I'm Nobody

iUniverse, Inc.

Contents

Introduction..................................................................ix1. My First Memories..........................................................12. Safety Do's and Don'ts.....................................................103. Guardian Angel.............................................................174. The Difficulties of Learning...............................................235. My Tattoo and My Barbara...................................................306. Alone, Hungry, and Scared..................................................347. Mom's Arrest—My Fault................................................408. My Family of Sticks........................................................459. Nobody Tells...............................................................4810. Only One ... Me...........................................................5411. Foster Care—Eyes Wide Open..........................................6012. My Plan In Motion.........................................................6313. Reunited and Moving.......................................................7014. Frank, Another Guardian Angel.............................................7415. Married Life—Who Knew?..............................................7916. Bellefontaine—Responsibilities and Missionaries.....................9517. The Mormon Church—A New Way of Life.................................10618. Buckhorn and Reviving the Past............................................11619. Bath County—Family Life.............................................12120. Divorce—Who Knew....................................................12721. Endings and Beginnings....................................................134Epilogue......................................................................161

Chapter One

This is hard for me to write because I can't set an age and I don't have a time frame. One of my first and most vivid memories is that of my toes. They were soft, warm, and wiggly. I liked feeling them; I liked my toes. They gave me joy.

All of my memories at this time were of me on the floor. I remember sitting up. A big person walked by me on my floor. She wanted me to stay out of her way. Sometimes she stepped on my parts. She stepped on my fingers, my wonderful toes, and sometimes on my arms or my legs. I would cry when this happened. My crying made the big person angry. I don't think she purposely stepped on me; I think I was just in her way. There was a place I needed to go to when she was on my floor. I needed to get behind the door. She would forget about me there. Behind that door was my safe place.

I remember she would put things on the floor, and I would put these things in my mouth. I liked that feeling. Sometimes she dropped things, and after she left, I would put whatever they were in my mouth.

I have no memory of anyone else at this time. I had no knowledge of the rest of the house; my floor and my door were my world. I later learned that the floor and the door were in the kitchen. I don't remember a bed unless my bed was in the kitchen, possibly on the floor behind the door. At some point, I realized that there was another me in a different room. This is the first time I truly remember joy. I couldn't get to the other side because of something in the doorway, and I could hear the big person talking to the other me.

She called him Billy. Soon Billy would be on one side of the doorway and I would be on the other side. I could touch Billy. I felt his arm. It felt like mine. We learned to play through the doorway. He was like me, and I felt good and happy about this.

The big person liked Billy too. I could see her picking him up and talking to him. I don't remember any jealousy or bad feelings about this. I loved to watch her with him, and this made him even more special to me.

I remember one time Billy pulled my hair and I bit his arm. That was the first time I remember being slapped. The big person was very mad at me. I remember crying and waking up behind the door.

All I remember after that is happiness. My world was Billy. At some point, we were together in the same room. The chair–what had been between us–was no longer in the doorway. I knew my place was still in the kitchen. My safe place was still behind the door.

I couldn't wait to be with Billy whenever I was awake. We were both walking and running. Billy called the big person Mommy. I called the big person Mommy one time, and she quickly and sternly let me know she was not my mommy. I was to call her Aunt Mary. I'm not sure what age I was. I remember Billy, Aunt Mary, and a dog. I loved to hug and rub the dog.

The next event I remember is a woman and a man coming to the house one night. The woman picked me up and called me Erma. That was the first time I heard my name ... Erma. The woman told me she was my mommy and the man was my daddy. She put me in a dress and tried to comb my hair. That hurt.

Aunt Mary and this woman talked for a long, long time. The woman took me to a car, and I cried. I did not want to leave the other me behind. I did not want to leave Billy. We left anyway.

I sat on the woman's lap, and the man drove. They made several stops. They were drinking, and I had lots of things to eat. I found out later that we had driven to Columbus, Ohio.

The man and the woman were mad at each other. They hit and screamed at each other. The man hurt my mommy. I wanted my safe place, but it was at Aunt Mary's. I went under the bed. I did not make a sound. I had learned very early at Aunt Mary's about being quiet and staying out of sight.

The police and a woman came. My mommy and daddy went to jail, and I went to a big place with lots of children. It was my first trip to a children's home. It would not be my last. I'm not sure how long I stayed there–maybe about six weeks.

Mom went to jail for disturbing the peace. She also assaulted another woman. Eventually, Mom got out and came to get me. I remember crying when she took me away, so I must have liked being in the home. I have no memory of my time there.

My mother was Agnes B. She had six brothers, three sisters, and one half-brother from her father's first marriage; there were eleven children in the B. family. The family was extremely poor. My grandfather never owned or rented a home. He just found an empty house and moved in, making it his new home. He was a squatter. Very few ever questioned or messed with him and his six sons. They had a reputation for taking and keeping what they wanted.

Mom has said many times that Aunt Mary was her favorite sibling. Mom dominated her sister and often bragged about holding Aunt Mary until the school bus passed so they didn't have to go to school. Aunt Mary liked going to school, but Mom dictated what they did. Mom controlled Aunt Mary most of their lives.

Mom also ruled at home. She had violent temper tantrums when she didn't get her way. Mom's mother also felt dominated by her wants and demands. During one of these violent incidents, Mom's dad sent her away from home with a gun pointed at her head. Grandpa Fred was the only family member to stand up to Mom.

Agnes left her home at the age of eighteen. She went to live with her sister, Mary, and her husband, Howard. She became pregnant with...