Late afternoon, 1981. School had ended a few hours earlier. I lay in the hand made foam rubber and plywood bed my dad fashioned for me. I was more comfortable in it. I was glad my crib days were over. Most days I don’t know which dad is going to walk through the door. The dad that just won at gambling? Or, maybe the just completed a construction job and actually got paid dad? The dad I dreaded the most was the miserable one. I hated when he appeared because often that misery was taken out on me, my two brothers or my sister. You might ask what that meant for us? Well unfortunately punishment was not your standard go to your room with no dessert or toys. When my father let off steam, it involved a rubber hose or an extension cord and yelling.

I had done something in school I was fairly proud of as a precocious 4th grade boy. Ms. Lublin was a troubled teacher. I would sometimes watch her walk to school from the J Train, muttering to herself and biting the loose skin off her bottom lip. Maybe she had her fill of dealing with knuckle headed fourth graders. Whatever it was, I was always raising her eyre. The slightest instance of me doing what kids do would lead to my ear getting pulled or a bar of soap in my mouth. Not the fruity soaps of today either. I can still taste the Lava Soap on the buds of my tongue. Little did Ms. Lublin know these torments were like a tickle compared to what awaited me at home. I don’t even know what I did anymore to provoke the soap lunch. I do recall, upon being dismissed from school for the day, yelling at top of my lungs at her,”You fat pig!”

One of the most stressful parts of living in dad’s house was when that phone rang. It was a rotary dial black phone. An appropriate color for the merkiness of what a conversation between he and who ever was on the other end could lead to for us. I knew what I had done this time and my heart sank whenever he answered a call. Once it was Sweet Uncle George. Dad’s Laughing! Good news. Then came the next call. My ears strained and my heart beated out of my chest. It was Ms. Lublin. She told my father what happened earlier in the day after school. My father hung up and ran to the bathroom and picked his weapon. This time it was the rubber garden house, I had never seen used on a garden. He looped it in his right hand and ran toward me. With every welt producing, painful hit came a syllable. “DON’T-DOIT-AGAIN.” He must have said it about 5 times. I had the welts on my arms and legs to prove it.

Thinking back, I feel like Ms. Lublin knew the extent of the abuse that went on in my home and what that phone call would mean. Did she not care? Was she a sadist? For me it didn’t matter whether it was my teachers or something else that happened in my father’s hard life. An abuser needs easy targets that cant fight back. Those were my siblings and I.

My father taught me well who I did not want to be. In fact, just doing the opposite of most most things my pop did has made a good amount of the difference. Add in the work of self discovery and I’m happy with the man I’ve become.