There, but...
Aug. 26th, 2004 11:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lillibetTonight I watched Riding in Cars with Boys.
I grew up in a town not unlike Wallingford, CT. The first girl in my class to be pregnant was in 7th grade. Darlene was 14 that year, if memory serves--she'd been held back more than once. What I remember most vividly about her happened on the bus the first day back at school after Christmas that year, or maybe the year before--we were all comparing Christmas presents and when someone asked what she got, she said "A whole carton. But I smoked 'em already." I wonder now if that was true, or if a carton of cigarettes just seemed like a better answer than "nothing." In 8th grade there was a girl in chorus who came to school wearing a "Baby on Board" maternity t-shirt, but everyone said she was just faking to get the attention. Most of the girls who got pregnant were fairly dumb, but there were some smart ones, too. There just wasn't much to do in our town.
There was a guy who was pretty hung up on me. His father was abusive and the scars he could show were frightening. He had dreams that scared me, about following me to New York and getting an apartment together while I went to school. I broke up with him and he started dating another girl--but he made her ask me if it was okay. He made her come ask me again when he proposed--just to be sure that I wasn't going to change my mind. She wasn't pregnant then, but she was before they got married four months later. A month after that he showed up at my dorm room. They had a daughter. The wife started drinking. The guy tried to leave, but couldn't get custody and so he went back. I hear she dried out and they moved out west and are doing better now.
I think I was very lucky in my family. Even if they did condemn me to a childhood smack dab in the middle of nowhere, in a blue-collar town where we stuck out like poppies in a cornfield, it never occurred to them that any of us would stay there. I didn't get pregnant and I didn't get stuck and I ended up with a good education and a fabulous husband and a truly wonderful life.
Watching the movie, especially the early scenes, where Bev is bursting with her own intelligence, desperate to find an audience for the words that spill out of her like an avalanche, casting her pearls before the local swine--that was all far too familiar. But I stuck it out and it had some good moments, even if they did seem too self-congratulatory at times. Somehow I can feel that person living inside me, like a shadow, an evil twin, the person who got caught by her bad choices and had to live with them. A toast to her, wherever she may be.
I grew up in a town not unlike Wallingford, CT. The first girl in my class to be pregnant was in 7th grade. Darlene was 14 that year, if memory serves--she'd been held back more than once. What I remember most vividly about her happened on the bus the first day back at school after Christmas that year, or maybe the year before--we were all comparing Christmas presents and when someone asked what she got, she said "A whole carton. But I smoked 'em already." I wonder now if that was true, or if a carton of cigarettes just seemed like a better answer than "nothing." In 8th grade there was a girl in chorus who came to school wearing a "Baby on Board" maternity t-shirt, but everyone said she was just faking to get the attention. Most of the girls who got pregnant were fairly dumb, but there were some smart ones, too. There just wasn't much to do in our town.
There was a guy who was pretty hung up on me. His father was abusive and the scars he could show were frightening. He had dreams that scared me, about following me to New York and getting an apartment together while I went to school. I broke up with him and he started dating another girl--but he made her ask me if it was okay. He made her come ask me again when he proposed--just to be sure that I wasn't going to change my mind. She wasn't pregnant then, but she was before they got married four months later. A month after that he showed up at my dorm room. They had a daughter. The wife started drinking. The guy tried to leave, but couldn't get custody and so he went back. I hear she dried out and they moved out west and are doing better now.
I think I was very lucky in my family. Even if they did condemn me to a childhood smack dab in the middle of nowhere, in a blue-collar town where we stuck out like poppies in a cornfield, it never occurred to them that any of us would stay there. I didn't get pregnant and I didn't get stuck and I ended up with a good education and a fabulous husband and a truly wonderful life.
Watching the movie, especially the early scenes, where Bev is bursting with her own intelligence, desperate to find an audience for the words that spill out of her like an avalanche, casting her pearls before the local swine--that was all far too familiar. But I stuck it out and it had some good moments, even if they did seem too self-congratulatory at times. Somehow I can feel that person living inside me, like a shadow, an evil twin, the person who got caught by her bad choices and had to live with them. A toast to her, wherever she may be.
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no subject
Date: 2004-08-27 04:02 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-08-27 06:11 am (UTC)Glad that didn't happen.
In an odd sort of way, I have Castro to thank for not having gone through something similar... :-)
no subject
Date: 2004-08-27 12:39 pm (UTC)