1967 Ethel Magee: Part 2

“Just because your mother’s crazy doesn’t mean she’s not right.”

~ My therapist, 2011

At that house on Standing Oaks Street in 1967 we had a backyard so big the neighbor boys used to come over uninvited to play catch. The blond-haired, blue-eyed, positively dreamy Nesbit twins who lived in the middle of our block were the worst offenders. It seemed like Daddy was forever chasing them off our property. But there was no fence around our backyard, so it is not really surprising that boys would throw balls around back there. Mostly it seemed innocent, harmless.

Then one day in 1968 it didn’t seem so harmless anymore. The Magees weren’t our neighbors for long and I don’t remember the family well. I think Mr. Magee was a tall, thin working-class Irishman with dark hair, but I am not sure and it doesn’t much matter. There were two Magee youngins’ roughly the same ages as me and Baby Sister. The oldest was a girl whose name was, I believe, Tammy Magee. There were a lot of “Tammys” in my suburban elementary school. The younger Magee was a boy; his name may or may not have been Robbie, but that’s what I will call him for reference.

Those folks were all the wallpaper to what I do remember. Now it sounds dismissive and self-centered to refer to people as the wallpaper of my life, but I think at that age most everyone experiences most…