Their wedding took place on October 4, 1946. It was a small service attended by seven friends and family members; my sister and I were the flower girls. I was eight years old. I have only a slight memory of this occasion, although the scratchy taffeta of my dress and the smell of gardenias still linger. That same fall, after the honeymoon, we left our home we had shared with our father on Clovelly Road, and moved to a house on nearby Woodland Road.
I grew quietly furious. A family friend once described my new stepfather as a “bantam rooster.” It was true that, while he was rather short of stature, he strutted about our house with the clear intention of ruling the roost. I resisted any interaction with him, refusing to comply with his smallest request. Every night, before I went to sleep, my mother would demand that I say good night to him. I never wanted to do it, and so I’d stomp downstairs and stand in the doorway of the living room, before muttering “ ’night” as I turned to race back upstairs. My mother’s remarriage ignited a deeply felt loyalty within me. Although I had only lived with my father for the first six years of my life, I had developed a closeness to him that endured. I was still awaiting his return.
My stepfather, it turned out, was a severe and unfriendly man. He owned many dogs, and when he became upset with me, he would address me as he did his dogs: “Mind!” He disliked reminders of my mother’s prior marriage, and so any discussion or mention of my father was frowned upon—the expectation was that we were all to behave as if he had never existed. Looking back, I can see that my mother was in love, and that in my stepfather she had at least found the security she had lacked in her marriage to my father. But at the time, as my school report from that year indicates, all was not well with me:
December 13, 1946—Mimi has had a great deal on her mind this year. She is going through a period of adjustment that is very trying. Confusion and worry are evident. The most obvious result is a very short attention span. She has difficulty concentrating on any of the academics for any length of time.
She does much better in group situations where several children are working on one focal point. Even at times when she is receiving completely individual help, she soon becomes preoccupied with her own thoughts. Since Mimi has shown no drive for better achievement, it does make it difficult to accomplish much. Her whole adjustment is going to take time.
I continued to ask my mother about my father. I kept repeating the question “Why?” Finally, she informed me that my father was “ill.” The words “manic-depressive psychosis” were used. I had no idea what this meant, and my mother refused to explain.
After my mother remarried, it was as if I had lost both of my parents. My stepfather was very possessive of my mother and she was eager to please him. They were often away from the house, at social or business events. Each February they left for the Caribbean, fleeing the New England winter in the hope it would alleviate my stepfather’s asthma. My sister and I always stayed behind. On Valentine’s Day and Easter, a card appeared, written by our mother before her departure, inscribed with a single word: “Mother.”
One year, my mother and stepfather were coming back from their winter trip. Our housekeeper’s husband, who worked for us as a driver, picked them up from the airport. On the way home, he warned my mother that she shouldn’t expect a warm welcome from me. “Miss Mimi is no longer the cheerful little girl she used to be,” he explained. “She has turned into an ice princess.” My mother later repeated this exchange to me, emphasizing that this had been the moment she “gave up on me.”
In June 1948, I graduated from my elementary school and entered Beaver Country Day School. My teachers soon observed that I was having trouble listening and paying attention. Our principal believed that any student who misbehaved or had marginal grades should consult a child psychologist. On several occasions I was sent to such a doctor in the hope that this would improve my performance at school. The first psychologist had his offices in an old brownstone on Beacon Street in Boston. I went to him twice, during which time I sat in my chair, refusing to say anything. I remember feeling rather proud of this accomplishment. The next psychologist I visited worked at a hospital. Again, I remained mute throughout the session, and again the visits were soon discontinued.
Silence continued to prevail all around me. While I was growing up, many of my father’s friends—including some of the doctors treating him for his illness—lived nearby. Their children were my friends and I often spent time at their houses, but I don’t remember anyone ever mentioning my father. Out of respect for my mother and in accordance with the social codes of the times, no one breathed a word.
One day, five years after my mother remarried, in May 1951, she made a startling announcement at the breakfast table.
“Your father is coming to visit you this afternoon.”
I struggled to absorb the meaning of her words. By now I was thirteen. I hadn’t seen him in nearly seven years.
“I’ll call your school later this afternoon,” my mother went on, “and they will send you home to see your father.”
I nodded silently. I hoped I would recognize him. Although I had strong memories of his presence in my life, I hadn’t seen him in such a long time, and had no photographs of him.
After breakfast, I walked the short distance to school. I went to my morning classes, waiting with apprehension for the afternoon to arrive. As promised, I was summoned to leave and told to go directly home. It was a bright spring day, and I carried my coat, wearing my neat plaid skirt with a white blouse and navy cable-stitched sweater. I followed the school driveway, walking past thick woods to my left, tennis courts to my right. Perhaps I should have raced home in anticipation of a joyful reunion with my father, but instead, I was overcome by an inexplicable feeling of reluctance. The hesitancy was so powerful that, about halfway along the driveway, it stopped me in my tracks. I considered turning back, but I knew my teachers would only send me home again, so I forced myself to keep walking.
A few minutes later, I arrived at my house. I hung up my coat in the closet and immediately ran upstairs to my room, throwing my books on the bed. I turned around and went to the window across the hall from my room and waited, looking down at the road. After a short time, a man in a suit and hat walked up to the front door. The doorbell rang, and my mother called my name.
I went downstairs and into the living room. The man in the suit was sitting next to my mother and stepfather in front of the fireplace. He had removed his hat and I could see he had brownish hair, slicked to the side in the typical style of the times. The suit was dark-colored and hung somewhat loosely on his tall, broad-shouldered frame. I felt a tug of recognition. This was my father.
I don’t remember exactly how I greeted him. I doubt that we embraced—it’s more likely that we simply stared at one another. What I do know is that at some point, I left to go back to my bedroom and my father followed me. Upstairs, I proudly showed him my room. The house had once belonged to a cardiologist, and my bedroom was in his former library. I showed my father my beloved balcony, my refuge, where I could look down on the terrace at the back of the house. I showed him the letters I kept Scotch-taped to the back of my closet door, including some from my uncle Philip—his brother—in Texas.
We sat on my bed and talked. The exact content of our conversation has faded with the years, but I can still remember how extraordinary it felt to have him there beside me. I knew he didn’t belong in this house, and yet at the same time he was so completely familiar to me. Soon he got up to go, quietly descending the stairway. I listened as the front door closed.
The day after his visit, I was upstairs in my room doing my homework. I heard voices, some kind of commotion downstairs. I went to the hallway window. Looking down, I could see my father. He was stumbling along the front walk that led to the street, wearing yesterday’s dark suit. Today it was rumpled. He walked to the curb and sat down. I watched him for some time. He seemed very different from the previous day: his shoulders were slumped, his hat was off, and
his head was in his hands. If I had been more experienced, perhaps I would have recognized that he was inebriated, but I had no context for his behavior. After a while, I stepped away from the window. When I looked once more he had gone. I never saw him again. Nonetheless, our time in my room and even that brief sighting of him outside the window reinforced my connection to him, a feeling that I carry with me to this day.
As the years went on, the question of my father’s absence continued, insistent and unanswered. I ignored its refrain as best I could, trying hard to maintain my mother’s code of silence. These were the 1950s. You did not whine. You did not complain. “You’re made of sterner stuff” were the watchwords of every parent and teacher at that time. When any feeling of confusion about my father surfaced, I pushed it away, forcing my mind to go blank. The blankness came at a cost, and I was in a permanent state of distraction during my teenage years. I found it especially challenging to pay attention and to retain information, and there are tremendous holes in my education as a result. There are holes in the emotional fabric of my life, too.
In 1953, my mother and stepfather decided that I might do better at boarding school, so I was sent to a school in Middlebury, Connecticut. I was eighteen and in my senior year when my father sent me the only letter I ever received from him. It was delivered to our Chestnut Hill address, and my mother, without opening the letter, forwarded it to me at school. I opened it immediately. Inside, I found a photograph of Elaine Stewart, a popular, rather voluptuous actress of that time. A note was attached from my father indicating that she looked quite like me. I knew the tone and content of the letter were inappropriate. I tore up the photograph and note and threw them away, dismayed. My roommate found me not long afterwards, curled inside my closet, weeping.
Three years later I graduated from Colby-Sawyer College. I went to work in Cambridge as a secretary at the dean’s office of the Harvard Graduate School of Education. This was a happy time for me—I enjoyed my job and newfound independence, sharing an apartment on Marlborough Street with three girlfriends. Various friends were beginning to pair off and get married, and I knew that soon I would do the same. There was a feeling for all of us that life was just beginning.
Then, in May 1959, a year after my college graduation, I received a telephone call from my mother.
“Your father has died,” she informed me, without preamble. “You are to travel to Texas for the funeral right away.”
Stunned by her announcement, I did as I was told. I hung up the telephone and began my preparations, grabbing clothing from hangers and packing various items in my suitcase. I sensed that this activity would be easier than trying to comprehend the loss of a father I had always missed—but who now was truly gone—and whose funeral I had just been inexplicably commanded to attend.
The following day, my sister, who was still in college, met me at Logan Airport and we flew to Dallas together. We spent the duration of the flight in uncomprehending silence. My mother’s aunt, our great-aunt Martha, who lived in Dallas, met us at the airport and took us to her apartment. The next morning, we drove to church to attend our father’s funeral.
His obituary appeared that week in the local newspaper, although I didn’t see it until many years later:
Dr. Perry C. Baird Funeral Rites Slated Thursday
Funeral services for Dr. Perry Cossart Baird Jr., 55, a Dallas native and at one time an internationally known dermatologist, will be held at 11:30 a.m. Thursday.
Dr. Baird died Monday in a Detroit, Mich. hotel. He moved to Detroit six weeks ago to enter business.
He attended Dallas public schools and Southern Methodist University, and graduated from the University of Texas with honors, including Phi Beta Kappa. He later attended Harvard Medical School, graduating with the highest honors ever awarded a graduate at that time.
In addition to his private practice he served on the staff of Peter Bent Brigham Hospital in Boston, Mass., and as dermatologist consultant and teacher at Harvard. He lived in Boston about 20 years. Persons throughout the world consulted him during his years in Boston.
Dr. Baird returned to Dallas about 10 years ago after his retirement. He was a member of numerous service and private clubs in Boston.
Survivors are two daughters, Miss Mimi Baird and Miss Catherine Baird, both of Boston, Mass.; two brothers, James G. Baird of Minden, La., and Lewis P. Baird of Dallas; one sister, Mrs. W. O. Williamson Jr. of Atlanta, Ga.; and his mother, Mrs. Perry C. Baird of Dallas.
The funeral service was held at a small chapel, but I have few other memories of our two days in Dallas, except that, despite the sad occasion, our Texan relatives were overjoyed to see us. We had been estranged from our father’s family since the divorce fifteen years ago and over the next few days, we spent our time continually being introduced to relatives that we didn’t know. Despite our bewilderment, my grandparents and aunts and uncles treated us with unguarded love and enthusiasm. Everywhere we went people gathered around us and photographs were taken.
By then, my grandmother—who was known to all as Momma B.—was frail and elderly, but she was particularly delighted to see us, repeatedly wrapping us in hugs. The reunion evidently meant a great deal to her, and I wish I’d had the maturity at the time to understand the reason. Perry had been her dearest son, and the appearance of her long-lost granddaughters at his funeral must have been a source of much consolation. This could have been the beginning of a new relationship with our grandmother, but in fact, it was the last time we saw her. Three months after my father’s passing, she followed him, dying brokenhearted.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
After the funeral, my sister and I flew back to Boston. The following day, I returned to my usual routine, and my sister resumed her studies. In the ensuing weeks, I put away the confusing matter of our father’s death, diverting my attentions to my job and social life.
Soon after, I became engaged. It was 1960, and my ambitions were those of so many young women at that time: I wanted to be a wife; I wanted to have a family.
A few weeks before my wedding day, my mother took me to one side.
“You don’t need to worry,” she informed me. “Your father’s trouble can’t be inherited. Your children will be fine.”
I stared at her in disbelief. It had never occurred to me that my father’s illness might be inherited. I had no understanding of manic depression—it had never been talked about or adequately explained to me. I certainly never thought to look it up in a medical dictionary; the subject was completely taboo.
“Thank you, mother,” I responded. End of conversation.
After my son and my daughter were born, in 1961 and 1963, I put my focus squarely on my children. I absorbed myself in their daily development, delighting in the milestones along the way. It was only when I emerged from their early childhood years that the mystery of my father began to trouble me again. I knew I had been given incomplete information about my family history and therefore, on some level, I felt myself to be incomplete. What had taken place all those years ago in the house on Clovelly Road? Where had my father gone and why had we never visited him? Surely my mother wouldn’t deny me some basic information at this point. I was an adult now, with children of my own.
But it wasn’t until the fall of 1969 that I got up the courage to call her, letting her know that I had things on my mind and that I wanted to visit to talk about my father. I made a special trip to Woodstock, Vermont, to the country home she shared with my stepfather. My mother was in her late fifties by then, and strands of gray were starting to appear in her hair, but she still found it hard to sit and listen, preferring to be in constant, nervous motion. The afternoon of my arrival, we went to sit in the outdoor porch, with its beautiful views of Mount Ascutney. The autumn air was chilled.
“Mother, I would like to ask you some questions about my father.”
Instinctively she looked around at the screen door that led to the living room, trying to ascertain if my stepfather was within earshot.
“What happened after he left us?”
“Your father was ill,” she replied, using those same words she had always rolled out. “He had manic-depressive psychosis.”
“I know. But didn’t you ever visit him? Where was he?”
“Your father was … hard to see,” she replied, slowly.
I could see my stepfather peering through the screen door to the porch, straining his neck for a better view. My mother was shuffling in her seat, as if she couldn’t wait for the interrogation to be over.
“What did his doctors say about him?” I asked.
“Really,” she said impatiently. “I don’t remember.”
Meanwhile, my stepfather appeared on the opposite side of the porch, beginning—rather unconvincingly—to rearrange the wood stacks piled up near the outdoor fireplace. I marveled at his determination to interrupt our conversation; nonetheless, I was resolved to continue.
“Mother, did you ever consider taking me to see him?”
“Maybe I did,” she replied. “It was so long ago. I don’t know how you expect me to remember.”
“I think it’s only fair that I should know.”
My stepfather turned around from the other side of the porch.
“Gretta,” he called, “it’s growing cold out here. I think you should come inside.”
That was the end of it. My mother went inside and the conversation was closed.
My mother’s reticence wasn’t only due to stubbornness; in fact, it had deep roots in her own childhood. Not only had she married a man with manic depression, my mother had been born to a father with the exact same illness.
I must have been in high school when she happened to mention, in her offhand way, that her father, Henry Gibbons, had also suffered with manic depression.
He Wanted the Moon Page 13
