by M. Murphy ©2019
He reported that these moments manifest clearly and succinctly as vibrating looped still images; little movies a fraction of a second in length. They are his first memories.
He said that it began in Greenbelt, MD. He was one and a half.
He was sitting on the kitchen floor, underneath the Formica topped aluminum table. The view looked huge, but closed in like tunnel vision.
In front of him, the cabinets seemed to glow pale-yellow white. To his right, a white door to the outside was open, filling the room with light.
Clinging to the metal storm door, he held himself up and looked out. A concrete sidewalk directly in front, and a little patch of grass just to the right. There was a fence, and a gate.
Through the door, he could see his brother and sister outside playing. His brother was riding his tricycle on the sidewalk. His sister was sitting on the patch of grass. Half of her face is covered, wrapped in a bandage.
Once outside beyond the storm door of the kitchen, he felt the sidewalk, the fence, and the gate. The sidewalk led to a ribbon of sidewalks. The sidewalk was very significant.
He didn’t know that doctors were about to cut him open and remove the two growths that had attached themselves to his lower descending colon.
His sidewalks led to New Carrollton, MD. He was two.
The Carrollton house had a basement with several rooms; a laundry room, a work room with a table that had a large scale electric slot car figure eight track set-up, and the main room. The main room had a couch, ironing board, television, and a pile of blankets and pillows on the floor where he was molested. He was molested by a babysitter. A teenage male that lived down the street masturbated in to his mouth. Everything about the whole act remains. However, it was not verbally articulated until thirty years after the fact.
His older brother was called James. He followed James everywhere. While visiting his grandparents, he followed James outside, down the brick sidewalk, and across the street. James hopped up on a wall and sat, but he couldn’t get up to join him. James helped him up and together they sat. James teasingly pretended to hop down and run. But, his little brother didn’t pretend and ran out in front of a speeding taxi-cab. He can still feel the impact, and then waking up in the hospital, the whole right side of his body broken.
He had to crawl now to get around, and needed assistance while his body healed. His mom would feed him as he sat in a high chair. She burned his tongue with a hot spoon feeding him chicken soup. He still has a scar on the tip of his tongue.
He fell off the couch, convulsing, not breathing, hitting his head on the basement floor. When he woke, the world was pink. His parents would wrap him up inside a blanket like fruit in a paper bag whenever this happened. This time, he was on the way to the hospital. He woke again inside an oxygen tent. The doctors didn’t seem happy when they found poop shoved in to the ventilator.
He liked his playpen. He liked that his legs could fit through the bars, and his toes could just reach the ground; mobility and independence. When it got warmer, his mother would place him in the wheeled playpen and take him outside. He was able to commandeer the playpen off the front porch, down 3 stairs, down the driveway, and off down the street before his mother caught up to him. It was exhilarating.
He followed two older girls walking their dog. The shape made by the girls rear-ends inside tight blue jeans created distinct lines that made two flowing waves as they walked; a hypnotic pattern. The shape, movement, and color held great interest for him. As he reached out to touch the flowing waves, the dog, a standard poodle, had other plans. In the blink of an eye, the poodle bit him in the face, nearly taking his eye. There was blood everywhere.
He was standing in the kitchen because he heard a noise coming from the basement. His father ran up the steps yelling; “Get in the tub!” Moments later, sirens. From the bathroom window, he could see fire engines. They parked in front of the house, the flashing lights reflecting back off the bathroom mirror lit up the small room. The bathroom door was opened by one of the firemen that were now inside his house. The house was on fire. A faulty outlet in the basement.
The new home in Bowie was twice as big as the Carrollton house. He’d just seen it, and the room he would be sharing with his brother. It was a big deal that he got to sit in the front seat of the new Pontiac Tempest. In the back seat, his brother and sister fought while mom sped everyone back to the Carrollton house to finish packing. A drunk driver made sure that process would not go smoothly by running through a stop sign. The Pontiac Tempest versus a Ford Galaxie. Seat belts and car seats were not mandated at this time. People can, and did, get hurt.
By summer, the family had settled in to the Bowie house. Even their dog, Bee-Gee had adjusted without incident. But sometimes, it’s hard to see small dogs at night, and that is how Bee-Gee got run over by a car. She didn’t make it, and the car got away.
School started in September; kindergarten. He was five and a half now.
That’s when the voices began.
The Spiral Saint 