Chapter 12 - Why I Shattered the Steel Ceiling & How I Did It

Before dad died I started having an affair with that man who was eighteen years younger than me. Mom had always told me that life began at forty, and she was right.  That is how old I was when younger men started showing up. 

They were a lot more fun than the men my own age who had, for whatever reason, decided they were not interested in anything except a blow job most of the time. Oh yeah, they wanted me to wait on them while they vegetated on the couch too. 

If I was going to have sex, then I was going to get something out of it too! Also, the younger men were not afraid to pitch in and help with the things that men my age thought were ‘women’s work’ like cooking, cleaning and laundry.

#8 was on parole. He could not find a job so I talked him into going back to prison so he could complete his sentence and be done with the department of corrections.  I stuck by him while he was incarcerated because I believed he would, like I had, come out and build a productive life. 

We were married after he was released on November 25, 1996 and divorced May 15, 1997.

Although marrying #8 and #9 (married March 21, 1998 and divorced July 27, 2000) were horrific mistakes monetarily for me, they were probably the best things I could have done. I could focus on the chaos of trying to live with men who had their own agendas rather than how much I missed dad.  I got to grieve dad a little bit at a time.

My siblings and I went through the things that were in dad’s house. I found out later that they got what they wanted first.  I was not even allowed to walk into dad’s side of the garage. 

I put the things I wanted in a pile in his living room and expected them to be there the next day, but when I went back the lamp I had chosen was gone and a pair of huge ugly lamps had taken its place. My sister said she donated the lamp I chose to a couple who had a fire and needed furniture. 

I had to pay each of my siblings one third for the cemetery plot next to Lori’s grave. I gladly paid them because dad had always told me that he was going to be buried in that space.  He said there were only three plots there.  It turns out that there were four plots and he was buried next to mom. 

I had my head stone installed on my plot that has “Mother of Lori” on it. I was finally, after thirty four years, able to claim that I am her mother.  That may not mean anything to anybody else, but it means the world to me! 

Dad’s estate paid #8 and me to clean the house so it could be sold. It took a while because dad did not want anything moved while he was alive.  There was literally a lot of crud to dig though. 

After we were done my brother called from dad’s house, “Git your ass over here and help me dig out the staples that you and #3 put in this carpet pad!” CLICK

When I walked into the house I reminded him that he and his second wife had that carpet installed for dad. “I’ll help you pull the staples, but don’t blame me!”

He did not apologize. In fact, he has never apologized for anything. 

I was always getting blamed for things I didn’t do. The family continued mom’s obsession about blaming me for everything that went wrong in our family.  She always told me, “If you would just do what I tell you, everything would be perfect!” 

Dad had stomped down to the basement where I was sleeping, “What did you do to your sister?”

“Nothing!”

“She just shit herself and I know you did something!”

“She left the bar right after we got there with a guy and I haven’t seen her since then!!”

My sister recently told me the reason she had the accident in the bathroom that morning was because she had gotten the stomach flu from her daughters.

My siblings and I went our separate ways after dad’s funeral, but that didn’t shock me. The only time that either of them called me was when there was a gift that I needed to buy for something or they wanted something else from me.  In fact, the calls were pretty well nonexistent after I no longer made custom window treatments and didn’t attend family functions. 

When I would call them to try and stay in touch, I got the impression they were only being polite in listening to me. When the calls were not reciprocated, I gave up.

However, I did get calls from my brother when I could pick up a check from dad’s estate. One time he called me to come to his house.  I said something about my classes at Drake University.  He seemed to get pissed.  He told me that he had wanted to go to college when he graduated from high school, “But the folks didn’t have the money so I had to go to work.” 

He acted like he was not going to give me the check until I reminded him that he, as the executor of dad’s estate, was getting more money than me, “You could go to college if you wanted to.”

He finally handed me the check. I was glad to leave because, at one point, he had the same look on his face that mom always got right before she slugged me.

I figured out later that he may have thought our parents had spent their money on me so they couldn’t afford to send him to college, but that was wrong. I was only nine when he graduated from high school.  It was not until I was fourteen that our parents started spending their money on psychiatrists, hospitalizations and medications so that I would keep my mouth shut about our pedophile grandfather.

After #8 and I were married, he dropped me off at the AA club in Des Moines and disappeared with my IROC.  He also emptied out my checking and savings accounts, and took blank checks. 

Later a police officer told me that he had committed two burglaries in my car, wrote lots of bogus checks on my account and was living with another woman. If I had not turned him in for stealing the car, the police would have confiscated it, but I could do nothing about the money.

I had gotten a ride home from an AA brother the night #8 stranded me at the club. Now I was stranded at home.  After a week or so, and the police not finding my car, I called #8’s mother.  I told her to tell her son that his wife wanted to talk to him.  It wasn’t very long and he drove my car into the driveway. 

He went to the bedroom and called to me. Instead of following him, I grabbed my purse and the dog.  I got in the car and left.  I stayed with a girl friend in another town and didn’t go back for a couple of days. He told me a few years later that he had hitchhiked back to Des Moines that day

I don’t remember how long it was, but he ended up stealing another vehicle, leading the police on a high speed chase and getting put in the Indianola jail. I took the paperwork for our divorce.  It included getting everything back in my name, and I always get my maiden name back.  If I didn't want to be married to the man, I certainly didn’t want to use their last name. 

My attorney said that he would not sign them, especially the quit claim deed, but he did sign everything in front of the jailer. I went before the judge and we were divorced.

KARMA – #8 dammed near put me into bankruptcy. He got even with me for husband #2.  I had torn up and shredded everything in our apartment before I left #2.  I took the two pounds of ‘weed’ that he was going to sell.  I made sure he didn’t have any nice clothes to wear.  Yeah, I finally knew what #2 felt. 

I also understood what my best friend went through when her husband moved in with me and then back with her. She taught me what getting past judgment looks like. I am still friends with the other woman that #8 was living with.

Additionally, I had to feel what my grandparents felt when I was still in the throws of my addictive behavior. They had moved from the farm into town.  I helped a man who needed to get out of Des Moines fast.  A friend and I took him to their empty house on the farm and left him there.

They had left their dog in the fenced yard to keep everyone out of the house. They knew that I had something to do with the cigarettes being crushed on their hardwood floors because I was the only one that the dog would have allowed in the yard, but I denied knowing anything about it. 

Karma is a bitch, but in this case, the pedophile is lucky that is all I ever did to him!

Throughout dad’s illness and death, my marriages and divorces, I kept attending undergraduate classes at Drake University.  Focusing on my classes and homework kept me grounded and somewhat sane.  Attending 12-Step meetings kept me sober.

I was in psychology class one day. I don’t remember what we were studying, but it was like a lightening bolt went off in my brain and the sky became crystal clear. 

It wasn’t my fault that grandpa raped me and mom made me live lies about it! ….. Everything wrong in my family wasn’t my fault! 

I even realized that my prayers were not the reason mom had the car accident. She screwed up!  She was driving too fast for the weather conditions.  She locked her brakes going down hill on frost and lost control.  She didn’t mean to kill Lori so I could never be her mother.  She just fucked up!!!

I left that room in a daze after class. I walked directly to Dr. Dean’s office, but he wasn’t there.  I must have looked pretty bad because his wife asked me, “What’s the matter?”

I could only get out a whisper, “You mean it wasn’t my fault?”

She shook her head no and I sobbed.

The biosphere snapped into its proper place again that day. No longer was I willing to accept the responsibility for my family’s rage and guilt so they could look and feel normal. 

I bought a Buick with some of the money I got from dad’s estate because #8 had almost blown the motor in my IROC. I paid off my student loans and remodeled my mobile home. 

I combined two small bedrooms, two closets and a half bath room into one large bedroom at one end. I left the other bedroom for my office at the other end.  The living room, dining room, galley kitchen and bathroom were in the middle.  The washer and dryer were in the hall. 

I had the vanity in the bathroom replaced with a pedestal sink on a platform so it was tall enough for me. I bought new appliances and really loved my electric range with a flat cooking surface because it was easy to clean.

I washed the ceilings and painted them, wall papered part of the walls and cleaned the paneling. I had ceiling-hugger fans installed over the dining table and in my bedroom.  I had the floor coverings removed and a sub-floor installed.  I laid the vinyl tiles like dad had taught me by starting with a chalk line to keep them straight and the carpet layers took care of the rest.

I have had to stop typing for a bit. I was remembering all of my marriages, affairs, etc.  Somewhere in the book, Alcoholics Anonymous, it talks about alcoholics roaring through people’s lives like a tornado.  That is what I did.  I tried to drag him, whoever he was at the time, with me toward my goals, but they had their own agendas and didn’t want to go.

I have always envisioned these episodes in my life as if I was a beautiful female horse trotting down the road pulling my small two wheeled cart. The sun is shining.  I am happy and care free with my mane and tail flowing in the breeze.  That is how it feels when I am on my own. 

Invariably a stud trots up beside me. They tell me that it would be easier for me, and I would be a lot happier, if I would harness up with them and pull their large heavy wagon.  I eventually believe them after a few romps in the pasture.  I unhook from my cart and harness up with him. 

Everything is fine for awhile, but then, every darned time, the sky would fill with clouds. Then the thunder and lightening would start and I would get scared when they yelled at me.  I felt they were going to attack like mom did, and some of them did emotionally.  It always seemed to me that the storms got worse the more I hid in my safe place and just kept my mouth shut. 

Their wagon would get harder and harder to pull. I would give it all I had, but after a while I didn’t have any more to give.  I’d look over and he, whoever he was at the time, would be lying on the ground letting me pull the wagon and drag him too. 

I always knew it was over when I drove into the driveway and didn’t want to go into my home because he was in there.  I would tell them I was done, mentally and emotionally remove the harness, sometimes leaving behind everything I had added to his wagon, and get a divorce. 

That process was three fold for me. (1) I would look at the divorce papers and think, is that all there is? There should be more! (2) In time I would think, another one bit the dust, boom, boom! (3) I happily trotted on down the road with my mane and tail flowing in the breeze in front of my empty cart.  However, with practice, these phases shortened in duration and I got over the relationship faster. 

I believe that I am somewhere on the attachment disorder continuum. It seems to be easier for me to get over relationships than it is for other people.  Believe me, I know that nothing lasts forever and, if there is such a thing as a soul mate, I don’t blame mine for running the other way.

After my third husband, who was also an alcoholic, all of the men I married or had a long-term relationship with were from outpatient treatment or the AA club. They all had issues, but I had watched other ‘double winner’ couples (both recovering alcoholics/addicts) find happiness being married to each other.  I was not ready to give up trying to find the right man.  I still did not understand that I was not the right woman.

I should have listened to a friend who told me years ago, “Bonnie, if you keep fishin’ in the same pond, you’re gonna keep catchin’ the same kind of fish.”

 #8 went back to prison after our divorce, but I never found out what the charges were. To be honest with you, I did not really care. 

I went to the AA club in Des Moines after classes.  I attended 12-Step meetings and continued to play cards like I had been doing for years. 

One of the men I had known for about twelve years started getting friendly with me. He said that he was living in a woman’s house and doing her handy man chores, but there was nothing else between them …. and I believed him.

However, she did not see it that way. She thought he was going to marry her.  She stalked me by putting items on my car every time I went to the AA club, hang up calls at home, etc.  Once I went to her home and returned the gum and note that she had stuck on my car window. 

I knocked on her door, but when she did not answer I stuck the gum and note on her vehicle window and got off her property before the cop got there. I didn’t do that again after a stern warning from the nice officer.

Right after #9 and I were married he told me something he didn’t like about me. I don’t even remember what it was, but I told him, “Don’t start!  If I change that, there will always be something you don’t like.  You’ll want me to keep changing things into infinity.  That just ain’t gonna happen.  You knew who and what I was when you married me.  Deal with it!”

The next thing I noticed was every time we sat down to eat a meal he would find a long brown hair in the first bite. That really puzzled me and made me feel awful.  I had never had trouble with my long hair in food before, especially every meal, and especially in the first bite of every meal. 

Finally I realized that he went to the bathroom just before we sat down to eat. I figured out that he was going in there, taking a hair out of my brush and putting it in his mouth before he came to the table.  I removed the brush from the bathroom and there were no more problems with my hair in his food.

As usual, my life did not change that much. I just had a different man in my bed.  He went to work and I went to college.  My main focus was going to 12-Step meetings, classes and studying. 

I fixed our meals, did our laundry, cleaned the house, had pretty good sex with him, etc., but I started noticing that when I told him that I had a big test coming up, he picked an argument with me the night before so I was too upset to study for it. I stopped telling him when I had tests.  I didn’t have that problem any more.

He wanted to have a water softener installed. I told him, “I have high blood pressure.  I can’t have that much salt in the water.”

“Well, my other wife had high blood pressure and we had a water softener.”

Since I had known her, I asked, “Yes, and what did she die of?”

“Heart attack.”

“Your honor, I rest my case. That is the reason people with high blood pressure are not supposed to have a lot of salt in their water.”

He told me that he was playing games on my computer in the den while I was reading my text books in the living room, but one day I got on the internet. He had forgotten to log off of a dating site.  His profile said, “Married, but looking”.

Needless to say, I immediately put a pass word on my computer so he could no longer use it. There was a small computer with games on it waiting for him in the living room when he got home from work. 

“Why can’t I use your computer?”

“You need to get your own computer to troll for other women Hot Shot! What do you mean married but looking”?

Since there was no way for him to deny it, we settled into a hush that verged on mayhem.

Later he asked to use my computer again, “I’ve changed!”

“So have I! I didn’t blow your head off as soon as you walked through the door after I found ‘married, but looking'!”

The two pistols in the house immediately disappeared.

Some weeks later there had been a lot of rain and everything was flooded. He told me, “Honey, let’s rent a boat and go fishing on the lake this weekend.”

“My daddy didn’t raise a fool. You aren’t gonna get me in a boat on flood water!”

“Why?”

“Because you and I both know that I wouldn’t come back alive.”

“Well, why do you stay with me if that’s what you think?”

“Because I gave a letter to the Waukee chief of police that says, if something happens to me, it was not an accident.”

He took off and I knew that he was going after the pistols in the storage unit. I called Joyce, “Will you come help me move my stuff to your house until I can get him out of here?”

“Sure, I’ll be right there.”

His pickup came skidding back into the driveway. He stormed into the house, “Now say something!”

“I’m not saying anything. Joyce is on her way to help me move my stuff to her house.”

That seemed to take the wind out of him. He sat down at his computer and started playing games.  He stayed there while she and I packed my stuff in our cars. 

I stayed with her for a while. I decided to get my own place since I couldn’t smoke in her house.  I knew that it was too dangerous for me to move back in with him, even though it was my mobile home that he was living in. 

I asked her to drive me to look at an apartment. We had decided that the apartment was not for me and she was driving back to the street.  #9’s pickup went by.  I told her to follow him, but he pulled into the next parking lot.  We waited until he was inside the building.  She parked next to the pickup.  I put a note on the console of his pickup, “This is why!”

I talked to the woman he was having the affair with several years later. She told me that he had turned white after they got in the pickup and he saw the note. 

He moved back with the original woman. I moved home.

#8 offered to kill #9 for me, but I told him, “There is no place in the Big Book that gives me permission to do that or have that done for me. I’ve read that dammed book three times trying to find anything I can misconstrue to give me permission to blow his head off, but its just not there!  Believe me, I would have found it if it was!!!”  #9 and I were divorced July 27, 2000.

My bank accounts had been emptied again so I had to make a decision. I was either going to keep my mobile home and go to work, or sell the mobile home and continue my education.  Since the only thing I was good at was driving semi, and my back would not let me do that any more, I sold the trailer. 

I had some friends help me take the few things I needed to the one room I rented from an AA brother. Everything else they divided up between them for helping me move.

I sat down with #9 and played a game of cribbage some moths later in the back yard of the AA club. He had retired and was getting ready to move back to the west coast where he was raised.  I apologized for not focusing on him and our marriage more.  That is all of the amends I felt that I needed to make to him.  He did not offer any amends to me, but that was okay, I had cleaned up my side of the street.  He came to visit friends in Iowa several years ago and had remarried his first wife.

I continued my classes at Drake University.  I worked part time as a care giver for an agency that helped people with learning disabilities so I could pay my rent.

Dr. Dean, my student advisor, told me that I needed to write my life story. You can give voice to girls and women like you!”  He sent me to the hardest writing classes that Drake offered. 

He told me that my book could help others going through the same things I had lived through. “Look at you now!  You’re getting an education.  You need to do something with it!  If you get enough education, you are in the position to be a communication conduit between corrections and the inmates.  He said it so many times that I believed him. 

He told me that I should get my master’s degree in criminal justice. He had me contact a woman who was an attorney at the Iowa Attorney General’s office.  She also had a PhD in criminal justice.  We were supposed to meet for about an hour in the Drake cafeteria, but we ended up talking longer. 

She told me to take the GRE examination. She said that I needed to pass it before I could be admitted to a graduate program.  I didn’t tell her, but I have always been horrible with tests. 

In between mom telling me that I was a peacock and not a crow, and I was not living up to my potential, there were a lot of times that I was too stupid to bring home all A’s. Or was it that I was not stupid so why didn’t I bring home all A’s?  Either way, I never was able to do things right for her.  Tests were how my intelligence was measured and the tests scared the hell out of me.

I didn’t jump right into taking the GRE exam either. In fact, I waited for quite a while before I even bought the book, GRE for Dummies.  I read through it a couple of times and realized that there was no way I was going to be able to memorize all of it.  I laid it down and tried to ignore it.

My undergraduate senior capstone was the session, ‘Institutionalized Women: Their Barred Opportunities and Resources’ that I organized and moderated at the 2000 Midwest Sociological Conference in Chicago: Century of the “MINORITY” Majority. 

I presented my paper, The Steel Ceiling. All other participants that presented papers at my session had graduate degrees while I only had the general equivalency degree (GED) that I had earned before I went to prison in 1963.

The female attorney with the PhD in criminal justice had become one of my mentors by that time. We flew to Chicago together and she presented her paper, Women Behind Bars: Equality, Equity and Justice.  She also attended my senior capstone presentation at Drake University. 

She told me that she was proud of me because not very many undergraduate students organized their own sessions at that kind of conference, presented a paper they had researched by sending out questionnaires to corrections, and then introduced a new concept like ‘the steel ceiling’.

We had many long discussions. She said that she was aware that the majority of female prisoners had been abused as a child, but had never really thought about the long-term consequences of how that abuse might affect the rest of our lives.  How hard it might be for them to heal by themselves.

She could see, in me, living proof of why many of us ended up living on the streets drunk and addicted, prostituting ourselves, in mental health and correctional facilities, and how much better my life was after people started helping me instead of punishing me.

I didn’t tell anybody, but I knew that I was a token (tokenism: the practice of doing something (such as hiring a person who belongs to a minority group) only to prevent criticism and give the appearance that people are being treated fairly). I knew that I was being watched to see if rehabilitation really worked.  Hell, I didn’t know if it would work for me or not, but I was going to give it my best shot!

We had an interesting conversation after she told me that she and other female attorneys had volunteered at the women’s prison to teach the inmates how to balance their check book. She looked surprised when I laughed.

“We already know how to write checks, and balancing the book is not our problem. Being able to earn enough money so we can have money to open a checking account is our problem.  Nobody wants to hire us when we are released.  We have a choice of working at some place like a fast food joint at minimum wages or selling drugs and our bodies so we can make up to a thousand dollars a day.  Which one would you choose if your kids were looking at you and asking for more food?”

I learned a lot from her too. For instance, I learned why most people don’t want to help those sitting in the chair I once occupied.  By the time people like me get in trouble with the law they have been damaged to the point they are running on rage and their survival instincts.  They have been emotionally cut off at the knees when they tried to trust.  They end up fighting everyone and everything.  At least that is what I did.

Many times it is like trying to hold mercury between your open fingers to corral them so you can figure out what they need. Just like the mercury, they get away at every opportunity, and there is usually collateral damage on both sides.

Yes! I was going to need a lot more education.  I had to figure out what would make someone be willing to make that kind of effort and commitment to someone like me. 

Below is my tribute to one of those people:

 

 

I finished my undergraduate classes and received my degree in sociology on Mother’s Day 2000. I accepted the diploma and started walking across the stage, Whatcha think about me now ma?

She had always told me, as we passed Drake University on our way to and from downtown Des Moines, that the people who went there were really smart.  There was also a neighbor on the next road from our farm that she said I should be real nice to, “His grandfather donated a building at Drake University.”

After all of the times she and so many others had called me stupid, crazy and everything else you can imagine, did that diploma mean that I was not real stupid after all?

I had learned enough in my classes to recognize that I was not the only unbalanced person in my family, but I also realized that I certainly had my share of flaws. What I was real curious about is, was I finally living up to that potential mom had beat me over the head with?

I wrote earlier about the graduation party my friends threw for me with the tent, balloons, disk jockey and dancing, and why I did not invite my family. I had a wonderful day and was totally exhausted when it was all over, but I am still extremely sad that I did not trust my family enough to include them in the festivities.

There was an international Alcoholics Anonymous conference in Minneapolis that year and someone paid for my ticket.  I never found out who did it, but I gratefully accepted it as a graduation present. 

I caught a ride with some women from Des Moines and stayed with them in their hotel room.  None of them smoked so I went to the smoking area in the hall.  I was sitting there by myself one morning when I realized that I knew God loved me, but I had never told God, “I love you!”

I started crying, “Oh God, I DO love you! Thank you for my sobriety and all of my blessings.  And thank you for not giving up on me when I gave up on you.”

Why is it so easy for me to hear that someone loves me, but I need to be reminded to tell them the same thing? Maybe it has something to do with still feeling vulnerable when I wear my feelings on my sleeve.

I guess it took that moment, along with the electricity of hundreds of alcoholics in recovery from all over the world, for me to realize that I had finally found a Higher Power that I could trust enough to call God, Higher Power, Father, HP, etc. I sat there and admitted to myself how long I had wanted to feel the reciprocity of our love. 

I moved into Joyce’s house for the summer after I graduated. I had already passed the Graduate Record Examination (GRE) that was required at the college I wanted to attend in Omaha.  The exam measures verbal reasoning, quantitative reasoning, analytical writing, and critical thinking skills.

Some of the scars from childhood ripped open and regurgitated the day I took that test. Taking it was an experience that I hoped I would never have to repeat. I had what I would probably describe as a PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) breakdown every time I even thought about taking that GRE. 

It is similar to when I was growing up and really laughing. Mom would tell me, “You’re laughing too much.  You’ll be crying before the night is over”, and she always made sure that I was. 

Every time I really laugh or try to feel good about what I am doing, I get ready for something bad to happen. That fear seems to be hard wired in me because joy is still fleeting most of the time.

I knew I had no choice. I needed to pass that dammed GRE test if I wanted to attend graduate classes.  Both of my mentors had told me that the exam was the next step for me.  I picked up the book, GRE for Dummies, and started studying a few weeks before graduation. 

One day I took a deep breath, like dad had done after that hail storm, and set up an appointment to take the test on a computer. When that day rolled around, I took another deep breath, put my head up, shoulders back and walked into the building. 

I was shown the computer I was to use. I sat down and I was doing just fine inputting my personal information, but when the screen said something like “Ready to Start Push” I had a panic attack like the ones I had as a child knowing that mom was going to hurt me. 

I thought I was going to vomit and I almost passed out. I went to the restroom and splashed cold water in my face.  I put cold wet paper towels on the back of my neck.  Slowly I got myself back together.  I knew it was then or never, “Here goes nothin’!”

I went back to the examination room and completed the test.  I didn’t take very much time answering each question.  I just wanted to get it over with.  If I passed, I would go on with graduate classes.  If I didn’t pass, we would know that I was actually stupid.  I would be humiliated and have to find something else to do.

My score is a distant memory, but I don’t think it was real high. I remember that I was disappointed in me, but it was high enough for me to start the graduate criminal justice program. 

Or maybe my mentors asked that I be given a chance and I was treated like a token again. Either way, I was following the path that they had cleared for me.

I needed a job for the summer.  I went to work as an enumerator for the 2000 United States Census Bureau.  It was hot walking from one residence to the next.  I had to complete all of the questionnaires for every person in my assigned neighborhoods. 

I had to go back to some addresses, time after time, until someone actually answered the door. That meant that I had to work not only during business hours, but also in the evenings and on the weekends to catch people at home. 

I got a ‘weed’ contact high in numerous homes. Many did not want to answer personal questions.  I assured them, “I will be arrested if I tell anybody.  So will my bosses if they tell anyone.”

I sewed my summer wardrobe. There were numerous bright, bold floral long skirts.  I completed the outfit each day with a cotton top.  It was white or a light color to pick up the colors in the skirt.  I found coordinating wide brimmed straw hats to shade me, low walking heels and matching purses.  I learned after a couple of weeks that the people in the neighborhoods were calling me ‘the hat woman’.

Toward the end, since I was a sociologist, I was being sent into different parts of several ethnic neighborhoods.  Take it from me, just because two pit-bull dogs are tied to concrete blocks with heavy chains, does not mean there is not another one running around loose in the yard.  And that one was smart too.  He waited until I had opened the gate, walked through it, closed it behind me and was halfway to the front door before he started barking and ran around the corner of the house at me. 

I am really glad that I had worn my flats that day and, just like always, my survival instincts kicked in. I am living proof that a fifty five year old woman who had smoked since she was nine could still move really fast. 

I actually got the gate closed and latched behind me before the dog hit it. I am extremely grateful that it was a big yard because, if it had been any smaller, he would have had me on the ground chewing the heck out of me.  I was also relieved that the gate held because that dog was pissed. 

That is the only place that I told my supervisor, “I absolutely am not going back there without a police escort! He had better have his gun out too!!”  I never heard how they got the information from that house.

Later I had to get an interpreter to go with me because I do not speak Spanish.  I walked in the alleys and enumerated many illegal families.  They were relieved when the interpreter told them that it was against the law for either of us or our bosses, clear to the top of the agency, to say anything about where we found them. 

I interviewed a lot of really nice people, and a few ‘poop heads’, but am glad I got to work with so many dedicated people who spent long, hard and hot hours gathering that information so federal funds could be distributed to our most vulnerable populations.

It was time for me to move to Omaha and get ready to start my graduate classes.  Several long-time AA brothers told me that they would move my things in their pickups.  We packed my stuff into the vehicles and drove out of West Des Moines toward Omaha on Interstate 80.

I had told them that we would take our time on the trip and make pit stops along the way, but I got behind a semi that was ‘kickin’ it’ and my trucker instincts took over. I stayed right behind the leader and the two pickups were glued to my back bumper.  In no time we were in north Omaha.  I stopped at a convenience store to use the rest room and ask for directions to the college.

I parked by the building and both pickups slid in beside me.  Both drivers’ doors slammed open and they made a mad dash into the building.  I followed them and used the ladies room. 

I cannot remember exactly what was said, but it was something like they were afraid I was never going to stop, they almost had to tie a knot in it and “Don’t EVER do that again!!!”

We found the college.  I got my key and directions to my room in student housing.  We got everything piled in my room and then I took them for lunch.  It was a fairly nice place close to the campus. 

We had a good laugh about the trip while we ate. We walked outside.  I was getting ready to hug them goodbye when a fart escaped, and it was a loud one too!  They were laughing so hard I thought they were going to roll on the ground.  I said, ‘Yup!  I’m a graduate student now!!!”

What I know about me today is, you can dress me up and even educate me, but once I open my mouth everybody can tell there is something different about me.

Truthfully, I am very proud to be a farmer’s kid. We all farted when I was growing up.  However, I do try to hold them in public.  See, I have been domesticated somewhat over the years!  There is just one thing, the older I get, the more they escape without permission.

I thanked my AA brothers, hugged them goodbye, went back to my room and got everything put away. My bedroom was small with just enough room to walk between my bed, desk and file cabinet. 

I shared the ground floor apartment with three young women. The lady I shared the bathroom with was African American and the two that shared the bathroom on the other side of the common area were from Japan. 

It was wonderful living there. They were all very nice.  We worked together to keep everything clean.  We did not bother each other or the visitors.

I met a woman about my age from Russia when she came to visit several of my roommates.  She and I had a wonderful talk.  We compared the propaganda that each of us heard about the other country when we were growing up.  We were both told pretty much the same terrorizing things about the other country.

It was so nice to have an ice cube maker in the refrigerator. Usually I would fill the ice cube trays when I shared living arrangements with others, but there would only be one cube in each tray when I wanted ice water to drink.  Now I had all of the ice I wanted.  I was in heaven!

I had one of those folding canvas chairs.  I sat outside under the stairway, facing the golf course and reading my text books.  I could not smoke in my room and my COPD (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease) got worse when winter came and I had to go outside in the snow and wind to have a cigarette.  Walking up and down the hill to classes just about did me in because I would run out of air about halfway there.

My back was not doing well either.  I put my books in a plastic waste basket that I bungeed to a luggage carrier with dinky wheels.  It was hard pulling in the snow up the hill and stairs, but I had no choice.  I couldn’t carry the books. 

Looking back, I imagine the other students said things about my carrier. I could have argued that I was not working full time for a state or federal agency like them, but then, I would have had a really nice book carrier if I had not married #8 and #9 to empty out my accounts.  Yes, it was my own fault that I was broke again!

I worked part time for an agency that housed troubled teenagers.  One day I was left alone in the building with a particularly agitated girl that wanted to fist fight with me no matter how I tried to deescalate the situation.  I absolutely was not going to be charged with hitting a minor, and that’s exactly what I would have been forced to do to protect myself, so I called the police to intervene. 

She started pulling out her hair by the hands full as soon as the officers walked through the door. She was taken for help with mental health issues and I was told my services were no longer required because calling the police was not something that agency condoned.

At the turn of this century the social, political, academia and research mentalities were not ready to listen to me that the rehabilitation model might be the answer to reducing recidivism.  I found my classes very interesting and I tried to participate, but kept getting not-so-subtle messages that I was in the wrong place.  After all, I was in classes with FBI agents and officers from lots of different law enforcement agencies that had been raised to believe that the punitive model of ‘lock ‘em all up & throw away the key’ was the only answer to lowering crime.  I was an ex-con and, as far as they were concerned, my opinions did not count.

Actually, one of the seniors announced to the class in front of me one night that he didn’t understand why anyone with a criminal record would waste their time and money getting a graduate degree when nobody would hire them anyway.

Yup! I needed to hear that!!

A few weeks later there was a guest speaker in one of my classes.  She was a professor at the university and did international research.  She cited a lot of statistics about what was working to reduce recidivism in this country and the work being done in England with their prisoners. 

She got my attention right away because I could see where doing research might be a great way to get those right people to understand they needed to help the girls and women still sitting in the chair that I once occupied.

She asked for questions after she finished her presentation. I raised my hand, “Where is the voice of the prisoners?  What do they say?”

She waved me off with her hand, “They don’t matter.  Are there any other questions?”

I just sat there and looked at her.  I cannot tell you what happened after that because I felt the same way I did when the funeral director’s wife slapped my face.  My childhood training took over and I was catapulted into the abyss to hide and cower. 

When I write about the rivets in the steel ceiling, I mean little barriers people like me face when we try to fit into a not-so-friendly outside world, but this “they don’t matter” was a spike solidifying the whole dammed steel ceiling in place to make sure those under it never get out.

People like me were ‘throwaways’ (a child who has been forced to leave home or who has run away from indifferent or hostile parents). In this case the whole criminal justice system was viewing us as not worthy of even listening to.

I realized sitting there that she was one of those right people that I had been trying to find because she, as a researcher, had the power to prove that those sitting in the chair I once occupied not only needed help, but deserved it because they never got help when they were children.

But she was not even interested in asking them, let alone doing something about it. If those girls and women did not matter, then neither did I.  That other student had been right about me wasting my time and money trying to get a graduate degree. 

I just sat there stunned. The room was empty when I was finally able to get to my feet and walk back to my room.  Somehow I finished the semester.

I was going to AA meetings at a club in Omaha with Native Americans.  I found them fascinating.  One of the women was going to a different college so she could go back and help her people. 

I asked her if she would help me understand her people. I explained that my undergraduate degree was in sociology, but I had never been around Native Americans. 

She was wonderful and shared much about her people’s history and attitudes, especially why they did not trust people like me. She said they called us ‘meat thieves’ among other things because our ancestors stole their ancestors’ meat at night. 

She explained that her people had the same dreams I have, but I realized they face a lot more barriers than I ever thought of dealing with when I went to the casino with her one day to have lunch. I could not believe how the Caucasians bumped, pushed and shoved her around as she was trying to get to the restaurant.  When we finally got to the table I asked, “How can you stand that?”

She looked at me, “Stand what?”

I realized that either she was so used to being treated that way and didn’t notice, or maybe she had me accompany her to show me how her people are still treated today.  If that was her goal, it worked.  I was shocked at how barbaric we can be to those who have done nothing wrong except have a different color skin.

She invited me to attend several sweats with her, explained some of their prayer rituals and I was invited to another sweat by another person.  I asked her what to expect during a sweat.  She told me, “Everyone has their own experience.  Could you tell me what to expect if I went to church with you?”

Even though no one said anything, I started understanding that I was on the wrong path. I had no idea where to find the right one.  I asked her and she said, “You’ll be shown.”

Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners at the AA club were wonderful.  The Native man sang the prayers in his language.  I felt like I had a connection with the first Thanksgiving dinner.  There was lots of wonderful food and genuine caring.  Besides, we were all sober and that is what really mattered.

Oh, I almost forgot, there was a Caucasian man that went to that group.  I knew him, but he didn’t know me.  You see, he was so drunk several years before this that the police had to get on each side of him and pretty much carry him to their car.

I had been working for an agency part time while I attended Drake.  I was sitting in the back seat with several clients at a stop light on an off ramp when this man’s convertible hit the back of the van.  I got whiplash and still suffer with much pain.  However, this man was claiming twelve years of sobriety in the meetings at the club.

Do I confront him in front of everyone? Do I get him by himself and tell him what I know?  Or do I pray for him and keep my mouth shut? 

If I confront him, either in front of others or individually, I would definitely embarrass him. That might make him go back to drinking all of the time instead of sporadically.  If I say nothing, he might kill somebody the next time. 

What would be my motive for confronting him? Would I be confronting him to help him or to get even for all of the pain he caused me? 

I did a lot of praying and read the ‘Big Book’ several times. I decided that my motive would be to embarrass him and pay him back for the pain I will feel for the rest of my life. 

Okay, had I ever driven while I was drunk … and probably in a blackout? Did I really know that I had never hit or hurt anyone?  Could I guarantee it?

I decided to pray that he stayed sober and got all of the good things I wanted for myself. I turned him over to the Higher Power that I believe in.  I have seen miracles happen through the years when I got out of the way and allowed that Power to do what It does.

I started classes after the holiday vacation.  I think I actually made it into February.  I went to a class one evening where the professor was telling us that we were going to visit a women’s prison.  I watched and listened to her and the other students.  It sounded like they were getting ready to have a picnic while they visited the zoo instead of a prison with human beings that had feelings. 

I don’t remember exactly what I told the professor after everyone else left the room, but it was something to do with me not being able to go and, “remember, when you’re looking at the animals, they’re watching you too.”

I woke up not too long after that.  The first thing out of my mouth was, “I don’t know who I’m doing this for, but it’s not me!”

I got on the web and looked up my original trucking company.  I still had a clean driving record.  Even though my back was hurting and I had not driven truck for quite a while, they knew that I was a ‘runner’.  I was pretty sure they would hire me.  I applied on line and was hired right away, but I had to go to the terminal in Oklahoma City to get a company truck. 

I called that Native American woman and told her to find a pickup for everything I did not need on the truck. I gave her everything else including an almost new computer and printer, heavy wood computer desk with matching large 2-drawer file cabinet, and lots of beautiful clothes, shoes, purses and accessories that were her size. 

After I had loaded everything I would need on the truck in my car and the rest was loaded for her to take, she said that she had forgotten to tell me that when someone gives her people a gift, they must give that person something of the same value.  She handed me a beautiful ring. 

At first I refused to take it because she had tears in her eyes and I could see how much it meant to her, but her boyfriend nodded for me to take it, “Tell everybody that a Lakota woman gave you that ring and they’ll understand.”

She told me, “It’ll take care of you.”

I would like that lady to know that the ring has been with me since that day and on my finger most of the time.  I want to contact her so that ring can be returned to her after I pass….From my lips to Higher Power.

I wrote several chapters in my first book, Proclivity, about some of the things that happened while I was driving semi.  I am not going to retype all of it here, but let it suffice that I was a lot older at fifty five than I had been the last time I drove for them. 

It didn’t take very long for me to get back into the swing of things, but I didn’t have the energy I once had. I was no longer a good runner.  I was an exhausted driver most of the time trying to recapture the momentum I had in my forties.  Additionally, I almost got raped in El Paso. 

That was the first time that I had ever been really scared on the road. Well, that’s a lie.  That guy who had broke into the tractor and had an arm full of our electronics as he jumped out in front of me in San Diego was the first, but he ran away while I yelled at him. 

This guy in El Paso was not running away.  In fact, he grabbed me and tried to push me into my cab.  Thank goodness I had parked by the shop where mechanics and drivers were standing around. 

I started laughing at first after I slugged him with all I had and he didn’t even flinch. I don’t know which pissed him off more, me slugging him or my laughing, but he got pretty rough.  Then I started yelling, “RAPE! RAPE! RAPE!!”

A bunch of men ran toward us from the shop and the guy took off in the other direction down the side of my trailer. I told my dispatcher what happened and asked to be brought back to the terminal. 

Then I tried to drive with an owner operator so I would not be such a ‘sitting duck’ driving solo. It started out pretty good, but he only had one single bunk in the sleeper.  One of us had to sleep either on the floor in front of the bunk or on the seats in the cab with the cooler in between them to fill in the gap.  It was not very long before my smoking, which he had told me did not bother him, became a big issue. 

All of a sudden I was not doing anything right, even though I was doing the same things I had done from the beginning. The same things I had always done when I drove solo and team. 

Depending on his mood, I was either driving too slow or too fast, and even though he had not provided any instructions, I stopped at the wrong truck stops. I told him that I had a lot of talents, but clairvoyance was not one of them.

Once I scaled a load and fueled to get legal for the trip, but he had some kind of homemade scale on the deck between the tractor and trailer.   He told me that the certified scale ticket was wrong.  He got into the trailer and moved around the cargo.  He went to the bunk and had me drive though the coup. 

I was pulled around to the back of the scale. He had to get into the trailer to put the cargo back before the officer would allow us to proceed.

I finally moved back to Des Moines and drove for a trucking company out of Cedar Rapids for a few months until they fired me because I was late too many times.  I just did not have the energy I needed to drive solo any more.  But that did not stop me.  I went to work for a company out of Waterloo.