Part VII: Time Warp 2000’s – Cut! #9 (Chapter 111)
Please don’t be angry:
I
am a prisoner of biology.
Short of voluntary hysterectomy, there is little I can do to
change nature: I am at the mercy of my periods, PMS, hormonal upsets, and no
matter how faithful I am about birth control, biological happenstance. No
matter what fiery rhetoric I might have planned for Monday’s class, invariably
I wind up with cramps ‒ and another psych movie.
And you are never free of your offspring:
First, they invade your womb, and then for 18 to ? years they
sap your strength with their incessant demands for food, shelter, clothes,
playthings, safety, affection, education, esteem ‒ money.
From conception on, they suck the milk out of you, then scream “unfair” when
the breast finally shrivels up.
Last year, I told my daughter Nicole that I couldn’t lend her
$10,000.
She said, “I didn’t ask to be born,” and then stomped out of
my house.
As if my not having enough money weren’t bad enough.
Believe me, if I had the money, I would gladly pay her just to
keep the peace.
I remember when I found out I was pregnant with Nicole. I
wanted to die. I was 18, unmarried, unloved. Penniless. Alone. Abortion was
illegal then in my state, but you could always trek up to New York and find a
doctor who would do the operation ‒ for
about $300.
But I couldn’t do it.
I kept thinking about the poor, helpless creature in my womb,
looking to its mother for its safety, not its death.
If I had only known.
I went on welfare and eventually married Nicole’s father when
she was two, but that didn’t work out, so we split up when our daughter was
nine. I had just earned my M.A. in Clinical Psychology and was beginning to
teach college full time.
And then that fateful date with Shel.
Nicole was ten when we married.
She also depends on Shel, hitting him up for $50 or $100 loans
from time to time.
And he never lets us forget it, either.
His poor little match girls.
*
January 1, 2001. 1:30
P.M.
What
a strange dream, what can it mean?
Two
helpless little girls…
Man.
My head hurts like hell. God, I must have drunk a lot.
Uuuhhhh…
My
poor stomach.
I’ll
never look at another bottle of champagne or rum.
And
those fried cheese balls...
Jump
out of bed and run to the bathroom, hang head over toilet bowl.
UUUGGGGHHHH...!
Fall
back into bed
I
can’t believe I’ve sunk so low.
“Idiots
don’t like thistles, fat people, or lesbians.”
Did
I really say that last night?
Ad
Nauseam, I’m afraid.
A
real charmer.
I
bury my head in the pillow.
Too
late, collateral damage already done.
A
tornado whirls in my gut.
Back
to the bathroom.
Hang
head over toilet.
Hurl.
Back
to bed.
Damn!
Why
did I drink so much last night?
Wipe out!
