The Steps and The Hallway!
When your orphaned (that's what I called it, at least at the time that's what it seemed like) and you are being shuffled between family members, I just was trying to find a place to belong. The front hallway steps were where I thought I belonged..out of the way.
At 6, I craved the quiet. I didn't want to be fussed over. I didn't want to be found and usually for the most part nobody noticed anyway... when you have a house full of people at all points of the day there is usually one kid that slips into some crack!
Now don't get me wrong, I was not abandoned, well may be in some other sense with mom dying but I was not left to take care of myself nor was my sister... We were not left alone for hours on end trying to fend for ourselves that was never the case!!!!!
I was just a different kind of kid, not too far from what I am now just...a different kind of adult! I became highly sensitive to the noise and I found that if I sat in that hallway, I could collectively gather my little thoughts. (What thoughts I had at 6 years old is not important now but I had them)
Our house was a constant shuffle of commotion. It seemed crisis after crisis occurred and the shoe was always dropping and after mom's death nothing seemed calm for lack of a better word. In that hallway, the ceiling went on forever, landing after landing (ok there were only 2 landings but still!!! when your small everything looks gigantic) the winding steps descended into the heavens and the acoustics OMG!!! (that I learned later on) there was an eerie feeling to that hallway. The air seemed thicker and a cast always seemed to linger. Noises, echos and creeks always came from that hallway and to date many of my nightmares still take place in that hallway. The hallway was a remarkable place to disappear to...but it was also a place to fear in the dark.
Sitting on those top steps was a learning opportunity. On those steps, I learned how dogs mate! ( A. Phyllis had a beauty shop in the basement and her and one of her clients talked relentlessly one day about dogs mating...hows that for a 6 year old learning curve?) I Learned about kissing boys (again A Phyllis would have friends over and I would be sent upstairs...ha! joke was on them!!! I was in the infamous hallway listening), Time after time though more than anything, I heard crying, deep sobs of crying... heart wrenching...heart breaking crying. Not understanding any of it, what choice did I have but escape to the hallway. What does a 6 year old do when no one can explain anything...but to retreat to the solace of the hallway steps to find the quiet and pretend everything is ok.
That hallway and I became the best of friends...even when I returned to that home as an adult. I would sit now on the second landing steps and sing to the top of my lungs. I wonder if mom did that too? High ceilings and vocals make a fascinating combination!!!
I even painstaking painted that hallway and its 18 foot ceilings, removed the carpet off those steps and stripped them down to the bare wood...only to come home one day to find that the person I was living with decided he was going to have the steps re-carpeted with out my knowledge! I was furious!!! I did not speak to him for almost a month. (that is no exaggeration either!!)
That hallway and those steps and I became one!
I miss my place of retreat. My spot of where I belong!
Those days are so long gone... I now live in a home that has no massive hallway but a set of outside steps that looks out into my back yard. I find myself in the mornings, with my cup of coffee, my cigarette( that depends on my stress level) and the dogs. There on the top step I plop my adult body and I retreat, reflect, contemplate, plot, and plan all my moves. I still am trying to find that place where I belong, where I'm not in the way, can do my thing and where I can just be quiet with my own thoughts. There I can get away from the madness and the noise when I find the need to escape to some solitude. I take this walk down memory lane and I think how far I have come and all that I have chose to leave behind... and pray for what is yet to come!
I am no longer 6 years old and I no longer feel the need to eaves drop and the only crying I hear is my own...Oh... but don't fret, those tears I'm shedding are worth their weight in words! and I will cry me a river for as much as I need... to get it all out....cause there are still many stories to be told from a new set of steps!
Meet Me In St. Louis
Kitryn Marie
Bates Street House
(Where We All Grew Up)
