My Earliest Memory

I am four years old. I have long dark hair and blue eyes, just as I do now. My father is walking me to kindergarten for the first time and the sidewalk has yellow dandelions coming up through cracks in the cement. My father says, "Look at all the yellow buttons on the sidewalk," but I do not see any buttons. I do not know why we are going to school, and I do not know yet that he will leave me there.

In the classroom, I see four round red tables, sixteen small green chairs, a large brown desk with a big brown chair, a blue carpet, a brown rocking chair, a shelf of books, and bins of toys. I go to the bin that contains toy cars and begin lining them up on the edge of the carpet. It is important to get them in a straight line but every time I am almost finished, another kid comes along and moves one. I am concentrating hard on what I am doing and for a while I don't see who is moving the cars, so at first I keep thinking that it is my fault when the line is not straight. When I do see a kid pick up a car, I am so full of rage that I start throwing the cars all over the place. A woman comes and grabs my hands. Her mouth is moving but I can't tell what she is saying. Someone is screaming and it is so loud in here. Maybe the person screaming is me.

Someone is taking me out of the classroom and talking at me in gibberish. I grab anything within reach and throw it, because I don't know where I am being taken. I look around for my father but he is gone. That is when I start to kick and everything goes white, like a screen at the end of a movie.

After a long time, my mother is there. She takes me from whomever is holding me and sits with me for a while until I have caught my breath and start to see in colors again. Then we go home.

This scene at school replays itself for many days. If it weren't for the fact that going to kindergarten always ended with me lost in a meltdown, it would have been almost comforting in its repetition: I go to kindergarten; I line up the cars; I have a meltdown and everything goes white; my mother takes me home. But it is not comforting. It is exhausting to be so angry and then, later, to become aware of being in a new situation different from the one that made me mad. As if everything has been erased and then replaced with something unfamiliar. Week after terrible week. And all the time I don't have the right words to make anyone else understand how I am feeling.

My mother is sitting on a chair at the back of the classroom. I can see her sitting there while I am playing with the cars. I look at her every now and then, and I know that she is my mother because I recognize the flowered handbag she always carries. "That is really my mother," I keep saying to myself. I am glad she is here. When another child takes one of my cars, I open my mouth and yell. I am surprised that my mother does not come over and get it back, but she does not, and I yell harder. I yell until my mother does come over, but she just picks me up and takes me back to her chair. We sit there and I kick her every now and then, just to give her the message that I want that car back, until finally she wraps her legs around mine and I am wedged tightly onto her lap. I begin to breathe deeply and I can feel my eyelids closing. My mother is what the minister would call an island of stability. But I know I am not supposed to sleep here. I look drowsily at all the colors around us and slide off my mother's lap. My mother nudges me back toward the cars and I edge over to begin my play again.

The teacher is putting up pictures on the October bulletin board. During the last month I have read all the books on the shelf and now I know better than to play with the cars because somebody always takes one. Today I am sitting at the computer typing random letters. This is best because if I write something intelligible the teacher always wants to talk about it.

A boy comes over. His mouth is moving and sounds are coming out but I don't hear any words. Then he tries to push me out of my chair. I grab the mouse and pull it out of the computer; then I hit him on the side of the head with it. He runs away crying and I sit back down, plug in the mouse, and continue to type random letters.

I am surprised when the teacher comes over and turns off the computer. The computer is always on all day.

"Computer," I say. "On all day."

"It's going to stay off until you apologize to Elton," says the teacher very slowly.

I turn the computer back on, because that's the only way you can type the letters, and when the teacher tries to turn it off, I bite her on the hand.

Then there are a lot of loud voices and soon I am sitting in an office where I see another computer. When the person gets out of the big chair, I go and sit there and then start typing my letters again. I do this until my mother comes and takes me home.

That night my parents yell a lot against each other. I can't tell what they are saying, because they are in their bedroom and the door is shut, but the voices are so loud they make my teeth ache. My skin starts to hurt and I roll myself up in the sheet from my bed. If I roll it tightly enough, the soreness in my skin goes away. Then the yelling comes out of the bedroom and fills the whole house and I am in the middle of it. I am in the middle of the yelling and I can't find any relief.

I am in a little room at school and my mother is sitting on a chair outside the door. I can see a corner of her flowered handbag where it sits near the doorway. There is a person across the table from me and a gray machine on the table, and the machine dangles red, white, and green cords. I am wearing headphones and I am supposed to say "yes" every time I hear a beep.

"Yes," I say. "Yes, yes, yes. Yes." I pause, listening carefully. "Yes."

This goes on for eleven minutes and then we are done.

The person goes outside to talk to my mother and I can hear them whispering.

"Good news. She has normal hearing," the person says.

"I knew her hearing was fine," says my mother. "She hears like a cat."

"Can we get a cat?" I call.

"No," my mother says, coming back into the room and holding out her hand. "Time to go back to the classroom. Come on."