Sidetracked Charley

My father and his father The Ruskin Heights tornado was this dividing line in my life. And in the life of our family. I have wondered from time to time what the alternate timeline would have been. We went to Kansas City for the funerals as a family and we came back as isolated individuals living in the same house. What had always united us before, fishing trips and camping and building things, was gone. On hiatus. Mother had a secret. A lump had begun to grow in her breast. She would ask me during our bathroom talks. She would invite me in to talk while she took a bath. Talks that Dad and my brother were not privy to. She had come back from KC with a pain in her right shoulder. She went to Dr. Fitzpatrick who thought she had a lingering infection from the mastitis. He treated that with more antibiotics. Then he thought she had bursitis. He treated that with heat treatments. The lump was supposedly drainage. But it kept getting bigger. That was what the whispered talks were about...

When a young and impressionable high school student I read W. W. Jacobs short story The Monkey's Paw. Seldom have I been so taken by a few words, which for all of you that have not read it, is available on line to read at the link American Literature link. In short the story is about wishes that go wrong, and being very careful what you ask for. I had at the time a very difficult life. Mom had undergone breast cancer surgery which in the early sixties was a black and brutal thing indeed. My father, who deeply loved my mother, was not coping very well at all. My brother, who was over attached to Mom, was useless. And I had a kid sister that seemed abandoned by everyone but me who was having a difficult time with me. And as if that was not enough my art teacher decided to become abusive and the school administration's only answer was to take me out of the one activity of the day that produced any sort of calm. I teetered on the edge of a total nervous breakdown. Looking back I n...