el elefante es grande

Selsa Couch was born and raised in Taos, New Mexico. She came from a rather large family - at least four brothers and three sisters that I can remember. I only saw the whole crew together once but at different times, her mother, Margaret Anaya, and some of her sisters or brothers, would visit the Couch family in Fort Wayne.

That entire Anaya family was an animated bunch. When with each other, they would speak their native language (Spanish) and their hands would be doin' almost as much work as their lips. Please do not think that I am making fun of them - I'm certainly not. If anything, it made me aware very early in life how powerful non-verbal queues were to communicating with someone else.

Selsa's family had very deep roots in a world that frankly, I knew nothing about. The language, the traditions, the foods - they were all new to me. I was a good sport though - I kept my mouth shut and tried to blend in as well as I could.

One of the things that was extremely important to Selsa was that both of her children had a solid understanding of their roots. The playing out of these expectations came in the form of a strict, Catholic-church upbringing, a rigorous educational curriculum, and hands-on experience with traditions that Selsa herself experienced as a child.

I've already written about our CCD Classes, Confession, and Communion.

Another area that she was insistent that Ericka learn was the Spanish language. When the Couch's moved to Hadley Road, we jumped full-force into learning how to speak Spanish. Me and Ericka would sit in the nook area (between the kitchen and the family room), with our books (which Selsa purchased for us), and we would review our Spanish lessons with her.

This was independent from our school stuff - this was afterschool lessons and how I got mixed up into it - I'm not sure. It was probably a lot like all of the other things that my mom and Selsa conspired on (i.e. if it was good for one daughter - it would be good for the other daughter too).

Nouns and verbs.
Male and female versions of words.

It was a lot to learn.

Selsa used to drill us on the fundamental proununciations of the words. The phrase which I cannot get out of my head, "el elefante es grande".

Looks (and probably sounds) simple enough, right? Absolutely not. You needed to put emphasis in the right areas and your tone needed to reflect the statement that it was.

It was during this period of time in our friendship that I first noticed how tough Selsa was on Ericka.

Selsa was an elementary school teacher. She taught at Hoagland and then at Ward. Her teaching (and parenting) methodology reminded me a lot of my third grade teacher, Miss (Sandra) McDougall. She was tough, had high expectations, did not take any b.s., and did not allow for any excuses. Neither she nor Miss McDougall were mean - they were just very set in how they thought things should happen. It's a series of good qualities to have in a school teacher. In a parent? I have mixed emotions.

My mom wasn't anything like this (not to say she was a "better" parent or anything like that). Their styles were just totally different from one another. My mom was more laid back and casual about parenting and I think that I had higher expectations of myself than I think she had of me - or at least that she ever verbalized to me. She was basically a kid herself and although she was smart, she dropped out her junior year to have me. I think she was just pleased that I was a good kid who liked school, did well, and didn't cause issues for anyone (except my bratty sister PJ).

Sitting at the table, one Wednesday afternoon, practicing our Spanish - I saw it.

I saw the almost unbearably high standards for everything and anything.

I saw the cracks in my friend. She never broke down or fell apart. It was her demeanor, the sad, defeated look in her dark eyes. I didn't know how to fix it. My first reaction was to grab her hand and run out the back door and into the big, back yard.

But I didn't. I sat there with her and we continued through the lesson.

Afterwards, while waiting for my mom to pick me up, we went outside and spun ourselves around in circles until we got dizzy and fell to the ground laughing.

That's how me and Ericka used to deal with things in our lives. Distractions. Goofin' off. We never poured our hearts out to each other and we never had deep, insightful discussions. We were there for each other in a very silent way and for many years, it's probably what kept us both sane.

Life on Hadley Road

We helped the Couch family moved into their new house on Hadley Road. There were a lot of "firsts" involved in this move (for me). For example...

1) It was the first time I saw a moving truck that big. When we moved from our apartment to a house, there were pick-up trucks and cars involved - no moving truck :).

2) I had never seen a house that big.

Some perspective for you. The house that they lived in on Kyle Road (I believe it was rented from the Toor's), was approximately 800 square feet.

This is an aerial view of the house they moved into on Hadley Road.



I would guess the house is at least 2500 sq ft. - maybe more. The driveway - which pretty much looks the same, was black tar-like material that sloped downward. In the winter time, it made it tricky to get vehicles in and out but during the mid to late 70's, Hadley Road was more of a side road. It didn't have the traffic that I'm sure it has today.

Other things I remember about the house...

No one ever used the front door - it was much easier to drive down the driveway and enter the house through the garage (which sat under the house).

The first floor, which had the living room, family room, dining room, 1/2 bath, and kitchen - was sparsely furnished in the beginning. In fact, the official "living room" and "dining room" had nothing in them and we would often use that area to goof off....Ericka would show off with her fancy gymnastics moves and I would twirl around and tap like I was Fred Astaire...

All of the bedrooms were located upstairs. Ericka kept her room kind of plain - it had her white, four poster canopy bed in it along with her dresser and night stand in it. Her younger brother (Aaron) though, wanted his room painted dark blue and I think he even had bunk beds.

For the first couple of months, things were different - obviously - because I just couldn't walk over to Ericka's house on my own (nor her to mine), however, we settled into a comfortable routine whereby I was able to spend the night with her often. Kind of like our own slumber party.

On one particular Friday, Ericka introduced me to a record - and an artist that I had never heard of - Elton John. Music was always in the background of my life but it wasn't until that very moment, that I honed in on my first artist and my first set of "serious grown-up albums".

In the front room area, we had our bowl of Jiffy Pop, our pitcher of grape koolaid and we put on the toons and sang and danced. Stand out tracks included: Island Girl, Crocodile Rock, Bennie and the Jets, and Honkey Cat.

Confessing My Sins

This Is Where Ericka Accidentally Tripped Me
Originally uploaded by kristinafh

At some point in time (1974?), my mother enrolled me and my sister PJ in CCD (Confraternity of Christian Doctrine) classes at St. Therese. They were held every Wednesday evening and at one point in time, they almost cut into my favorite new show – Happy Days.

Selsa Couch also enrolled Ericka in CCD and between the two of them, they coordinated the pick up and drop off of the three of us to the classes.

During second grade, Ericka and I went through some special preparation which led up to two events – First Communion (and more on this later) and The Sacrament of Penance. I was puzzled by the latter. The idea was to confess our sins and to be freed from them while at the same time, seeking mercy and forgiveness from God. There were categories of sins and ways in which people showed that they were sorry for them.

My very first time was a bit scary and intimidating. In the multi-purpose room (in the St. Therese school/church building), they set up the confessional – um – I guess box? It was dark brown – one side was where the priest sat – cloaked in privacy and the other side was where the confessor sat. In between us was a wooden, sliding window. It was to be pulled open when the confessor was ready to begin.

I thought long and hard about what to confess and amazingly – I had to really stretch the “bad” things because I truly was a good kid. Seriously!

I remember telling Father Frank that I had been mean to my sister Patty (I left out the part that she provoked me – the little brat that she was), I thought mean things about my mom and dad, and I had told 2 lies to friends (okay – those were white lies because Colleen Wooden had asked me if I liked the way she cut her Barbie’s hair and I said sure – I didn’t want to hurt her feelings).

Ericka went right before me so when I was finished, I joined her in the church, with my rosary to say the prayers assigned to me (10 Our Fathers and 3 Hail Mary’s). Although we were being watched closely by our CCD teachers, we compared our punishment through a pre-designated sign language system. Fancy that we both received the same number of prayers!

After it was all over, and we were waiting for Selsa to pick us up, Ericka dropped the bombshell on me that she would probably be moving at the end of the school year. It seems that her dad Larry was moving up in the world so they were going to move into a big ole house far away from me.

I was stunned and said nothing.

As we were running down the sidewalk to meet her mom’s car, I tripped and fell, cutting up my calf and knee pretty badly. I accused Ericka of tripping me and truth be told – I’m not sure if she did (accidentally) or if my clumsy self with my big feet, tripped over something like an indentation in the pavement. We were horsing around as we were running so either could have been the case. I sobbed – almost hysterically. Sure, there was lots of blood and crappy gravel-ish stuff in my knee but looking back, I think the tears were really about me losing my best friend. She had been my “constant” for three years. I felt like the rug was pulled out from under me. But I never told anybody that (until now).

The next day, Ericka came over to my house and delivered to me a "get well" plant along with a handwritten note about how sorry she was for tripping me. I couldn’t even look at her. While looking at the ground, I accepted her gift and then went back to the dinner table to eat.

My mom was impressed with Ericka’s gesture. I kept silent during the entire meal. Everything tasted like paper but I knew that if I didn’t eat, it would draw attention to myself and I would be subjected to questioning. I ate. Kept quiet and took the pain to bed with me.

Me and Ericka never talked about the accidental tripping situation again nor did we have any discussions about the move. When we were together, we just didn’t talk about that. Selsa would give my mom details and my mom would mention things to me. But me and Ericka – nope – we never talked about her moving.

And it happened. She moved to a big ole fancy house on Hadley Road. And another chapter in our relationship began.

The Frazier's and The Couch's

The map probably looks familiar because I've posted it before. It's my memory of the kids that lived in my neighborhood, plotted out on each street. When I was in Fort Wayne in May, I stopped by the old neighborhood and snapped pictures of the houses where each one of my friend's lived. That one up there is the house where the Couch's lived.

In 1971, I made a lot of great friends at Indiana Village Elementary School. One in particular was Ericka Couch. We sat at table #6 (Miss Crouse's afternoon Kindergarten class) and I think we bonded because one of the other girl's who sat with us (her name was Smokey - I kid you not) - well she kind of scared us. We paired up out of fear - I guess there are worse things to start friendships over :).

Like me, Ericka was the oldest child with one sibling (her - younger brother Aaron, me - younger sister Patty).

We also happened to live in the same neighborhood - well kinda - as she was on the "outskirts" or what was known as Kyle Road. Not that I was allowed on Kyle Road at that age. It might as well have been Sandpoint Road as far as my parents were concerned. Crossing over to it was like asking for a car to hit you. Really. They were convinced that Kyle Road was a main thoroughfare, with wildly - out of control cars and trucks - that struck innocent children - dozens of them.

Another biggie: we also had staunch Catholic mothers and non-religious fathers.

But none of this came to light until one day when my mother dropped me off at school. Ericka's mom was there too. They introduced themselves based upon the fact that they had heard each other's daughter talk about the other (of course they never did know about the "fear" factor and they must have assumed we had gobs in common to bond so quickly).

Before we knew it, my mom (who had recently left her KMart job) and Ericka's mom, Selsa, had made this arrangement in which my mom would babysit Ericka and Aaron during the week. Selsa was an elementary school teacher at Ward Elementary and was looking for help with her two kids during the day. With me and Ericka becoming instant friends, this situation looked very perfect to our moms.

And I absolutely enjoyed having someone else aside from my sister to play with. Although Ericka wasn't really into Barbies, she was adventurous and would play in the ditch with me or on the swings and she was definitely a fan of Gilligan's Island and the Brady Bunch. And she's also the one that showed me how to climb trees. There was one at Scott's Court that was great climbing material - it was a cherry tree and many cherries were collected for pies from that tree...

But anyway - this friendship between our families was a big deal because as I've mentioned previously, my father was extremely racist. And the whole babysitting situation almost did not come to be...because Selsa wasn't white.

But she wasn't black. I'm saying this from the perspective of a six year old because when it came up in a discussion between my parents (of course I was listening - duh!) my dad flat out asked if Selsa was 'that word' which he always associated with non-white. That's when I learned that Selsa was born and raised in Taos, New Mexico and that she was married to Larry who was white. So even though my dad labeled this as an interracial marriage, the fact that Selsa wasn't black but "Mexican" must have been okay. I didn't understand the reasoning then (or even now) - I just know that this distinction is what made it okay for our families to socialize together.