Creating Peace From the Pieces

My memories are so fragmented, but as I continue to write, maybe I can make sense of… something.
We were considered to be a fairly large family. Most folks seemed to think seven kids made for a massive family, anyway. I never thought we were of any extra volume, people-wise. Our church was filled with so many families even bigger than ours, that we just seemed normal to me. The adults were taught that if they didn’t all “be fruitful and multiply”, that they were not living in God’s perfect will. So, in accordance with that misinterpreted biblical command, our parents continued to create loveable littles. Often, I was placed into a sort of supplemental caretaker role, but I didn’t mind. I liked that I could stay quiet and lose myself in the hubub.
Something else got lost in that fundamentalist old-woman-in-a-shoe chaos too, though – something so precious and so important. Our innocence was stolen. Perhaps our parents were blinded by a misplaced zeal to create a quiver full of children instilled with a love for God. They did love us. Without a doubt, both of their love was, and still is, unconditional. There was something truly missing in their application of love, though. In my perception through hindsight, they were misguided by a church that valued evangelism and sexual purity above all else.
In their campaign to keep us pure and subservient to God, our mom and dad drove us to find our own answers to questions on topics that “we’d find out after we wed”.
When asked how babies were made, our mom responded that after a lady gets married, God puts a baby in her belly. Imagine the confusion in my six year old brain when our 17 year old pastor’s daughter became pregnant out of wedlock. The single other situation of it’s kind that I was aware of at that time was the story of the birth of Christ, so I remember asking my mom if the preacher’s daughter was like Mary. I don’t recall her response, only the tightening of her jaw as my mom clearly decided this was another batch of information not to be shared.
I do think that it was around this time, age six or seven, that I truly became aware how different my family was from others. One event stands out in my mind as a sort of point of no return for my young mind. I was outside playing on the sidewalk in front of our house, when a couple neighbor girls came over on a mission to satisfy some pre-discussed curiousity. “Why do you wear dresses EVERY day?” one girl asked me. A sense of defensive shame reared inside me, and I immediately snapped with all of the haughtiness a six year old can muster: “Because I LIKE dresses”. Later in the day, I related the conversation to my mom, and her response was to ask me “Why didn’t you say it’s because dresses are modest?”. From that day on, I slowly began to observe my family almost from a distance. Most days, I watched as if from an amphitheater box, looking down into a dark comedy. As time passed, the acts became darker and less laughter inducing. More and more often, I felt forced to leap from my observatory, down to play in a gladiatorial game with whatever horrific terrors had been loosed upon us.
Most of our battles were, as explained by our parents, simply uncomfortable situations that we invoked upon ourselves through our own rebellion or sin. If we got into trouble, it was our fault and we couldn’t expect to be protected from the results of our transgression.
I have crystal clear memories of being lectured on the danger of causing mens’ thoughts to turn sinful because my bra strap slipped into view or my skirt didn’t cover my knees.
We didn’t just not have sex education, we treated anything to do with reproduction as if it were a plague. I learned what intercourse actually was by looking up the term in an old encyclopedia Britannica. I didn’t know correct names for body parts until probably my preteen years – we only used the terms “private parts”, or “bottom/forward bottom”. I remember very clearly being reprimanded for even saying “butt”.
My mom didn’t even discuss periods with my sisters n I until we came to her in terror, leaking blood and believing ourselves to be dying of some terrible illness. I’ll never forget my mom’s response: “You’re a lady, now!” (Before explaining this horror would pass in a few days, btw). I remember thinking that if this was what “ladies” experienced all the time, it was no wonder she was generally in a pissed off mood.
Our brothers didn’t have it much easier – probably their existence was only a different hell. Just as vividly as I remember my own events, I can still clearly hear the sound of my brother choking as our dad’s fist met his stomach, because my unfortunate sibling had laughed at a lightly raunchy joke. The male members of our little collective of convoluted theology and misinterpreted doctrine were not allowed unmonitored internet access, because our parents were convinced the boys would watch porn. (They were correct). Being caught online without permission generally resulted in an interrogation wherein the sibling in custody must prove their own innocence.
We were expected to perform like saints, and our father’s “rod of correction” was ever ready to guide us away from sin should we stray.

Somehow that all seems so very far away. We all have either forgiven, forgotten, or simply chosen to pretend our tragedy played out with unwanted scenes withdrawn. We silently understand that to condemn a person for atrocities committed prior to 40 more years of learning and growth, would make us into monsters darker than the nightmares that still haunt us. Whichever the path, we all somehow have chosen kindness to our aging parents. In choosing to love them, we chose to love ourselves.