One of my most vivid memories as a child was being about 9 or 10 years old. It was summertime, and we still lived in Passaic Park. Right on Main Avenue, a block and a half away from our apartment, was a Dairy Queen. My Mom was working nights at that time, and was at work. My father was in a stupor from whatever the hell he had ingested earlier that night while outside playing with his asshole friends. He came wobbling upstairs and told Melissa and I that for being so good and leaving him alone while he was outside we were going to walk to Dairy Queen. The niceties were few and far between with my father, so when good things were offered we jumped at the chance. The 3 of us walked down there, and got whatever it was that we wanted. My father handed us the bag, and told us to go eat and take his upstairs and put it in the freezer. We went upstairs, ate what we could, and I went to put what was left of my and my sisters ice cream in the freezer for later. When I opened that freezer door, my fathers came tumbling out. It hit the floor and the lid cracked. I put it back on, cleaned up the little bit that spilled and put everything away.
About a half hour later, our father comes upstairs. I guess his playdate with his useless cronies was over and he was looking for a snack. He opened the freezer and saw that his had fallen earlier and that the lid was cracked. His extremely short fuse was lit, and it was like 10 tons of dynamite went off. All of this because of a cracked lid and some dribbling. We were used to his temper tantrums at this point, but this one, oh this one. This was off the charts. My father flew into a rage. To say he saw red is putting it as mildly as I possibly can. I remember the screaming. I couldn't tell you what he said word for word, but I remember it being deafening. I remember things being thrown all over our kitchen. But then it went too far. The doors in our apartment were very old, and were made of real wood and were very heavy. My father ripped the door literally off the hinges and threw it with all his might at the bed my sister and I shared and were huddled on crying and praying for him to pass out or just stop. That door missed my head by an inch. A literal inch. I was on top of my sister trying to protect her. It didn't end there. Object after object came hurling at us. I still to this day don't know how the hell he missed. One could say it was his drunken inability to aim. One could say it was blind luck on our end. Or one could say that we have someone up there watching over us.
By some miracle that night my Mom came home hours early. That never happened. She walked in just as he was winding down. She saw the carnage and us weeping. She did what she could to calm us down and clean up the carnage. By this point my father had gone into his room to pass out. There are just some things that stay burned in your memory no matter how hard you try to forget.
That's just a small insight as to what life was like in my house. For all intents and purposes, I shouldn't be here today. I had many close calls growing up in my house. Never mind the close calls I've had in my adult life.
Between that, and driving home drunk from the bar too many times. Poor choices made and consequences I've paid, someone up there must want me down here.
I don't know why I'm here today. I'd love to think that my Grandmother who died when I just turned 9 is up there watching over me. I believe in guardian angels. I'd love to think that maybe I'm meant to do great things in this life and it's just yet to happen. I'd love to think that I'm here so that I could be a mother to my amazing child and she'll do incredible things. The point is I'm beyond greatful that I am here and I look forward to growing old and wise.
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