Food and Shelter
Mom gave birth to me, her second child, just two months after turning seventeen. She continued to live with her parents for a short while, but a second child sounded the final closing of her childhood and the end of their protective shelter. Her parents had two more children at home; twelve-year old Johnny and fourteen year-old Susan, for whom I was named. They could not continue with the conjugal visits of Mom’s husband and unending pregnancies under foot. Mom had endured a miscarriage after a four month pregnancy between Jennie and me. She would have one more baby girl fourteen months later and name her Elizabeth, after herself. We were all born Cesarian, as Mom was too small at fifteen for childbirth and stopped growing with the advent of four pregnancies. (more…)