, they enjoyed talking with me. I have never really understood that.
As she grew older, computers helped her to stay in touch with people from all over the country. She turned down offers to speak on behalf of the distribution of Chicken Soup for the Prisoners Soul. She was surrounded by people and always had someone that she trusted with whom she could leave her house.
My mom now had a big house with more rooms that she ever went in. There was always plenty of food and my mom was generous about sharing it. She had many people around her.
It was like I was a small boy again when I told her that when she went to the hospital everything was going to be ok. I calmed her and then she slipped into a coma. I only know that I was there for her last days, I’m not sure that she was. When I eulogized her, I told the Parable of the Talents. I asked that the servant who had been afraid and hid “talents” for fear of losing them not be punished. My mom was not that servant but she understood his fear.