This week I am still contemplating the image of being knocked out of my shoes. I'm not sure it really happens, but I've heard that when someone is hit by a train or other fast moving vehicle, they are literally knocked out of their shoes. I can relate to this emotionally. Somewhere in the woods behind the First Baptist Church in Bladenboro NC there must be a small pair of tennis shoes. Proverbial or not, I still see them.
I am only three and as I sit on
the ground with my feet dangling in a hole, my mind is exploding, reconfiguring
and exploding again. The change may not
have been instant, but it is life changing. All color seems to drain out of the
sky. The sun no longer shines the same joyful way it used to. Everything I see
becomes the color of sepia. Not black and white or gray, but the reddish brown
color of faded dried blood.
My father dug this hole to bury a
dead lady and a still living child. I am a candidate for that yawning gaping
hole in the ground too. My grasp of life is churning in my head like a pot of
stew. My relationship to, and my perspective of the world are forever altered.
I step back into the shadows of my mind and begin to watch it float by. There
are no more questions at this point. I don’t quiz him about why the lady was
hanging in a tree and I don’t wonder anymore what dead means.
I understand that I killed this lady. Not because I wanted
to, but because he made me.
I know she was sleeping when he cut her down from the tree. It doesn’t
matter that I couldn’t wake her up. When he dropped me into that hole on top of
her she made a noise. It was so hard to keep my balance. I didn’t mean to fall
on her. It was different then when I play with daddy or momma on the floor and
sit on their tummies. I don’t fall off so easy. The lady felt squishy and
reminded me of stepping on little rocks that roll under my feet and make me
fall.
I didn’t mean to hurt her, but she cried out. It
sounded like when I surprise daddy and jump on his tummy. So I know she was
just sleeping and I just surprised her. She didn’t get up though. I woulda
gotten up quick if it had been me! Daddy laughed at her noise. Daddy made me
open her mouth and put dirt inside. I cried because I wasn’t brave. I did not
want to kill that lady. I know that when you get dirt in your mouth and nose
and eyes that you can’t breath good and it hurts. I begged daddy not to make me
do it, and to wake her up. But now it is done, and I don’t ask anymore. Daddy
put dirt in the hole on top of the lady and me. I’m so worried that Momma will
be mad at me when I get home cuz I’m so dirty now.
Daddy told me the lady was bad cuz
she told someone something she wasn’t s’posed to tell. Daddy says that secrets
are important to keep and that I better not ever tell anybody stuff about me
and daddy. He says that the little girl is naughty, cuz she told stuff she
wasn’t s’posed to tell, too...........
