The "Bod Squad" Moves In

Of the daily challenges presented to a single mother of six children, none equal the time and energy expended in the perpetual search for money. A woman can either work two or three jobs at minimum wage or try to sell her body for a slightly higher scale of pay. With the relatively sexless body of a twelve-year old boy walking backward, I could not imagine anyone buying mine. Since I lacked promiscuity, education, a base of salient skills, and had six children under ten, the reality of my position became quite clear as I set out a few decades ago to find a job, become educated, and raise those kids alone.

In a set of strange circumstances due to a risky state of being both physically overstressed and emotionally overwhelmed, I began to recognize the presence of more than just my own brood. There began to appear on a daily basis metaphysical personifications that exhibited actual personalities, distinguishable by their behavioral patterns. I found it strangely satisfying to draw interesting parallels between the body of their activities and those of my children and began to refer to them as Nobody, Everybody, Somebody, and Anybody, AKA/”The Bod Squad.”

While learning their names and idiosyncratic proclivities I discovered that I actually liked Nobody. Nobody loved vegetables and Nobody ate them. Nobody completed homework and Nobody followed my organizational chart. Nobody remained polite and cheerful and Nobody washed dishes. Nobody picked up clothing from the floor and Nobody claimed ownership of the jeans thrown there. Clearly this one had potential.

Because of my extraordinarily reasonable and especially pleasant nature, I was surprised by the presence of the one I called Somebody whose specious behavior belied the positive nature of the others and the one I blamed for the loss of my cranberry sweater, misplaced Libra ring, removal of the covers and pillows from my bed, and in fact was a suspect in the loss of my favorite champagne flute, an elegant piece of crystal stem-ware I especially loved. I often envisioned a future world in which I might own two of them and regularly hid money in a sacrificial sugar bowl hoping to find a duplicate. The bowl, the money, and the flute were quite simply missing. The rhetoric went something like this:

"Somebody broke my champagne flute” I screamed, “ravished my sugar bowl, and absconded with $3.42!"

True, I was somewhat hysterical and while I demanded an immediate resolution, my eldest countered with her inherited ideological preference for non-biased accusations.

"Why blame Somebody when it could have been Anybody?”

Daughters two and three in nodding agreement argued vehemently for the defense, insisting that Everybody had access to the cupboard, Anybody could be guilty, and Nobody should be blamed.

"Nobody?" I was stunned. “How can Nobody be blamed?”

It was obvious to me that Somebody took these things because they were in fact gone, breaking perhaps the only remnant of my future fantasy life. For reasons beyond logic my children insisted that Anybody and Everybody should be held responsible which seemed somehow suspicious. I could however imagine such acts of egregious behavior by those unscrupulous ones since it was a well known fact as stated by my eldest, “Everybody hangs out at the mall, stays out late, smokes cigarettes, talks incessantly on the telephone, and uses bad words.” There were in fact dozens of their pilfering pals whose fingerprints I daily wiped away. One miscreant might just be Anybody, a mysteriously vague personification not entirely trustworthy. In the end however, after a thorough investigation, Nobody claimed responsibility and Nobody was punished. Since Nobody confessed and with the evidence removed, I concluded that when Nobody is to blame, nothing gets done. When I confronted them with this reasoning, my children accused me of bias against Everybody who was their current favorite among the iconoclastic representational bodies in residence.

"Since as you say, Everybody always behaves badly," daughter's two and three proclaimed, “and Anybody could be guilty as charged, Somebody might consider your conclusions slightly prejudicial."

The clarity of my argument took a mercurial drop as my children turned it against me and I seemed to have lost another battle. Nobody appeared interested in the issues, however with Nobody on my side the majority was sure to rule.

When the dog produced five puppies, Nobody came to my aid and Everybody hid behind Anybody with an alibi. Nobody verified the father of this error in judgment, which led me back to the ongoing, but unresolved argument of assessing ownership of jeans thrown disrespectfully to the floor. The girls all wore the same size which led me to begin an investigation into certain very specific worn spots accompanied by appliquéd butterflies, and various other relatively personalized creations and tell-tale indications of derelict ownership.

In a moment of unforeseen frustration, I ran yelling through the house in an unprofessional, albeit succinct, non-prejudicial rant.

"I'm throwing all of these jeans in the garbage!" I stated further that, "Persons owning these jeans and those who know the gender of the dog must be held liable for their actions."

Unbelievably, daughters, four and five engaged in a strategy that included youth and innocence as a viable defense against sexual knowledge, an argument I was not about to enter as Anybody would most certainly become confused and Everybody would claim a significant victory. As for the jeans at issue, Nobody claimed them and I laundered them in silence.

The dog, apparently a female, was named "Gretchen" as my children seemed to think she was a "Dutch Terrior," a previously undiscovered breed and bestowed upon her a fabricated pedigree. Gretchen, a dog with neurotic tendencies was terrified by the presence of the children and unknown to me, gave birth to and deposited all five of her puppies under my bed.

Also unknown to me was my latent allergy to puppy dander. Everybody blamed my extreme bronchial distress to the fact that I worked in a bar twelve hours a night, and spent eight hours a day in a "sick" office building. Somebody suggested I stay home, clean house and make cookies, an excellent but thoroughly impractical solution. After much discussion, Somebody then suggested the animals be removed, to which Everybody agreed. Anybody could see the logic of it and after Nobody’s objections the eldest was sent out on her bicycle with a small lunch, a wagon, and six "for-free" animals. I was miraculously cured, returned to work, and food appeared once again on the table.

When daughter number five began to exhibit bizarre episodes of limping, and doctors suggested to me that her behavior appeared to be a production of symptoms associated with a psychoneurosis motivated by my neglect of her, I wondered if this child was emulating her sister who had also lost her ability to walk for a period of time some years before. I pulled that one around in a wagon because she said, "I can't walk." That child was often found napping on the sidewalk by neighbors who actually believed her and considered me a nut. Because I worked three or four jobs and left my children to their imagination, I suspect the timely arrival of the personifications upon which we could foist unacceptable behavior absolved my children from the exacting consequences of parental authority and I was grateful to be let off the hook.

When the cat ran into a car, I was in another county, far away in a hospital attempting to manage the operation of daughter number four, a child who required screws in her thigh. The apparent theory for her slipping epiphysis was associated with a congenital factor however under sedation this child admitted to stomping aluminum cans into a kind of "shoe-heel" and clomped around on them daily for fun. Upon our arrival back home at last, we placed the crutches for my daughter at the bottom of the stairs. The cat, with a broken leg, and wearing a cast, sat quietly between them. Visiting children came with their mothers and were amazed by the size of the crutches for such a small cat.

Tutu, a rare "Chocolate-Point" Siamese was no doubt expensive in the past, but had fallen on hard times, landing on our doorstep and scooped up for play by daughter number five who dressed her in frilly doll's clothing and pushed her around in a wicker basket banging recklessly into the furnishings.

When the leg was healed and the cast removed, Tutu sprayed the sofa I designed and waited six months to receive. On the day I removed the plastic that cat not only dictated its territorial arena with a disgusting skunk-like odor, it rendered the sofa helpless by tearing to shreds, the arms, sides, and back of its frame. Nobody knew of course the cat was a male, and Nobody assisted me with its removal.

Tutu disappeared one day along with some turtles. The turtles were actually unintentionally ground up after they had become seriously strange looking, and were unidentifiable as a species. A Great Dane was then introduced to our family by daughter number five, a dog so large that I thought it must be a horse. I noticed it while painting the kitchen ceiling a special color. I thought tomato soup red would work quite nicely with the yellow shag rug I had kind of destroyed when I attempted to create a kinetic sculpture which exploded during an experiment. It had not occurred to me that adding one more drop of catalyst would produce such an effect in the resin.

I snipped the "shag" down with manicure scissors believing that I might manufacture a kind of "short shag," maybe something unusual, pulling the hardened acrylic shards which had burst into glass-like pieces. I believed there may be in existence the possibility of a "golf-link-like” short, grassy carpet. The tomato-soup ceiling was almost a success but had a "lumpy" appearance, the result of the hardened acrylic thrown by the blast. Additionally, while drying, pieces of pasta previously thrown had slipped a bit and created a bas-relief effect, a kind of Art Deco over-all arrangement, an interesting almost sunburst look, useful perhaps in Xanado.

One of my many jobs involved the completion of 8"x10" highly detailed ink renderings with copy, of fashions shown in local boutiques. I was paid $25 per each piece selected to be advertised in the fashion section of “The Detroit Free Press,” a paper considered at the time to be quite prestigious. I pinned the clothing to the tomato-soup walls of the dining room to achieve fluidity and often spent many sleepless nights engaged in the project. While working at an off-premises location, Somebody removed the seriously expensive dresses from the wall leaving me with nothing to render and nothing to return. I was sued of course, but with no redeemable resources, Nobody collected, reassuring me of the fact that Nobody would stand by me.

In the meantime and for reasons unknown to me, my children were adamant that the Great Dane should live with us, an absurd notion of course since there was no money for food. Happily, that animal left through the back door not long after he was dragged through the front. Somebody must have left the door open! I just knew Somebody would become an ally!

I began to look at these creatures as a happy accident, something like a solution to the extraordinary problems faced while raising six children. I liked them and remained positive in spite of the incredibly negative behavior attributed to them. In fact, I liked blaming them for inappropriate activities, and I especially liked having discussions about them. Because my children were collectively against anything I advocated, I used whatever measures were available to me to police them.

Not long after the arrival of the “Bodies,” an unexpected opportunity arose to move three thousand miles away from the nosy and often misunderstanding neighbors. The person I promised to marry in exchange for the opportunity to survive elected to force an ultimatum. I could either marry the guy or lose our home. Few decisions were made in less time. Not only did I sell every piece of furniture not nailed to the floor, I sold furnishings actually nailed to the floor, including every appliance that came with the semi-ownership of the condominium, including the bathroom fixtures. With a fist full of checks from an astounding number of accommodating neighbors, I found an agent of Cadillac who was happy to pay me to drive across the country in their stunning white, boat-like car, upon which I balanced two beautiful bicycles.

The trip to California with six children under ten was a bit of an illusion, surely something a responsible person would refer to as a fantasy. However in 1973 all things seemed possible, including a home for my children. Nobody led the way and we ended our travels at a comfy Ho-Jo’s in a northern-most nook and cranny of Marin County.

The really strange part of the process began the following day at the bank. My account was in effect frozen; an operational consequence of the deposited checks which were written by the persons for the sale of items that did not all belong to me. It was becoming increasing clear to me that I was about to become a criminal. To what degree remained unknown but I suspected Nobody would come to my aid and in the end I would require the assistance of Somebody or in fact Anybody with a legal background.

However, moving three thousand miles seemed to cool the professed ardor of my intended, and he was quietly assuaged with full ownership of my darling home, leaving me free to wander for which I was grateful.

Finding a home for six children and one adult in the 70's proved to be an enormous challenge. The one I chose to rent did not allow children, so I lied and said I had none. We moved in, all seven of us, along with three pillows and a coffee pot. The rent would of course become an issue due to the freeze on the account, and I was forced to return the fire-engine red sports car that did not start which was in fact a blessing. With no way to attach the money, the used car dealer was unable to manage the disposition and just picked it up.

In the meantime I found a waitress position which allowed me to "steal" food and toilet paper from the restaurant and feed my children. Nobody objected, and I continued to become a felon, a career objective that Somebody considered difficult to comprehend, and a course of action perceived by Everybody as unwise. With my first paycheck I reimbursed my employer, confessed, and begged to be forgiven. Nobody was, as usual, there for me and I was fired. My landlord, an unwilling participant in an ongoing lawsuit against him for allowing children to live in the complex, caved under the pressure and forced me to leave. By the time I returned home after being fired on Christmas Eve, the children were all sitting outside on the pillows while the eldest held the coffee pot.

If Somebody had an idea Nobody was discussing it and if Everybody thought we were beaten by this we looked toward Anybody with a positive solution. I decided to hide the children once again and find a home, this time with no money, a delicate task indeed, but not entirely impossible. While “bathing” in the rest-room of a gas station it occurred to me that the bank might have released the freeze on the checks written for the sold contraband. As amazing as it may seem, I was able to withdraw almost $3000, an astronomical amount of money which was after three months, finally ours.

We ate something other than tea and toast for the first time and after renting another room at out favorite motel for showers, clean sheets, and television, we snuggled into a discussion of room service. Somebody suggested that Everybody would benefit from a walk to the nearest fast-food joint, an option Nobody found satisfactory as it was concluded to be too thrift-oriented. In the end, the desire to eat actual food out-weighed all other practical options. The pleasure of raising a half-dozen kids is significant, but the immutable thrill of feeding them trumps all.

Sitting in the booth of a restaurant with a serious claim to the best seafood in the world, my darlings ordered hamburgers with cheese.

"We don't like fish," they proclaimed, "especially fish with bones."

Somebody suggested lobster as it has none, a fact Everybody agreed upon and Anybody could see the logic of such a choice. Nobody, once again came to my aid.

"Lobster it is," I declared, and lobster it was for our re-entry into the world of normalcy.

Albeit dinner blew a magnificent hole in our funds, it also produced a significant burst of energy and emotional well-being. We found a very simple home; an extremely rural cottage, the kind some might describe as "shack-like," available however to mothers with children. By padding my resume with outrageous lies, I found a job and bought a car that not only started on command, but had a functioning reverse gear, and joined other working moms dropping their kids off at school.

In the end it was a simple project: a task devoted to the ordinary notion of keeping six children alive; an idea developed while skirting them through negotiations with an exceptional parent and the evolution of an association with unrealistic and entirely imaginative personalities, all willing to support their creative endeavors, specific ideations, and loving pursuits. Through a prism of four decades past, I cannot see how it was done, but can only recall the joy of raising six children on my own.