It’s the same old kind of Sunday morning, waking up to gospel music blaring from the radio, and I mean blaring. Mama turns the volume up so loud you’d think everyone could hear it from here to Kingdom come.
First thing I hear is the Herby Family shouting out about them having a little talk with Jesus and telling Him about their troubles, then it’s the Happy Brotherhood Boys singing about how they saw the light and were no more in darkness, no more in night and they were praising the Lord about that. And although I always liked the light songs, I know now that even though it’s good to be walking in the light, that too much light is not good for you, even as in the darkness you can get too much rubbed the wrong way.
Rubbing around on me. Fitting the dresses on. Patting. Feeling. “That’s sopre-e-tty, Elizabeth. Ain’t thatpre-e-ty?”
Then after the singing, it’s Preacher Edwards coming on for an hour of ministry and music. As if we didn’t hear enough of him at church, we have to listen to Preacher Edwards’s Gospel Hour while we’re having breakfast and getting ready for church, then after going to church in the morning we go to church again that night to hear Preacher Edwards again, like he’s some kind of appetizer, main course, and dessert all rolled into one. But my Lord, too much of a good thing is enough, not to speak of Preacher Edwards, mind you.
This morning, however, I’m not getting ready for church, even though Mama keeps urging me on. “We’re gonna be late, child, if you don’t get a move on. What you waiting on, say?”
Since Mama hadn’t seen fit to buy any cornflakes, I get a biscuit and cut off a slab of cheese from the hunk of hoop cheese sitting in the saucer on the table, and I have a cup of coffee with it. Then I listen to Daddy read out from the editorial page from Dr. Fred Allen’s column.
“Now he makes sense, Elizabeth.” I’ll bet Daddy’s said that a hundred times to me. And today is no different. “Now he makes sense,” Daddy says, and starts in. “Now this is what he says, Elizabeth, listen to this. ‘Everyone feels himself a mixture of good and evil. We see and approve the better things of life, but too often the worse things of life we follow. Sometimes the wants of the body and the desires of the soul are contrary, so that one sometimes feels he is driving a team of horses, with one horse pulling in one direction, the other horse pulling in the other direction.’
“Now, isn’t that something Elizabeth? Now, what do you think of that?”
I say yeah, it makes a lot of sense to me, but I am far understating the case, for it really makes so much sense to me it’s scary. And that’s one thing about Daddy that puzzles me. I think sometimes he knows exactly what all is going on inside me and with Mama and all, but he won’t come right out and say it, but instead he kind of hints around that he knows all about what I’m going through, just like him reading things like this to me. It’s like he’s saying, “Elizabeth, I know what you’re going through, but I can’t come right out and talk with you about it, but I can read you this instead.” Does he know everything, somehow? All of what she did?
Or he might tell me about a book to read, and if it’s not on his shelf of books that he kept from the little college that he went to, it’ll usually be at the library. And it’s usually something like Life is What You Make It, or You Can Overcome Anything, or The Power of Common Sense Thinking. And although sometimes they have some corny stuff in them, there have been some things in them that’ve helped through it all.
What puzzles me even more is that Daddy sort of comes to my rescue when Mama finally outright asks me if I’m getting ready to go to church, and I say, with pictures of Saturday-night dance time and aggravating old Tommy flashing through my mind, “No, I think I’ll just sit this one out today.”
“You mean you ain’t going to the Lord’s house, and it Sunday morning?” she says, looking from me to Daddy, but mostly at me, just looking. Staring. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to feel Mama’s eyes lying comfortable upon me. I just don’t know. Anyway, since neither of us is saying anything, in fact not knowing what to say, Mama goes on just like she has everything figured out. “Oh, well, it’s Lona, I should’ve known that. Should’ve known all along you’d go see her instead.”
It’s easier to look at Daddy, not Mama, so that’s where I look, although I am talking to Mama. “Well, Mama, I called her last night. And, yes, I would like to go and visit with her today. Yes.”
“But why can’t you visit her after church?”
I sigh and look at Daddy to see if he can help muster up some courage in me. But he is studying the paper. So I dip way down in the pit of my being, and I say, “Mama, I’d just rather not go to church today, okay?”
“Sure,” she says, “sure, I knew it. You and Lona, you’re gonna side up together against me. Don’t think I don’t know what you’re up to, Sarah Elizabeth. I know, all right.”
I start to say, “How, Mama, how are we planning to side up against you?” But I decided that wouldn’t help anything.
“See?” she says. “You won’t deny it, will you? You know it’s so. Y’all making some kind of plans. Don’t think I don’t know. But on the other hand, maybe I don’t. Nobody tells me nothing no way.”
No, they don’t, Mama, I thought, they sure don’t. And I want so much to come right out and make up some plans, even though we aren’t planning anything. Something like, yeah, Mama, I’m planning to come back and live with Aunt Lona from now on. Something like that. But that would be the little child in me acting up. So, I just clam up, not saying anything at all, just letting Mama run on and on about anything she wanted to and any way she wanted to.
Mama soon puts Aunt Lona aside. She’s rushing around trying to cook up some dinner at the same time she’s running back and forth from the kitchen to the bathroom to get dressed. She has on a new dress—bought, not made. It’s navy with little white dots all over it, and it has a bunch of slick red plastic cherries at the neck. It looks different for Mama. Makes her look a little more slick herself, though the plastic is still shining through big as ever.
Poor Mama. She keeps glancing at me sitting in my chenille bathrobe, while it’s getting on toward ten o’clock Sunday school time. She looks like I have insulted her to the nth degree. But she doesn’t say that. She says, “I don’t know what everyone will think, you here at home and not at the Lord’s house.”
Daddy speaks up real quick. “Vera, I think Elizabeth wants to hear something when she goes to church, and you’ll have to agree we’re not hearing much these days.”
Well. If Daddy had gone over and slapped Mama in the face, it wouldn’t have gone any harder with her. “Hear something,” she says. “Hear something? As if Preacher Edwards ain’t something? May God strike some sense into both of you!”
Right then Mama’s red, plastic cherries fall off her dress, and she is so embarrassed that she picks them up, whirls, and goes back to the bathroom.
I look at Daddy and he kind of nods at me, like he’s done his part in this whole thing, and I want so bad to say, “Thank you, Daddy, thank you so very much.” But I don’t know if that would be appropriate. Should I thank him for making Mama so mad? What would Elizabeth do? In this case, I plain don’t know, so I do what is easiest, which is nothing.
I sit there, turning through the family life section of the Sunday paper until I come to the Worry Column, and I am glad that the Worry doctor doesn’t talk about sex on Sundays, because I am too flustered right now to take any of that. I’m glad the doctor is talking about positive thinking, so it will get me thinking positive that Elizabeth is going to come out of this whole thing all right and leave Angela as far behind as possible. Not all the way behind, mind you, I don’t think I can ever do that, but I can leave her far enough in the past so that she won’t interfere with my being what lam.
I am what I am. I know God said that sometime, somewhere, maybe to Moses, and I wonder if God had to figure out what He was all about too, if He was Him, or if He was someone else. Lord, I hope not. I hope there’s at least someone in this whole scheme of things that knows their real self, because somebody’s gotta know, so they can help others find their way. I’m not sure at this point, if it’s God who’s gonna help me find my way, though. But maybe God is what sent me to Nathan in the first place. Maybe, like Caldwell always said, maybe it was his will that I go there. So here I am blaming things on the Lord, so I’d better stop that. Anyway, I guess that things work out like they’re supposed to work out. I’ve finally decided that’s all people mean when they say, “It’s the Lord’s will.” They’re saying, “All is as it should be.”
Mama says no more to me nor Daddy until Sunday school time, and that’s when she says, “Sarah Elizabeth, all I can say is I’ve tried. God knows, I’ve tried to bring you up in the fear and the ammunition of the Lord. And I reckon now, that’s all I can do. The rest is up to you. But Elizabeth,” and she looks like she’s going to start crying, “Elizabeth, God help you.”
Then I feel like I’m going to start crying. Because for once in my life, in our ongoing battle, Mama hadn’t won and Elizabeth had. What’s in that to cry about I don’t know. I should have been laughing on the inside, shouting hooray and hallelujah or some equally appropriate exclamation, but I feel sad. Sad for Mama. Why? I guess because she doesn’t understand. She just plain doesn’t understand that I have to be me, whatever that turns out to be. But even though she doesn’t understand, it seems like she’s saying, “All right, Elizabeth, I’m not doing anything more to prevent you from being you. I’ve done my share.” But she really didn’t say that, so I have to go by what she said, and she said she was wanting God to help me. But she did say that the rest was up to me. And maybe that’s what I really feel sad about. From here on out, I have to go it on my own, and I can’t be depending on Mama to tell me how to act or what to do every single moment. I surprise myself thinking that it would be so much easier going back to being the same old Elizabeth, with no choices, no decisions, no say-so in anything. It’d all be really quite easier, wouldn’t it, whereas now with the new Elizabeth sprouting out and blooming around, I’ll have to start making a lot of decisions, start taking stands. Taking stands is scary stuff.
I don’t mind my decision of staying at home, though, at church time on Sunday morning, to go see Aunt Lona. I love it pure and simple. It’s like I have been released from some kind of chains, maybe some kind of umbilical cord stretching all the way from me to Mama and the church and anyplace else she’s wanted me to go or anything she’s wanted me to do, and I feel for the first time like it says in the Bible, “born again,” only this born again makes sense to me, it’s not something some preacher is shouting at me because that’s what he’s supposed to do. This born again is what Elvis is talking about. . . “I wanna be free. . . free. . . free-e-e-e-e, I wanna be free, like uh bird in thuh tree.” So I go on to the piano after Mama leaves, sit down and play it, all the time thanking Elvis, and God, and Dr. Adams—all of them—that I am becoming indeed free. And I feel way down inside that it is a miracle. Indeed, a miracle.
When I finish thinking on the miracle of me becoming me, I call Aunt Lona and tell her I’ll see her after church, that I’ve decided, after all, to go to church, but not to the regular church. I want to go worship in Daddy’s flower garden so I can see some more miracles, for that’s where the miracles are—in flowers, in the birds, in the stars, if you can see far enough into them, in the rays of the sun beaming down, in the morning glories, blue and pink and white—you don’t find miracles in the church, unless it’s there in the people themselves, but they go looking for the miracles in the history teachings of the Bible instead of inside themselves.
So, I sit down on the little grassy hill above Daddy’s flower garden and I look at the chrysanthemums and the daisies and the early blooming roses, and I thank God for every single one of them. I thank God, too, for Daddy, who has seen fit to seed these little miracles in the earth and for Mama, who sees the miracles in the wildflowers alongside the road. It’s harder thanking God for Mama, but for the first time I am feeling some of the respect for her that I have always felt for Daddy. And with respect, comes love, doesn’t it, at least that’s what Daddy always says. Anyway, they’re mixed together in there somehow.
Oh, I know deep down that I love Mama, as children, you know, love their parents, which means sometimes just taking for granted that they’ll always be there. But at my age, I think there should be a little more of the respect kind of love between Mama and me, and not until now did I see a chance of that happening, in spite of what all has happened in the past. Mama may always feel disappointed in me, I don’t know. But that’s okay. That will be her problem that she’ll have to deal with along the way, not Elizabeth’s problem. I’ll settle for disappointment any time, in exchange for getting to be Elizabeth. That’s better than trying to be Angela for the rest of my life.
Anyway, I have my church service there at the flower garden, thanking God, or whatever the great force is in the universe, for life itself, and life includes people, people at the church worshiping in their own way, and people in Littleton who choose not to go to church, but who are still okay in their own right because they are human beings that God made, and would He ever make anything that was totally bad, I don’t think so.
And at last I get around to thanking him for me, for Elizabeth, and for Angela, too. I know it says in the Bible that a house divided cannot help but fall, but my house of Elizabeth is going to have to divide, and I think God understands that it will have to fall, that I will have to let Angela go, if I am going to live a normal life.
Normal. That seems so, what was that other word I learned just last week, “elusive,” that’s it. Normal always seems so elusive to me. I’ve never thought I would be acting in any such way. But maybe I will. Maybe I will. And the news Mama brings home from church about Mary Jane Payne, that makes me more determined than ever to get as normal as possible. What news? Well, Mary Jane Payne had walked down the aisle, took hold of Preacher Edwards’s hand and “got saved.” Mary Jane Payne—saved. Born again. Free from sin. Just like that. In the twinkling of an eye. I had to go see Mary Jane. See her for myself. So, after lunch I walked over the hill and down to the Frostee-Burg, the Sunday afternoon hanging-out place.
I halfway wonder if Mary Jane would be hanging out as usual, too—her breasts pushing out of her blouse, her rear pushing out of her too-short shorts. But, no, that’s mean of me, I decide. Mary Jane would be changed. At least for a while. And, well, she has changed outwardly. She still has on her Sunday church dress instead of shorts. Instead of smoking cigarettes, she is chewing around real hard on a wad of gum. She isn’t talking and laughing loud, like usual. In fact, when I get to the picnic table where she’s sitting, in spite of her surprise on seeing me, she seems to me right downcast and glum underneath the glad hellos.
“Elizabeth!” she says, as pleasant as possible. “I didn’t know you were back home. Your mama didn’t say nothing about it at church. Why, how in the world are you doing? Come on, sit down,” she says, patting the side of the table across from her.
“Let me get some lemonade, first,” I say. “Lord, I’ve missed that stuff. Nathan’s not known for its lemonade, you know. Lemons, maybe,” I try joking, but it falls down and goes nowhere, whereas the old Mary Jane would’ve guffawed at hearing something like that. I walk on over to the window of the Frostee-Burg to place my order, all the while fussing at myself inside my head for even trying to joke about Nathan. Why, that’s what everybody else around here does; and here I am, acting just like them.
Mr. Snipes, who’s never won any awards for friendliness, doesn’t even say “hello” nor anything. He just looks at me, except his looking is a little more puzzling than usual; he looks as if he is looking at something in a zoo. But, I say to myself, that little window has two sides, and Mr. Snipes is the one inside the cage, not me. “I’ve missed your lemonades,” I say, trying to break his staring, but he just nods and keeps on staring. I look back out at Mary Jane, and she is staring at me, I look around at the teenagers at the other tables, and they’re staring. Everybody, everywhere they all just look at me, like they are holding their breath to see what will happen next. “I’ll have a lemonade, please,” I say, as politely as possible, while counting out my change. Mr. Snipes just stands. Still staring. I look around, stalling for time, stalling to figure out what to do, what to say.
“Well,” I say finally, “are you going to get me a DAMN lemonade, or will I have to go somewhere else?”
At that Mr. Snipes snaps alive and springs into action. “Sure, sure,” he says, “what size? Small, medium, or large?”
“Ah, heck, just mix ’em,” I said, “small, medium, and large. Mix ’em up altogether real good.” Although I can’t believe I’m joking around like this, still it feels good in a way. Until I look out at Mary Jane. She still isn’t laughing. Only looking at me. Changed, she is. Everybody is changed. Change yourself, and . . . presto! Everybody else changes, too. Even Mary Jane Payne. Even Mary Jane. I still can’t believe it, and for a moment I want to go back. Back to being Angela, or whoever and whatever it was I’ve been being. All this . . . everybody staring at you . . . everybody changed . . . looking like strangers. Suddenly, I want to be back at Nathan. Now it seems Nathan is the real world, and here are the “crazy people.” Scary. Out-of-this-world scary, like I’m standing outside of my body, standing back, standing aside, looking out and down on everything and everyone. I am not a part of it all. But separate. I am not them. They are not me.
Mr. Snipes now at the window plunks down three cups I can choose from—small, medium, large, all full of lemonade, and an empty cup, some size I’d never seen before, a no-size, non-regular cup. And he, Mr. Snipes, pours lemonade from all three sizes, small, medium, large into the strange, new container. If he weren’t looking so serious I would be laughing. Imagine what he must think. He thinks I am serious. And . . . yes, (pardon me, Dr. Adams) I’ll have to admit, he probably thinks I am crazy.
“That’ll be five more cents,” he says, “including tax.”
I add more change to my counted-out money, hand it over, pick up the lemonade, and walk back to the picnic table and Mary Jane.
Sitting down, I raise the lemonade in a toast to her, just like she always toasted her beer. “Here’s to new containers,” I say.