I Was That Girl
I didn’t ask for it, I didn’t want it, and I didn’t deserve it
Have you ever had a moment when you make a decision that seems completely trivial but ends up spinning your life into an entirely unanticipated direction? Some of those choices end up altering our lives in great ways — the wrong turn that took you to the best restaurant ever, that person you met in the library who ended up being The One.
Some of those small choices, though, end up leading to catastrophe. When I was 16, I made one of those choices, ordinary and no-big-deal. Things went bad fast and led to circumstances that defined my life for decades.
I might not look as though I am in Hell, but looks can be deceiving. In full fake-it-til-you-make-it mode, regional Junior Miss pageant. First Runner-up and Miss Congeniality, thank you very much
I grew up in a small town in Oklahoma, daughter of an oilfield worker and stay-at-home mom, who were both a million times more than that description might suggest. They were smart, great-looking and crazy in love with each other. Dad was the kind of family man who came right home off his shift for dinner with his wife and daughters. The kind of man who called from a pay phone out in the oilfield to tell us to run outside and catch a spectacular sunset — and we were the kind of family that did.
Mom was an out-of-step activist in our farming-and-oil community — advocating on behalf of the migrant workers who came through every summer — the time, for example, she went to a city council meeting and told the city fathers that, instead of complaining about how filthy the migrants were, they might put a few bucks into building showers for these workers their businesses depended on. Mama was, as everyone knew, a pistol.
At the dinner table, we talked about books, about words and ideas. We questioned religion, we discussed politics. We were encouraged to think. Mother took my sisters and me to our Disciples church every Sunday morning and choir practice on Wednesday nights. Dad would show up at the church for Easter and Christmas and whenever “his girls” sang the Sunday special music.
I didn’t realize how remarkable they were and how close we had been until my connection with them was stolen and I never found my way back.
How I Got Lost
Mom and Dad were honorable, upstanding people. I was raised with great values — honesty, hard work, consideration of others — that are still the best of me. They also had a strict moral code. My sisters and I were expected to be virgins when we married — and we were expected to marry sooner rather than later. We couldn’t go out with boys until our parents met them. We had curfews. They did everything right to make sure we had a good, respectable upbringing, according to their standards and the morals of the day.
Except … I was a teenager. It was the Sixties and I wanted to be so much cooler than they were. So, one Saturday in my junior year, I took the bus to Stillwater, a university town about two hours north of my hometown, and met up with “Clair,” another girl from my hometown who had graduated the year before. [It’s not her real name, but hers is not my story to tell. If she ever wants to, I’ll make her a part of mine.] Clair was so sexy and cool I knew going out with her would confer instant sophistication on skinny, gawky me. Our adventure in that college town had one agenda, the ultimate score: Dress so that we looked 21 and see if we could get a bar to serve us.
That was the win. We had no plan after that.
As it turned out, it didn’t matter how old we looked. No one attempted to card us, no one even raised an eyebrow as we sauntered into the bar a few blocks from campus and casually plopped ourselves into a booth. As we sat drinking our first bar-bought beer and celebrating our victory, two well-dressed guys came over and asked if they could buy us a beer. A man was buying me a drink, all sophisticated and adult-like.
I didn’t like the taste of beer, but I loved the idea of being independent women on the town, apparently irresistible to these nicely dressed strangers. Fraternity men, the kind of guy who would impress your parents if you brought him home for Sunday dinner. Such friendly guys, having so much fun with two girls from the middle of nowhere. We thought we were pretty cool. They bought each of us a beer, then bought each of us a pitcher. Soon we were joined by two or three other men — a real party.
I wonder who caught me when I passed out. I wonder how they communicated to each other what they intended to do next. They all knew. It was a pre-existing plan.
One of the men tossed me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and carried me out of the bar. They took us to their frat house. I remember little of what followed, except coming up out of my blackout enough to realize that I was in a room, in a bed and someone was on top of me. I will never, can never, forget the leering, jeering expressions on the faces of the men around the perimeter of the room. I passed out again and when I tried to fight my way out of my unconsciousness and get up, they started this woozy-sounding roller-coaster wooo-ooo chant that would rise and fall with my attempts to pull away and get up. I was held down. Helpless. And they were taking turns.
I blacked out again and only vaguely remember being carried back to the car — again thrown over someone’s shoulder. They must have felt like such cavemen, carrying a skinny 16-year-old girl that way. The next time I regained consciousness, I was on the street with Clair, leaned against a tree on a side street, strategically placed beside two garbage bags to underscore, in case we hadn’t gotten the message, who and what we were: Discarded. Worthless. Garbage.
The lesson landed. I spent the next several years throwing myself away.
There is much more to this beautifully written and very insightful story.
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