Praise for Once Upon a Time a Sparrow
“A school psychologist works to accept her own past while also fighting for her students...A heartwarming story of how a young woman confronted dyslexia and went on to help others…Kabrich reveals an engaging story of self-actualization.”
~ Kirkus Reviews
“Mary Avery Kabrich has written a book that is like a verbal tapestry. Three stories are woven together here, each with its own gift to the reader: a tale of dyslexia and how it alters a life for good or ill, depending on how it is regarded and treated across the life span; a story of an educational professional whose power to discern what is needed by children with learning challenges is challenged daily, both by her unwitting colleagues and her own history; and finally, the story of story itself, with its power to lift us and transform our lives.”
~ Maryanne Wolf, Professor and Director, Center for Reading
and Language Research, Tufts University
“Maddie is a bright, imaginative third grader who, in spite of well-meaning adults, is unable to read. With moments both heartbreaking and inspirational, the story follows the child Maddie’s tenacious journey while interweaving the adult Dr. Mary’s inescapable struggle to accept herself and recapture her dream of becoming a writer. A story that honors the real lives of people touched, and too often damaged, by a lack of understanding of dyslexia.”
~ Dorothy Van Soest, author Just Mercy and At the Center
“This book offers a unique window on ‘why some children learn to read as effortlessly as a bird learns to fly, while others flap their wings so hard they almost break, and still end up in a nosedive.’ Written in the compelling, lively style of a personal narrative, this book offers deep insight into the perspectives of educational professionals who deal or do not deal effectively with dyslexia in school settings and the emotional consequences of dyslexia across the life span for affected individuals. The book is highly recommended reading for the general public and school professionals as well as individuals with dyslexia or family members with dyslexia.”
~ Virginia W. Berninger, Professor and Research Affiliate,
Educational Psychology, Center on Human Development and Disability, University of Washington
“The book is engaging from page one and throughout. It is very rare to read a novel that addresses dyslexia, let alone portraying it from the eye of the beholder. I loved the magic and wonder around words and the imagery and imagination throughout the story.”
~ Dr. Pauline Erera, cultural diversity scholar
“This beautifully crafted story has heart and soul, validating the life of anyone who ever felt ‘less than.’ Readers will cherish this book.”
~ Jennell Martin, Child Welfare Worker of the Year,
Western United States, Child Welfare League of America
ONCE
UPON A TIME A
SPARROW
MARY AVERY KABRICH
Published by Open Wings Press
140 Lakeside Ave. ste. A-#144
Seattle, WA 98122-6538
Copyright © 2017 by Mary Avery Kabrich.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including
photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods,
without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the
case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain
other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
For permission requests, write to the publisher at the above address.
This is a work of fiction drawn heavily from the author’s experience.
All names, characters, and places are products
of the author’s imagination.
ISBN 978-0-9972332-0-9
1. Self-acceptance — Fiction. 2. Psychological fiction.
3. Dyslexia — Fiction. 4. Catholic — Fiction. 5. Minnesota — Fiction
Designed by Partners in Design, Seattle
For my family
CONTENTS
CHAPTER 1: 2005
CHAPTER 2: 2005
CHAPTER 3: 2005
CHAPTER 4: 1967
CHAPTER 5: 1967
CHAPTER 6: 1967
CHAPTER 7: 2005
CHAPTER 8: 1967
CHAPTER 9: 1967
CHAPTER 10: 1967
CHAPTER 11: 1967
CHAPTER 12: 2005
CHAPTER 13: 1967
CHAPTER 14: 1967
CHAPTER 15: 1967
CHAPTER 16: 2005
CHAPTER 17: 1967
CHAPTER 18: 1967
CHAPTER 19: 1967
CHAPTER 20: 2005
CHAPTER 21: 1967
CHAPTER 22: 1967
CHAPTER 23: 2005
CHAPTER 24: 1967
CHAPTER 25: 1967
CHAPTER 26: 2005
CHAPTER 27: 1967
CHAPTER 28: 2005
CHAPTER 29: 1967
CHAPTER 30: 1967
CHAPTER 31: 1967
CHAPTER 32: 1967
CHAPTER 33: 2005
CHAPTER 34: 1967
CHAPTER 35: 1967
CHAPTER 36: 1967
CHAPTER 37: 1967
CHAPTER 38: 2005
CHAPTER 39: 1967
CHAPTER 40: 1967
CHAPTER 41: 2005
CHAPTER 42: 1967
CHAPTER 43: 1967
CHAPTER 43: 2005
CHAPTER 45: 1967
CHAPTER 46: 1967
CHAPTER 47: 2005
CHAPTER 48: 1967
CHAPTER 49: 1967
CHAPTER 50: 1967
CHAPTER 51: 2005
CHAPTER 52: 1967
CHAPTER 53: 1967
CHAPTER 54: 2005
CHAPTER 55: 2005
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
AUTHOR DOROTHY VAN SOEST TALKS WITH MARY AVERY KABRICH
~CHAPTER 1~
2005
MY MOTHER crawled into bed, adjusted her flannel nightgown, and fingered the smooth glass beads of her rosary as she began to chant Hail Marys. Somewhere between “full of grace” and “thy will be done,” she drifted into a sleep so deep she never woke again. This is precisely how she had hoped to die, an admission she’d shared with me over a steamy bowl of split pea soup in early December.
As her only daughter, I was special; this was made clear by the mantra she’d spontaneously call out as I drove her home from the mall, or while hemming her dress, or when trying out a new recipe together: “A daughter is a daughter for life; a son is a son until he has a wife.” When I heard this as a teen, I would roll my eyes; as an adult, I wondered if Mom missed the unique but attentive ways my three brothers showed their affection. She’d sense my uncertainty, fix her gaze upon me, and add, “If you had a daughter, you’d understand.”
I was wholly unprepared to find her lying in bed as though asleep but with her face drained of color, lips parted as if in prayer, and her eyes, not open or closed, but sunken. Even as my heart raced, the steady part of me couldn’t help but notice that a calm surrounded her body like an ethereal blanket. She had passed the way she had said she wanted to. I wonder if she had had any idea she would die so young? She was only seventy-two, an age I no longer view as old.
Mom left us in the cold of winter. The Minneapolis School District was generous in granting me an entire week of paid bereavement, which I had hoped would be enough to at least patch the hole in my heart. A month later, I still couldn’t shake the bitter chill. I walked the halls of Milton Elementary wrapped in a perpetual blanket of frostbite.
Now it’s spring, and life goes on with frag
ile normalcy. Surely, three months and two days should be enough time for a grown woman of forty-seven—a psychologist, for God’s sake—to make peace with her mother’s death.
As a school psychologist, I have no analyst’s couch in my office, just a collection of briefcases filled with tests designed to measure a range of aptitudes—unfortunately, with little precision. My interest in psychology has always been narrowly focused on the nature of intelligence; why some children learn to read as effortlessly as a bird learns to fly, while others flap their wings until they almost break, and still end up in a nosedive.
I’m resting on Mom’s beige microfiber couch, relieved to have stayed steady and productive all afternoon. In the course of the past three hours, I’ve filled five packing boxes and six garbage bags, now amassed in the center of her twenty-by-thirty living room. I’ve managed not to shed a single tear. Gazing out her picture window, I notice a glimmer of lime-colored foliage unfurling from the buds of small shrubs.
Hanging lopsided on the adjacent wall is a family photo. I’ve avoided it all day, even after knocking it askew. Now I find myself rising up to straighten it, as if Mom were in the room. I’m suprised that one of my brothers didn’t snatch it up when we did our walk-through last month. My oldest brother, Rob, flew in from Los Angeles, where he works as a district attorney, but left his wife and two kids behind. My two younger brothers, Jack and Danny, live within forty minutes of Mom’s house, in the suburbs of St. Paul. I live a universe away from them in the Powderhorn neighborhood of Minneapolis. On a good traffic day, I can get to her place in less than an hour.
It was the first time since growing up and leaving home that the four of us had gathered without the buffer of spouses, children, or our mother. I doubt more than thirty minutes elapsed before we had completed a visual inventory of what to keep and what to donate. Unlike in my own home, everything of Mom’s is neat and has its place. My brothers and I stepped lightly from room to room, starting in the kitchen with that hideous green linoleum floor and the pansy wallpaper. Still, seen often enough or through the right eyes, the space was filled with warmth. Lined up along the two generous windowsills sat three decades of mismatched vases, porcelain figures, and various trinkets. At age five or seven or nine, we had imagined that she would treasure them. They were purchased with our limited weekly allowance—we gave them for Mother’s Days and birthdays—and she saved, displayed, and dusted them on a regular basis.
As my brothers and I gazed upon the collection, mutual eye contact was enough to communicate that not one of us had a place in our own homes for any single orphaned item. We fell into a silence of collective respect for the care she had given to each cheap relic we had gifted upon her.
It’s probably not fair to call the photograph her favorite family portrait since it’s the only one. It was taken with my parents’ Polaroid Automatic before Jack disassembled it in his quest to find out where the pictures came from. It was 1966. The year Grandma O’Leary died. I was in the third grade.
When I was eight, my world consisted of long, drawn-out Monopoly games with my brothers while snow drifted onto our rooftop, springtime expeditions to catch frogs, and school days that made me want to bury myself deep in the lining of my black coat. Rural Minnesota kept us sheltered, wrapped tight in an insulating blanket while much of our nation pulsed with adolescent exuberance, defiance, freedom, and angst. It wasn’t until ninth-grade history that I became aware of the war that couldn’t be won and the many protests against it. There was so much that bypassed the one thousand white citizens in our town centered in the middle of cornfields. Betty Friedan, Martin Luther King Jr., and the summer of love. The Beatles did reach through the airwaves to our home on the lake. I can still recall dancing in the kitchen and bellowing, “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.” In my mind, Lucy was a fairy.
The picture, framed in quarter-inch copper, captures the six of us dressed as though we’d just arrived home from church: my three brothers each with their shirts tucked in, Mom and I both wearing dresses. My six-foot-four father towers above us all. The corners of his mouth are turned upward, but his brow is creased as if he is about to give a lecture. His eyes are focused on some point far off in the distance. He always knew right from wrong, and not one of us would ever have dared to challenge his conviction. My mother, an entire foot shorter than my father, peers directly at the camera, and even though she was in the midst of raising three rambunctious boys and a girl who had her own set of convictions, her smile radiates a warmth I would give plenty to bask in one more time.
Jack is grinning big—he’s only in second grade—and I remember that face. I used to tease him about having chipmunk cheeks, because he always kept his lips closed when smiling and his cheeks became fat pouches. Jack has our Uncle Joe’s fair hair, while the rest of us have shades of brown to black. Six-year-old Danny also grins, his smile revealing two missing front teeth. He’s looking not at the camera but sideways at Jack, his hero. That year, Danny and I were the best of friends. Rob was about to finish sixth grade, but to me it seemed more like he was finishing high school. His glasses seemed to offer proof of his intelligence. He ended up skipping seventh grade.
In the photo, my thick brown hair is cut in a blunt bob just below my ears, and my bangs line up above my eyebrows. Mom cut our hair. The boys, including my father, got traditional buzz cuts. My brothers all had cowlicks, which created endless discussion and teasing. It’s clear to me my smile is as forced as the folded hands in my lap, as I tried to look ladylike for the camera. I was envious of my brothers. I wanted what they had—fewer rules and more smarts. I even thought I wanted to be a boy but wouldn’t have dared to say so. Instead, I put my efforts into becoming a nun.
I leave the picture hanging, certain Jack or Danny will want it, and return to the couch, plopping down to take a mental inventory. All that’s left is the bedroom. Last month, with unexpected ease, we divided the contents of Mom’s jewelry box. Each of my brothers has children who deserve to own something of their grandmother’s. Because I was never one to adorn myself with strings of gold or silver, my sentiments fell upon the Bible and rosary sitting in tranquility upon her bedside table. I knew that these two items, more than anything else, had absorbed something of her spirit. Her Bible had rested daily in her lap as she fingered each and every one of the fifty-nine translucent amber beads of her rosary.
I shake myself out of a daze as I replay my phone conversation with Danny from the previous night.
“Are you sure you don’t want a little company and help tomorrow? I have the weekend off, no Little League.”
“Thanks, Danny, it’s really okay.” I yearned to spend time alone in the small house Mom occupied for more than twenty-five years. The funeral had become a blur, leaving me to wonder if I had truly said good-bye. “Believe me, there’ll still be plenty more to do—like schlepping the bags to Goodwill and hauling the furniture out.”
“If you say so. You have my cell. Give me a call if you need anything or change your mind.”
Other than her Bible and rosary, I didn’t expect to lay claim to anything. My townhouse is small and well furnished, and I don’t need an extra set of dishes or blankets or (God forbid) knickknacks. But when we entered her bedroom and I averted my eyes from where I had found her, they fell squarely upon the Lane hope chest pressed against the foot of her bed, a loosely crocheted rose-colored lap blanket draped across the top.
When she graduated from high school, my grandparents surprised my mother with the modest, simple four-by-two cedar chest that would later house, among other things, her wedding dress. That’s the one piece of furniture I wanted and could make space for.
I look at my watch, 3:45 p.m., and make a firm resolution. In five more minutes I will rise up from this couch, go to her bedroom, and finish sorting and packing, starting with her large walk-in closet. I know what has created my roadblock—it’s the bed. She looked so peaceful, but truly, her death was a freak of nature. My mother, who walked two miles a d
ay, played golf, bowled, and, as a former nurse, monitored her health, up and died of a heart attack with no warning. Don’t most healthy women live to eighty and beyond these days?
Ten more minutes pass. Finally, I leave the couch and grab a couple of empty boxes from the kitchen and peel a plastic garbage bag off the roll, determined to finish before the sun drops. I enter the room wearing make-believe blinders, focusing only on the closet, where I skim an accordion of color organized by length, from blouses to skirts to long flowing dresses. Mom’s preference had always been for bright colors, showy and bold. Each Christmas, I’d receive at least one fuchsia-colored garment with a gift receipt tucked in the box. She was such a good sport, never commenting when I failed to wear it.
I avoid lingering on any one familiar outfit, reminding myself that what I’m seeing is simply the way she dressed—not her. I stay focused on the message I had chiseled on my mind when I viewed her foreign, discolored features: my mother’s essence has moved on. Painstakingly, I fold each and every outfit, my mood lifting with the knowledge that someone, a kindred spirit of flashy, yet classy, outfits, will be thrilled with my mother’s clothing. I’m pleased to have finished what I set out to do while still witnessing the last bursts of radiance from a sun that has not yet set. I’ll be home before dark.
The closet is now empty; the things that gave my mother comfort are neatly packaged for someone else to enjoy. I too feel empty.
I look back upon the hope chest. I kneel on the braided rug in front of my inheritance and lift the lid, releasing a fragrance of mothballs and cedar. As expected, folded on top is the white satin wedding dress that she showed me years ago. She had a vision that I might wear it, but at five ten, I took after my father, and there was no way my mother’s only daughter would ever be able to squeeze into a dress designed for a petite woman of five four. Since I’m now divorced, it was no great loss. Beneath this, I find her favorite baby outfits, but since her sons have only daughters, the blue, navy-blue, and shades-of-brown getups have all stayed put. These will be fabulous finds for thrift store shoppers.
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