Dancing with the Octopus

by Debora Harding

  We eventually arrived in Laurens. The welcome sign said POPULATION 1,600.

  My parents dropped me off at the only hotel, which had eight rooms. It didn’t even have a vending machine. After getting bored watching television, I decided to walk over to Main Street. It was a stark, barren, empty, soulless strip of cement. I’d never seen such a desolate place. A grain elevator with three silos loomed on the skyline to the left, a water tower with the word LAURENS painted on it in big black letters shadowed the right, and a railway track ran in between. Main Street was two lanes wide. There was a bowling alley, a women’s clothing store with six mannequins in the window who wore half the inventory, a pharmacy presumably named after its owner, George, a barbershop, a general hardware store, and three churches. As I counted the number of retail establishments, I saw a car with four teenagers pass by me and was relieved when I saw them disappear over the railroad track. Is there an act more humiliating at the age of thirteen than to be seen walking by oneself in front of other adolescents?

  I watched as they made a U-turn and headed back down the street, slowing to check me out as they drove by. They made another U-turn and paraded past me again, this time with a friendly wave, like we were passing on a sidewalk. I felt like I was watching something in a National Geographic documentary. Had anyone told me I would be desperate to be inducted into this social club a year later, or I’d be lapping the town for track practice warm-up, I’d have said no way in hell. David Lynch later used this stretch of town in a movie he made about an old guy who rides a tractor mower across the state to see his dying estranged brother.

  The next day on our return trip to Omaha, Dad asked me if I wanted to lean up toward the front seat so the three of us could have a talk.

  “Well, why not?” I said, in my friendly neighborly voice.

  “So Debora, can you tell us why you are here today?” Mom asked. The formal use of my first name was preserved for those times I was in trouble.

  “I’m not sure.”

  I was sure though. I had been waiting for it to come as soon as my father had said they had talked to Susan’s parents. I had become wiser in the ways of eluding detection, and there was no way I was going to fall for this invitation to show my hand, just in case I was wrong.

  “Would you like to think about that harder?” Mom questioned.

  I did, but the focus of my attention was on how I might swiftly and deftly influence my father to take my side. I wasn’t accustomed to having him around for disciplinarian sessions, since he had always been on the road. In fact, I realized that he had probably orchestrated the three-day delay in conversation. It was utterly uncharacteristic of Mom.

  “Well, why don’t I try to help you,” my mother said. “You’re smoking cigarettes, aren’t you?”

  “No,” I said in disbelief. Actually, I was, but again, she couldn’t expect me to rat myself out. What kind of self-respect is that?

  “Would you like to share what your plans were when we left? Is it true that you intended to go drinking with your friends at Peony Park?”

  “Oh, well,” I said bravely. “You have me.”

  “See, I told you, Jim.”

  Dad appeared to be concentrating on his driving. I couldn’t help but feel slightly paranoid. I hadn’t a clue how they had found out and couldn’t exactly ask.

  Once we returned home, my mother’s campaign to save my deteriorating character included grounding me for a week, then continued with more lectures and rants of shame after Dad left. But it didn’t stop me from acting with my impulsive unthinking adolescent brain, and I decided that the best way to captain my own ship was to carry on with experimentation.

  A few weeks later a couple of friends and I were down at the neighborhood pool in Elmwood Park. Someone said they had a joint and suggested that we walk over to the grotto in the woods, a hundred yards from our beach towels. I was aware of the risk I was taking if Mom found out, especially since I had just been freed of house arrest. But I was much more concerned with having fun and not being a prude, especially after having had our party plans at Peony Park scuppered. After a few puffs I didn’t feel anything and grew deeply disappointed. But as I was walking, I suddenly felt the weight of the universe lifting, and I skipped home under a clear blue sky.

  In Which I Am Scared Straight

  Omaha, 1977—Two weeks later, I was kicking a ball in the street with a couple of friends. My mother called me into the house, unusually calm, like she had a friendly favor to ask.

  “I have a phone call to make, and I’d like you to be here while I make it.” I had no idea who she was calling. I casually leaned against the counter.

  “Yes, she is here,” my mother said as if she were continuing a previous conversation, turning her back slightly toward me so that she could concentrate, then a pause as if she were being asked a question. “My daughter is smoking marijuana. I would like to have her arrested.”

  I realized my error immediately: I had told my younger sister Gayle, thinking it was important to share these sorts of experiences in life. And she told Mom out of eleven-year-old concern.

  My mother continued, “No. She’s not high at this moment, but she did get high.” She drew in on her cigarette. “A joint.” Another pause.

  I didn’t know whether to remain or run. This was my mother. “Two weeks ago, at Elmwood Park,” she continued. My sister—definitely. Mom looked out the window, wrapped the telephone cord around her finger, tucked the phone under her ear and shoulder so she could take another drag of her burning cigarette. “I see,” she said, exhaling—glancing in my direction for a split second. “What if I brought her down to the station? Is there an officer who speaks to young criminals?”

  She put down the phone, stubbed out her cigarette, and said, “You’re coming with me.” Once we got into the car, she refused to talk until we pulled into the parking lot of the local police station, with cruisers parked outside. “You’re lucky I’m doing this,” she said, swinging the car door open. We entered the building and went to reception. Mom spoke to the desk officer. I watched as he looked at me, then looked at her, then looked at me. And with a hint of impatience in his voice, said he would see if he could get the sergeant. His annoyance increased my embarrassment.

  Eventually the sergeant came out and suggested that my mother wait in her chair as he showed me into his office and shut the door. He then motioned for me to take a seat. The smile on his face and his relaxed manner disarmed me enough to move from feeling terrified to uneasy. He looked like the volunteer coach of my baseball team.

  “So why are you here today?” he asked. It was more like a “Can I help you?” question.

  “My mother wants you to arrest me.” I felt the blood rushing to my cheeks.

  “Yes, I’ve heard. I hear you have been smoking marijuana,” he said, almost impressed.

  “Yes.” I lowered my head. “But I didn’t inhale.”

  “That statement wouldn’t help you in a court of law, you know. But truth-fully”—he tilted his head toward her through the window, raised his eyebrows signaling an unspoken comradery—“your mother’s behavior is a little odd.”

  I looked at him, unsure of the appropriate response. Maybe this was an interrogation technique.

  “It’s a little intense, a mother trying to get her kid arrested. You also seem like a smart kid, and you don’t really strike me as the criminal type.”

  I nodded in agreement, a glint of hope he might be serious. He asked me if I enjoyed school—what kind of grades I had. I told him I had proudly made honor roll that term. I was on the student council and I had just been nominated for homecoming court. It didn’t feel like something to brag about, but he asked. I also added that I was on the track team.

  “How about out of school?” he asked. I told him I went to youth group once a week, and church choir once a week, and Bible class and service on Sunday. And I used to be in 4-H Club, but I was too busy now.

  “Uh hum,” he said, pausing, thinking.
“Listen, I’m sure your mother is doing the best she can, but if I am totally honest, I don’t think it’s necessary that she brought you down here, and quite frankly, it has me a little concerned.”

  He had a few more questions about our relationship, then asked about other adults in my life, a support system. He went on to explain the concept of a scapegoat and boldly suggested that perhaps my mother’s tough love approach might not be helpful, and then kind of looked like he felt sorry for me. I was so overwhelmed with his support I didn’t know what to say. It made me feel anxious yet affirmed, the way a horrid truth does when it feels right. He gave me a warm sympathetic smile, knowing the comment had landed where he wanted it to, told me to not take drugs, especially at my age because it could stunt my brain growth. He then gave me a card and told me to call if I ever felt like I needed anything.

  Mom was reading a Sidney Sheldon novel when we came out.

  “Well, Mrs. Cackler”—the officer walked me forward and patted my back as if he were handing me over—“I think I can say with all honesty, you don’t have to worry about your daughter. She has a sensible head on her shoulders.”

  It was clear by the look on her face it was not the verdict Mom expected, and she looked at me like she wanted to cuff me, like I was to blame. As we left, I turned around to give the officer a good-bye-thank-you look, and in return he gave me a no-problem-take-care-of-yourself smile.

  That handsome police officer is definitely going on the shelf of those who kept me straight.

  In Which Charles Visits a Judge

  Omaha, 1977—Six months from the day he was arrested for putting a .22 rifle in a woman’s face and thrown into the Douglas County Jail, Charles Goodwin appeared in front of Judge Murphy for his official sentence. Charles would get credit for time served, but he wouldn’t get any consideration for what he endured as a sixteen-year-old being held in the adult holding tank, when a white racist indulged his violent sadism by raping him.

  Judge Murphy was the grandfatherly type—benevolent, caring, patient. He genuinely wanted to know how to help this young man. He asked Charles why he had this problem of stealing automobiles when his parents gave him access to the family car and an allowance. And then the judge shuffled back a piece of paper or two, and corrected himself—Charles’s stepfather and his mother.

  Charles corrected him and told him Paul Goodwin wasn’t his stepdad. And the following conversation went something like this:

  Judge Murphy said, “Well, it says here on the record that you were adopted.”

  “Well, that isn’t right. My dad probably just said it as a figure of speech.” It wasn’t easy telling a judge that he’s wrong.

  “You’re not helping yourself here, son,” Judge Murphy said.

  Charles had no idea what he was talking about, and the judge knew it by looking at his face. He looked over at Dorothy Goodwin for clarification.

  “Can you please confirm for the court, Mrs. Goodwin, who Charles’s natural parents are?”

  “My husband is his adoptive father, but I am his natural mother.”

  And while the biggest betrayal of his life was sinking in, the judge went forward with sentencing Charles to five more months at the Kearney Youth Development Center, even after witnessing what had just gone down. There was a real poetry to it, the state taking custody of him at the moment he found out his real father was a mystery man. That judge played it like he cared, but the sentence made it clear he didn’t.

  Five months later, on November 12, 1978, Charles Goodwin was released from the Kearney Youth Development Center. After a quick stop at home, the first thing he did was take a bus downtown to the courthouse to see Judge Murphy with a revolver in his pocket.

  When Charles entered the elevator, Judge Murphy just happened to be inside. The judge recognized Charles and asked him with all sincerity how he was doing, as though he were glad to see him back on the streets. That was when Charles lost his nerve.

  Instead, he told the judge it was nice to be home and he was looking forward to going back to school. So he rode the elevator up with the judge and then rode it back down again. It was more like a ride on a fairground than the mano a mano he had planned.

  In Which I Am Rescued

  Omaha, 1977—After hearing about our scared-straight trip to the police precinct, Dad decided to take charge of my rehab in his own way.

  “So,” he said, one Saturday morning as he poured the eggs into the skillet over diced-up Spam, “I want to sell you an idea. I need an assistant for a ten-day business trip to New York.” A pocket of pork lard popped. I wondered if I heard him right.

  “I want to try the Taurus out in factories. I can’t pay you, but we’d have fun. Here”—he handed me the spatula—“can you give this a stir?”

  He returned a few moments later with a map, with the stops we were going to make—Des Moines, Dubuque and Davenport, Peoria, Chicago, South Bend, Indianapolis, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, Johnstown, Philadelphia, Scranton, Syracuse, Rockville, and NYC. Then he showed me the call sheets he had made for the companies where he had made appointments. I was impressed at the genius of his organizational system and was excited about the job.

  And that’s when Mom walked in the kitchen. “I suppose she thinks this is your idea?” She looked at my father and then at me. “I thought if your father took you with him, it would assure you won’t land in prison at the age of thirteen, which everyone knows is where you’re headed, young lady.”

  I wasn’t sure who this collective “everyone” being cited was, but I caught a look from Dad, a silent plea to not provoke her further, before he assumed his normal deferred posture. It suddenly occurred to me how new it was for him to be around when I was in trouble. I dropped my head for his sake, slumped my shoulders, oozed glumness and shame the best I could. It sealed the deal.

  A few days later, Dad drove up to the house in a red-and-white Ford transit van pulling a small flatbed trailer, a turquoise blue hydraulic arm attached. The Taurus robot was cutting-edge technology in 1977. It was a back-saving device that enabled its operator to grasp heavy items by use of a remote control, allowing them to tilt or rotate pieces by 360 degrees, before setting them into place. I quickly developed affection for it as if it were a pet. I don’t know if there was any formal connection, but I knew Dad’s zodiac birth sign was the Taurus—the sign of the bull, which may have had zero relevance except for the fact that Dad clearly believed they were fated by the stars to be aligned.

  We set off early on a Monday, taking Interstate 80, crossed the Mormon Bridge, and headed out of Omaha. Objects slid by: farmstead silos, barns and grain elevators, water towers with town names painted on their bulbous sides, rest stops, trucker’s cafés, and exits with fast food—Kentucky Fried Chicken, Wendy’s, Arby’s. As we passed other cars, they reacted with a “what the hell is that?” look as if we might be pulling a large circus animal.

  I couldn’t help but feel a little like Laura Ingalls Wilder with Pa, as I thought of the technological progress we had made since pioneers drove Conestoga wagons through that high prairie grass. After the first hour of growing restless, I began my on-the-job training.

  Dad told me if I checked under my seat I’d find a manufacturer’s book that contained the locations of companies who produced steel products such as John Deere tractors, construction beams, and engine parts. My job was to identify any company that might fall in our route between his scheduled stops.

  He then gave me a spiral notebook that featured teenage-dream hunk Harrison Ford, from the movie Star Wars. My job was to staple our receipts to the pages so that the tax man could see we weren’t using the money to go to Tahiti, maintain a log of the miles we covered each day to show the government that we had used a car instead of a horse, and keep a journal, so that I could keep track of the deposits my father and I made to our joint memory account.

  My induction over, Dad let me dither with the radio frequencies. We were so far in the boonies that I’d get a station dialed in just
in time to lose it again. After the second hour, I complained.

  “Dad, this scenery is so boring it’s hypnotizing me.” I couldn’t imagine surviving ten days of this.

  He grew enthusiastic. “That’s a sign the trance is settling in—it’s a good thing. A road trip is a state of mind, not a destination. My best ideas come when I’m looking out across those plains or up at the sky. I also find chewing gum helps pass the time.” He reached into a brown paper lunch bag with a huge stash of Bazooka Joe bubble gum and tossed me a piece. “You have to read me the fortune.”

  “Dad! You must have one hundred pieces in there.”

  “Nah, fifty.”

  I unwrapped the waxy cartoon paper and shoved the rock between my molars, chomped down on it a few times, waited for the saliva to take hold. “You need the jaws of a cow to chew this stuff, Dad.” I churned the gum a few more times while I read the fortune.

  “It says, ‘If your Mom says no, there’s always your Dad.’”

  “No, it doesn’t say that.”

  “Yes, it does. Take a look.”

  “I can’t because I’m driving, but stick it in here,” and he opened his clean ashtray. “I always like to review them at the end of a trip. Let’s open another one. See what we get.”

  I dug in, pulled one out, peeled back the wrapper with care so I wouldn’t rip the cartoon, read it to myself, then groaned at its dryness. “Bazooka Joe says, ‘Don’t let anyone burst your bubble.’”

  “That’s perfect. Blow me a bubble. Let’s see what you’re made of.” He watched the road with patience as I attempted to position the gum with the help of my tongue against the inside of my teeth. Once I gained a handle on the wad and gave it my best, I pliffed a small bubble, which then snapped.

  “You can’t rush it. The trick is chewing it so the consistency is even. And don’t cross your eyes like that when you’re blowing. You’ll get a headache.”