Ramblings: Summers With Lisa

I never felt “normal” growing up. When you’re rolling with a one-legged Dad and an obviously severely handicapped little sister, you get the idea of what it must be like to be a celebrity. People stare, point, sneak peeks, and sometimes people would just stand there staring at us, with their mouths open, grabbing at the person next to them all while staring and pointing. As much as I understood that my family didn’t mirror other people’s, I didn’t realize what a side show we appeared to be outside of the confines of Clinton, Iowa.

In Clinton, my dad was the handsome, popular, golfer, beer drinker, and business owner. The fact he had one leg just made him more popular. People he didn’t know by name knew just about everything about my dad. His “story” was a good one – the leg issue became a non-issue pretty quickly. But add Amy into the mix and we were a sight to behold. It was always my worst nightmare to have to be in public outside of our hometown if my dad was on crutches. Even shorts I didn’t mind. His artificial leg was ok. But a man on crutches with a visible stump instead of a leg was more vulnerable. I didn’t like people looking at my dad like they felt sorry for him. And then they’d see Amy and oh God – you’d think some of these people were either going to whip out cameras and start yelling at us to pose OR they were going to give us spare change. Neither was cool with me. No matter what people are going to look. But I hated it when I felt their pity.

Being in a "special family" didn't always bother me, but I longed to know what it felt like to be NORMAL. What would it be like if Amy was “normal?” I always thought she would have been much prettier than me. Petite with that thick wavy brown/blonde hair, cornflower blue eyes, she would be skinny and have little boobs. I would be SO jealous, but also so proud of how beautiful and popular she was. But – that’s not the sister I got. I got the pig tailed, buck toothed bouncy stepped kid who would bite her hand if she was mad and if she was happy she would hum “This Old Man” in the most forceful grunt you’ve ever heard. And guess what? I was SO jealous of her, but also proud of her. I wouldn’t change a thing, but I longed for a taste of normalcy. I wanted a “real” sister. And every summer from about 1975-1980, I got her: my cousin, Lisa.  Lisa was 5 years older than me and she lived in Florida. She had bleach blonde hair, big boobs and boyfriends. I idolized her.

I’m really not sure why Lisa would come to stay with us in the summertime. It may have been because my mom needed help with Amy or it might have been because my Aunt Sandi needed a little help with her wild child – it was probably a little of both. But my mom’s whole family lived in Clinton – my grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, great aunts and uncles…countless more distant cousins. It was nice that Lisa could be subjected to the crazy cast of characters for a few months every year, just so she knew where she came from. She seemed ok about coming and she seemed to like hanging out with me – which was perfect because all I wanted was to be with her every waking moment.

Because of Amy’s disabilities, I tried extra hard all the time to be a good girl. I did not want to rock the boat. I hated to be in trouble. I didn’t ever want to cause trouble for my mom. She had enough she was dealing with. I hardly ever needed to be asked twice to do something. My dad was gone a lot, “starting his business,’” so I was second in command at home. I knew everything to do with Amy as well as my mom and would do whatever needed to be done, whenever it needed doing. When Lisa came to visit, she and I shared the job – wow, what a difference it made to have one more set of hands.

Lisa brought with her a breath of fresh air that we all felt in the house. We laughed so much when she was around. Everything was funny.  She made every day an adventure – even if we had Amy with us! We’d just throw her into a stroller and drag her all around town with us. She didn’t give a shit if we looked silly. If someone looked at Amy too long she’d make some funny comment about him or her and pretty soon the laugh was on whoever was staring at us. She was so defiant in that way. You weren’t dare going to make fun of her – she would always get the last laugh. In a family that prides itself on dry, quick, sarcastic wit – she could outwit us all. We all marveled in her humor.

One family trait Lisa and I shared was a struggle with weight. I know I was eating my troubles away when it came to Amy. Food provided such comfort and my mom was such a good cook. Lisa loved my mom’s cooking and eating in general, like I did. Most of our time spent together was either spent eating or planning what to eat. Inevitably, we would each gain 5-10lbs within the first couple of weeks of the summer. And of course, my Grandma would comment.

“Gosh, the girls sure are looking big!” She’d say to my mom in a scolding voice. So, my mom would limit our snacks – either in the $ she gave us or the portions she served. One time she made her specialty: homemade hot fudge sundaes. She gave herself a great big huge bowl. My memory sees it as like a pint of ice cream in a bowl covered in gooey hot fudge. And we got 2 spoonfuls of ice cream and a snot-sized dollop of hot fudge. Lisa and I stood there in the kitchen incredulous. Seriously? These are our treats? This is ours – and THAT is yours. Now, if Lisa hadn’t been there I would have never said a word. Then again, if she weren’t there I wouldn’t have gained the weight – so whatever. Suffice it to say, I didn’t normally question anything. Lisa, on the other hand didn’t hesitate.

“Hey! How come you get so much more? You get all that and all we get is this,” she said. This was injustice! Completely unfair!

My mom started giggling. “What did you say?” she said as she sat down her bowl and spoon. “Why do I get this big bowl and you guys get that little bowl?” 

And then she bent down, grabbed the hem of her nightgown, lifted it up to show us her skinny body and she said, “THAT’S WHY!” And with that she put her nightie down, took a big bite of her sundae and walked away cracking up, swinging her skinny butt. Lisa and I nearly wet our pants laughing. I don’t care if she was body shaming me, my mom was laughing and having fun. We were a family who laughed and had fun!

Every Wednesday our local movie theater would play a matinee for like $2.00 admission. I loved movies, so we went almost every week. However, the snack money we were given at the beginning of the summer started to dwindle until we were only given money for a ticket and that’s it. Why? You know why.  Grandma mentioned, “Boy, the girls sure are lookin’ big!” again. Well, we showed them! Lisa and I started eating popcorn off the floor at the Capri Theater. We sure did! And without shame. When we told my mom, we got our snack money back. Heh heh. Lisa was SO SMART.

We  thought my mom was pretty mean for always telling us we were fat. Little did we know, she was just reacting to my Grandma dinging her about it all the time. And…. little did my mom know – my Grandma was giving us coupons and cash for candy bars every time we saw her. When my mom found out she was so pissed! I’m sure my Grandma just shrugged her shoulders and primped her hair up.

One time Lisa and I saved up coupons for a night we knew we would be babysitting my sister late into the night. We were going to have a Candy Feast! I’m not kidding, we probably had $20 cash and coupons for so many full-sized candy items that we both had two huge bags filled with candy. So much more than Halloween. We went to our dealer – Van’s Supermarket – and loaded up. I was so excited and my adrenaline was going so spastic that a car almost hit me on my way there! Some lady with short shorts and curlers was yelling at me and Lisa just sat in the parking lot, laying on the ground laughing at me. Our Candy Feast was off to a crazy start!

We hid the bags of candy in the bushes of the house next door to me and then waited anxiously for my parents to leave. As soon as they were gone, we got our stash. First we laid out a quilt on the floor (one each) and then we laid out our booty. From there we just started eating. I have no idea how much I ate, all I know is Lisa gave up sometime before me and I was psyched to get her candy, as well.  I’m sure we were really good babysitters that night!

Lisa and I spent a lot of time at my Grandma’s house. My uncle lived in an apartment upstairs so he let us hang out there when we wanted to. We hung out there as much as we could. It was fun to pretend like it was OUR apartment. We thought it was a pretty sweet pad.

The guy who lived next door to my Grandma was a nerdy dad/mailman. Lisa noticed him checking us (her) out a few times and we laughed about it. One afternoon we were hanging out at my Uncle’s apartment, sitting on his porch that looked right into the mailman’s house. In fact, it looked directly into his bathroom. And there he stood in all his glory. Naked and loving it. Loving himself! Of course we did what any young girls would do – we totally cracked up laughing and ran away.  For a while it would happen every time we were over there. We finally got sick of it and called 911. The call went something like this:

Lisa (in her hillbilly voice) “Ah yes, hello? I’d like to report a sick chicken who is exposing himself to my children.” 

And then we started laughed and took off running back to my mom’s house. Along the way I fell and broke my ankle so it quit being funny. I don’t think the police ever came, but The Sick Chicken never showed us his cluck again.

My favorite thing Lisa and I would do though, was “go to lunch.” Going to lunch is still one of my top five favorite things to do. Every other meal, eh, ok. But, what’s for lunch? And specifically, where are we going? I hate home lunch.  Luckily for us, we lived just 2 blocks from downtown – where there were restaurants! Our mainstay was the counter at Woolworth’s. Not only could you do a little shopping as well, but unch was dirt-cheap and they had the best fries in town. I think I could get a hot dog and fries for $1.50, including a drink. We almost always paid in change.

Sometimes, though, if we had saved up some baby-sitting money we would go to Reynolds. Reynolds had always been a mystery to me. I had never been there, you couldn’t really see in and no one I knew had been there. All I knew was that it looked fancy and I wanted to go there. Always up for living the glamorous life, Lisa was just as excited as I was to go to Reynolds. When we had both saved up about $5 or $6 we decided we were rich enough for Reynolds! We spent a little extra time getting ready that day, wore clothes just a little better than usual. And of course, we had Amy with us so we definitely made sure she looked cute. It was nothing for us to drag Amy around with us. If Lisa didn’t give a shit that people looked, either did I. Lisa was from FLORIDA which was way cooler than Iowa. So we trucked around town like we owned it, with our retarded little sister bouncing happily along with us. We were women on a mission to become: Ladies Who Lunch.

I think we walked passed the door to Reynolds three times before we gathered the courage to go in. Finally, we did. What greeted us was pure luxury.  I know for a fact there wasn’t a maître’ d in a tuxedo standing behind a reservation desk in the entry, but that’s what it felt like to me. They seated us at a nice table for 4. The tables had white linen table clothes AND cloth napkins. I had no idea there was something this cosmopolitan in Clinton. We were the only other people there except for two ladies whose combined aged was close to the number of years in the bicentennial our country had just celebrated. They were OLD. And very dressed up and fancy. They seemed ambivalent to our presence and we took that as acceptance and settled in with our menus.

Whoa, it was super expensive. The hamburger platter was the cheapest thing on the menu and it was $5. All I had. I decided. I was good as long as I just drank water. Lisa tried to negotiate the sandwich alone for a lower cost but we were told that it only came as the platter.  We both ordered the platter and a glass of water. We would share our fries with Amy. When our food came out it was obvious why it was five whole dollars. The burger was amazing looking, the fries seemed fancier, too. The ketchup was in a silver serving bowl even! We ate every last bite of our pricey hamburger platters. When the bill came, we were totally mortified. We had forgotten to factor in tax or tip. We didn’t have enough money!  We sat there for a while wondering what to do. I was completely panicked. When we confessed our dilemma to our waitress, she couldn’t have been nicer or more discreet.  We walked home, stole $10 from my dad and gave the whole $10 to her.  We covered the bill PLUS a huge tip. We never thought twice about walking into Reynolds again. We became known there. And we certainly knew exactly how much money we needed to cover 2 platters, tax and tip. We always went in with just the perfect amount. It was usually in change and almost always stolen from my dad. We were a 1970’s Iowa version of The Bling Ring. We saw nothing wrong with borrowing a few bucks to cover our fancy lunches.

That’s pretty much how things went. You couldn’t say we were “bad” but you couldn’t really say we were “good,” either. We always skated by trouble by being funny.  My dad’s company had this big white conversion van they would haul things in that my dad brought home on the weekends. Lisa and I begged him to let us spend the night in it. We said it was “camping” and they let us. Just like real camping, we got bored pretty quickly. That’s when we had a great idea! We’d talk on the CB radio! Our handles would be Squeaky & Squealer. I think we played hillbilly sisters. Hillbillies were our main comedy characters. We started attacking the airwaves name checking ourselves because we had nothing else to say.

“Hey ya’ll this is Squeaky,” Lisa would say.

“And Iiiiiiiii’m Squealer!!” I would shout.

And then we’d say something about it being good to be there and 10-4 good buddies. The other people talking didn’t seem to hear us, so we did it again.

“Hey ya’ll this is Squeaky,” Lisa would say.

“And Iiiiiiiii’m Squealer!!” I would shout.

And again, we would throw out any Smokey and The Bandit lingo we could muster up. Finally someone politely told us to “log off” or whatever you called it in cb lingo. However, feeling bold in our anonymity, we started heckling conversations. Basically we were trolling people before the invention of the Internet. That’s exactly what we were doing.

Lisa and I knew just a teeny tiny bit about the CB radio world because our Uncle Clyde was really into it. We adored our Uncle Clyde. He was my Grandma’s brother and we thought he was so handsome, soft spoken, but funny and he was so nice to us. We never could figure out his wife, Norma. She was fat (a sin in our family) and she had an unfortunate situation with her teeth. She didn’t have many. Norma was also really into CB radios. Lisa and I used this knowledge in our trolling.

“Hey, do you guys know Norma? She’s only got one tooth in her head!” We laughed and laughed at how hilarious we were. We laughed until we heard a familiar, deep voice say, “Girls – I think you need to get off the radio now.” Oh shit – it was our Uncle Clyde. I’m pretty sure we cried ourselves to sleep knowing what trouble we were going to be in and how disappointed Clyde would be in us.  The next morning we came clean to my mom and Grandma about what we’d done. They told us we would have to apologize. We decided to write a letter. It read:

Dear Uncle Clyd,

We are so sorry for what we said. It was stupid and we promise NEVER to touch the cb radio again or say mean things like that again.”

Love, Lisa & Nikki (aka Squeaky & Squealer)

Our apology was accepted, but we never lived that letter down. First of all, everyone thought it was hilarious we spelled his name wrong and for awhile we all called him “Clyd” instead of “Clyde.” And then the “(aka Squeaky & Squealer). Really, what were we even thinking? It’s not like we were KNOWN by these names and we certainly weren’t trying to be funny! For whatever reason we wrote it, thank God we did. My Uncle thought that was so funny we were pretty much forgiven on the spot. We were very careful to mind our p’s and q’s when it came to Norma, though. And after we saw a picture of her looking like Ava Gardner in her prime – we knew what “Clyd” had seen in her.

Summer’s end was the worst. First. Lisa had to start making the rounds to other relative’s houses to spend time with them before she went home. I hated it and always worried she would come back liking someone else better than me. I felt normal when Lisa was around and those other people got to feel normal all the time. Sharing her was really hard for me and I’m pretty sure I was a real brat about it. I didn’t care. I needed her to like me best. I needed her to stay with us. WE needed her so we could laugh and feel silly!

When she went home we would try to hang onto her energy. We would make some of the jokes that were so funny when Lisa was there. But they weren’t as funny anymore. If my Grandma gave me a coupon for candy bars, I probably threw it away because I really was getting fat. When Lisa left, I was no longer a Lady Who Lunched. Reynolds was just a place I would look longingly at until next summer, when Lisa would come back and we would all be happy again.