She was the youngest of six. There was lots of vying for attention in her house. Her Dad was a butcher and liked to spent money. He liked the girls, too. Mom stayed home and raised the family; four girls, two boys. The boys died before their fifties. The girls lived into their nineties. When the foursome got together, three of them living a thousand miles from their home in Missouri, it was a cackle of conversation. Four women, all under five feet tall, talking at once, one upping each other. Our Sugar Plum was lost in the crowd. She set it up that way. I don't think she knew it. Mostly.
Family togetherness often left her feeling less than whole. She played the learned helpless role. There was a sort of safety knowing where she was in the pecking order. I often thought had things been different, she could have been so much more. Fulfilled. Peaceful.
Sugar Plum was sweet, round in her later years and often talking about that. Self-effacing, the scapegoat. Her husband often put her down in front of the family and friends. He had his own issues losing his brother. His parents told him they wished he had died instead of the beloved brother. He never felt whole or even close...after that.
That he had a girlfriend didn't help the situation. The family lore was to keep quiet about it. Beth often saw them together. He and the girlfriend. Sugar Plum and he only went to social events together. He lived two lives, one with Sugar Plum, and the other with the other woman. Once he even came on to Beth's Mom. She is still surprised she told me about it.
It was a crab basket in that family. Everyone crawling as quickly as they could to get out from whatever they felt they were stuck in. And, there wasn't much emotional support going on. The sisters did laugh from time to time about the family antics. Especially forty years after the events.
There was the story about the family continually moving when the bills came due. The story became more funny with each passing year. I imagine it wasn't so funny packing up and escaping. But escaping is what they people did.
G was the oldest of the sisters. She and her husband had no children. Couldn't. A crackerjack bridge player. Balanced. R was the social one, the formally educated one, a teacher. She told the rest of the clan that she was smart. Sugar Plum revered her and believed what she was told. The family was know for repeating exactly what was told to them as though it was gospel truth.
"She is the talented one. Draws, paints, speaks languages," Beth often heard.
Her younger sister, J, was the nervous one, though her daughters did not think so at the time. She had the big house in suburbia. Her husband is said to have removed materials from his government job. He was proud to display Uncle Sam's wares in his shop. That he was excellent with tools speaks to his many ways of being clever. A mechanical engineer. He and J were married secretly for ten years. Her parents never liked the man. They were not about to tell them they eloped. In time, they relocated out of state. Eventually, everyone knew the story.
Sugar Plum's husband, a talented and brilliant engineer also, headed the agency J's husband worked for. In fact, he helped him find the position. The agency was only to happy to have a capable man. Sugar Plum was happy to have won her husband. Another part of the family creed. Marry well, look the part. Suck the rest up.
It took Beth years to understand Sugar Plum. That she suffered from self-esteem was an understatement. Her children were continually embarrassed by her, but only too happy to receive the goods she bestowed on them; home down payments, babysitting, college and graduate school tuition, an open heart, and lots of compassion, delivered meals when they were sick.
In so many ways, Sugar Plum was the most successful sister. Not that there is any standard of measurement by which to assess this. Everyone loved her. Her children were embarrassed by her.
By the time Beth realized what was going on, she started a personal mission to help Sugar Plum's esteem. Both women supported one another in the years to come But it wasn't always that way. Sugar Plum wanted her children to marry well. Degrees. Family names. Money. Beth didn't have those kinds of credentials in the dating stage. In years to come, she rang the bell. The only one to attend an Ivy League school. It didn't matter as much for Beth as it did to Sugar Plum. She made sure everyone knew. She also added,
"They must have eased the requirements, Beth being an older student and all."
That was quintessential Sugar Plum. No filters. You knew where you stood with her.
In time, Sugar Plum grew to love Beth. Beth set better parameters for her. Even helped her and her daughter find peace together. When life took Beth in another direction from the family, a phone call to Sugar Plum after a few years of silence said it all.
"Hi, is Sugar Plum around?"
"Hello, is this OUR Beth?"
This ninety something woman called those dear to her 'sugar plum.' In time, the women of the family who had an affinity for her reversed it.
She was OUR Sugar Plum.
No comments:
Post a Comment