Little Altars Everywhere (9 page)
Shut up, I tell them. Yall listen to me!
Even Sidda listens because she’s as bored as the rest of us. I reach down into the toy chest and pull out two dolls that Sidda and Lulu have already ripped the hair off of. One of their favorite things is to rip the hair off their dolls and throw them up in the chinaberry tree and laugh at them.
Yall see these dolls? I ask.
Uh-huh, they nod. I am the leader, they’re all listening to me.
These are Miss Peppy’s new babies, I announce to them.
What? Sidda says.
I repeat, These are the new babies of Miss Peppy, the fart dog!
Little Shep, Sidda says, what are you talking about?
I’m not just talking! I say proudly. I am going to swap these bald-headed rubber dolls for Miss Peppy’s babies and see what happens.
Lulu smiles and reaches into her pocket where she has more fudge stashed away. Baylor starts giggling.
Sidda says, Shep, you know how Buggy is about that dog. You’re gonna get us all in big trouble. It’s a great idea.
I say, Yall leave it up to me. Just leave it all up to old Little Shep.
I wait until Buggy goes outside to collect rainwater like she always does for her house plants. That dog’s right behind her, almost peeing on Buggy’s shoes. Buggy always says, It is so cute the way Miss Peppy “powders her nose” whenever I’m out in the yard.
I plant Sidda at the sliding-glass door to keep watch, and Lulu and Baylor stay in the hallway to tip me off if the enemy starts to come back inside. As it is, I’ve got plenty of time. I sneak into Buggy’s bedroom, snatch Miss Peppy’s babies out from under the covers, and stuff Lulu’s old dolls in their place. Then I run into the kitchen and cram those fake dog babies down in the trash can underneath the kitchen sink. Buggy’s still outside and I’ve pulled the old switcheroo off without a single solitary hitch!
I walk over to the rest of the kids and give them the
A-OK sign and say, Check! like I’m a double agent. Alright now, I instruct them: Act normal.
So we get out Sidda’s Barbie and Ken dolls and switch their heads. It’s great to see old Ken’s head on a body with boobs. Sidda always gets a kick out of that. We all do.
Buggy comes back inside with her poot dog and we all say, Oh hi, Buggy! Like we’re children from Lourdes or something. She says, Yall are being so sweet. The Baby Jesus is smiling at you right now, I can just feel it.
We keep on playing with the dolls. I get out my troll doll, which is the only doll I have anything to do with on my own. The rest are sissy dolls. My Daddy said my troll doll is a sissy doll too and he won’t let me take it in the truck with him. But I still play with it when my Daddy’s not around.
We’re all staring at each other trying to act like nothing’s going on. I am so excited I can’t keep my leg from bouncing up and down the way it does when something’s up. Sidda is rolling her eyes around like she’s in a scary movie, and Baylor keeps licking his lips. He has the longest tongue you ever saw. He can touch his nose with it, easy. Old Buggy’s just watering her African violets and Miss Peppy is trailing her around on those high-heel toenails. I start humming “You Are My Sunshine” just so I won’t start laughing.
Finally I see Miss Peppy get this thought in her head, and she heads in the direction of the bedroom.
Sidda jabs me in the side and I whisper, Bombs Over
Tokyo! They’re all looking at me, but I go on brushing my troll doll’s hair like life is normal.
Then the barking starts up! Well, it isn’t really barking. More like a high yowling that you wouldn’t expect from a dog the size of that runt. Buggy drops her watering can and runs straight back into the bedroom, her slippers flapping on her feet. We’re all looking at each other—like, Alright! This is it!
Buggy starts shrieking like she’d rehearsed all her life for something like this to happen. Like she’d practiced and practiced, just to be ready to make those sounds.
Jesus, Mary, and Joseph! she screams. Oh, Our Lady of Prompt Succor, come to our aid!
We sit there laughing so hard without making any sound, the way we have to do at Mass when somebody farts. Then Sidda says, Come on, we better go in there and act surprised.
So we all run down the hall and there is Buggy in her room with that dog, both of them looking like they’ve gone right over the edge. The attic fan is pulling and I can see the curtains getting sucked in, then letting go with the draft. I can hear cartoons still playing on the TV, and Miss Peppy is still making those high-pitched moans like someone’s beating her.
What’s wrong? I ask, all innocent.
Buggy says, Yall don’t even look. It’s too terrible. Miss Peppy’s babies have been kidnapped and Buggy does not know how!
Then she runs to the open window and looks out,
like she might actually catch a doll burglar trying to escape over the hydrangea bushes.
My mouth hurts and my face is starting to develop a twitch from trying not to laugh. Lulu starts to giggle, but Sidda pinches her and she shuts up. Bay just stands there with his mouth open. Sidda comes over and stands in front of me, like she thinks I might be in trouble. No big deal, I whisper. I got things under control.
Buggy gathers Miss Peppy in her arms to try and comfort her. But that dog is in the middle of her own nervous breakdown, and she hauls off with her tiny poodle teeth and bites the inside of Buggy’s hand hard enough to draw blood. Well, we’re just horrified. We’re just fascinated. We are just about to fall out on the floor. I wonder, Will Buggy finally up and get mad at this dog?
No way. She just stands there looking at that poodle with a retarded look of love. She says, Precious little Miss Peppy, no one will never know the pain you are suffering.
Goddamn, I think. I wish my Daddy could see this! He’d know what to say. Then I think, Oh great, what if my grandmother gets rabies and croaks and it’s all my fault?
Buggy, I say, Maybe you might want to pour some hydrogen peroxide over that bite.
She looks at me like I’m a real doctor for thinking that up and she goes in the bathroom to open the medicine cabinet, at the same time starting up a holy rosary out loud. She puts Miss Peppy down on the bathroom counter and I swear, the dog keeps
staring
at me. That
dog looks so lost standing there next to Buggy’s false-teeth container and Five-Day deodorant pads that, for a second, I actually feel sorry for her. It’s not her fault she lives in a crazy house.
I say, Buggy, maybe you better go to the doctor. Dog bites aren’t good.
She interrupts a “Glory Be” long enough to smile and say, Thank you, blessed child, but you don’t have to worry about Buggy. This is not really a bite, but more of a love-nip from Miss Peppy, who is being tested by God this morning.
It gets clear to me that my grandmother is sort of enjoying the whole situation.
She herds us back into her room and makes us kneel down and recite the rest of the rosary with her. Buggy’s on the prayer kneeler holding Miss Peppy, who is shaking like Mama does in the mornings. It’s hard to concentrate on The Sorrowful Mysteries with those bald-headed dolls still staring up into space from the bed. We just cannot take our eyes off them.
Lulu starts to blurt out something, but I put my hand over her mouth and Sidda says, Lulu, be quiet! We are praying.
Then Lulu bites my hand and we both start giggling, but I try to make it sound like I’m coughing instead. I act like I’m thinking about all of Jesus’ suffering so I won’t totally lose it. But then Miss Peppy jumps out of Buggy’s arms and starts clicking her toenails in the direction of the kitchen.
We rip through nine more Hail Marys before Miss Peppy lets out a series of yips that sound like Nazis are pulling out her teeth. Buggy runs into the kitchen with us close on her heels, and I can’t believe the sight in front of my eyes.
The dog is standing there on the linoleum floor with her “babies” dangling out of her mouth. They are covered with coffee grounds and a banana peel is hanging off one of their arms. That dog has actually nosed open the kitchen cabinet, knocked over the trash can, and fished those dolls out! The poodle starts turning in circles, jerking those dolls up and down so hard it looks like her own head is gonna snap right off and roll across the room. The dog has lost her mind. She’s found her babies and lost her mind. We’ve never in our lives seen an animal act like this. We’ve seen Mama act like this, but never a dog.
Buggy is red-faced and sobbing, and she turns on us.
Which one of you pagan children did this? she screams. Which one? Who? Who did it? Who has done this cruel thing to Miss Peppy and the Baby Jesus?
We just stand there looking at her. I love the way her eyes bug out and her veins pop when she gets real mad. This is more fun than I thought it would be! It’s worth getting in trouble for. Baylor’s holding onto Sidda, and Lulu’s chewing on her hair as usual. I figure I better be the one to say something.
Buggy, I say, it is a terrible, terrible thing that has happened here and we are real sorry. But we don’t know one thing about it.
She says, You should all be shot with a gun! But Buggy will not sin over the likes of you. The Baby Jesus will punish you enough. Yall will burn in hell along with your Baptist father!
Then she locks us in the grandchildren’s room for the whole rest of the day so we can pray for forgiveness. We play with all our toys and I make fun of Buggy’s face and do a series of Miss Peppy imitations. I make us all lose our breath, we laugh so hard.
When Mama finally gets back, it’s already dark. Buggy lets us out and we fly down the hall to greet Mama, climbing all over her. She smells like air conditioning and department stores and she has all kinds of gifts for us. An Etch-a-Sketch for me, two tortoise-shell headbands for Sidda, a wind-up elephant for Bay, and a pogo stick for Lulu. All from Lafayette!
We’re starving to death, Mama, Sidda announces.
Yeah, Lulu says, Buggy hasn’t fed us since twelve o’clock noon.
All she did was feed that dog, I say.
Mama turns to Buggy and says, Mother, why haven’t they been fed?
Buggy reaches down and scoops up Miss Peppy in her arms.
She says, Because your oldest son bit Buggy on the hand and she has a bad fever.
Mama says, Well that is the first time I’ve ever known Little Shep to bite anybody. Maybe it was just because he was hungry.
Buggy says, It is not funny, Viviane Abbott Walker. It is not one bit funny. I’m just glad it’s you and not me who is responsible for the souls of these children.
Don’t worry, Mama says, I’ll take care of Little Shep when I get him home.
I get a little nervous when she says that, because Mama sure does have her ways.
She kisses Buggy on the cheek and says, Thank you for keeping the little monsters, Mother. Here—I brought you some perfume samples from Godchaux’s. And she hands her a bunch of little vials that Buggy already has drawerfuls of.
When we get home, Mama makes us pancakes for supper and she lets me help flip. She doesn’t eat anything herself, just fixes a drink and models her new clothes for us.
She says to me, Well, my little cannibal, how do I look? Doesn’t this dress look good enough to eat? Is your Mama a living doll or what?
Later, she comes into my bedroom to tuck me in. I say, Mama, I wanna tell you something. I didn’t bite Buggy. Really. That dog did.
She holds her cigarette down by the side of my bed. I lean my head over and I can see its red tip burning in the dark.
I know, Little Shep, she says, and she outlines my lips with her fingers. But you have simply got to start behaving when I leave yall with Buggy. Decent baby-
sitters are hard to come by. You’re my big man. You understand.
Yes ma’am, I say.
You don’t know anything, you old witch
, I think.
When she leaves the room, I just lay there and play back the whole day. Just thinking about all I have accomplished makes me feel great, like I can do anything in the world I want and no one can stop me. I am a born leader.
Siddalee, 1963
A
t Our Lady of Divine Compassion Parochial School, I keep running into trouble because the nuns say Daddy is rich. Which he most certainly is not. For instance, Sister Osberga never lets me be in charge of the record player. She says: Your father is so rich that you’ll probably break our record player on purpose just to show he can afford to buy a brand new one. Blessed are the poor, Siddalee Walker, and you are not one of them.
The Divine Compassion nuns are all bent out of shape because my Baptist grandfather, Pap, once owned some land that Bishop Siminaux tried to beg off him for a new church. Daddy says they sicced every fast-talking priest and monsignor they could find on Pap. When Pap finally decided it was too much land to give away to a church he didn’t even like, the bishop told him he had blown his one shot at heaven—and
that went for his whole family, too. He told Pap this over a big country breakfast my grandmother had prepared for them out on her porch. Daddy loves telling the story of how his mother snatched one of her angel biscuits right out of that bishop’s hand and said, You better get yourself up from the devil’s table and get offa my porch.
When Daddy was little, he used to sing in the choir at Calvary Baptist, where his Mama organized church suppers. Now he claims he has his own church—The Church of Sunday Drives and TV Football. He says, The old Podnah (which is what he calls God) lives in the cotton fields as much as He does over at Divine Compassion.
Before he could marry Mama, they made Daddy sign an official document promising to raise all of us in the Catholic faith. He also agreed to go to Catholic Instruction every Thursday night for two whole years. But when push came to shove, Daddy refused to join the Catholic Church. He said, Yall are like sheep to the slaughter when it comes to the Penguins (which is what he calls the brides of Christ). Yall can drag me to Mass on Christmas, he says, but other than that, don’t swing that damn incense in the direction of my sinuses.
Now I didn’t even know about this before we started at Divine Compassion, but at school I’m always singled out because I’m the child of a “Mixed Marriage.” That means I’m likely to make the Baby Jesus cry a lot more than a kid with two Catholic parents. From the minute
I started first grade with my hair down to my waist and my brand new baby-blue Nifty folder and fat crayons, I have been worrying myself sick about making the Baby Jesus cry.
The nuns have us divided into four groups:
- Fast and Slow Readers (I am Fast)
- Talkers and Non-talkers (I am a Talker)
- Catholic Marriage and Mixed Marriage Kids (yall already know what I am)—and worst of all
- Children from Broken Homes (the kids whose parents are divorced)
Broken Homes is the most shameful group to be in. But at the same time it gives you more leeway. I am here to tell you that kids from Broken Homes can get away with a lot more than the rest of us can, which is not fair, if you ask me.
You pray for Children from Broken Homes right along with the Public School Kids and Pagan Babies. You can buy a Pagan Baby for eight dollars, and that means you get to name it yourself. We have mayonnaise jars with pictures of Pagan Babies taped on them and the lids have slits to put money in. If the eight dollars comes from the whole class, then we all vote on the name. But if someone just walks in and forks over eight dollars on their own, then they can name the
Pagan Baby whatever they want. One time, Little Shep took some money Daddy gave him and named a baby “Orlon,” which the nuns didn’t think was funny at all. But it was his money, so what could they do? He went around for weeks telling people there was a kid somewhere in a pagan country named “Orlon” all because of him. That just cracked him up. Little Shep can sin his butt off and not blink an eye.
Sometimes I wish Little Shep was in my class so he could take up for me. Like when Sister Osberga announced to the whole class that our Mama lets us go to C-rated movies. Which is definitely not true. Every Wednesday when the diocesan newsletter comes out, Mama cuts out the Legion of Decency’s list of movies and tapes it to the inside door of the canned-goods cabinet. We have to consult it before making any movie plans whatsoever.
There are A-1, A-2, A-3, A-4, B, and C movies. Walt Disney movies are A-1. If somebody cusses in a movie, it is an A-2. If somebody kisses too long on the lips, it is an A-3. And if unmarried people kiss at all on the lips, it is an A-4. In the B movies, people take the Lord’s name in vain while they take off their blouses. And in C movies (like
Cleopatra
), they just sin their lives away in front of anyone who gets to watch.
We only get to see A-1 movies (unless there is something Mama and the Ya-Yas just have to go see and they can’t find a baby-sitter). But secretly, I am dying to go to a C movie just once in my life! I love those
photos of Liz Taylor with her bosoms and eye makeup. The royal gowns and all her dates with Richard Burton, which Buggy says is just awful.
Buggy says, That poor sweet Debbie Reynolds! Just look how she is forced to suffer, all because Liz stole Eddie away from her in front of the whole world. That Liz didn’t even love him, she just wanted to prove that her violet eyes could break up a happy marriage—even if it was a Mixed one. And now the sinner has dropped that poor Jewish boy to carry on with Richard Burton. It just makes me sick to my stomach!
Impure thoughts, impure acts—everywhere I turn, I stump my toe on impurity. It seems like every thought that comes into my head is impure. I worry that I’m sinning all the time just because of the way my mind works.
Thoughts have a lot of power. Just
thinking
about committing a sin is the same thing as actually doing it. Sister Osberga talks about this in class all the time. She says: If a man plans to kill somebody, but on the way over there he gets hit by a car and dies, then he will die with the sin of murder on his soul. Because he has already killed a man
in his mind.
In his mind.
I can never get my mind pure. I keep thinking of impure things every minute of the day. They are like rats crawling across the floor of my brain.
So I’ve started going to Confession every day. There is nothing in the world like that light, pure feeling the
second you step out of the confessional. It’s such a relief to know that if you croak over right then and there, you’ll go straight to Heaven. But the pure feeling wears off quicker and quicker every time. Sometimes I have to turn right around and go straight back into the confessional and confess the sins I committed in my mind in just two minutes!
The priest says, These are little things, stop thinking about them so much. Do not come back here for a whole week. You should go home and ask your parents to take you to a psychologist.
Well, that gives me diarrhea for days. I
need
to go to Confession. Sometimes I just pray to become a leper and get it over with.
I still want to see those nasty movies, though!
But Mama says, You will never so much as set foot in a C movie. Do not ask me again.
We’ll be driving in the car and she’ll blot some of her blood-red lipstick with a Kleenex.
Why, Mama? I pester her. Why can’t I go to a C movie?
Listen to me, she’ll say. Sex is for marriage, marriage is sacred. It is a sacrament.
I know, Mama. But why can’t I go to see
Butterfield 8?
But she just lights a cigarette and says, Oh, will you shut up before you drive me to the insane asylum?!
It’s a real double whammy—being from a Mixed Marriage and not being poor and holy. It means I have to do much more self-mortification than your regular kid.
Sister Osberga says, Remember: Any pain, discomfort, inconvenience, humiliation that comes your way—
offer it up
. The more you can offer up—the more indulgences you can get—the less time your soul will have to suffer in Purgatory.
I try to commit little acts of self-mortification every day. First of all, lying in bed, I pinch my stomach until it hurts and bruises blue. Then, later, when I have a bad thought, I lift up my blouse and see that bruise and I don’t feel so guilty. Second, when I have to go to the bathroom, I hold it for as long as I can. Sometimes this gets me into tight spots, but the way of the penitent is not always easy. If I am feeling particularly bad about something I’ve done that day, I wait until Lulu is asleep and then I lie down on the bare floor and try to sleep with no covers. Just like St. Therese the Little Flower.
I write down all of these things in my diary and try to figure out at the end of each week how many days I’ve burned off my time in Purgatory. You’ve got to rack and stack those indulgences.
I learned how to read way before first grade, thanks to Mama and Aunt Jezie.
Children’s Lives of the Saints
was my first book. Buggy gave it to me. St. Martin de Porres, the patron saint of the poor, is the one I really go to for intercession. St. Martin was a barber during the day, but at night he had all kinds of visions. He was the son of a knight and a Negro woman from Peru. And even
when all the people started calling him the “Father of Charity,” he just called himself “Mulatto Dog.”
Every single time I talk about St. Martin, Little Shep starts barking and yelling, I’m a mulatto dog! Woof! Woof!
My all-time favorite, though, is St. Cecilia. She was from a rich family and they made her marry this good-looking pagan. But St. Cecilia had already promised God she would stay a virgin forever, and so she refused to Do It with her husband and actually managed to convert him. So they sentenced her to be suffocated in her bathroom. But she just kept on miraculously breathing. Then a soldier went and tried to chop her head off three times and she would not die! She lay there half-dead for three solid days!
St. Cecilia is one of the things my friend, Marie Williams, and I have in common. We are fascinated by her. Marie and I open the saints book to St. Cecilia’s picture and just stare at it for hours. We try to figure out whether St. Cecilia’s head was actually still attached to her body while she was lying in that bathroom half-dead, or whether it had sort of rolled off to the side.
Now, as I have said, Daddy is not rich. Oh, sure, we have enough money for Mama to get her hair done once a week, but not at Mr. Julian’s, where they serve sherry and where M’lain Chauvin’s mother goes. Mama goes to Jeannine at the House of Beauty because she claims Mr. Julian will not use her brand of hairspray.
Mama says: Julian is full of shit charging as much as he does, just because he uses hairspray in a pump bottle from France.
Jeannine is a black-haired woman who’s a big-time bowler at Bowl-a-Rina out on Highway 17. Mama’s appointment is every Friday, before her big grocery shop at the Piggly-Wiggly. Mama is convinced that she doesn’t have enough hair. Jeannine sold her this little hairpiece that fits on the back of her head, and every Friday she washes and sets that hairpiece along with Mama’s real hair. Then Jeannine sticks it on the back of Mama’s head where it stays until she takes it off at night. She puts it in the night-table drawer while she sleeps and it looks like a little strawberry-blonde rat. We are not supposed to talk about it.
On Fridays Mama brings the hairpiece to the beauty shop with her in a plastic bag. And I bring my spend-the-night things to school so I can ride the bus home with Marie Williams and sleep at her house, where everything is all poor and holy.
See, even though the Williams aren’t dirt poor, at least they use powdered milk. Marie’s father is a garage mechanic and her mother is a housewife named Antoinette, and they don’t have a maid or anything. Their house is absolutely cram-packed with kids and canned food and crucifixes. Their yard has one tree in it and a barbed-wire fence and almost no grass, because their mongrel dog is such a rooter. They are real Catholics with a big family, not like Mama and Daddy who
stopped after just four. (Five, if you count my twin that died.)
They have seven children in a two-bedroom house. All six of the girls sleep in three sets of bunk beds in one room, and their brother sleeps on the fold-out couch in the living room. He waits until everyone’s finished watching TV to unfold his bed. Since it is so crowded at their house, Marie sleeps in a sleeping bag on the floor when I spend the night and I sleep in her top bunk above her sister Bernadette.
I am so jealous of the fact that they all got named after saints. Do you think Mama gave a damn about saints’ names when it came to us? No. I ask you: Who ever heard of a Saint Siddalee? Who ever heard of a Saint Lulu? When I bug Mama about it, she just says, Most of those saints’ names are just too Italian-sounding for my personal taste.
On Friday evenings, the Williams sit around a crowded dinette table in their tiny kitchen. The older girls help their mother prepare the tuna loaf or other poor people’s food.
Afterwards, I always go home and beg Mama to use powdered milk. She sometimes buys some to indulge me, but there’s no way tuna loaf will ever pollute her kitchen. My parents are steak-and-baked-potatoes people, and that smell of Lea & Perrins steak sauce sprinkled on near-raw meat drifts out from under the broiler at least five nights a week. Daddy raises his own cattle, so after dinner we’re all expected to say, Umm,
good meat, Daddy! Like it’s his own flesh we’ve just eaten instead of a dead cow’s. On Fridays when we can’t eat meat, Mama cooks red snapper or fried shrimp. But her idea of a meal does not include tuna loaf.
All I want is the Williams’ macaroni and day-old bread, and the way Marie’s mother makes things last, and her father wearing those green overalls, and the brother Jude with his old
Popular Mechanics
magazines.
Oh, their bathroom is so heavenly. It smells like cedar, and they have these huge bottles of the cheapest shampoo and creme rinse like I always see at Kress. They use Sweetheart soap and they have those kind of towels that come free inside of jumbo boxes of laundry detergent. Even with all the people who use that bathroom, it’s always clean. Mrs. Williams has a handwritten sign by the sink that says: “Did you clean up after yourself?”