Stubborna Defiance and the Alley Witch

       As if the angry Italian gene wasn’t already in evidence, when the woman accused me of taking my child into an alley for the sole purpose of abusing her, I truly understood the blood lust that makes it necessary to not just do in the individual, but also their entire family. Had the said child, the daughter, the only person I know who is more stubborn than me, not already had me at my wits end, perhaps I would have just let the comment go. Chalked it up to the fact that the woman glaring over the fence at me was obviously a malicious, old, crazy witch. But my blood was boiling.

       When we happened upon the witch, the daughter was standing in the middle of the alley, her bike lying where she had just tossed it, screaming at the top of her lungs. The dog, as stubborn and seemingly untrained as the child, refused to heed my command to sit. Instead, he demonstrated his annoyance to the fact that he was attached to a leash by lunging at every smell he could uncover in the alley, effectively pulling the arm out of me. The daughter, as she always does, had insisted on taking her bike. As she is only two, we make it a short walk. One block from home, regardless of how long or short the walk is, she usually throws her bike to the side and begins screaming wildly when I refuse to carry her and her bike home while trying to control the heedless dog. I never seem to learn. But that is yet another unfortunate family trait. None of us ever quite seem to learn.

       We stand there at loggerheads, the daughter and I, and despite the fact that this is all my fault for allowing her to bring her bike, I am ready to throttle her. And while I’m not quite sure what throttling entails, it sounded horrible enough when my mother threatened us with it to effectively reign my siblings and I into compliance. I straighten the daughter's bike and tell her I’ll push her home, all she has to do is sit on the thing. She gives me a look that tells me in no uncertain terms what she thinks of that idea, then knocks the bike over again. To further demonstrate my stellar parenting skills, I cannot help now but to goad her. “Fine,” I say, “just leave your bike there! Some little girl that will appreciate it will hopefully find it and take good care of it.” Even I don’t expect her to hop right on and keep riding after this comment. She screams even more hysterically and digs her heels in even deeper. Enter the alley witch.

       As I stand there, completely defeated by a two year old, trying to decide what a proper parent would do that would result in everyone walking home calmly and happily, the old witch pops her head up over her fence. She stares at me, long and hard. Likely giving her the same look the daughter is giving me, I shout over at the alley witch, quite pleased with the admirable restraint I show in my choice of words, “Is there a problem?”

       “I heard the baby crying,” she responds, still staring at me with her evil witch gaze. “I wanted to make sure she’s alright.”

       “She’s fine,” I respond. “Just very stubborn and not too happy at the moment.”

       “I guess that’s why you’re in the alley.”

       “What?” I ask, not understanding witch speak.

       “No one takes walks in alleys unless they don’t want to be seen abusing their children.”

       To hell with admirable restraint in my word choice. I was so incensed that I cannot recall what exactly my response was, I only know that it was extraordinarily vulgar and likely suggested she partake in acts that even an alley witch would find offensive. And while I realize such language is inappropriate in front of a child, I deemed it more appropriate than demonstrating to the child how to rip the tongue out of someone.

       I doubt normal people get accused of hanging out in alleys because they are good places to abuse their children. But I’m not surprised this has happened to me. I must give off some sort of lunatic pheromone that attracts crazies. I once had an overly ripe smelling man choose to squeeze himself on to the seat next to me on a mostly empty #8 Halsted Bus. He then proceeded to describe Lenin’s home and furnishings to me in painful detail. Another time, a homeless man not quite right in the head blocked my path and offered to go to the bathroom with me. Then, a man at the swimming pool in a hotel outside of St. Louis, much to the delight of my siblings, approached me, touched my Bozo like hair, and told me how beautiful it was. If that wasn’t crazy enough, he then asked my siblings if he could marry me. I should add, this was at our second hotel of the night. We had to flee the first one after discovering that our rooms smelled like rotting corpses. Something else that I imagine doesn’t happen to normal people.

       Surely there must be something to this lunatic pheromone theory. Growing up, we didn’t know a whole lot of normal people. Our family friends had names like Don the Coupon Man, Ralph the Junkman, and Crazy Joe. We were friends with Crazy Joe's daughter, too, and she was by no means the picture of sanity. She happened to be at a turkey trot we ran in one year and as she knew us, she ran most of the way with Sibling #3 and I. She was in mid-sentence, jogging along next to us, when she suddenly just went sprawling. It’s a mystery what she tripped over, as the ground was perfectly level. No matter, she hopped up as if nothing had happened, and just continued on with her sentence, no mention made at all of the fact that she had just been kissing the sidewalk. When we realized she was unhurt, my sister and I began running again and Crazy Joe’s daughter fell instep alongside of us. Only, instead of running, she was doing this slightly Monty Pythonesque loose-legged, fast walk. Then, after a couple of minutes of this, during which I was turning blue as I couldn’t breathe from trying to hold in the laughter, she just started running again, her story still in progress. Suddenly, with no explanation at all, she began to skip. A really exaggerated, arms swinging high, type of skipping that you can’t help but notice as you drive past and think to yourself, “what the fuck?”

       So, having grown up around people that would likely have to check “other” on a form indicating level of mental stability, I do know it really is best to keep a calm, level head when confronted with the mad ravings of a crazy alley witch. Yet, as she continues to stare and expand upon her theory that only parents that want to abuse their children walk in alleys, I continue to bombard her with phrases that would make the most foul-mouthed trucker blush, as I finally pick up the child and her bike and allow the dog to drag us down the alley. When we get home, my arms slightly shaky from the effort of carrying the child, her bike, and a pulling dog, I put down both the child and her bike. She gives me one of her well practiced looks that make it unerringly clear what she thinks of me, and then hops on the bike and speeds off down the sidewalk. As the dog pulls me after her, I contemplate changing the daughter’s name to the more fitting, yet still feminine sounding, Stubborna Defiance. And, yes, I know that she has won. Again.