You’re not in that class, Nemo, but I imagine you are.
You’re not there on the last day of class, when Leroy asks for the tenth time this year, “Miss Radack, are you
a lesbian?”
“Would it matter?” I hear myself ask back, feigning both innocence and naiveté.
Neither confirm nor deny has been my mantra all year and today’s another day I could have changed all that, Nemo,
and today’s another day I relented to fear, masqueraded as professionalism.
It would matter, wouldn’t it, Nemo? If they knew?
I feel it, too, Nemo, that sting you feel when they scream “faggot!” down the hallways, so nonchalantly, yet with
such venom that my teeth clench and I swallow the very same tears I cried when I was your age. Confused like you,
Nemo, but not nearly as courageous.
Why can’t courage be as infectious as ignorance?
I could have used some of your courage right now.
I could have used it, Nemo, because I know it would matter because today that sticker in our classroom was ripped
to shreds again. Our so-called “safe zone,” violated again for the tenth time this year, scratched out while I
was at lunch, pondering the pros and cons of “telling them.”
Mr. Porter called that sticker a symbol of my “gay agenda,” a symbol of my insensitivity to their cultural heritage.
My insensitivity?
So, safety, Nemo, is now synonymous with insensitivity. And I could have used your courage right then, Nemo, and
I wished you were there because, once again, I was “appropriate” and “open” to his comments because he was just
saying what he felt and was trying to “keep open the lines of communication.” And I nodded and smiled and smiled
and nodded, the same way they all do when I again go over the etymology of faggot with the dictionary open because
I am so tired of hearing that word being flung across the classroom and the hallways.
And you and I share a wink and a smile that period, Nemo, like we did when they asked me about my boyfriends.
And Mr. Porter’s talking and I’m staring at the sticker at the center of all this controversy, a fresh one I put
up this morning because the last one was defaced with black permanent marker.
And I am ashamed of my fear and my compliance.
Almost as ashamed as I am of my own community, Nemo, for what they have done to you. Because your introduction
to the queer community came in the form of a five dollar bill from an anonymous hand because you agreed to suck
it without a condom. And the very people who were supposed to embrace you in the face of rejection took advantage
of you.
And I feel like a surrogate mother and I want to bring you home and show you what unconditional love really is
and I know your mother would do the same, Nemo, if she understood how much it does matter and if she could reconcile
your queerness with her Pentecostal Puerto Rican identity.
But right now she can’t.
And so, Nemo, I came out to you and only you because I know how much it does matter. Because I wanted you to see
that our community isn’t sex and violence and drugs and that, despite what you think, black eyes don’t just happen
when your face gets in the way of your boyfriend’s hand.
And I wanted to be a role model to you, Nemo, but there’s an irony there in that you are stronger and more of a
role model than I could ever be.
Because it does matter, you know, if they know.
And so I imagine you sitting in that class when Leroy asks me again if I am a lesbian, like he’s done so many times
before, and again we share a wink and a smile and every other instance like this one plays and replays in my head
and this time will be different, Nemo, and this time, Nemo, because it does matter, I will tell them. Because there
are others like you and it does matter. And I can feel the courage to tell welling up inside of me after 25 years
of silence and submission and professionalism and appropriateness.
And then I glance over to my cabinet at what used to be a white sticker with a pick triangle in the center - and
what used to say “Safe Zone” is now a system of scratches and slivers. And I leave my body, Nemo, and you look
down in what I can only imagine is disappointment and shame and all I can say is, “Would it matter?”
This was written to and for Nemo, my only out gay student, for reminding me why “it does matter.”
I’ll do my best, my confused little friend
To clear up all of your questions.
You see, I paint my lips and nails and all
For the very same reason you paint your walls.
Because when you love something you want to embellish it
And as for my makeup, well, I simply relish it.
So tell me, do you say these very same things
To the chicks with eight tattoos and eyebrow rings?
Because, last time I checked, that’s “unnatural” too,
So what is it, Honey, that so offends you?
Is it that I “look straight” and don’t look like
Androgynous enough or enough of a dyke?
And are you that same chick who, when I was eighteen,
And I went onto my computer screen,
Searching for a community there,
That’d show me what it meant to be queer,
And because my screen name wasn’t dykey enough,
Like “Clit69” or “MasterofMuff”,
You decided again that I didn’t fit in
To your narrow definition of “lesbian”?
So let me see if I got it right,
These rules for being a “self-loving” dyke…
You can’t shave your legs, or under your arms,
But you should shave your head, ‘cuz in that there’s no harm?
You know, I’ve read all the books and all the studies,
And I’ve seen the documentaries,
About all the women’s magazines,
The Beauty Myth, Naomi Wolf,
“Killing Us Softly” and to tell you the truth,
I fully agree and I don’t debate it,
But I’m neither airbrushed nor computer generated,
I am curve after curve of pure and natural me,
And if I choose to enhance that, just let it be.
Because, similar to what Marilyn said,
Rhinestones and glitter, in fact, are a girl’s best friend.
So I will gloss my lips if I so desire,
And throw heals on my feet to make me higher,
And paint my nails to make them shine,
And you can complain and rant and whine,
And scoff and mock and sneer and vent,
‘Til your au natural heart is content…
Because I know where true beauty lies,
And for me it’s not in some andro-disguise.
I do love myself, despite what you think,
That “real dykes” can’t really like pink,
And I know this may come to your chagrin,
But I really am a lesbian.
I am a dyke as much as you,
And there’s room for me in this march, too.
So make way, my dear, for my glitter and glam,
Because I, too, am beautiful and I know what I am.
This poem was written as a response to a comment I overheard at the 2001 Dyke March, at which the theme
was “Love Your Body.” I was marching with friends when, from behind us, somewhat snidely commented, “I don’t get
why they’re wearing makeup when the march is about loving your body. At the time, I didn’t say anything, although
my friend turned around and proudly announced, “I love my lipstick!” So this poem is what I wish I had had the
balls to say…
When I grow up, if I could have just one wish
It would be to become the world’s sexiest bitch
With black leather boots that zip to my thigh
On Stiletto heals that are eight inches high
And a hot pink bustier that comes to my hips
And fuck-me-red lipstick all over my lips
And I’d be able to dance without cracking a smile
But I would crack a whip and I’d do that with style
And never would I squeal with shear delight
Instead I’d be coy and try as you might
To get me to giggle or smile or blush
Or develop on you some kind of cutesy-girl crush
I will always pass your sexy-bitch test
By forever remaining thoroughly unimpressed
But, I suppose, if the “sexy bitch” gig didn’t work out
I’d settle for “tough girl” without a doubt
And I’d get a tattoo to show off my muscles
That I earned lifting weights and not dancing the Hustle
And I’d shave my head and wear carpenter pants
And I’d still never smile when I dance
Hell, I wouldn’t dance at all
Instead I’d stand toughly against the wall
And be cool and intimidating all in one
Yet strangely intriguing, while in my forefinger and thumb
I’d hold my cigarette like a tough girl should
And nurse my lipstick free beer bottle like a tough girl would
But I did shave my head once and you know what they said?
“Lani, you look so cute!” as they patted my head
As if I were some kind of puppy dog hound
Who they’d just gone and rescued from the pound
And I was also told that I looked like a monk
And a chubby little boy and my heart just sunk
And then one day I heard “Nice hair cut! You look so tough!”
But instead of being cool and butchie and stuff
I squealed shit like “Really?” and “Oh my god, Yay!”
And my hands started clapping in a girly-girl way
“Lani, you are so cute!” everyone started to shout
And that’s when I knew there was just no way out
Because even when it was boys’ affections I thought I awaited
I was always the girl they said they’d marry, but never dated
I suppose there are worse things than cute that people could call me
Like when creepy men wink and then “Hey, doll” me
And I can’t help that I smoke like a girl
Or giggle when I dance or that my favorite word in the world
Is “Yay!” which usually seems to precede
The girliest clapping that you’ve ever seen
And I don’t wear leather ‘cuz I know if I buy it
I’d think of dead cows and then I’d start crying
And the thought of a bustier makes me recoil in fear
And in all my life I’ve never liked beer
But I can rock the fuck-me-red lipstick, or, in my case, pink
But it inevitably ends up all over my drink
Which is usually a Malibu and Coke in a girly-girl cup
Which is neither sexy nor bitchy nor remotely tough
So until the day when I am no longer able
To sing Disney songs on command at a restaurant table
Or learn to control my perpetual giggling
Or learn to dance without smiling or wiggling
I suppose I’ll have to show my tough sexy bitch beauty
Later, and for now just be Lani the cutie
25, Mom, the very age you were when you gave birth to me - your second child, your bubeleh, your only girl.
At 25, I can’t imagine having been married for 5 years with 2 kids, but you were the only daughter of aging parents,
the first generation American of Holocaust survivors and you were alone and needing company and so you married
and had us.
And I wonder what your other dreams were and I wonder even more why you never spoke of them. And I wonder
if those very dreams deferred fueled the very loneliness you were trying so desperately to escape.
And you surrounded yourself all day with children and when I would visit you there, in your brightly colored classroom
filled with my old toys and books and outgrown dance recital costumes that were now reserved for your other
kids, you were my hero because you laughed and smiled and sang and played without inhibition.
And, in your classroom, rules were made to be broken. And, in your classroom, there was neither yelling
nor fighting -- and I wondered where all of that gentleness and silliness and cuddling was in our house.
And I wished that you and I could live in the housekeeping corner of your perfect, safe classroom and play Mommy
and Daughter forever.
Because at home you rarely played with toys and I saw you cry more than laugh and I heard you yell more than sing.
And when all that crying and yelling got too much for you and I watched you run to your car and saw the red lights
melt into rain drops, I knew for sure that I hated you. Not just because you were abandoning me and leaving me
alone in that noise and war, but because you were able and allowed to drive away into your fantasy world
of songs and toys and laughter -- and I wasn’t.
And I would listen as you came home and crept up the stairs and I would pretend to be sleeping as I listened again
to your crying. And I wanted to rush in to your room and save you and fall asleep in your arms and be hypnotized
by that clicking sound you make with your tongue when you sleep.
But instead I used my tongue and swallowed every last bit of your anger and resentment and fear and denial
until my entire core was filled your emotions. And I mistook those feelings for my own and your misery became
mine and suddenly I didn’t know where my identity stopped and where yours began because now we were
two sides of one coin and two halves of one whole, yet somehow terribly unwhole. And I know you did the same -
swallowing all of my sadness and anxiety and hostility and later even my adolescent angst.
So I made it my life’s mission to not be you and never be you because I didn’t understand and knew that I never
would why you were so angry and sad and lonely. So I ran and ran and ran - and so did you.
And I hated you for your emotions and hated you even more for your expertise at denying them and denying mine and
denying everything. Because denial never worked for me.
And so I had to crawl inside myself and excavate those shards of my psyche that really belonged to you. Strange,
isn’t it? Getting rid of pieces of yourself in order to make yourself whole again? And all of that psychological
archeological work proved to me that I am more you than I had ever dreamed.
Because now, Mom, I am 25, the very age you were when you gave birth to me, and for the first time I can say that
I understand.
I learned to laugh at summer camp. Yes, I had laughed before my first summer at Camp Young Judaea, a conservative
Jewish Zionist summer camp in hills of New Hampshire, but I had never learned how or why to do it. I learned quickly
that boys were the reason for learning to laugh.
I was 9 my first summer and even then it was a necessity to have a boyfriend to be cool. Mine was Adam Davidoff.
He was 8. One trip day he won some fuzzy rainbow dice and gave them to me. I guess that’s kind of like 9 year old
sex. And as I giggled as he handed them over and I watched the corners of his mouth turn upward and his pink face
start to match the red stripe on the fuzzy dice, I knew that I had learned to laugh properly.
Two summers later, it was a whole new ball game. That summer I was 11, and apparently I had become so skilled a
laugher that I had 3 boyfriends in 8 weeks and that summer was our introduction to “flagpole time” which meant
that after our evening activity, we were allotted 15 minutes to spend with our boyfriends at the flagpole outside
of the dining hall. I became an undercover anthropologist among the love-struck couples and took my cues from the
boy-crazy girls and mostly I learned that, no matter what, I was to continue laughing. Laughing was cute and sexy
and boys liked it.
One of the precious three that summer was Josh Bear. We dated for 11 days, but he would reappear two summers later
outside of Levine, the recreational building, one night during Friday night Israeli dancing. “Didn’t I date you?”
he asked and his voice was cocky. He was now 14 and I was 13 and so memories of 2 summers ago were as fuzzy as
the cubes from Adam Davidoff.
And so we talked and of course I laughed and talking evolved into back rubs and still I laughed and, when it was
my turn to have my back rubbed, I laughed even more - because that’s what girls were supposed to do with boys.
And then when his hands got really heavy on my back, I laughed. And when he grabbed me by my sides and flipped
me over on the cement wall so hard that I felt like crying, I laughed.
And he started moving his body up and down along mine and I laughed.
And I looked around and everyone else was gathering around and laughing - campers, counselors, Josh Bear - and
so I laughed too.
And I kept laughing as his hand forced its way up my shirt and even when he pulled so hard that the straps ripped
and my bra came off in his sweaty hand, I laughed.
And as he swung it around in the air like it was a prize, like it was Adam Davidoff’s fuzzy dice from trip day,
and everyone else - the counselors I was supposed to trust like family and the campers I was supposed to love like
family - cheered and laughed, I laughed too, because that’s all I had been trained to do.
And, after I snatched back my tattered bra and ran laughing all the way down the gravel path and past the flagpole
back to cabin 9G, I lay on my bed and the laughing turned to crying and I couldn’t figure out why I felt so hysterical
and dirty because I had done everything I was supposed to do.
And I still couldn’t figure it out when the camp director called both of our names -Josh Bear’s and mine - over
the microphone at dinner, and the whole dining hall laughed, and we had to go to his office and I laughed during
my climb up those stairs, walking beside Josh Bear. And as we sat in front of him, I was sorry that I had ever
cried at all and even sorrier that I had done so in front of my counselor, because now I was in trouble and I had
to bring my tattered bra as “evidence” and, even though I wanted to cry again, I remembered to laugh as I answered
questions. “Yes, I knew him” and “Yes, we had dated” and “Yes, I had offered to give him a back rub” and, of course,
“Yes I had laughed.” Did I say no? “I have no idea.” Was I supposed to? Because no one had ever mentioned that
or taught me that.
And I even laughed when I was told that we were both at fault. And years later, when I had an emerging feminist
consciousness and an even greater emerging feminist vocabulary, I would have the words I needed then like “sexual
assault” and “violated” and “blaming the victim,” but at the time I was 13 and all I knew was that every ounce
of my body wanted to get out of my chair and shake my Director and punch Josh Bear.
And when I suggested that it wasn’t my fault, my Director looked up and smiled - and I was sure he, too was about
to laugh - and he replied, “But, Lani, you were laughing.”
Saying things like “She’s a little bit gay"
They seem to approach me day after day
Standing around and continuing to linger
My friends say I put the “grrr” in swinger
How is it that in a room full of dykes
At slams or clubs or open poetry mikes
The people who approach me never seem to fit in
To my criteria of cute, single, sane lesbian
So I thought I’d tell you if I may
About all the others who come my way
The first group of folks who try to win my affections
Tend to be those who come with erections
As hard as this little girly lesbian tries
Not to attract the attention of guys
They always seem to come quite near
So I try to tell them that I’m quite queer
Which is usually the absolute wrong thing to say
Cuz then they really don’t go away
“A lesbian? Can I watch? That’s fucking hot!”
As if to show how homophobic they’re not
So I turn and walk in the other direction
And leave my admirers sporting erections
And just as I’m making my way back to my table
Along comes the dyke who is clearly unstable
I know this cuz last weekend at 2 AM
When I was outside the club with a bunch of my friends
She ran up and proceeded to tell us
About how her ex girlfriend is just “so fucking jealous”
“Isn’t she just a whore?” she ranted and cried
To a complete group of strangers standing outside
So needless to say I don’t need to be told
Not to go near this chick with a ten foot pole
So thinking that I’ve seen the worse
I take a cigarette out of my purse
And just as I put it in my mouth and bite it
A hot dykie girl comes and offers to light it
And she proceeds to charm the pants off of me
Talking about books and philosophy
And she turns so I can see her left eye wink
As she lights my cigarette or buys my drink
So I ask her, “Do you come here a lot?”
“Yeah, it’s totally my girlfriend’s favorite spot.”
What the fuck is wrong with me?
Do I need some kind of therapy?
Clearly hormones are not what I need
But maybe fermone replacement therapy is more my speed
I wonder if the convent would let me become
An Agnostic Jewish Lesbian nun
Cuz apparently I’m giving off all the wrong vibes
And attracting people of all the wrong kinds
My friends seem to take great comfort in
The fact that I’m the single lesbian
So they can all call and ask for advice
On how to live their non-single lives
And I sit on the phone and answer their questions
And calm their fears and offer suggestions
But I do think that to a certain degree
There’s an awful lot of irony
To the fact that for their dating tips
And advice on healthy relationships
And how to make their girlfriend’s hearts tingle
They turn to the friend who is chronically single
But I suppose what more could a friend really want
Than a perpetually single confidante
I dressed in drag once in college.
It was for a Halloween drag party hosted by both the LGBT group and the rave group and everyone went in drag and
so I did too.
It was right before the stage in my lesbian career when I shaved my head, but around the same time I had begun
wearing gender neutral pants and tank tops.
And I knew then how the other dykes had felt earlier in their lives, when they were made to wear pink frilly dresses
and flowered underpants.
But I loved pink frilly dresses and flowered underpants.
In fact, I hated boys clothes even at the age of 2 when Mom tried to potty train me by buying training pants.
“Those are boys underwear - gross!” I promptly announced and flat out refused to wear them.
Mom tried to reason with me, but it was futile and so she had a plan.
We went to Caldor and I picked out the prettiest underpants I could find, girls ones, and Mom said the first
time I had an accident I would have to wear the training pants. And so - I never had an accident.
But I couldn’t tell that to the dykes at Skidmore, or at least I thought I couldn’t, and thus began my parallel
childhood where I too preferred soccer to ballet and boys clothes to girls clothes and I too had shaved Barbie’s
head and made her make out with Skipper and I too had always known I was a dyke and had resisted wearing makeup
or shaving my legs until Mom forced me to.
I couldn’t believe everyone believed it. Even I started to believe it.
Truth is, I danced ballet for 10 years and only stopped because the girls in the class really annoyed me and because
my knees started to get bad, but I had loved it.
And the only reason I had played soccer for as long as I did was because Mom and Dad both made me, despite my angry
protests.
Ballet shoes always felt more appropriate than cleats and pink tights felt natural compared to shin pads and knee
high itchy white socks, but no self respecting dyke is supposed to say that.
And the wooden bar and the mirrors never intimidated me like the ball did -- and I had even been in special gym
because of my fear of the ball. And I was the only kid in gym class who actually looked forward to the square dancing
unit because it didn’t involve a ball.
And I had Barbie and Ken making out, even though I didn’t really like Ken either, but I didn't like him
because Ken had non-brushable plastic hair, and I didn’t even know who Skipper was.
And I played mommy in every childhood game and was always holding a baby or dressing up with a slip on my head
as a bride.
I went as a bride for three years in a row for Halloween. But marriage is a patriarchal institution and now I was
supposed to be political and political people were always right.
Mom had prevented me from wearing makeup, despite my endless pleas, and had also refused to by me nylons, even
when my jazz teacher insisted I wear them for my recital.
And under nylons you have to have shaved legs and I started shaving on a chorus trip in the 6th grade so Mom couldn’t
stop me, because she had forbade that as well.
But at this point I was determined to wear only overalls and bandanas and, despite my itchy legs crying out for
help, I was not supposed to shave them, but I did anyway because that was the one guilty pleasure I allowed and
no one could see them under the overalls anyway.
And I too scoffed at the girls on campus who wore black pants and used sunglasses as a hair accessory because they
clearly knew nothing about politics.
I hate to say I told you so, but I was so right.
You want to be tough and stand offish and a total prick, but you know that you are incapable of maintaining that
façade in front of me.
You said yourself that I can read you like it ain’t no thang.
Sometimes I scare myself with what I find when I do read you because you embody nearly everything I want to avoid
and you embody nearly everything I need.
My friends say they have never seen this side of me - this assertive, I’m not going anywhere I am not leaving unless
you fucking force me to side.
I hate to say I told you so, but I really am not going anywhere and, my dear, neither are you.
Because I know when and why and how and where you are trying to run - and I am a step ahead of you.
You want me to mistake you for the asshole you try to be and I want to mistake you for that too so I can just write
you out of my life with an angry poem.
I hate to say I told you so, but I’ve already written you into my life and my writing is never wrong.
You told me I don’t have a monopoly on caution and I told you that you don’t have a monopoly on secrets and so
we are even.
I hate to say I told you so, but I didn’t run away.
Bitch showed up at my door at 5 am - ringing and ringing and banging and “I’m gonna fuckin’ kill her!” and me left
½ dressed under my flannel sheets with only your earring and ace bandage and card from Wednesday on my shelf
and I still did not run.
Brutally honest pathological liar.
Sad and tormented contented soul.
Bittersweet romance and sticky smoothness.
I hate to say I told you so, but I knew those things before you expected me to.
You know when I know and I know when you know and you know when I know you know and I know when you know I know.
I hate to say I told you so, but you already knew that I know.
I told you that early on.
I told you you do that thing with your eyebrow when you are lying, but I did not tell you you do a similar thing
with the other eyebrow when I am right.
I hate to say I told you so, but your eyes give you away every time.
They are the reason I don’t close mine when I kiss you.
“What are you like?” you ask.
I hate to say I told you so, but you are not the fucker you want to be when you say shit like that.
Because I had you massaging my feet after you had me crying and I knew that you knew that I knew that you never
thought you would do that.
I hate to say I told you so, but you knew that already.
Before I met you, Caroline, I didn’t believe in salvation.
I was 11, the depression had set in, I was angry and I was confused.
But now it is 14 years later and you stand on the bimah in a light pink suit and light pink is perfect for you
because it always was your favorite color. And I wonder if I’m one of the only people in this entire synagogue
who knows that.
Before I met you, I babysat Alyson. 12 years old and they asked me to do it because I was Mrs. Radack’s
daughter so I must be good.
My first real babysitting gig.
When I showed up, at your old house before you or Ruggiero Way, Alyson came flying down the stairs in a flurry,
with a patchwork quilt somehow fastened to her head.
“Hi, Alyson. Nice to meet you.”
“I am not Alyson; I am Rapunzel and I have let down my hair!”
A drama queen in training, Alyson was what you might call a high-maintenance kid.
But then you came, Caroline, and there was nothing high maintenance about you.
I was 12 and you were 11 days old and your parents decided to leave you with me. And the moment they laid you in
my arms, I fell in love.
Before I met you, never before had anyone entrusted me with anything so important - and I was not going
to do anything wrong.
Because I loved the way you smelled like light pink baby lotion and loved the way your entire body fit neatly between
my elbow and my hand.
With your wispy blond hair and light blue eyes and soft pink skin, I thought you were my China doll and I held
you the way my babysitter’s books said to - so you wouldn’t break.
And I was afraid to leave you alone for more than two minutes so I carried you with me into the bathroom.
Before I met you, I thought I was already grown up. But I grew up with you and you saved my life.
I wonder how many people in this synagogue know that you learned to pout when you were two months old. Your tiny
bottom lip curled over your even tinier top lip - and I would melt.
Because you never cried.
But you did laugh, especially when you saw me and before I met you, it had been a long time since I’d made anyone
smile.
With you, Caroline, I was Lani the Babysitter - 2 days a week after school and regularly on weekends.
And the squeaky rocking chair in your nursery became my solace from my life.
Because, as I rocked you against my chest and sand Puff the Magic Dragon and your smile faded and your eyes closed
and your breathing got heavy and I made my breathing match yours, I would hold you in my arms long after you were
asleep. My Caroline.
Two years later you were still my Caroline and I was your Leila, because you couldn’t yet say Lani.
Before I met you, I didn’t know anything special and I wasn’t anything important. But now I was one of the only
people in the world who knew that, before you could be tucked in, you needed your light pink Mr. Bear and your
passy, but that your passy had to be upside-down.
And you still never cried and you did everything with silliness and abandonment.
“Caroline, should we go outside and spin around until we fall down?”
“Yay Leila!” you sang and so we did.
And I loved watching the way your watermelon bonnet swirled in the sunlight and the way your arms stuck straight
out before youo hit the ground and the way your giggle was infectious when you landed. And we would spin on your
front lawn before Ruggiero Way for hours.
Before I met you, I never smiled at strangers on the street. But after we got up off the grass, I’d put you in
your stroller and we’d go for a walk and people would smile at me as we passed on the sidewalk and by this time
I was in high school and being with you was all that got me through.
Because I helped teach you to read and you helped remind me to laugh. Where the Sidewalk Ends was your favorite
and you had memorized eight different poems before you could even read a single letter. But I gave your parts to
recite all by yourself and you would squeal with delight when I changed my voice.
And we would sing the frog song and the unicorn song and I smiled and clapped when you remembered the hand motions
and you felt like a big kid for remembering.
Before I met you, six years was an eternity.
Twice a week for six years and I never stopped going and you never stopped smiling and leaping into my arms when
I arrived at your door.
By the end of 11th grade, I drove myself to your new house, the huge one on Ruggiero Way, and we were still
as silly as ever.
Before I met you, I had never made toast.
But as I stood in your kitchen and made you cinnamon raisin toast, you told me about kindergarten and making fancy
A's.
You still had trouble with saying your S's because of all your ear infections, but you would sing “You are my Dundine”
at the top of your lungs anyway.
Before I met you, I did not have a little sister and my brother had gone away to college and left me alone to handle
the fighting.
“Lani?” You looked up at me as we drank our pretend tea with your dolls.
“Yeah, Caroline?” I stopped looking out at the grass.
“You’re my best bend. You’re like one o’ the bamily.” And your sigh and giggle filled my core with warmth.
Because, before I met you, I was cold.
And you cried when I went away to college and you said you would come in my suitcase, but I tried to explain that
there was no room for you at college. Before I met you, I wanted more than anything to leave home. But now just
you and my dog made me homesick.
And then your brother was born and I came home less and less, but when I would see you, you still jumped into my
arms.
And now, Caroline, you are older than I was when I first met you and before I met you, I thought 25 was old.
So once again I am warm as I watch you on the bimah and you don’t notice I am there, sitting with the rabbi’s wife
and daughters, until the very end. And you look up and see me, and your eyes grow wide and your mouth opens and
you wave and I wave back and we giggled, even though we both know we probably shouldn’t be doing this. Before I
met you, I always followed the rules.
And I wait forever in the receiving line and then I get to you and now you are taller than I am and too big to
jump into my arms, but you do throw your arms around me and I revel in the sanctity of that moment there in the
sanctuary.
Friendly’s was the only thing in Andover open past 10 pm, other than McDonald’s. That is, it was the only thing
open that welcomed teenagers. Andover was, and is, a very youth-unfriendly town.
In middle school, on half days, we would head “downtown” after school, because that’s all there was to do. Only,
starting in 7th grade, we had to leave our backpacks outside the door and could only enter two by two into nearly
every store on Main St.
I don’t know what they thought we were going to do, and I don’t know why they thought making us feel like
criminals would make us any less likely to be criminals, but there we went, ants marching two by two in
and out of the Andover Gift Shop, where we never bought anything unless it was someone’s birthday, in which case
we invested in an overpriced hand painted picture frame, because they wrapped it for us for free and even curled
the ribbons; the Andover Spa, where we could overdose on Watermelon Nerds and Coke; and into CVS, where all there
really was to do was invade the cosmetics aisle and engage in battle with tester sprays of Vanilla Fields and Debbie
Gibson perfume - Electric Youth - until the manager would find us and chase us out.
But where we were supposed to go, no one ever told us. And so we would congregate in the park, where the cops would
watch us, especially when we were in high school, because somehow it was a crime for teenagers to gather in one
place and eventually they’d need to break us up.
So we’d move on to the library. Bad ass kids at McDonald’s and the rest of us at Memorial Hall Library. Because
we were allowed in the library more than two at a time and we could bring our backpacks inside with us and the
library was open until 11 also.
Conveniently, Friendly’s was next door to the library and so we could traverse back and forth between mozzarella
sticks and magazines, butterscotch and biography. And such was the existence of Andover youth.
I’ve always thought that a town with so much should offer more to its youth. For as long as I could remember, Andover
had been trying to erect a youth center, but the way people acted, you would think they were trying to drop a prison
in someone’s neighborhood. Stores feared scaring away customers and residential areas feared the loitering of idle
hooligans.
And somehow no one connected any of the dots when we had a suicide epidemic in high school and when heroin, LSD
and cocaine began replacing mozzarella sticks and watermelon nerds.
What else are kids with lots of money and no where to go going to do? Where parents would rather buy their children
new SUVs than invest in a youth center or fund after school arts programs?
And so it became the elephant in the room - announcements in the morning over the loudspeaker that “Andover High
had lost another valuable member of its community over the weekend.” And then an assembly on suicide and how great
life was and how we all needed to stick together to get through this - like a scene out of Heather’s.
And they appointed the student body president and class valedictorian to the “Suicide Prevention Task Force” and
no one ever bothered to ask the rest of us.
If you have enjoyed Lani Radack's Poetry, then please be certain to e-mail her at radacklani[at]hotmail.com and thank her for posting her Work.
Click here for a list of all of Lani Radack's Stories and Poetry at Sapphic Voices Authoresses.
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