A Total Mess

I only think about this incident when my siblings and I get together at my parent's house and talk about old times. And, don't let us get a few drinks in us; then it's an evening of laughs, with one of us getting more laughs than the next and him or her becoming the honorary sibling for the night. We love roasting each other from time to time, but when it's my turn, it always balls down to this one embarrassing moment in my life. Now, I was just a child, but imagine how you would feel if your siblings kept bringing up the same old story over and over again, especially around friends and family members. And I swear they add more to the story each time they tell it. So, here it is in my words and how I remember it since it happened to me.

Growing up with an older sister and three younger brothers was fun, with a few awkward moments here and there. I was born in 1957. I grew up in Harlem when things were very different. It's incredible what I remember and what I choose to forget. Some things I put totally out of my mind. This incident was one of those times, but my siblings insist on telling it, so it was always there lingering in the back of my mind like a wart. What's even funnier is that my two younger brothers act like they were there. They join in as if they witnessed the whole scene. So, they haven't forgotten, and they remind me every chance they get. It's funny now, but not when I was a little girl. So, now I can let go because I'm telling it to you. I'm sixty-three years old, and the emotions are as real as they were over 50 years ago. Yet this will free me from the snares that have been terrifying me all my life. So, allow me to tell you the most humiliating childhood story of my life.

Everyone talks about how poor they were when they were growing up. I won't bore you with all that. We didn't have a lot, but we had each other, and we still do. We were close growing up and still close today. My siblings are my BFF (best friends forever). We played every day on the streets of NYC with each other and our neighborhood friends. But the best times were at home playing jacks, tracing coloring books, watching cartoons, and playing Monopoly. My father worked every day at whatever job he could get, and my mother was a stay-at-home mom and housewife. We ate every day, but my mother, on the other hand, did not. She made sure her children were feed before she ate anything, and my dad always ate first. Speaking about my dad, he's the reason this incident happened in the first place. He never took us anywhere alone, for reasons of his own. In his mind, that was my mother's job, but this day was the first, and the last time he decided to do something nice and take us out with him.

My mother always took us with her somewhere - to the park, the supermarket, my grandmother's house, church, and school. We weren't bad kids, and we weren't naughty, but my dad thought differently. We were just busy little kids, and he couldn't handle us on his own. My mother was the disciplinarian, not my dad; he was a pushover. But this day, my dad decided he would take us Christmas shopping without my mother and try something new for a change. She stayed home with our youngest brother, who was an infant at the time. He took us to the Five and Dime Store on 116th and 117th Streets and Lenox Avenue. I was five years old at the time; my sister was seven and my brother four, so we were all fairly young. We rode the mechanical horse outside the store before going in. We walked each aisle, happily picking anything we wanted. When we finished, my dad treated us to something to eat. There was a coffee shop inside the Five and Dime, and we each had a cup of hot chocolate with a plain donut. I remember sitting at the counter on a swivel stool covered with shiny red plastic that sparkled. We sipped our chocolate, ate our donut as though it was the best day on earth. When it was time to go, my father buttoned our coats, put on our hats and gloves, and ushered us towards the door. We walked through the revolving door and waited for him. It was a perfect day with our dad; we rode the mechanical horse, picked out gifts, and drank hot chocolate. As the cold air hit me, I instantly felt a chill go through my body and will never forget the look on my dad's face when I told him I needed to go to the bathroom.

"WHAT?" my dad said, his eyes bulging out his head.

"I have to go to the bathroom."

"WHAT?" he said again. "Can you hold it?"

"No."

"What do you mean you can't hold it?"

"I can't, daddy."

"Well, you're gonna have to. Why didn't you say something while we were inside?"

"I didn't have to go inside." That infuriated him.

"Shit," he said out loud. He may have contemplated going back inside for a minute but didn't. That meant he had to take all of us back inside and figure out his next move. "What do you have to do?" He snapped.

"Number two."

"Number two? Well, you're gonna have to hold it till we get home," he said as we walked towards his car. Tears began rolling down my chubby cheeks because I knew I couldn't, and it was only a matter of time before the worst happened. We walked about a block to the car when suddenly, I felt something warm running down my legs. I pretended not to know what was going on, but I knew I was in serious trouble. I had on a pair of rubber boots with my shoes inside, so yes, that warm stuff rolled down my legs, inside my boots, and onto my shoes. We didn't have UGG and all these fancy things kids have now. I rarely wore pants and always wore a dress with ankle-high socks and black and white shoes.

We finally approached the car; my dad opened the door, and we climbed in the back. My brother first; I slide next to him, smearing everything on me onto my father's back seat, and my sister climbed in behind me. The last thing I thought about was the smell or anything getting on my sister or brother. Then the unexpected happened.

"What's that smell?" my sister practically yells at the top of her lungs. "Daddy, it's on my hands," she said, screaming. Daddy quickly turned and looked directly at me. "What did you do? Did you shit on yourself?"

"No."

"Then what's that smell, little girl?"

"I don't know." He swung his car door open, hopped out of the car, snatched open the back door, grabbed my sister, then me out of the vehicle, turned me around, lifted my coat and my dress, and got the surprise of his life. I really started crying then. I was out of control.

"I told you to hold it," he yelled as if holding it was an option.

"I tried," I said, tears streaming down my face. But it wasn't my father I was concerned about; it was my mother. I didn't know what to expect once we reached home.

"You didn't try hard enough," he yelled, still holding my dress in the air in the middle of the street. "Godamnit," he said.

He opened his trunk to look for something to clean me off, but to my surprise, he cleaned his back seat. He was so angry I thought he would spank my backside right there, but he doesn't for obvious reasons. My brother begins screaming because he somehow puts his hand in it. Daddy calms him down and wipes his hand with the opposite end of the same towel he used to clean the back seat. He takes my brother out of the back seat and puts him in the front seat with him. He finds another piece of cloth in the trunk and cleans my sister as well. He grabs her by the hand and puts her in the front seat along with my brother. I'm still standing by the car, shitty, smelly, crying, and petrified. I thought he was going to leave me there by myself but doesn't. He looks up and down the street as if for something and sees a cardboard box. He mumbles something under his breath as he walks by me towards the box. He walks back with the box in his hand. He's furious and mumbling, "that's why I don't take these damn kids with me anywhere," as if it was any easier for my mother. He ripped the box apart and wipes shit off my legs; he takes off my panties, throws them in the gutter, and wipes my butt with the cardboard box as well. Now, I don't know if you even wiped your butt with a piece of cardboard box, but it's not pleasant.

I was five and never felt more humiliated in my entire life. My dad rips the box apart to make something for me to sit on. He doesn't even help me get in the car like he does my siblings; he made me climb in by myself.

"And, don't touch nothing," he says as he closes the door behind me. "Just sit still; you hear me."

"Yes, Daddy," I answered between sobs.

I hear my siblings laughing. I continue to cry as my father pulls out of the parking space and heads home.

A few minutes later, we arrived home and found a parking space immediately; there weren't many cars on the road back then. He gets out, opens my door, and I climb out. "Stand right there," he snaps. I stand quietly, tears still rolling down my face. My little bottom and my feet are freezing. He gets my siblings out of the car, locks the door, and we head upstairs. We live in a five-story walk-up on the third floor. He makes me walk ahead of everyone while my siblings walked behind me with my whole ass out. My sister and brother are laughing so hard that I cry even more. I was a mess, a shitty mess.

As we approach our apartment, he orders me to stand in the hallway until my mother comes. My siblings are allowed inside the apartment, but not me. My dad tells them to go straight to the bathroom and wash up. But I am ordered to stay in the hallway. My mother begins to panic when she doesn't see me but is relieved when she does. He tells her what happened, and now I am out of control. I am crying hysterically because I have to face my mother. He leaves me with her and goes to fetch a bucket to clean out his car. His car!!! She allows me into the apartment and directs me straight to the bathroom. She has her hand on the back of my coat collar, directing my every step. My feet barely touch the floor, she's lifting me so high by my collar. She made sure I didn't touch anything. My siblings are finished washing up and telling our mom everything that happened and how furious daddy was. She stands me up in the tub, fully dressed, and begins taking off my clothes. I thought she was about to get sick, but she kept her cool. After I am bathed and she put on my pajamas, I am sent directly to bed.

I am sure my dad never changed a diaper in his life, and I know why he was so afraid of taking us anywhere alone. Thank God for family rooms where the whole family can go inside case of an emergency. I can still see myself standing on the side of the curb crying and my dad wiping my butt with a piece of cardboard. But I am free now, as long as there is a toilet around. I still panic to this day if I think I will not make it to the bathroom in time. But, I have no hard feeling and of course no regrets. Until I peed on myself while hanging with friends after work and one of them was this guy I liked. That was the end of that relationship.