Turning It All Inside Out

Assuming you had a happy childhood -- and I did -- there is something lovely about living in the same town in which you grew up. All the happies are there. The happy birthday when you were nine, the happy feeling when the boy you wanted to ask you out did, the happy holidays that brought family together.

First day of school

I periodically drive past Glencairn, my old elementary school, when headed to the east side of town. I lived five blocks away during a period where children walked to their neighborhood school. We walked home, too -- my mother would hear me crying because Bobby Burgess was teasing me. Her sage neighbor said, "It's getting louder. Let her come."

And times at Glencairn were happy times. My best friend was Shelley LeVett. She was creative and we could draw together, play Barbies and make things. There were other friends, too. The Loomis twins and their sister, who were from Costa Rica, adopted by their academic parents. There was Bobalee and Susie and Kristin and lots of others. We grew up from class to class, Brownie year to year. 

There was a fireplace in the lobby and Miss Sloan, the principal, would sometimes have us there for a story. Every Easter a large egg tree stood in that hallway. We had "boys day" when the boys brought kites and "girls day" when the girls brought their dolls. Today, sexist. Back then, it was all right.

The Glencairn Brownie Troop

The teachers. Mrs. Ruby, grade five. She was great fun. Miss Lee (grade four) was a bit mean, but looking back, I think she was just doing what a teacher of fourth graders had to do. I still have an ornament on my tree she gave us. 

Mrs. Craddock (grade three) was the best. I think I learned how to spell from her and I still remember making puppets and macaroni cigar boxes in her class. Mrs. Burnett, Mrs. Gregg, Mrs. Quimby, I remember them all, and fondly.

I'm sure there are moments of which I am less fond -- Field Day, for example; being picked last; corrective shoes and math. But overall, I loved grade school and it broke my heart when my parents made the wise decision to move when I was going into sixth grade. Wise, but difficult.

I didn't go into Glencairn school for many years after. Decades. Then I met a guy named with Rick with two boys, Greg and Kevin, who attended the same school. I had the chance to see that school through an adult's eyes. The "tall ceiling" -- not so tall anymore. The chairs, however, seemed very small. The school had been added onto and yet it was much the same and it was very good.

It's not so easy to go by Glencairn anymore. This spring a friend of Greg's since he was a small Glencairn kid himself, decided that his life was too complicated to continue and in the schoolyard where he once played, where Greg said they had been very happy, he took his life. 

I won't go into the myriad of feelings that come to my mind when I pass that playground. I think you can guess what they are. Nor will I dwell on the sense of loss that we all felt when this handsome young man so full of promise when Rick and I saw him just two months before, feels like. You can imagine that, as well, and it is something you never want to experience yourself. And of course, for us, the loss could never be compared to that of his family. Wonderful human beings who did all they could. 

At the funeral, Greg told his mother (and later, me) that after seeing the pain that his friend's parents and brother were experiencing, he was so glad that during his own dark times, times when he had contemplated doing the very worst, that he didn't, for he could never bear to give the people who loved him that much pain.

 

"Star" by Greg Oberle, age 18

On Thanksgiving Rick, Kevin and his Molly and I gathered for dinner at the duplex in which Rick lives, two blocks away from me. He rents the other side, his tenant a quiet but great guy. Greg couldn't make it, he had a gallery showing in Chicago and was under deadline. After the turkey was in the oven, we all walked to my house where the guys trimmed branches that were scraping my roof, moved a chest in from the garage and then Rick left to base the turkey. I checked the mail and left Kev and Molly watching last minutes of the Lions game.

When I returned home, the police were questioning Rick, asking him when he'd last seen the tenant. As we watched -- and tried not to watch -- the scene unfolded in front of our eyes. His adult children in profound and inconsolable grief, police cars, an ambulance that left empty, rubber gloved policemen entering the house. And later, a body removed, covered with the sheet.

Later, we learned that this charming guy had been deeply depressed for a very long while. 

We had no idea. 

I've been depressed, too. Many times and darkly depressed. But I've always known that for myself what these two wonderful people did was not the way out. 

I implore you, if you have a dark space -- even a very long and hard one -- find another way to get to the light. Get help. Make people listen and if they don't, find someone who will. And when they try to help you, accept their help. If you fall back, seek them out again. And remember, people love you.

 

And from the outside -- be vigilant. Look around you and make sure the people for whom you care know how much they matter. When they are sad, listen to them. If you must, encourage them to get help. Remember, this six-week holiday season can be very difficult under the best of circumstances. For some, they are nearly unbearable. Be aware. Do everything that you can do -- and know in your heart and soul that you did everything you could.

 I'm so glad Greg wasn't there that day.