Day Twenty Three - Tired - Short post

Sometime around the summer of 1994 , my oldest brother and two sisters and I met at my parent's house in Mississippi. It was a great time. I don't recall any of our spouses being there except my soon to be sister-in-law. While mother and daddy kept the kids, we drove over to Natchez to visit with my cousin, Willie Ray Huff. At the time he was the sheriff of Natchez, Mississippi. If you were to characterize a Mississippi sheriff, my cousin would be it. His tall and broad stature shadowed the doorway as we entered the sheriff's office.

We had such a great time on the drive over. I remember joking about Mississippi and the stereotypical person who grew up in Mississippi. While driving we took in the beauty of the land and the culture of the state. Although our parents grew up in the south, this was still even foreign land to us.

During the time with our parents a lot of complicated stuff was discussed. We spoke of the difficult transitions each of us made into the States. My older brother shared about his arrival in America with a trunk of possesions and no money. Like me, he was young and vulnerable. We talked of being third culture kids, not being able to call anywhere home. Japan was where we grew up, but the reality was that, although we grew up there it wasn't our home. Even the monkeys starred at us. But niether was America our home. We didn't belong really anywhere.

Yet, we had a strange confidence about us. One American spouse of a fellow MK (missionary kid) identified it as "covert superiority". My brother described it as having the kings privelages with a paupers salary. When we traveled we traveled first class. Not necessarily by plane but traveling on the President Lines (cruise ships across the Pacific with a stop in Hawaii) for two weeks on a cruise, really didn't do us good. Having our own private server, being able to order what we wanted to eat, be treated like kings and enjoying all the privelages of the rich did cause us as children to expect that later in life. What we didn't realize was the privelages we had were way beyond our reality. But somehow it became our reality. Thus the "covert superiority". Others could describe it better than that.

Another reality was this: most of our parents had, not only a college degree, but a post secondary degree. Not just our fathers but our mothers as well. Not many people raised in the 60's and 70's had parents with college degrees much less both parents with post secondary degrees. That affected our attitude.

So, we struggled with being accepted yet we had a "covert superiority" about us. What gives? ( I think that was a phrase penned during the 80's.)

It was during this weekend that I finally had the courage to tell my parents about the abuse. The reason it took so long was because I had anticipated their response. I was ready to accept that they might make me responsible for his actions. Because, you see, men can't help themselves.

One of the lessons we were taught as young girls was that boys/men think about sex every 8-9 seconds. Because men think about sex so often, it is the responsibility of the girls to remain stoic and pure. I don't quite agree with that lesson. It' s not my responsibility to keep a man pure. I do agree that girls do need to be careful with their suggestive clothing etc. however, I don't think it's all on the girls. Men have at least equal responsibility or more. That was not the lesson we were taught.

© Copyright 2009 Janet Calcote Simmons All rights reserved.