"Educational Autobiography"

Not a single tomato grew this summer in Tuckahoe. Not one pulpy, edible red fruit burst forth from that old pot. In spite of the natural radiance of the sun, in spite of the abundant rain in our region, the plant my mother watched so intently produced absolutely nothing but leaves. Oh, it grew to an admirable three feet or so, but upon very close inspection one could see the leaves, while plentiful, were rather thin. To the naked eye anyone would agree it looked to be rather healthy. It had leaves that, while they were not what one would describe as overly lush, were most definitely foliage that appeared as it should. The absolute barrenness of this famed “love fruit” perplexed my mother, whom I sometimes silently but more often outwardly, loudly, and annoyingly decried and cursed as she made the forty minute or so round trip drive to the “House in Tuckahoe” at least every other day last May through the end of August to ensure the particular pot received what it needed. I was angry every single time I saw her slowly pull our old van out of the driveway to go to that house, the home she made livable for my older sister who had abandoned it after only just one year. 

My older brother and sister came to be my mother’s children about seven years before I was born. They were nearly four and a little shy of thirteen months, respectively. They lived here at their home (that was perhaps nebulous at best in the eyes of the legal system, but certainly not in theirs) for five years as foster children until a law was passed under the Clinton administration that reduced the time children could languish without a permanency plan in foster care from forever to mere months. During that long time in limbo, my brother and sister lived a fragile “normal” existence for which they were too young to realize was not yet legally theirs. After the adoptions and until they were in their late teens, my siblings believed wholeheartedly they were full blood relatives. I was born when my older brother was nearly eleven, shortly after my mom got married. My younger brother quickly followed suit. The marriage crumbled before my younger brother was born; thus, we were now and forever a family of five. In spite of all of the warmth, nourishment, and care that was given to my older sister and brother in a conscious effort to change their trajectories, as they blossomed into adults and learned details of their early lives, they seemed to rage into adult life with the abandonment people only possess when they learn that they were, in fact, once abandoned. For the longest time, the only memories I had of our family were of my own perception of happiness. I loved watching my older sister do teenage things, and I adored my older brother and cried wholeheartedly when he went off to college. I cried more when I saw him return from college after completing only three years. Things fell apart. Their memories, it seems, are no longer what they were. Perhaps mine are not either. It has been painful to watch them struggle.

Irritation has gnawed at me relentlessly as of late. It irritates me that I have lived my entire life with far too many people floating in the orbit of our home. It irritates me that growing up there was always an extra adult (or two) or child (or ten) who, when in need, my mother always obliged and offered shelter, food, and money…even to the possible detriment of herself and sometimes us four children. Our family was Tommy, Kayla, Joey, me, and my mom, yet there seemed to always be intruders. I have enviously been a voyeur of the normal lives of my friends. 

My mother secured the house for my sister and her children to live in right before the pandemic hit. I had screamed at her at Christmas time in 2019, “Why did you buy a house when ours is falling apart and we have a big mortgage here? We can’t even pay our own bills!” I was in tenth grade. COVID blew in, and my mother lost her job. I then saw this woman with a Ph.D. cleaning houses, scrubbing people’s toilets to put food on our table. Yet, through all of the storms these nearly past two years have brought, what was left of our family at home still somehow, in our own way, thrived. We studied. We recreated our favorite restaurant Hibachi meals at the kitchen table on a hot electric skillet. We made inexpensive crafts. We planted gardens. The “House in Tuckahoe,” like that pot, appears almost as it should but it is lifeless. My sister, who has a history of mental illness, took her children and left. We do not know where they have gone, or if they will ever be back. My brother, Tommy, drifts farther and farther away on the sea in the Middle East on a Navy vessel. They do not communicate often. Lately, it seems, not at all. I like to think, however, that there remains an infinite suggestion that our lives together had an impact on them and that there is love whirling somewhere in the clouds of their minds. 

Although there is now a crisp autumnal whisper in the air, I noticed that somehow that plant continued to persevere—even in the gray skies of October. I saw a single tiny white flower on a stem. I did not tell my mother.

Like this plant, I wish to both defy and embrace the warmth of the sun, the convoluted nutrients of the earth from which I have been born. I will grow and adapt. I will rustle in the breeze, never minding my sparseness, never losing faith that I will stretch tall. I will learn to thirstily drink in the drops of rain understanding this will give me strength. I will move toward or away from light depending upon my needs as the seeds of my education and life quietly and resolutely take hold in the earth. My garden is one of thoughts, goals, and dreams. Looking up, I will fight gravity with all of my might.