There are moments from childhood that stand out like beacons
in our memories—distinct fixed impressions emblazoned across our neurons for
all time. These memories can be random,
not at all emblematic of the most important or representative scenes from our
lives. I often recall strange
combinations of details from past events, such as the smell of someone’s
perfume or the music that was playing in the background. One day my mother pulled out a dress to wear
from the back of her closet. “Oh, you’re
wearing your cafeteria dress,” I announced as she emerged from her room. The only time she had ever worn that dress
was a day when the family ate at a cafeteria-style restaurant (something we never
did before or since) many months earlier.
When I was a young child, my parents had very close friends
from Costa Rica. The husband worked with
my father and the wife became good friends with my mother. They were celebrated guests in our home as if
they were close relatives. I remember
that they went off to Costa Rica for two years, leaving a void in our home’s
social energy. This couple tried for
years to have a child, adopting a little boy as they returned to town. As a four year old and the youngest (at that
time) in my own home, I did not spend much time with babies. I was fascinated by this little guy—how he
reacted when I shook the rattle, how his tiny fingers curled around one of
mine, and how he smelled. Oh, little
babies smell so good!
My mother and the baby’s mother were catching up on old
times. As I was now much older than the
last time our friend saw me, my mother was sharing with her all my
developmental milestones. Chief among
these was the fact that I could now read by myself. I have a brother who is older by a year, so
while my mother sat patiently teaching him to read, I lurked in the background
unnoticed absorbing it all. To demonstrate
her claim of my prowess, my mother pointed to a poster on the wall and asked me to read it. It was a quirky travel poster, about two and
a half feet tall but only about twelve inches wide. It depicted graphically what I later realized
were representative features of a South American country. Displayed vertically were the snow-capped
Andes, the ruins and tall rocks of Machu Picchu, and a llama (I thought at the
time it was a giraffe) against a lush background of trees. At the bottom of the narrow picture it said,
in block letters, “PERU.”
I stared at the poster and did not speak.
My mother asked again.
“What does this say?” Again I did
not answer. I crossed my hands across my
chest and shook my head. Frightfully
embarrassed, my mother demanded, “Read this!”
I still did not answer, baffling a woman who knew from experience I was
only too happy to share my reading skills to anyone who would listen. My mother was not pleased.
The fact is, I could read the word easily enough. I even knew what ‘Peru’ was—although perhaps
not where it was. I had heard about the countries in South
America and knew that people spoke Spanish there. The first time I had heard the name spoken,
it was pronounced with a rolling ‘r’. For
some reason, I was afraid to affect that rolling r with my own mouth. It was the same fear that caused me to
intentionally lose the “color prize” in nursery school, refusing to pronounce ‘amarillo’
(yellow) in an oral showdown. I had the
knowledge, but I also had an irrational fear of speaking these seemingly
strange sounds. I was mortified to the
point of muteness. No amount of coaxing,
yelling, or threatening could bring those sounds from my lips.
Later that night, as my mother was drawing my bath she found
me in my room reading a book. Playfully,
she began spelling out words for me to guess.
What’s “B-A-T-H?” she asked. “Bath,”
I replied, nearly insulted by the ease of it all. What’s “B-O-O-K?” she continued. “Book,” I obliged. “What’s “P-E-R-U?” Without thinking, I ran the word through my
mind phonetically and answered, “Peru!” Instantly
realizing that I had been caught, I clasped my hands across my mouth.
Anger came over my mother instantly, transforming the
teasing smile she used for the spelling game into her “I mean business” face. “I knew you could read that!” she
admonished. “But why?” she asked. “Why did you have to embarrass me in front of
my friend?” I did not know how to
explain to her the paralyzing fear I had of making the strange sounds. It was a deep and complex fear that penetrated
every inch of my being, causing a chill to run down my spine. At four years old, I just knew I could not
stand under adult scrutiny and utter that sound. As I blinked at my mother, the muteness
returned. I had no defense.
At about three years old, my daughter started refusing to
wear certain items of clothing in her drawer.
We always laid out her clothes the night before in order to streamline
the morning activities of a busy household.
She had a serious aversion to certain items, working them systematically
to the bottom of the drawer. If I pulled
out one of these as a suggestion, she would look at me as if offended saying, “No,
Mommy,”—hiding the item back on the bottom of the drawer. One day I was determined to get to the bottom
of this. I laid out each item, allowing
her to build separate piles that indicated what the princess would deign to
wear. Once the forbidden pile was
assembled, I asked her quietly, “Emily, why are these bad?” She put her chin to her chest and rolled her
eyes up toward me, not uttering a sound.
I pulled out one top that I especially loved; the colors were beautiful
with her deep blue eyes. “Isn’t this so
pretty?” I asked. “No, Mommy,” was her
reply.
For months we battled this mystery. Why would this little girl refuse to wear
certain items? It did not seem to be a
matter of color or style; some items were simply and inexplicably taboo. I was afraid to buy her any clothing lest she
pronounce a death sentence upon it. One
day, when we were having a fun time getting her ready for bed, I asked if she
could whisper in my ear what was wrong with the latest condemned garment. Tentatively she approached, swallowing
deliberately, one, two, three times before speaking softly into my ear, “buttons.”
Who knows the source of these childhood fears—so irrational,
so primal, and so enduring? To this day,
my now-nineteen-year old daughter cannot explain her persistent aversion to
buttons. Suffice it to say that her
closet is a button-free zone. We refer
to her, jokingly, as having an allergy to buttons—it’s as likely an explanation
as any. And although my children were
indoctrinated with Spanish in the earliest grades, both switched languages without
undue influence at their earliest opportunity; my son chose to study French and
my daughter, Latin. I now live my life absent
rolling r’s, free to Anglicize with impunity any word of my choosing.
Tomorrow's blog: Pushing Up Marigolds
