excerpt from Bullshit Rodeo

I was in first grade. My parents would divorce soon. I lived in a house in Jacksboro, Texas on a dead end street with my parents and my siblings. A preacher and his family lived across the street. At night in the summer my sister and I would catch frogs. I remember being afraid at night because of stories a babysitter told me. The scariest one was about a doll that came to life and killed an entire family. Even though the story was ridiculous it scared the fuck out of me because I could imagine that. I could absolutely see one of my creepy dolls coming to life and slicing me to shreds with a butcher knife.

The preacher across the street had teenage sons. One morning with blue sky and white clouds and chirp chirp chirping birds I was in the backyard of the house next door with one of the sons. The family that lived in the house was not home. We were alone in the backyard. He had me down on the ground. There was a Little Golden Book. Why? How? Where the fuck did it come from? I don’t know. A Little Golden Book with songs inside. Music, lyrics, illustrations. The teenage son had me down on the ground. He said he would let me up if I could read the book. I was afraid. I could not read, not very well. I tried in my shy stumbling way to make up the words I did not know. I remember feeling fear and shame and powerlessness and then tremendous relief when the family finally got home. I was on the ground and he was on top, trampling smothering mocking degrading my smallness. I could have been a blade of grass. I could have been a dandelion. I could have been a flower.

But

I

was

a

girl.