My mom spent part of her childhood in an orphanage, because she grew up in an era where the worst possible thing that could happen to you was something worse than having to share a bathroom with your sister.
And according to her, growing up in an orphanage wasn’t the worst possible thing either. The way my mom talked about her childhood, it was sweet and funny and, in general, an enviable, wonderful life.
When my mom would talk about the orphanage – they called it The Home! (smiley face) – it was like listening to a fairy tale and not the creepy Grimm’s kind. And even though she had a well established reputation for talking about horrid things in the past as if she accepted an Oscar in a Bob Mackie gown, I truly believed her when she told me The Home! was terrific.
“I was the youngest, so I got spoiled,” she said. “They gave me all the old magazines and let me cut them up. With scissors!” There may or may not have been a soothing but cheerful soundtrack playing in the background.
I actually thought my mom was raised in this super progressive groundbreaking orphanage in Pittsburgh. Why have I not read about this place in The New Yorker? I thought. This should have been the bi-annual feel-good segment on 60 Minutes.
Then in the ’90s we got a hold of some photos from one of my cousins of my mom and her siblings, photos were taken at the orphanage.
It was grim. Or should I say, Grimm.
Their heads were shaved and they were wearing what looked like costumes from the It’s a Hard Knock Life dance scene from Annie. The picture was that sepia black and white, but I was very suspicious that their actual clothes, skin and hair (or should I say “stubble,”) was as colorless as in the photo. No one was smiling.
That was when I started to question my mom’s version of her entire life. If Orphanage Fabulous was a lie, what else had she been rosifying? Was it really “fun” to have no furniture when you got married, because you had something to look forward to when you finally scraped up enough money to buy something to sit on? Was it really better to not have a freezer, because when you bought a quart of ice cream you got to invite the neighbors over to eat it, before it melted? Were our trips to the grocery store, on foot, with five kids and a wagon with three rickety wheels really her favorite part of the week? And was World War II really a time of romance and handsome men in uniform kissing pretty girls with Marcels and bright red lipstick? My mom’s stories were like the Hogan’s Heroes of historical reference. We liked painting a line up the back of our legs with eyeliner. We didn’t want real nylons! It was fun!
The fact that she not only never complained about her life but wouldn’t even acknowledge it was typical of my mom. And being her daughter was interesting. In the relatively cushy ’70s, it was kind of hard to complain about a teacher who made me cry by speaking sharply to me, or that Ken’s arm broke and now swings around like a whirlygig or that Lawsons was out of mint chocolate chip ice cream. She had every right to say, “Oh, yeah, here, let me shave your head because some kid nine beds down may have lice. Now, go knock down some Liddle Kiddles with Ken’s gimpy arm and get outta here.”
Of course she didn’t say that. She was as likely to have said that as admit that it’s no fun to have melted ice cream all over your kitchen table.
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Read more of Diane’s Just Humor Me columns here. Sign up for our weekly e-newsletter to get new blog post notifications. And if you like her blog, you’ll love her book, Home Sweet Homes: How Bundt Cakes, Bubble Wrap, and My Accent Helped Me Survive Nine Moves.