Substitute Girl Mantra #5

I never really knew who I was convincing with this one.

The Tiger and the Orphaned Cacti

OK so here is your warning, as of this entry there is going to be more graphic content, namely my accounts of child abuse please be mindful of this when reading. 

The arrangement between my parents was alternating Christmas holidays and the year of my ninth birthday was the year we were to visit Dad in Sydney. This was going to be the first time we would be away from my Mother and her magical roller coaster ride, she didn't like that. I think my Dad had pushed for the visit and naturally my sister Kory and I were excited and with childhood enthusiasm comes blissful ignorance. My Mother was not pleased to be letting us off the stage of her little drama.

She started screaming. She went from yelling at me when she was annoyed to screaming. It is different, when a parent yells at a child it's to get their attention, to stop their current behavior and guide them back. But screaming, that is different, its the difference between a house cat and tiger they both have a bite but one gives you a fright and the other makes you frightened. She started throwing tantrums to rival a toddler.

I noticed that Trimsy was around less and my Mother was easier to irritate the closer we got to visiting my Dad. Now a little back story i lived with my Mother and Kory in Darwin Australia. Now that's in the tropics, so it's hot all the time and if it's not its hot and humid, that's pretty much the extent of the weather. The place also comes with a few painful quirks, crocodiles, cyclones, heat rash and bugs. It was the bugs that caused my Mother to snap the first time.

In Darwin head lice are a major problem in schools, every year every child has their hair washed with the smelly shampoo at least  twice. Its unavoidable and it is really just part of living in the tropics, so I thought nothing of it when I was sent with the usual slip home from school saying that my grade needed to be treated at home for head lice as a student had been found with them. I came home from school, got changed, unpacked my back and left the note out for my Mother. When she read it she screamed at me to come inside. "Sit down" she said in this menacingly low tone as she pointed to a kitchen chair. She combed through my hair and sure enough lice.

"Right get in the car, I've had enough of this shit. MOVE!"

Kory and I obediently got in the back seat of the car watching my Mother fume as she drove to the local chemist. She marched us inside and went straight to the counter and asked for hair clippers. What I thought was a trip to get medicated shampoo turned out to actually be a trip to get hair clipped and my Mothers intention was to shave our heads. Since I was little I had long blond hair, I loved my hair and here's the clincher, so did my Dad.

After failing to aquire clippers at the first chemist (she was told they had none in stock) my Mother took us to another chemist and again, none in stock. This wasn't helping, she wasn't becoming deterred, quite the opposite she was in the right and she was going to do it. So we drove to another chemist, by then Kory and I were crying as we were being dragged around by my Mother now that we were clear on her intentions. We were girly girls and we didn't want to look like girls. At the last chemist the attended realized what my Mother wanted and refused to sell her the clippers so she stormed out and took us home.

Now in a sane world, the wind out of her sails would mean we were safe but lets not forget this is my Mother circus.

I sat against the wall in the hallway watching from the corner as my Mother hacked off my sisters hair with kitchen scissors. I cried watching my sisters beautiful little bob get hacked off by my crazed Mother. Not cut, hacked. There was no method to it she just grabbed chunks and cut it half an inch or so from the scalp. My sister sat so obediently as she did this while I watched on in horror knowing I was next.

"Get in the chair. MOVE!"

My Mother dragged me to the chair. When I was younger, before my Dad left my Mother would brush my hair every morning while I sat on the dinner table. She would put it in a plait for school and every night after I had a bath I would sit at her feet in front of the TV and we would repeat the same ritual. We didn't have much but that was something between my Mother and I. And as she hacked off my hair and I cried I think the last part of my Mother that shared and special parental bonds with me was cut away too. My Mother disappeared for much of the night after that. She did that often, locked herself in her room or just left the house in general. I'd like to say that we were babysat by someone but no, she just left us.

The next day we didn't have to go to school. Once upon a time my Mother did feel remorse, she did this time. We were so embarrassed about how we looked, so ashamed that the next morning we were still crying. She took us shopping to buy hats and gave us a note the next day saying that we could wear our hats during class. I had sports that day and my hat fell off, I was mortified and in true form my class mates new this and laughed at me. My teacher asked me about it and I told her a sedated version of the truth, but nothing happened. Soon it was holidays and time to visit Dad.

When we arrived Anne (who was once an apprentice hair dresser) had to cute our hair shorter again to make it look even and less like a maniac had hacked off our hair. I cried again, now I had a boys buzz cut. But now we were with my Dad, away from my Mother and things could be just a little bit different, I made it to the happy place, right?

Yeah not so much.

Staying with Dad and Anne in Sydney was the first time since before Kory was born that I felt safe and relaxed and when I asked Dad if I could stay he said yes, but Kory wanted to go back to my Mother. It was the first and last time in our childhood when we were ever separated. It was the first and last time in my childhood I was a child.

Dad enrolled me in a school the next suburb over and I would catch one bus in the morning to go to school. I was 10 years old. Every morning I would wake up early and watch cartoons by myself as Anne and Dad would already be at work and then I would get myself ready and go to school. I remember that many of my class mates didn't actually know where Darwin was, even though it was a capital city so I was interesting and exotic so I made friends despite that I felt I looked hideous. I made up dances to pop songs in the play ground with my friends, and played on the monkey bars, had tuck shop when I was good and generally learnt how to be a kid again.

Every afternoon I would come home and Dad would usually be home about the same time so he would give me a dollar coin and I would take our german shepherd Chewy for a walk to the local park via the corner store where I would buy a Dr Pepper. I would sit on the swings with Chewy and drink my Dr Pepper singing songs to myself and watching the sky change colour, when it started to get dark was when I knew I had to go home, I wasn't afraid of getting in trouble it just seemed logical to me. Sometimes on the way home I would let Chewy off the lead so he could jump in the creek we walked passed, I always told Dad that he slipped out of his collar but I don't think he believed me when it happened almost every night. I was  always happy to towel him down because he loved it so much. Those afternoons are some of the happiest memories I have, this safe little routine my Dad gave me based on trust and love.

Substitute Girl Card #7 Daddy's Girl

The little routines my Dad, Anne and I had made me feel so special and loved. Having lived in chaos in my Mothers world it was practically like Disneyland. I remember my Dad and I trying all these different kinds of milk as I was mildly lactose intolerant, every week we would try a different brand because he knew I hated soy milk. Dad and I often did the shopping together, he would take me to a local fruit shop and let me help pick the veggies for dinner and the fruit for my lunches. Then we'd look at the specialty items, usually European specialty foods and pick something interesting to try. After our fruit store adventures we would go to see Lenny the butcher, he was a friend of Dads and would never let Dad pay  for meat. He'd always give me a frankfurt sausage to eat on the way home and I felt so special. These little outings may have seemed normal to anyone else but to me they made me feel like I was a princess, my Daddy's princess.

I was still shy though, I waited for at any minute to wake up. When it came close to the end of the school term my grade was told that there would be a five day school camp for grade five and six, it took me almost a week to get the courage to ask Dad if I could go. Of course he said yes, he even money to buy something from the souvenir shop. I went with my best friend at the time Sheridan, she and I shared a bunk and we basically inseparable, she was the first best friend I had since preschool. At the camp we did all the things children should do and I even had stamped envelopes so I could write home to Dad and Anne. Anne had made these up before I left. I brought a sports back and a boomerang from the camp and had never been more excited about something so simple before. When I got home Dad took Anne, Chewy and I to an oval so we could all practice throwing it, Dad being all manly and all was the only one who could throw it so it came back.

I had my first school dance in Sydney as well. Anne took me shopping for a dress I still remember what it looked like it was a sleeveless dress that was red down to black with the outline of black leaf outlines on it. Anne even had a black hat for me to borrow to cover my hair. Dad had brought me a disposable camera to take pictures while Anne helped Sheridan and I get ready. She helped us do our nails and make up and even put on lipstick. Dad wasn't totally impressed with the lipstick as it was bright red but he still said I looked beautiful and took our pictures. Oddly I remember nothing about the dance just the getting ready part.

I never really knew if everything Dad did during these few months were normal parenting or he was trying to make up for lost time. Never the less I was always so thankful to my Dad for humoring my childish wants. I remember Sheridan's mother had a cactus garden and when she had taken Sheridan to the nursery there were little cacti you could collect each week and she had brought some for Sheridan so naturally I wanted to collect them too so Dad took me to the nursery and with my pocket money I got the first  three in the series to live on my bedroom window sill. Dad took me to Sheridan's to drop them off in a shoe box the day before I left to go back to visit my Mother.

On a side note I am going to be posting every Tuesday and Thursday (time permitting) and this is in the Australian timezone. As always my email is substituegirlkhayle@gmail.com for questions and you can follow me on Twitter now@SubstituteGirlK ~ talk to you all in a few days, be good.