That she should pull me by my hair.
Too afraid to tell someone
In fear, my world would come undone.
An now, since fifty years have past,
The silent scaring's are what last
But oh, to travel back in time
And edit this filthy psycho rhyme.
When pain becomes poetry, yet words fail to heal.
True Story
It was the fall of 1972. After several years of being bullied by classmates and having mediocre grades, I was looking for a fresh start. My parents, Richard and Dolores, had been divorced for six years, and I was being raised solely under the auspices of my mom. I was on a doctor prescribed diet to help my weight and self-image. And I was being bused ten miles away to to Montour to a new school.
And a new fifth grade teacher
Her name was Linda Elsinger, recently divorced, and soon changing her name to Linda Cometo. She was a pudgy woman with short hair... and a short temper. As she was explaining some lesson to the class, my attention was diverted to a classmate. As I interacted in a brief conversation with my classmate, little did I know the consequences.
Ms. Cometo came over to where I was seated, and pulled me up by my butch haircut, raising me up from my seat. Wow! My eyes were wide open, and the fear of God was in me.
I was afraid to tell my mom, the principal or any person of authority,i although my classmates remember the scene to this day. The fear of her flunking me in school for reporting her, was real. After many years, I had a new beginning, and did I want to jeopardize it?
And so it went unreported and may have contributed early on, to who I am today?
If I could go back in time, would I have spoke up? Hell yes! Silence allows abuse and baggage to thrive, while corrupting the self-esteem. Today, any teacher would be fired for what she did. Through the years, I have had trust issues with female authority figures. I wonder why? I am single also, and still find myself working through the psyco rhyme debris.
The Catholic Church compensates with money for sexual abuse by priests, but our governmental public schools remain silent with skeletons of stories.
Linda Cometo continued the next year, as our sixth grade teacher, before leaving the area and school system. She fell in love with the state of Hawaii. In a few years she had a child. She came back to my home town twice to visit our class at the local park, telling us how she loved us.
Ok, so how does pulling my butch hair express love? I am listening.
If there was a redeeming grace to this...person, it was that Ms. Cometo introduced me to writing poetry in the fifth grade. The poems I write today find their origins in the little rhymes of a fifth grade class. Yet, words, nor money cannot edit or erase the rhymes of psycho baggage. If she only knew then. But would she care...then or now?
But I am only one person.
So many others have fallen under the abuse of teachers, scout leaders, clergy or family members or friends. Each have their own story and journey to travel through. Some may try to bury it, but it still comes out, even sideways. Regardless, there is lasting implications that can live for a lifetime without understanding, reconciliation, emotional compensation or healing.
For most, it is a sad crime, for which the victim can only find peace on their own.
But I think it is the children and families targeted by the CPS governmental crime syndicate, that have it the worst. The multiplier of their circumstances create a downward spiral, for which many never return. Let me explain.
Your son, Dillon, decided to be in little league. Despite his vision, he makes the team. After a month, finally, he gets to play. Oh boy! He is excited and gives it his best shot. However, he gets bruised up by a couple of fast balls, but takes it in stride.
The next day, his teacher, Mrs. Wilson, notices his bruises and asks if he is ok. He sheepishly replies, yeah. But Mrs. Wilson is not so sure. She tell him to go visit the school nurse.
Nurse Angela takes a look at Dillon and also ask Dillon about his bruises. He feels uncomfortable. After all, it is not manly, to admit defeat or bruises. He brushes it off with a shrug. But nurse Angela does not. She contacts the CPS for further investigation.
And investigation, it quickly becomes the priority of Child Protective Services. Caseworker Jenny McGreedie is right at it. You may remember her from my former writing. Well, dear Jenny is low on cash, not quite making her quota of child trafficking, so she grabs the case. In a heartbeat, she is on the phone, cross examining you and looking up your son at school.
Wasting not time, she strategically plans a surprise visit to your home, equipped with notepad all sorts of scheming tricks. Within no time, she is doing her magic, twisting your words, creating fear and intimidation and manipulating the conversation. You try to tell her Dillion bruised himself from little league, but she refuses to believe you.
As quick as she blew in to your home, she leaves like a fast moving storm.
You ask yourself, where the hell did that one come from?
You become concerned, with the threat of supervised visits. Within in a short few weeks she blows back in, only to take Dillon from your home, and place him in foster care. What the hell happened? I should have had a lawyer. And so you get legal counsel.
In the meantime, your decide to research what the hell the CPS is. You learn that Child Protective Services is a for - profit governmental agency, that places children in foster care. You learn from your friend, Jackie, that it is a child trafficking ring, whose goal is to break up families and legally kidnap children.
Now you are scared as hell. You decide to go all in and hire a lawyer, spending your saving of five thousand dollars, in hopes to save Dillon. Well sadly, the lawyer works for the CPS and the judge is morally compromised from past infidelity. You lose the court case... and Dillon.
You will never forget that look on Dillon's face, the last time you saw him. His tears... his eyes haunt you every time you think of him, How you wanted to hold him and take him with you to a safe place. How you wanted to... but you couldn't. And then, he was quickly whisked away from view. The guilt, the 'why' questions, and the 'what should I have done' engulfs you.
At the same time, your husband, Jake, has said he is filing for divorce. You see, he cannot handle all this shit and has found greener pastures. Damn, if only you could have given him more lovin through this time. But where was he when you were trying to save Dillon. Oh yeah, he was working and did not stay in the loop of family life over the past six months.
And there were those strange hang up calls from a woman you suspect.
And now, you are alone. You see the pills and want to take a bunch to forget about this nightmare. You have been through too much and only want to escape.. for a while. You take the pills.
Your friend, Jackie, finds you unresponsive in your home, after countless phone calls. You are rushed to the emergency. Yeah, they pump you out and hold you for awhile, before releasing you for mental floor for evaluation. All through this, Jackie stays by your side. She is an angel. After getting through the mental ward, you realize you must go on with your life...but how? Jackie suggest contacting a pro-family group. Your thoughts return to you son.
In the meantime, Dillon is shuffled from home to home. He never plays ball again, but finds a paper route job and later a stocker gig in a grocery store, before getting his GED. But he learns to smoke and use women.
Dillon decided to drop by and look you up. It has been well over twelve years since you saw him. He rings the doorbell. He is a man now with an unshaven face and a rough smokey demeanor.
The meeting is welcoming yet awkward. So many emotions are spinning through your heart. Your mind is on overtime. He tells you you are going to be a grandma. And he leaves.
You thoughts move rapidly with wonder and anticipation of rekindling the mother-son relationship and being a grandma. Yet, you never hear from Dillon again.
And that is only one of thousands of families' CPS stories.
You see, there is no poetical therapy for them to journal. Dillon never picked up the pen. But there is the filthy psyco rhyme... we can call it the multiplier, that creates the storm of baggage and trauma. Remember your basic math class where you learned your multiplication tables. Well, multiply the trauma and tragedy times the greatest number squared and still... it does not match the suffering CPS victims go through.
The title of this writing includes the words abusive times. We are living in the day and times of abuse, but there is the second meaning of the multiplying effect.
Families and children are littered with tears, guilt, abandonment, fear, hopelessness, helplessness, depression, desperation, failure, voicelessness, numbness, addictions, abuse, predators, lies, scams, anger and even suicide or death. And the list goes on... and on. Yes, this is the multiplying factor, when the CPS enters your life.
Unlike victims of sexual abuse by Catholic priests, there is no financial compensation for the hell these families go through, by the selfish acts of the Jenny McGreedie's of the world, though there should be. Yet, no money can reconcile the hardship and life long hell.
Such crimes are exponentially greater than any butch cut hair pulling by a wacked up teacher like Ms. Cometo. She probably never will know what she did. But the filthy psycho rhyme remains multiplied. Oh where is poetical justice? It is up to us to stand up for the fearful and voiceless. We are their only hope. Otherwise it can be a downward spiral of failure. We must incorporate a zero tolerance to abuse and child trafficking.
Too afraid to tell someone
In fear, my world would come undone.
Will you be that voice, that will spare them the life long suffering? Will you protect families and children?
An now, since fifty years have past,
The silent scaring's are what last
