Memoir Writing Contest: What Was I Going Back To? by Irene Kessler

Post #92 – Women’s Memoir Writing, ScrapMoir – Matilda Butler and Kendra Bonnett

Women’s Memoirs is pleased to present the second winner in a two-way tie for First Place in our May memoir contest – ALL ABOUT MOTHERS. Irene Kessler’s story, published below, takes a tie for first place in our Mother’s Day category. Mother’s Day can be a great day, a terrible day, or somewhere in between. We have a full range of such stories that we’re publishing. Irene’s story is full of emotion and yet reveals insight. We think you’ll be moved by it.

Later today, we’ll publish the two winning memoir entries in the Mothers and Mothering category. Be sure to check back all day as we continue to publish these four award-winning memoir stories.

WHAT WAS I GOING BACK TO?

by Irene Kessler

           
I ran from the house like it was on fire. It wasn’t the house that was on fire. It was me. A fire burning as if it were about to consume me. I didn’t know where I was going, I just had to get away. I had left David in the bedroom and the children sleeping upstairs.

I climbed behind the wheel of the car and looked back over my right shoulder to back out. The loud rapping on my window startled me. I didn’t want to be stopped. No, I wasn’t going to be stopped. I turned, ready to argue with David, my foot above the gas pedal, when the voice of my neighbor Lois, finally penetrated my brain.

“Are you okay? Where are you going? You’re not going to do anything, are you?” She looked petrified. Oh my God, she thinks I’m gonna commit suicide. Clearly, she had heard the violent argument David and I had over disciplining the kids. I wondered how many of our neighbors also heard. Screw it. I didn’t care.

I rolled down the window. “I’m okay, and no, I’m not going to do anything stupid. I’ve just got to get away from here for a while.”

“Where are you going?”

“I don’t know. Anywhere. Anywhere that’s more peaceful than here.” My heart was still pounding in my ears. “I’ll see you later.”

“Remember, it’s Mother’s Day.”

“Goddammit, I forgot. Thanks. I guess I’ll be back in time for dinner.”

“Okay,” she said as she took a few steps away. I checked the mirror, she did not turn toward her back door until I was all the way down the block.

I headed for the highway toward the city. “I don’t give them everything they want,” he said, so high and mighty.  If not, how come he buys them all the toys and games and makes me look like the bitch. And how can he believe he’s there for them? He avoids talking to them unless it’s ‘Let’s play ball.” Where am I going?” I hear myself say out loud.  I don’t want to go into the city. I want someone I can talk to…anywhere. Then, to top it off,  he accuses me of having an affair when I’ve been completely faithful. What world is he living in?

The car seemed to know what I needed. I found myself turning onto another highway. I looked around to see where I was. This road led up to our old country house, the bungalow in Lake Mohegan. The thought calmed me a bit. That was a place of happier times and good memories. An hour later, I turned off Lexington Avenue, into the community where I spent so many summers. I headed down the steep hill where at thirteen, I had lost control of my bike and took a bad spill. It seemed like a century ago. Filthy with road burn, cuts and scrapes, I limped the bike the rest of the way home, as three boys decided to leer and laugh instead of helping. My knees and elbows burned. It was not until I got to my front door I realized I was out of my tube top on one side. That’s why they were staring. I blushed with shame.

I continued driving around the corner and pulled up alongside the house. Not a house really, originally a bungalow on sticks. A few years after he bought it, my father hired a man to build a foundation underneath. It was small, two tiny bedrooms, a nice-sized living room with knotty pine walls and a decent kitchen. Barely enough for the four of us. When the foundation was laid, he added a large dining room with space for a couch that opened into a bed for company and a beautiful flagstone patio with a built-in barbecue. It was tiny but it held the wonderful memories of my teens through early twenties, when David and I took over the house until our third child made the place too crowded to be comfortable.

Our once pristine front yard was now gone. The grass was three feet high and the house needed painting. The bushes my grandfather lovingly planted were scraggly and unkempt. The house was washed out, like me. An old lady, too tired and worn down to wash or comb her hair. I held back the tears. I sat for a few minutes but couldn’t make myself get out of the car.

Pulling away as fast as I could,  I turned the car and headed for the lake just a few blocks away. It was not yet the summer season, so it was very quiet. The lake area was not ready for the onslaught of vacationers, and was as unkempt and disappointing as the house. Why did I come here? What did I think I would find?

I decided to try the lakefront at the next community where all my friends used to live and where I spent most of my time. This time it felt a lot better. I parked and walked down to sit on a bench and watch the water. It was so peaceful, just what I needed right then. The emotional ups and downs of the fights the past few weeks had taken their toll. I got up and walked over to sit on the stone wall. I let my fingers dangle in the cool water and become intertwined with the early blooming lily pads.

There was something about the years spent here, the last of the carefree years, a time of fun and very little responsibility that was able to calm me and bring back some sense of peace. Sitting in the middle of what was completely natural, the trees and water spoke to me of timelessness and continuity, that life goes on, somehow, until it gets better. A lesson I would need to learn a few more times before it finally brought a knowing that lived in me, never to be forgotten.

In the calm of the long drive home a few hours later, my thoughts flitted around. The house, the barbecues on the new patio, the burgers and corn in the husk, the lake, Heshy’s store where all the kids hung out. Having to go to summer school, first romances, a boyfriend my parents didn’t like. Being there for the summers with the children. Tedd getting a piece of a branch in his eye, Michael falling on the flagstone steps and cutting open the back of his head twice. Ronni as an infant. My parents and grandparents. My Aunt Helen and other neighbors.

What I was going back to? Divorce. That’s what. That’s what I was driving back to. My marriage was over.

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You might want to read our other Mother’s Day story: Pink Pearls of Wisdom by Sara Etgen-Baker

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Tagged as: Autobiography, Journaling, memoir, memoir contest winner, Memoir writing, Memoir Writing Contest, Mother's Day, Scrapbooking