See through the cracks

...my brother and sister and I would be enlisted to go out into the paddock and whole thistles it was hot dry horrible work and I'd protest by lying in the front seat of the you with my legs sticking out of the window singing along with the Bay City Rollers I love watching American Imports like Bewitched and mash and I'd fight to stay up past my bedtime so I could absorb their accents and the wholesome story by far my favorite was The Brady Bunch I resonated so strongly with Marcia and Jan's boy troubles and since I was tall and lanky and forced to have my hair cut into a boyish crop I even felt a resemblance to Greg and he's gangly awkwardness it seemed like such an idyllic life and lovely lady who is busy with three lovely girls managed to meet a man named Brady who had three boys of his own the sweetness and he's of the Brady's family life was mirrored in my own my parents rarely fought we were middle class and surrounded only by people in our town that were the same I never saw any hardship poverty or loss I was never exposed to any other and we never traveled far from home I remember when I was eight or nine I heard about an uncle of mine who was getting divorced it was a totally New Concept to me since nobody in our town have been divorced I was fascinated by the idea especially since it was discussed in such secretive and scandalized homes just like the sheltered world's I saw on TV my imagination could only extend as far as what I was able to see The Brady Bunch gave me my earliest inkling that divorce did not have to mean the end of happiness she divorced my father when I was less year old filed for custody and was granted at by default when he didn't turn up to the custody hearing their marriage was short and he'd appeared to get a new mean and violent personality as soon as they were husband and wife I was born very soon after they married and it was clear that my mom was much happier about it than he was the final straw came when she left him alone with me as a baby because she had to go to work and when I had been crying for longer than he could handle he swung my best in it so hard that I fill out before punching a hole in the wall I'd married him so young and was a mother by the age of 23 so I was in for a rude awakening when all of a sudden I had to take care of myself and my daughter I decided that I needed a stable job so I went back to University to become a school teacher I worked in bars to make ends meet and I remember taking my daughter with me to lectures breastfeeding her in the back row and getting so grateful that I was able to get an education with such a young child before she left him my dad used to tell her that she was living in a Brady Bunch he meant it as an insult as he'd often find ways to make her question her intelligence he was telling her that she was to starry-eyed and too naive to be in the real world on the second day of her trip to Manchester I spoke to Truman briefly on the phone I don't remember what we spoke about but I remember thinking is accent was odd he joked about being my new stepfather which made me feel really weird perhaps it should have raised concern but instead it warmed my heart because I love to see what I imagine was our Two Worlds coming together true to my ex-husband's words I was letting this imaginary Brady Bunch perfect world skew my perception... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices