Here’s Something Different
Mores are usually described as social norms, which basically determine what is acceptable or unacceptable within any given society or culture. I briefly touch on the social mores of the mid-19th century in my historical fiction, “Oh! Susannah” - www.beckleysbooks.com , when I outline the dilemma my 3rd great grandmother found herself in. Back then, twenty-one was a very important age for young unmarried women. Many of their friends by that time in their lives were either betrothed or engaged. Turning twenty-two years of age, women found eligible bachelors choosing girls younger then them, some as young as 14 or 15 years old. The social norms of the time had Susannah Reigle having to choose between marrying someone who was her father’s age, and who also had character issues, or resigning herself to be celibate and single for the rest of her life. She had a decision to make, one that was clearly put before her by the time period’s accepted societal norms.
I was 13 years old in the early 1970’s and was being reared by a respectable family. My father had been a volunteer fireman, an elected councilman, and a church elder. With these “high profile” positions within our small village, there also came an expected behavior from his family members, social mores.
The time clock was ticking for me, but I never heard it! There were conversations at the dinner table about baptism, but I didn’t take the remarks as being directed at me seeing how we were in church twice on Sunday, and usually one night during the week and also had “devotions” nearly every week night during the summer. “Baptism” was just all part and parcel of my everyday life. I suppose in my subconscious, I considered baptism an “a la carte” option, kind of like squeezing the hand of the person on your left during a devotion's prayer circle. If I didn’t feel like saying a prayer, one quick squeeze, and I was passed over.
My parents tried the gentle persuasion approach, casually mentioning that come Sunday, when the preacher called for anyone to come forward to be baptized, “someone” from our family should “answer the call”. I felt the hint, but come that Sunday, I sat quite stoically in the pew, despite our minister’s superb message. This wasn’t the case, though, of my youngest sister who was up and on her way down the aisle to be baptized before the hem of her Sunday dress got tugged and she was smartly back in our pew. I guess the “gentle persuasion” approach backfired.
Next came the “Q & A” session. My parents first reminding me how all of my church friends were turning 13 and getting baptized.
Q: Did I believe in Jesus?
A: Yes
Q: Was I afraid of being dunked in the water?
A: No. I knew how to swim and hold my breath under water
Q: Was I afraid of all the church members watching me?
A: I suppose not
Q: Did I want to be the only person in my Sunday School class who wasn’t baptized?
A: I don’t know
Talk about bringing all of the social mores to bear!
Then, in a final desperate attempt, my parents sat me down in a “one-on-one" negotiation. It started out something like this, “You need to do this of your own free will ...”
I’m hoping that the God Almighty is heaping blessings on the first person I ever knew as a minister, Arthur Guy. He was a wonderful person who succeeded in his mission in life, to bring people to Jesus Christ through baptism. Mr. Guy gave up one of his summer mid-week evenings to cater to my eccentricities and put my family out of their misery by baptizing me in an empty sanctuary, save my father, mother and siblings sitting in the first pew.
Running concurrently with this “baptism debacle” was another struggle I was enduring at 13. A few months into having started middle school and I had my routine down; arrive – locker – then up the cavernous stairwell to my first class. Then one day, I was momentarily stopped while ascending the stairs by a pretty girl who turned out to be a year older than me. She was passing on her way down when our eyes met and the gaze was like taking a snapshot of our souls. She handed me a note, which had been neatly folded origami-style, and then dashed away. I read the note during my lunch break and was thunderstruck by her words, which said that she “liked” me and wanted to be my friend. Once home, I re-read her note so many times, finding it difficult to concentrate on my homework, before hiding it within my desk. The next day there was another encounter with Miss K and each of the school days thereafter until she finally asked, in desperation, if I had any intent on replying in kind? I was jolted into realizing just how rude I had been and began swapping notes with her, but not on a one-to-one basis. I treasured these letters and was anticipating how I would miss getting these over our Christmas break. And then, my secret affair was cruelly exposed over dinner, my parents with my “love letters’ clutched in their hands, announced that I had a girlfriend! My mother in cleaning my room had discovered my stash and now the unmerciful teasing and ridicule would begin. There was the inquisition to which I simply held to my 5th amendment rights to remain silent, but it was now obvious that the letters had to end. I didn’t want the letter exchange to end but my family’s sense of social mores meant that this had to end.
Back at school, I altered my routine, essentially avoiding Miss K, who had no clue what had changed. I hid in the band room, used deserted hallways, but she was persistent and usually found me. She enlisted friends who were also church acquaintances of mine, and despite all the external pressure from well-meaning people, I couldn’t find a solution to my internal turmoil. That is, until one day, when I was passed a seating chart to sign up with your buddy for the band bus on an upcoming trip. I was surprised to see my name had already been written in, next to Miss K, by someone other than me. I approached the band director after practice to explain what had happened and this is what caused the director to withdraw the seating chart and admonish the entire band over the seating issue. “Oh, what a mess!”, I thought. “How did it come to this?”
Needless to say, the letters ceased after our not being seat mates on that trip, and I sincerely regretted this decision I had made under duress. Looking back, I’m unsure what prompted me to attend the school dance on the last day of school. Hopeful? Afraid of missing another opportunity? It mattered not for I sat the entire night similarly glued to the wooden folding chair, just as securely as the chair was bolted into the concrete below me. I watched as others danced in the dimly lit cavernous gymnasium, the same venue my mother and father had danced in years before as high school sweethearts. The lights eventually came on and I walked home with only my thoughts, having not spoken to anyone the entire night. It was the start of a melancholy summer. By that Fall, with Miss K now in high school, I noticed her on her school bus leaving one day and I made sure to be there at that exact time in my walk home each day, but for no purpose. Years passed, Miss K had just graduated and I was working at the local grocery store in the butcher’s shop. One day I looked up to assist the next customer and our eyes locked and the gaze was just as it had been in the first instance, both of us surprised to see each other. I handed her the pound of baloney she had requested and then she turned and walked away without a further word exchanged, our paths never to cross again.
People say things come in lots of three, and during my unlucky 13th year, we received word of my great aunt, Miss Robart’s hospitalization. Our family all knew her affectionately as “Bubu” and she was particularly fond of me, as I was of her. Miss Robart was a Christian Scientist, and certainly, as a matter of faith, she would not be in a hospital! In the parlance of a small town, non-medically attuned family, the news was announced that “Bubu was riddled with cancer. They had opened her up and sewn her back up again.”
It was during this time that music became my salve and my soul took solace in the angst found in these lyrics. The song was not written about me, but for me.
“At Seventeen” - Janis Ian
I learned the truth at seventeen
That love was meant for beauty queens
And high school girls with clear-skinned smiles
Who married young and then retired
The valentines I never knew
The Friday night charades of youth
Were spent on one more beautiful
At seventeen I learned the truth
And those of us with ravaged faces
Lacking in the social graces
Desperately remained at home
Inventing lovers on the phone
Who called to say “come dance with me”
And murmured vague obscenities
It isn’t all it seems at seventeen
A brown-eyed girl in hand me downs
Whose name I never could pronounce
Said “Pity please the ones who serve
They only get what they deserve”
The rich-relationed hometown queen
Married into what she needs
With a guarantee of company
And haven for the elderly
So remember those who win the game
Lose the love they sought to gain
In debitures of quality and dubious integrity
Their small-town eyes will gape at you
In dull surprise when payment due
Exceeds accounts received at seventeen
To those of us who knew the pain
Of valentines that never came
And those whose names were never called
When choosing sides for basketball
It was long ago and far away
The world was younger than today
When dreams were all they gave for free
To ugly duckling girls like me.
We all play the game, and when we dare
We cheat ourselves at solitaire
Inventing lovers on the phone
Repenting other lives unknown
That call and say, “come dance with me”
And murmur vague obscenities
At ugly girls like me, at seventeen
Social mores were with us in the 19th century and in the 1970’s and even so today. Fear to comply with acceptable norms, many times enforced by bullies, could be left behind in the schoolyard back then. Now, with the ramped use of social media, the haunting and taunting of innocent victims can carry on 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
Sometimes it’s a matter of being unconscious to it. Social mores usually place people within a box where a decision needs to be made, choose “A” or “B”. But, wait! Why can’t there be another option? Take my heroine, Susannah. Why couldn’t she have chosen to hold out for that one gentleman, who it mattered not that she had been passed over by all the others? And yet, at twenty-two, she thought she had only two choices.
Pollsters today ask, “Are you voting for candidate A or candidate B? Some brave souls say, “I’m unsure.”, which places them in the “undecided” column and then the media really pounce seeking a decision.
There are more than two choices when marking your ballot paper. Candidate A and Candidate B and “Neither”, but nobody ever explains it this way! If one candidate is absolutely abhorrent to you and the other, you’re unsure about, you are exercising your right by simply skipping to the next race, with neither box ticked. It’s not like you can’t leave the dinner table until you are finished cleaning your plate of food. You can vote for only those you feel comfortable in doing so, and then leave. You’ve done your civic duty by not voting for someone or something you’re unsure of, and using a party affiliation as your guide is no longer a reliable measure. By the way, what do political party hacks know about running a County Dog Catcher’s office, other than it is another avenue for patronage? So, if you are familiar with what the candidate’s positions are, and want to see them in elected office, mark the box. Otherwise, move on to the next race down the ballot.
How would Susannah’s life had changed had she only known that by holding out, she may have had a third option? How might our elections turn out if people realized that they have a third option? I like the idea of having a choice, if for no other reason, I can look back and evaluate my decision at the time. I guess at 65, it’s as good a time as any to reflect on what might have been had I made a different choice, not in a manner of regret, but more of curiosity.
But alas, we are not going back, but boldly stepping into the future enlightened by all the choices we have before us.