I wish I could remember Helen and Martina's last names. I would love to look them up on facebook. But as the case is, I only knew each of them during part of fifth grade while living in Azusa, California—one of the brief stops of the 16 different schools I attended from first grade through twelfth grade.
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I didn't know anything about being gay as a child, except, I knew I liked Helen and Martina better than I liked any of the boys at my school. Helen was so beautiful. I can still remember her face. She was Spanish I think, perhaps from Mexico, because she had such bronze-tan skin. I learned later in life that most Mexican persons don't like being called Spanish because of the long history between the Spaniards and the Mayans of Mexico. And although I was aware of discrimination against blacks at such an early age during school I learned also that Mexicans out West and American Indians, too, were treated just as bad or worse by whites. Helen had a mature face for a fifth grader, but she was petite and very athletic. She could do eight to ten pull-ups on the high bar during P.E., whereas, I could only do maybe three to five. I wasn't obese as a child. I was slim. But, I came face to face with my own lack of strength when my class had to do those pull-ups. Helen had a crush on a sixth grader named Gavin. Martina was just as athletic and just as bronze as Helen. But, she had more of a baby face. And a smile that lit up the whole playground. She liked a boy named Gabriel. Helen and Martina were best friends. I longed to play with them and be in their crowd.
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One time all of the fifth grade classes took a field trip to Olvera Street in Downtown Los Angeles. My mother literally scraped up all the pennies she had so that I could have a little spending money for the trip and I took them across the street to the little bodega and cashed them into about three dollars. I remember my step-father being angry at my mother for letting me have the money, saying that we ought to save it to buy something more important. The next day my teacher, Ms. Gerubel, assigned Helen and Martina partners for the trip. I was placed with another girl in my class whose name I can't recollect, either. She was a little paler than me and she was chubby. She wore round wire-rimmed glasses and wore her light-brown long hair pulled back at the sides. I was upset that I had been partnered with her, although I tried not to show it. I wanted so much to sit next to Helen or Martina on the long bus ride and walk with either of them through Olvera Street. This girl was a little bossy, too. Reflecting back she really liked me and longed for my friendship the way I longed for Helen and Martina's friendship. That day at Olvera Street I saw a purple ceramic teddy-bear bank I fell in love with. However, I was about two and a half dollars short of being able to buy it. And this sweet traveling partner of mine gave me the rest of the money plus a little more to buy some candy for the bus ride back. I gave the purple ceramic teddy-bear bank to my mother when I got home that evening so that she would have something nice to save her pennies in. If I knew this girl's name and her last name I would find her on facebook as well and thank her for showing such kindness to me when I was a little mean to her.
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Ms. Gerubel was a great teacher. She let my class listen to her albums she brought in while we did our projects in the afternoon. I remember listening to Neil Diamond's "Brother Love's Traveling Salvation Show" and Marlo Thomas's "Free To Be You And Me" that my twin sister's teacher next door let our class borrow. My twin sister's teacher let her take that particular album home and she and I played it over and over again until we learned all of the songs by heart. I think back and really believe Marlo Thomas set the stage for how my life played out. Still, I am just now coming to terms with my own sexuality and I am just now, finally, feeling free to be me.
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Ms. Gerubel was very kind, but she was also very strict about attendance. She made her students stay after school to make up the time they missed. My twin sister and I walked at least a mile or more to school every day and so I was late a couple of times. One day I stayed after school to make up for the time I was late. The fifth graders were assigned a certain picnic table to sit at while the sixth graders at the next table watched out for us. Gavin was there that day. He was bronze-tan skinned also. His black silk hair was feathered away from his face and was a little longer than the other boys' hair. He was attractive and all the girls liked him. I knew Helen liked him a lot. He sort of liked me with my platinum blonde hair and green eyes and fair skin. I was shocked when he came over to my picnic table and asked me if I was a virgin. I never answered him. I couldn't answer out of shock, for one reason, but also because he brought up all of a sudden a painful memory of my sexual abuse by my oldest half-brother that I somehow blocked out of memory until then not knowing for sure all the facts surrounding the abuse that later would be confirmed when I was a teenager. So I didn't answer him. And that day when I walked home all alone I was so sad. I told my twin sister, Stephanie, when I arrived home about the incident, but no one else, not even my mother, who was suffering from major depression most of that year and was passed out on the couch when I got home. I went into the bedroom that my twin sister and I shared and I just cried. I have thought back on that day a thousand times. I wasn't mad at Gavin. I imagine he probably had been abused himself.
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If I could ever pinpoint a time that I knew I liked girls better than boys it would have to be that year, although, it's something I've been aware of my whole life, and it can't really be pinned down to one particular instance in my life. That year before June my family and I were packing again to move back home to West Virginia. And I never saw Helen and Martina or any one of those precious kids again. But each of them, faces I can see just like it was yesterday, all hold a special place in my heart. And I will remember them as long as I live.
