{"id":8002,"date":"2020-02-21T22:08:50","date_gmt":"2020-02-21T22:08:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.donnaionadrozda.com\/lifecycle\/?p=8002"},"modified":"2020-02-21T22:08:50","modified_gmt":"2020-02-21T22:08:50","slug":"bad-wrong-a-burden","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.donnaionadrozda.com\/lifecycle\/bad-wrong-a-burden\/","title":{"rendered":"Bad. Wrong. A Burden."},"content":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m currently mapping a year of recovery from a traumatic injury<\/a><\/span>. I now share this experience, through the eyes of my nineteen-year-old. Why? Because she has been communicating with me and needs to hear her own voice. She has a report to give. She is not a victim and has never felt a need to blame. I share on her behalf intending to give her a safe place to have her opportunity. She encouraged me to heal all through last year by reminding me of how she was given 3 gifts. <\/span><\/h4>\n

In sharing her mythic journey I hope to encourage you and others. Find the part of you that holds the golden key when you feel that your well-being is threatened. Thank you for being here.<\/span><\/h4>\n

“Relating to our personal struggles is the experience of all women. <\/em><\/strong>Stay with it. Connect to the depth. <\/em><\/strong>Locate Self. <\/em><\/strong>Call the deep-down part to discover where we are all connected.<\/em><\/strong>“<\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/h4>\n

Claire Zammit<\/span><\/h4>\n

I was going somewhere. I was moving away.<\/span><\/h4>\n

After several months sharing a one-bedroom apartment with my best friend, working hard at two jobs, playing at the clubs on weekends dancing to the local bands.\u00a0<\/span>Friends drafted to Viet Nam, others off to college; my roommate following her goal to obtain a law degree. My dream of art school dashed. After the meeting in the break room<\/a><\/span>, I give up my job at the dress shop and the ad agency where I enjoyed looking out at the great lake while drawing illustrations for machinery catalogs at my large wooden drafting table. It had been exciting waking up in my own place, dressing for work downtown, welcoming friends dropping by, hosting the ‘boys in the band’ (swooning over the drummer) from the house band, Tiffany Shade’. All good. Then … the missed period followed by my first visit to Dr. Perchan.<\/span><\/h4>\n

Now\u00a0four months pregnant and\u00a0in the mystery.<\/span><\/h4>\n

After the meeting with the social worker, mom decides on my fictitious transfer to Chicago. She has me locate a friend of a friend who lives in the city. She gives me instructions: every two weeks I will write a letter, stamp the envelope, place it inside a larger envelope and mail it to Chicago. The envelope contents will then be sent to my family address. Mom can then read my letter and share my news with dad and my 4 siblings at the dinner table. Authentic postmark. Proof. I’ve been given a promotion.<\/span><\/h4>\n

In truth, on the assigned day, mom takes me 45 minutes across town making a slight detour a few minutes away from our destination to show me the home where her grandparents lived and the large open yard where she played when she was young. We pass the historic signpost: established 1909; entering the affluent community. Small lakes reflect like mirrors the mature pines, holly, hardwoods, and immaculately groomed shrubbery surrounding sprawling architectural gems.<\/span><\/h4>\n

Driving down the main boulevard, lined on both sides by elegant homes, we enter the property of my ‘special arrangement’; a three-story stately glazed brick manse. I take in the beauty of the sweeping lawn, floor to ceiling windows, blue\/black slate roof, massive terra cotta urns planted with vibrant pencil cedars on either side of the arched front portico. Mom stops the car to consider: front door or service entrance? Off the driveway, a small round woman in a crisp gray dress\/uniform steps out into the cold January air to greet us. She smiles, quietly waiting as I gather the small case with my clothes and a few art supplies from the backseat. We are ushered through the back hall into the large light-filled kitchen.<\/span><\/h4>\n

I’m instructed to leave my bag and follow into the dining room where we stand and wait to meet the woman of the house. Minutes pass before the refined, very well dressed, impeccably groomed Mrs. enters. I’ve had time to notice the sideboard collection of engraved silver bowls and commemorative plaques each inscribed with dates and recognizing the man and woman of the house as major contributors to the Catholic Dioceses by both the Archbishop and the Monsiqueor. Mrs. gives me the once-over and informs me that I will have duties described in the kitchen. <\/span>She tells me, “You will have 12 hours off, <\/span>Saturday afternoon and half of Sunday, <\/span>and twelve dollars pay.”<\/span> She announces that <\/span>I am due back here well before dark on Sunday. I must provide both an address and phone number of my whereabouts.<\/span><\/h4>\n

I hear her tell mother that I will be “well taken care of” then mom is dismissed, passing me in the kitchen, she gives me an apprehensive hug and a quick: “Be good.” <\/span>leaving via the service entrance. <\/span><\/h4>\n

My training as a live-in domestic begins. <\/span>Rules are laid out: I am not to use the phone. I am not to go outdoors. I report for duty Monday through Friday at 7 am.<\/span><\/h4>\n

Carrying my small suitcase I’m led up the back stairway three narrow flights to a room in the very large attic. There’s one small area made into a bedroom for the live-in. It’s pretty. I like the small flower-patterned wallpaper matching yellow bedspread and pillow shams; white painted wood bedside table matching the headboard and beside the bed a dormer window looking down on the boulevard. A <\/span>tiny bright private bathroom. <\/span>The closet under the eaves holds several hangers with uniforms; three changes each day depending on the duty.\u00a0<\/span><\/h4>\n

Each morning I dress in the <\/span>pale gray cotton with white collar and short sleeve trim <\/span>service uniform.<\/span><\/h4>\n

S<\/span>itting on a tall stool near the house intercom i<\/span>n the main kitchen, I wait. When the signal comes through I carry the beautifully prepared silver tray with a cut-glass vase holding fresh flowers, breakfast dishes with silver domed covers and the days’ newspaper up the main staircase to the second-floor sitting room. <\/span><\/h4>\n

As Mr. & Mrs. chat over breakfast and read the news I turn down their bed, remove pillowcases, linens, and monogrammed silk bed cover, open the side window over the driveway, shake each item into the fresh cold air, assemble the bed so that a quarter can be bounced off the sheets after securing the silk cover out the window for additional airing. I remove the breakfast tray leaving the flowers, newspaper and china coffee cups. Complete the bed.<\/span><\/h4>\n

I’m given a half-hour lunch break in the main kitchen. From 4 – 4:30 I return to my room to rest. <\/span>After my afternoon break, I dress in the designated <\/span>charcoal gray cotton with white collar and half apron in starched white cotton edged in eyelet lace <\/span>dinner uniform. All uniforms hang baggy and loose to accommodate my changing body. <\/span><\/h4>\n

<\/h4>\n

Following morning duties, I change into the seersucker striped uniform: Monday I scrub the ten bathrooms. Surfaces must be bleached including toilet bowls cleaned with a rag, my hand reaches into the water and to the bottom. Tuesday I mop and polish the floors of the three full-size kitchens. Wednesday I polish the copper in the kitchen which opens out onto the semicircular ballroom with arched <\/span>windows reaching high up to the domed ceiling over the parquet <\/span>floor. <\/span>It’s my favorite room, the view opening out onto the wooded backyard. <\/span>Thursdays I polish the previously mentioned silver bowls and plaques in the dining room. Friday I help with the baking of popovers and scones. <\/span>Among the staff, I am a bad and wrong girl. Temporary. To be ignored. I have assigned work to do. I am to be left alone.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/h4>\n

I remain on call until Mrs. phones the intercom, usually around 8 pm. to tell me that they are done for the day.<\/span><\/h4>\n

Up in my room, happy to<\/span>\u00a0have my evenings, <\/span>I write notes to myself, bits of poetry. I’ve long had the habit of waking automatically around 4 am. During high school, it’s the time I reserved for doing my homework.<\/span><\/h4>\n

Since 10th grade English, <\/span>I’ve had an ongoing fascination with Emerson<\/a><\/span> and Thoreau<\/a><\/span>. I’ve felt a connection with the Transcendentalists<\/a><\/span> and inclined to walk to the beat of a different drummer. I dream of a new kind of life. I say to the baby that will be relinquished to Catholic Charities, “When you are born I will be reborn. If we ever meet I want you to be proud of me.”\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/h4>\n

Mom comes to see me four weeks later. <\/span>I’m given the afternoon off. <\/span>It’s the day after Valentine’s Day; my birthday. <\/span>I’m nineteen. <\/span>She gifts me a handwoven poncho made in Mexico, “Please put it on.” She takes me to Dairy Queen for a butterscotch sundae. Stopping her car in the parking lot, she looks at me as she fumbles for a scarf pulling the patterned fabric out of her purse. Pushing it into my hand she says, “Cover your head. Pull it forward a bit,’ she reaches across the seat and adjusts the fabric like blinders on a horse. “In case any of your friends might see you.” I remind her that I have no friends this far away from home. I never wear anything on my head so I instinctively readjust and let the scarf slip back onto my shoulders. She insists that I pull it up and forward as we walk toward the restaurant. “You never know,” she tells me. <\/span><\/h4>\n

Taking liberty with gender:<\/span><\/h4>\n

If a woman does not keep pace with her companions, <\/em><\/strong>
\nperhaps it is because she hears a different drummer. <\/em><\/strong>
\nLet her step to the music which she hears, <\/em><\/strong>
\nhowever measured or far away. <\/em><\/strong><\/span><\/h4>\n

Henry David Thoreau<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/h4>\n

<\/h4>\n

<\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m currently mapping a year of recovery from a traumatic injury. I now share this experience, through the eyes of my nineteen-year-old. Why? Because she has been communicating with me and needs to hear her own voice. She has a report to give. She is not a victim and has never felt a need to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[36,193,99,206,32],"tags":[23,258,281,283,271,282,280,285,284,259],"class_list":["post-8002","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-artlife","category-creative-life","category-donna-iona-drozda","category-natural-energy-management","category-starting-over","tag-adoption","tag-bone-healing","tag-domestic","tag-emerson","tag-healing","tag-live-in-help","tag-teenage-pregnancy","tag-the-transcendentalists","tag-thoreau","tag-traumatic-injury"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6htPT-254","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.donnaionadrozda.com\/lifecycle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8002","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.donnaionadrozda.com\/lifecycle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.donnaionadrozda.com\/lifecycle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.donnaionadrozda.com\/lifecycle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.donnaionadrozda.com\/lifecycle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8002"}],"version-history":[{"count":18,"href":"https:\/\/www.donnaionadrozda.com\/lifecycle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8002\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8021,"href":"https:\/\/www.donnaionadrozda.com\/lifecycle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8002\/revisions\/8021"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.donnaionadrozda.com\/lifecycle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8002"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.donnaionadrozda.com\/lifecycle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8002"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.donnaionadrozda.com\/lifecycle\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8002"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}