Continue reading to learn more about this memoir. Specifically, the author tries to answer questions relating to the memoir and encourages readers to post further questions related to this work. Thanks to all of you, in advance, for any type of such feedback--it is through such feedback that I become a better, more self-conscious writer and understand how and where I need to improve such that my storytelling techniques are maximized and meaningful to readers.
Above is a photo of the author's daughter, Allison, age 3. Her favorite stories are Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, Good Night Moon, Swimmy, and Hop On Pop. The authors of each of these books were and still are famous storytellers, each of whom knew the value of a good story. Timeless, each of these stories stand as examples and raise that metaphorical bar for future authors and illustrators. Our youngest son, Elvin, loves the story of The Very Hungry Catepillar. The author loves retelling this story, without the book, using American sign language to recreate the tale and maximize communication with the very young. While 7 months old, Elvin enjoys each time he hears his mama go "num num num....and the next day, he at a large, green leaf, and he felt much better...num...num...numm...*happy sigh*" (using her right hand and fingers to imitate the characters of the story.
The Drums Beating House: a Memoir, encapsulates the author's life during the years when she was growing up in Drums, PA. Starting with her earliest memory and progressing forward through her childhood, the author discusses memories she had as well as the dynamic relationship between her, her mother, Agnes; her father, Dwight; her sisters, Jessica and Becky; her maternal grandparents, Agnes and James Marsicano; her maternal uncles; her paternal grandparents: Walter and Peggy Bicking; and her paternal great-grandmother, Marge Klinger.
As I wrote this memoir, I conscientiously and carefully retrieved memories I had from my past. Abuse is cyclical within families. Hoping to avoid this in regards to the author's own family, self-reflection and daily meditation are useful in terms of avoiding the mistakes of her parent, their parents and the parents who were before them. Although there is much to be said about 'spare the rod, spoil the child,' the author feels that it is through observing behavioral patterns and treating her children as though they were small adults that the best correction for undesirable behaviors are rendered.
All of the written recounts are true and accurate, to the best of the author's memory
1. Why did you choose to write a memoir at such a young age? Memoirs are typically written by older people, who have more time to self-reflect about the events of their earlier years.
My answer to this question revolves around my requiring of myself a certain behavior. Specifically, I choose to conscientiously avoid the mistakes that were made by my parent and their parents with respect to the types of punishment for what they considered to be bad behavior. While correcting your child for something he or she did wrong is imperative, going to extremes in terms of corporal punishment is undesirable. Not only does this form of punishment scar a child emotionally, it is, most often, not effective. In other words, it does not achieve the results that the punisher believes that it will. Through careful discussions, and by treating a child as though they were older than they really are, the best results, in terms of corrected child behavior, are acquired. When danger is a problem, such as when a child comes too close to a hot stove and they may, perhaps, burn themselves, the author finds that brief corporal punishment--such as a pat on the upper leg and redirection out of the kitchen, sternly, using firm words--are quite effective. However, each child is an individual. In other words, each has their own personality and with that, their own set of personal quirks. Attentive and observant parents readily pick up on this, and the cues to correct come naturally rather than abruptly and forcefully. But the author is getting off topic--so she digresses...
...this memoir was written at an earlier age specifically because she remembers clearly the events of the past currently. At age 38, the author seeks to remember what did happen during the earlier years of her childhood and not repeat such events while raising her own family.
2. Who are my favorite authors?
Ernest Hemingway, John Steinbeck, Frank McCourt, Elie Wiese (although I’ve never finished reading any of his books; they are too-heart-breaking for me to read; I choose not to read so that I don’t heap up memories in my head regarding that particular instance because it’s a hard topic for me to deal with; I had to filter out some books as such because while there are collections, like Frank McCourt’s tale of his life that use humor to get by in certain circumstances, some writers, I have a hard time wrapping my head around their stories because they are just too descriptive and violently graphic )l, Ayn Rand, Roald Dahl, the Brothers Grimm (the fairytale writers), and the collection of authors who contributed to the Foxfire book series, which integrates life, storytelling, carpentry, and otherwise off-the-grid sort of lifestyles
3. What inspired you to write this book?
As a new mother, I was washing dishes in the kitchen of what we called home c. 2003, when I looked over and saw in the adjacent bathroom tub, my son, Connor, who was 1 and a half years old at the time, playing in a bathtub filled with toys. I had a flashback at that particular moment, I recall, when it happened back then, and I suddenly was flooded with memories about my childhood, when I was often left, alone, unsupervised, in a Pennsylvania porcelain bathtub. The water temperature slowly would decline sometimes when I was left in there, and I remembered being so scared. I thought the drain was going to swallow me. It was really the actual first account of when I can account for flashbacks as such happening. Post traumatic stress disorder is real for me. And seeing my own children progress through certain stages of my life afforded me, unfortunately, many opportunities where I would just get images of times when I was really small, alone and afraid. Retrospectively speaking, it has helped me be a more vigil mother to my own children, and has helped me focus on being a better, more understanding parent than my parents were.
What is your relationship with your parents now, currently?
My relationship with my father is distant. I keep him at an arm’s reach away via infrequent emails and I occasionally share some photos of my children with him. The Lord said you have to honor your mother and father, and to that extent, I’d rather maintain a positive relationship of sorts with him if I can. Do I forgive him for things he’s done to me and my sisters? I don’t think forgiveness is as easy as that. I could say I forgive him but the fact remains that I don’t truly believe he feels at all bad toward the monster father that he sometimes was when I was a child. You can only use humor to crutch certain things. I know very well, with him, were to draw the lines. I have lived in Arkansas with my growing family for nearly two decades and although they both have the means financially to take trips to the places like the Bahamas and such, he and his wife, Amy, have yet to even drive down our way even once to visit us over the years. They like to send packages to the grandkids, and cards with $50 dollar checks in them sometimes, and I’ve actually put a stop to that because it’s one thing to be an actual grandparent, but they act as though they’re just on-lookers from afar. So I told them, actually, after my stepmother--she used to send out Halloween and Easter packages, and that kind of thing was appreciated by my kiddos. But when my oldest son didn’t even get acknowledged with so much as a card or a small bag of candy last year because 15 is apparently the cut-off age for events like Easter and Halloween, I told them they could keep their money and stuff it! I’ve never asked for handouts, financially from them, and I will never start. If me and my husband cannot afford things, so be it.
In regards to my mother, I haven’t actually talked to her since I found out she was in prison without bond. The unfortunate reality of the situation is that she needs mental help, and lots of it, and really, she should be in a mental health facility up there instead of a penitentiary. But that’s not my call, and I really don’t want to get involved. I love my mother for what she had to offer me during her sober years, but I believe she has boarder-line personality disorder, in addition to being a victim of child abuse herself; you never know which version of Agnes you are going to talk to when you meet or converse with her, ever, and she is, unfortunately, incredibly stubborn and hard-headed about anything anyone else ever has to say.
4. Do you find your writing is, at times, a manual of sorts, to prevent the sour events of the past, like your purpose stated?
Writing the book, for me, was the best form of therapy I could ever afford for myself. And, as it happened, the dosage was perfect: I had the opportunity to share with friends, family members, and neighbors the life I was actually living back then and that meant a lot to me. When my mother was arrested for trying to hire a hit man to kill my father and my stepmother, Amy…jeez…my 20th Reunion happened just this past year and I was too ashamed of my family to even attend the event because of the way they behave. Writing the book, actually, was a way of telling local society that I was so very sorry for the burden that they are now strapped with in reference to the court hearing and my parents and step-mother. Amy actually worked as a paralegal in the Luzerne County Courthouse, for years, and there is no way possible that my mother is going to get a fair trial based upon that sort of nepotism, really. And truly, I don’t want to have any part in it or participate in it.
5. Why did you choose to write the book now, when you have so many family obligations and stress levels are seemingly high?
I actually was pregnant during the writing of this book, and was on bed-rest, so it gave me the opportunity to write what I could whenever I had to keep my feet up. But I wasn’t really good at that bed-rest thing, and I do have four other children who I love to spend time with. Unfortunately, our last baby was born this past May 7th when he should have been born on July 4th. He was about ten weeks premature, and I spent most of the summer with him in the NICU unit of Arkansas Children’s Hospital in Little Rock. The Ronald McDonald House was also available, and thank God that it was because it allowed my other children to at least be close to their new brother while he had his heart surgery, which occurred on May 17th. They were doing routine echocardiograms of the NICU infants and they found that he had a hole in his heart. The technical term for it is aortopulmonary window. And on May 17th, he had open-heart surgery. They put him on a heart-lung bypass machine and by the Grace of God, his heart actually started beating again without the need to electrically stimulate it with handheld chargers when they were through with the surgery. His heart started thumping all on its own…we were so blessed to have him live through the process, but it was heartbreaking not to be able to touch him or hold him for about three weeks, following that surgery. He’s currently doing better than we expected and we know that God answered our prayers with that little guy in terms of his healing. The surgeons were angels…the anesthesiologist even took an ultrasound of his wrist before surgery to know how deep the artery was, so he did not have to stick or prod him unnecessarily. He was a brilliant young man, and I can not express in words how appreciative I was to him, the surgeon, and the cardiac nursing team that helped my baby through that operation. Angles really do walk among us at times.
6. What is the title of your next book and what will it be like?
I am going with the title: Down the Road and Up the Way for my next book. After that, I have another book I’d like to write a book entitled Pondhouse, about our five years, across Five Aprils, as it happened to be, when we lived in an efficiency-style house that was situated on the levee-side of a pond, across from our landlords, the Woodward Family. Joe Woodward, a much-admired mentor, friend and attorney ran against Bill Clinton for the gubernatorial primaries way back when, but he lost. Joe Woodward passed away several years ago, but I have lots of golden memories to share in my next book in reference to him.
7. What is the relationship with your siblings and other family members like after you published this tell-all book of family secrets?
I keep my family at arm-length, and I don’t visit Pennsylvania under any circumstances. I have PTSD, and I have too many triggers when I go up there to make the trip worth it, actually. I do not keep in touch with my sisters. My youngest sister, Rebecca, doesn’t have much of a sense of humor about things and is ashamed that I published my memories from back then. In my book, I do make jokes at her expense, but none that are truly hurtful, and I take pot-shots at my own shortcomings through out the entire book than I amassed for her. My other sister, Jessica, is, unfortunately, a bit of a problem. I don’t have contact with her, either, and she chooses to live the life of an alcoholic victim. To the best of my knowledge, she has three children, but I try to stay out of her business if I can help it.
8. Are you firmly planted in Arkansas, or do you plan to move back to Pennsylvania at some time in the future?
Yes, we are firmly planted in Arkansas! We used to live in the southern part of the state, in a town called Magnolia, near the Louisiana boarder. But we finally found our 5 acres, adjacent to a deer camp and wonderful neighbors, 2 miles out a dirt road in Grapevine, Arkansas. There’s lots of wildlife…bears, deer, bobcats, rattlesnakes, water mocassins, etc. We also raise chickens on the side of our house, in a pen. They are fun to watch and the eggs are a bonus!
9. What are your other interests?
Film photography, when I have the time. It is a dying art form, and I hate to see that happen. I think there are too many photo share options available online nowadays, and they just don’t give you that real feeling of actually holding a picture in your hand. When you hold a photograph, you’re holding a souvenir of the past, and that should be treasured, not Instagrammed.
I also like to illustrate and paint. Working with acrylics is a fun pastime, but I don’t have a whole lot of time for that now because my children are young and they grow up too quickly. I also enjoy other art-forms, making wreathes out of actual flowers and greenery rather than silk imitations. I would love to write children’s books, and I have many ideas for lots of them, but I have to sort of put them aside for later years, when my own children are older and I have more time to afford to such activities.