You Cannot Mess This Up

by Amy Weinland Daughters

  Standing in the driveway with Little Amy nearby, I watched them pull away, Granddaddy in his felt fedora, pipe in hand, casually pulling what looked like a Buick Centurion out of the long driveway. Granny sat elegantly by his side, posture perfect, taking a long drag off her cigarette as she waved happily to her grandchildren.

  I realized that life never really changes. It repeats itself over and over again, seeming new and astonishing to its short-term participants, the same people who feel like it’s going on and on, forever.

  ONCE we were all back in the family room, Kim, Rick and Amy drifted off again, eventually to take their baths and prepare for bed. It was only about seven-thirty but this was suburbia; things didn’t go deep into the night. Dad brought in another round of beers as I continued to stare at the TV. What’s Happening was on. As Dad settled back in his spot, the program broke to a commercial, a preview for ABC’s Sunday Night Movie, something called A Question of Love.

  “Shhhhhhh!” Mom shouted, even though nobody was talking. “I’ve heard about this, turn it up!”

  Dad literally rolled almost Ninja-style toward the television, and from a covert position turned the volume knob until the audio was still scratchy but somewhat louder.

  “A Question of Love,” the deep-voiced announcer stated. “Based on factual events, the story of a child custody battle involving a gay parent, based on the actual court transcripts. Starring Gena Rowlands, Jane Alexander and Ned Beatty as attorney Dwayne Stabler.”

  The best I could tell, the movie was about two women, both mothers, who had moved in together under the auspices of post-divorce financial needs. It turns out the women are lesbians, something the main character admits to her teenage son when he asks her directly. The son tells his father and a custody battle ensues.

  Apparently, it’s based on a true story, only the names had been changed.

  When the minute-plus commercial wrapped up, silence enveloped the room.

  Mom, who seemed a thousand times more relaxed than before her parents went home started, “I can’t believe there is a movie about this … two gay women fighting for custody of their children …”

  “How can they have kids in their house?” Dad cut in, looking concerned. “Those kids might get the wrong idea about, well, how to be …”

  “I agree,” Mom said. “How can women be together, like that?”

  Paw Paw was conspicuously silent, but Bee, not surprisingly, was not. “It’s not right,” she began, rearranging her beer glass on the table. “It’s wrong … it’s clearly wrong … there is absolutely no doubt about that … But the way that woman slapped her daughter …” she continued, looking out the dark French door windows, referring to a brief scene where the alleged lesbian’s mom hits her in the face. “That … that wasn’t right either …”

  “It’s wrong, homosexuality … at least I think it is, but …” she said, looking around the room at the rest of us. “Everyone deserves to be loved, especially by their own family.”

  It was hard to argue with her, and nobody did. It was no surprise that everyone in this room, in 1978, thought homosexuality was wrong, but it was shocking that any one person would be bold enough to defend the supposed “perpetrators” in the name of love.

  Especially given that the person speaking was one of only two individuals from the Thanksgiving table that didn’t regularly attend church. Yes, Grandma and Paw Paw didn’t attend regular services, while the rest of us, including Granny and Granddaddy, did. How was it that the non-church goers could see the necessity of love above those who knew how to turn to Hymn 188, the one about love’s redeeming work being done?

  “Well,” Mom cut in, “I can’t believe they would put something like this on NETWORK TELEVISION. That show is on at eight o’clock on a Sunday night, on ABC. And what are they going to show these two ladies doing? Kissing each other? This is something for a movie, in a theatre, that’s rated R, or X. Not something that some kid can just turn on and watch in their own living room … Some people don’t watch what their kids are watching.”

  Dad and Paw Paw agreed with this, as did Bee. As for me, I was completely shocked that this kind of honest, challenging topic was being covered on national television in 1978. It seemed like something that was more suited for my time, 2014, when gay marriage was a hot-button topic, not now, in 1978, when the cloak of disguise was still apparently draped over the whole thing.

  But, really, what in the hell did I know?

  Sure, I had a decent education, a bachelor’s degree and all. And we, the adult Willie and I, associated with an intelligent group. We all lived in nice neighborhoods, in nice homes, drove nice cars, and sent our kids to nice schools. We were respectable. We knew a lot of important crap.

  Clearly, we did.

  But, still, we were living in the bubble, in suburbia, behind the nice front doors with the decorative wreaths. We drove past the bad neighborhoods, but what did we know about what was really going on there, or any other place that didn’t fit into our “box”?

  We liked the box, the accepted rules of the game, because, well, if I were being honest, because the walls of the box, the sturdy top and bottom, make us feel safe. As for the rules, the clear lines in the undeniable sand, they make us the winner, always.

  It justified, at least in our own minds, every single thing we did.

  “What do you think, Amy?” Bee asked.

  Good Lord, I wasn’t sure how to answer this question. I had lived in 1978, and I was here now, but I was still the lady from 2014, the girl who had questions about how “wrong” this really was. I had come to believe that people didn’t just wake up one day and say, “I’m going to be a homosexual!” Because, well, why would you choose a lifestyle that makes you a target for everyone from supposed Christ-followers to Communists to Neo-Nazis?

  Why would millions of people do that by choice? And why would they hide it, sacrificing how they really felt to live a lie, just so they wouldn’t be ridiculed?

  And why was it perverted? Why did people, some people, think that it was down to something going wrong between conception and birth, a genetic mismatch or a chemical imbalance? Really, why was love between two people, not forced, not criminally instigated, considered deviant?

  What about priorities? Why was homosexuality the one “sin” we couldn’t forgive? You could come back from almost anything, with the other “good” people; cheating, divorce, abuse … but not sexual preference.

  I didn’t have all the answers, but I knew that if God was love and I shouldn’t look for a splinter in another person’s eye when there was a big Duraflame log in my own, I had no right, absolutely none, to accuse, much less hate, homosexuals.

  If God really was love, then hating people, no matter how offensive they supposedly were, was absolutely not love. But how did I communicate that to this crowd? They loved people, I knew they did—they had loved me since I was a small child. It wasn’t their fault that they were born in the 1910s and the 1930s … all they knew was 1978 America.

  But, then, honestly, I understood that not even the passage of thirty-five years could guarantee that everybody in this room would see things differently. No, that might be left to my generation and the one to come next, the one that was already well underway in the future.

  “Well,” I said, slowly, hoping the alcohol would come in handy now, “I always believed that the longer I lived, the more I saw and the more of life I experienced, that I would gain valuable wisdom about how life works … But, in reality, as the years have passed, I have come to understand that I know less and understand fewer things.” I paused, looked down at the floor and continued, “The one thing I do know, for sure, is that to love and to be loved is a natural right, not unlike the rights guaranteed in our own Constitution, like the freedom of speech, and the right to property and the right to pursue happiness … Because love is a part of happiness, maybe the biggest part of it. And who are we to define another person’s happiness, especially if it’s lived within the
confines of the law? In this specific instance, I can’t believe that gay people love and care about their kids any less than straight people. And I can’t believe that they are wrong, and inherently sinful, just because of who they choose to love.”

  I stopped there, still looking down. Really, I was expecting to be attacked, not physically, not aggressively, but I did expect vehement disagreement.

  Silence.

  “I think that’s an interesting argument,” Dad finally said. “I’m not sure I agree with it, but I think you make a good point.”

  “I would have to think about it,” Mom added. “But, love is important and I agree that you can’t take it away from people.”

  “Really,” Paw Paw stated, finally adding his two cents. “You can try to take love away, but it’s impossible because you can’t stop people from feeling. I’m not talking only about homosexuality,” he continued, “but any kind of emotion people have is personal, individual, and untouchable.”

  “It’s brave,” Mom said, looking over at me in a way I had never seen before. “What you said, I’m glad you said it.”

  “It’s complicated—” Grandma added, but then stopped, suddenly, as the kids began spilling down the stairs.

  “That’s the end of that,” Dad said sternly, looking toward the kids. “No more.” Again, I got what he was saying, but at some point, honest conversations like this one, with older children, couldn’t hurt, especially if it was done in a loving way.

  It’s something I had been guilty of with my own children. It made sense, protecting them until they were ready. But I wondered, when was the right time to talk openly? Perhaps more importantly, were we really shielding them, or instead were we afraid of what they might say?

  Looking around the room at Mom and Dad, Paw Paw, and Grandma, I understood that as much as I could accuse them of a bunch of things, I, once again, had been guilty of underestimating people. In this case, it was the ones I thought I knew the best. If you would have asked me how these people, my parents and grandparents, would have responded to the subject of homosexuality in 2014, much less 1978, I would have been totally, completely and one hundred percent wrong.

  Where I assumed closed-minded negativity, instead I received well-thought-out open-mindedness.

  Maybe they were just trying to be nice, avoiding conflict, a family trait that was probably honored pictorially on our coat of arms, but still, they hadn’t looked angry. Instead, they had truly listened.

  It was one of my worst personality traits, assuming the worst, underestimating everyone but myself. Could I ever improve? Would I ever change? How many times had I been the problem?

  Perhaps the worst thing you can possibly be guilty of is assuming that the people you don’t agree with also don’t have a heart.

  Pulling the notebook back out, I jotted down, “1978 ABC movie about lesbian couple with custody battle. Was it a real story? Where was the case? What happened next?” Pausing, I turned to a new page, writing in big block letters, “STOP ASSUMING THINGS ABOUT PEOPLE. OTHER PEOPLE HAVE HEARTS TOO.” Then I flipped again. “Ask Mom and Dad about homosexuality, how they perceived it throughout their lives. What do they really think? What about love?”

  If only writing things on a to-do list could make them really happen.

  The kids filtered back in their pajamas. You never saw a lot of “proper” pajamas anymore, back in 2014, but this group was well represented. Even at twelve and ten years old, Kim and Amy were wearing matching PJs, lightweight pink cotton gowns with cartoon chickens.

  As for Rick, he wore a formal two-piece get-up, made of heavy starched cotton. The motif was some sort of exploding superhero, but what I remembered best about it, this same outfit, was one Christmas morning he wore it when my dad shot video with his eight-millimeter Bell & Howell camera. Based on the wear of the fabric, which looked almost new, it had to be this upcoming Yuletide when film history would be made. Though it was almost instantaneous, the sequence always got a good laugh because if you looked carefully, while Dad panned around the formal living room at the gifts and celebrants, he caught a glimpse of Rick’s horse coming out of its barn door. To clarify, his snake was peeking out of its pot, or, his sausage was coming out of its bun.

  Good times.

  To avoid the looming threat of bedtime, the three kids began to plead with Dad to come up with some sort of game. Whether it was because he had come from the land of no TV, or due to the fact we only had three television channels, Dad was gifted at coming up with exciting competitions and diversions. Nightly knowledge tests, high-impact hide-and-seek, full-scale bingo, art contests and other games requiring all the cunning and skill we could muster were a regular part of our childhoods.

  Relenting, Dad set up a metal trash can from Mexico in the walkway that led to the master bedroom. It was the family-favorite “toss the tennis ball in the trash can.” It consisted of Dad moving the can to different distances, offering varying degrees of difficulty, each of us in turn trying to sink the said tennis ball into the tall can. He always sweetened the pot in this game of daring-do and achieved his underlying goal of teaching us a life lesson by “betting” us more and more money as we sunk consecutive numbers of balls into the can.

  Kim, as the oldest, was the most successful at the game. With every ball she managed to sink, Dad would up the ante. “OK, Kimber,” he would say. “You’ve made three balls in a row now, if you make a fourth you will double your money, BUT, if you miss, you’ll lose everything.”

  On the night of my delusional return, this night, Kim had gotten about five consecutive balls in the can, making the jackpot large enough to have all three kids, and me, giddy at the thought of such a big prize purse. Dad gave Kim the option of stopping at the total she had already “earned” or throwing one more ball. If she made it, she doubled her money. But, again, if she erred, it was all over.

  Kim inevitably missed the last shot, badly, and lost all of her “investment” in a painful fashion. All told, she lost eight dollars in the game, eight dollars she never had to start with. But, Kim—with a flair for the dramatic—would no doubt amp up the level when she retold the story at a later date. Which I knew she would do.

  As the contest continued, it became clear that Little Amy completely and totally sucked at “throw the tennis ball in the can.” This probably came as no surprise to my dad, or my siblings, as I was horribly uncoordinated. Physical awkwardness combined with my hyperactive nature resulted in a poor showing in many such competitions. The only thing I really had going for me, a trait that is still a double-edged sword, is that I was and am over-competitive.

  So, as Kim and Rick sank balls in the receptacle, Little Amy bombed out. The great thing about Dad was that he continued to encourage her, as he always had, even though it was clear that she was never going to go to the Olympics in “toss tennis balls in Mexican trash cans.” Nope, Little Amy wasn’t going to make the medal count in that event. Dad was going to have to wait until she polished her interpretative ribbon dancing skills for that to happen.

  As good fortune would have it, finally, late in the evening (or 8:17 in the land of Dick and Sue), Amy made three consecutive balls into the can. Lining up for her fourth shot, she had some serious cash on the line. Though Dad issued all the stern warnings about gambling, bug-eyes was totally going for it. Oh yeah, she played it up, wiggling around and doing lunges in preparation for the biggest shot of her life.

  It was the 1970s version of Deal or No Deal and she was all in: “No Deal, Dick!”

  What happened next amazed and dazzled everyone, even my grandparents, even my mother who was sitting across the iron fence in the living room and even her poodle who she was holding in her arms.

  Yes, Little Amy sunk the ball in, no bounce, no trick shots, nothing but pure, unfiltered air. The fuzzy fluorescent orb soared about ten feet and hit the inside of the can with the precise amount of spin necessary for a score.

  Six dollars was in her pocket, Kim had lost, she had won and R
ick, well, he would never even remember that it had ever happened.

  Overwrought with pure glory, Amy did what any other ten-year-old girl would do. She took off every shred of her clothing, even her Hollie Hobbie underwear, and ran, pranced and flourished in the nude. Wait! I remembered this, this was an actual memory! I remember the streaking, the real streaking. As much as the football game was my one shining moment and badassery in a sport I would love forever, this, the naked run, represented actual participation in something I would spend the rest of my life talking crap about. Streaking.

  I was an actual streaker.

  As I watched, mesmerized, Little Amy continued, flinging herself unadorned from room to shining room as Dad tried, in vain, to regain control. “AMY, put your clothes back on!” He demanded, shaking his head. Honestly, I think I saw the hint of a smile behind his look of astonishment, a twinkle in his eye, as he watched the brilliant antics of someone he was biologically responsible for.

  He had sexual relations, somewhere, maybe in Ohio, and this had happened.

  As for the rest of the crowd, whether it was awe and admiration on the faces of my siblings, my grandparents, my mother and her poodle or just shock and terror, I couldn’t be sure.

  When Dad finally caught up with her, she was trying to scale the fireplace mantle. How mad could he really be? It was athletic genius and it was followed up with a magnificent display of enthusiasm and a salute to a fabric-free lifestyle.

  “I am so sorry about that,” Mom said to me from across the iron railing, her left hand resting on her left temple. “You didn’t need to see that.” As much as I thought what Little Amy had done was completely hilarious, and impressive as hell, I could also totally see how any mom would have been embarrassed for a stranger to witness it. I guess there really are two sides to every story.

  Chapter Thirteen

  ZIP UP YOUR BIBLES!

  Not surprisingly, Amy’s gold-medal run ended the evening for the kids. Before they went, one of the adults had the genius idea of switching from foamy lager to full-on cocktails. Yes, after nine hours spent messing about with the light stuff, the bar was now open. After taking orders, Dad went up the two steps into the breakfast room, around the corner and then reappeared in the bar. Reemerging, he passed drinks to his parents and me and returned to his spot by the fireplace. Moments later, Mom returned from the formal living room and found herself drink-less. Quick to remedy this deficiency, she called for Amy, now fully clothed, to make her a scotch and water.