The Abramson’s home was easily 3,000 square feet; two-story; relatively new; and sat at the end of an upper-middle-class leaning, quiet cul-de-sac. Mr. Abramson, a CPA, commuted to and from Los Angeles and Mrs. A indicated she was eager to begin work as a substitute teacher. Their children, Tina, Tracy, Samantha, and Paul, ranged in ages four to twelve. Tina, the youngest, was adopted. I found this out from ten-year-old Samantha soon after I moved in.
“We adopted Tina,” she mouthed, standing behind her preoccupied-with-a-doll younger sister. This may have been the moment sweet Samantha captured my heart.
***
I shared an off-campus apartment with three girlfriends my junior year at San Fernando Valley State College in Northridge, California, but my senior year found me hunting for a place to live. My girlfriends had deserted me—gotten married or transferred to other schools—and my boyfriend, Andy, a recent graduate of UCLA, was Europe-bound. Thus, my mood proved melancholy the August afternoon I lingered in one of Valley State’s wide, stark hallways, staring at three side-by-side available payphones.
In time, I mustered up the courage to lift the receiver of one, deposit the correct amount of change (no doubt, one dime) and dial the number I’d copied off a 3 x 5 card. Free room and board in exchange for light housekeeping and ironing. Close to campus. Sounds like a win-win situation.
Right?
I couldn’t have been more wrong.
Andy and I moved my things into a small bedroom off the kitchen of the Abramson’s home the Sunday evening before classes began. We’d recently returned from a road trip up and down California’s coast. And, yes, we missed one another already. Our young hearts loomed heavy as we worked unpacking, organizing, placing a favorite stuffed animal on the bed.
Not helping the situation, we could hear Mrs. Abramson in the family room erratically yelling at one or more of her four children. This is just great, I thought. Andy takes off for Europe in three days… and I’m left behind to listen to Dragon Lady.
I soon realized that Mrs. Abramson—platinum hair, medium build, angular figure—preferred a strictly business relationship, which was fine by me. I also realized it proved impossible not to bond with her children.
Her girls, at least.
Paul.
Twelve-year-old Paul was pleasant but kept to himself. He needed to arrive at school early, thus he served as my alarm clock—jolting me awake at 6 a.m. every morning with his extremely loud, oblivious banging and slamming of kitchen cabinets and drawers. This is my only bad memory of Paul.
Tina.
Four-year-old Tina Abramson, slight with tiny features and light brown hair, had a bad habit of her own. She pitched fits. New to the scene, I found it odd that neither one of her parents seemed to consider her routine outbursts cause for concern. Something else I found odd, I’d never seen her long, straggly hair combed into a ponytail or pigtails.
One afternoon, her mother out-an’-about, I said, “Hey, Tina. How ‘bout I brush your hair? Would you like a ponytail?” Tina nodded, we grabbed a hairbrush off my dresser, and she sat on the edge of my bed as still as a statue as I brushed and brushed, transforming stubborn snarls and tangles into a semi-shiny ponytail.
I was in my room studying, my door ajar, when Mrs. Abramson arrived home. Standing in the kitchen she barked her sergeant’s orders: “Tina, take down your hair. You know I don’t like it tied up like that!” Tina whimpered and resisted—pitched a minor fit—but eventually, the ponytail came down.
Tracy.
Tracy Abramson, spoiled and Mom’s and Dad’s favorite, turned eight on October 31, 1971. Although as a rule I’d head for home Friday afternoons—home being Riverside, a seventy-mile drive one way—I made the decision to stay in Northridge the weekend of Tracy’s party.
Why not? It might be fun.
By 3:00 p.m. Saturday, the bottom floor of the Abramson’s home was crowded with kids and adults—kids in costume running wild, and adults rattling ice cubes, enjoying dip ‘n chips, crackers ‘n cheese, and a variety of drinks. A little after 4:00 p.m., overhearing Mrs. Abramson suggest I take the children outside to play a game of musical chairs, Kat, the mom who lived next door, offered a much appreciated, “I’ll help.”
So… Kat and I rounded up the kids, herded them onto the Abramson’s professionally clipped back lawn, and soon the scene looked something like this: I manned the record player, stopping and starting “The Monster Mash” by Bobby Pickett, waving as witches, pirates, ghosts, hobos, and pumpkins cautiously circled by. And Kat, more experienced and up for the challenge, eliminated chairs and enforced fair play. Mr. and Mrs. Abramson remained inside, not once bothering to peek their educated heads out their tinted sliding-glass door. Sadly, the same held true when Kat and I supervised the tearing open a generous mound of gifts.
Samantha.
Samantha, the oldest daughter—sturdy body with a round face, and cheekbone-length dark hair—remained my favorite. One of Samantha’s “chores” was to accompany younger sisters Tina and Tracy upstairs at night and put them to bed. She’d oversee the process of pajamas, teeth brushing and, eventually, respective bedrooms. Not once did I observe Mom or Dad trek upstairs to offer a bedtime story, an “I love you,” or a hug and kiss goodnight. They remained downstairs absorbed in the LA Times or Newsweek Magazine.
I’d cringe at the hard, punitive edge Mrs. Abramson gave to the sound of her eldest daughter’s name, emphasized vowels and added syllable vibrating up the curved, shag-carpeted stairway. And my heart would feel a prickling pinch, as I watched Samantha unfailingly try only to please.
From what I could discern, Mr. and Mrs. Abramson held affection for each other. It wasn’t unusual, after dinner, for the two of them to disappear. If they informed anyone as to where they were going, it wasn’t me. The second or third time this happened, Samantha, Tracy, Tina, and I were caught snuggling on the family room couch enjoying an innocent sitcom (most likely The Partridge Family or That Girl) when the front door swung open earlier than we expected.
And, yes, Mrs. Abramson marched in and planted her solid-self between couch and floor-model television set. “Our children don’t watch TV on school nights,” she announced. Click. Followed by: “Su-ma-an-tha… take Tina and Tracy upstairs to bed.” Small-framed, wiry-haired Mr. A lingered in the dimly lit entry hall, typically passive.
I had little choice but to find refuge in my bedroom off the kitchen.
The months I spent with the Abramsons, well… let’s just say they proved difficult. I missed Andy to a painful degree, and before long the infrequency and passive tone of his letters became cause for concern.
Three months after Andy’s departure, the unthinkable happened—unthinkable to a naïve twenty-one-year-old college student, anyway. Andy ended our four-year relationship with an icy cold “Dear Jane.” A shortish, not-so-sweet, correspondence espousing upon how he had never really loved me. Ouch! Experiencing Europe had changed him. Allowed him to find himself…
Blah, blah, blah… blah, blah.
In time I learned from a reliable source he’d not only found himself, but he’d found a girl in Nancy, France. No irony there. They soon married, and while I received first-hand lessons on how not to raise children, and how not to leave your lover, Andy was making plans to remain in Europe. To pursue a graduate degree in finance, and eventually a career in banking.
Finance? Banking?
Really?
Yes, evidently Europe had changed anti-establishment Andy’s sociology-majoring self.
Go figure.
I moved out of the Abramson’s home prior to second semester, returning to my own home in Riverside; I enrolled in strictly Tuesday-Thursday classes rendering it semi-practical to commute.
Nothing proved uncomplicated about my seemingly devastating state, particularly having to say goodbye to Samantha, Tracy, and Tina. As I recall, there were no tears but the look on Samantha’s face, well … it’s one I’ll never forget.
I bunked with a friend in Santa Monica during summer session, completing my BA Degree in Sociology in August of 1972. I was tempted to allow my boyfriend-breakup and awkward live-in situation to interfere with my educational goals, but I didn’t.
Thankfully, not.
***
Speaking from a near lifetime of experience, when tangled happenings such as the ones defined above knock me down (yes, I’ve been forced to pick myself up and brush myself off many times), these same situations consistently and unwittingly reinforce my strength.
Well, sort of.
Not to mention my sense of humor; life sucks and then you die.
Today at age seventy-three, some fifty-plus years later—forty-three years as a mother, twenty-five as an educator, and too-many-to-admit as a blindly naïve, wannabe writer of middle grade novels and more—I continue to hold fondness for the Abramson clan.
Particularly my sweet, eager-to-please Samantha.
Needless to say, they’ve visited and revisited my thoughts over the years. I pray they’ve made their way in life, overcoming clearly dysfunctional beginnings. I was never told the details of Tina’s adoption. Obviously at the time it took place, Mom and Dad Abramson viewed themselves (and represented themselves to Los Angeles County Department of Social Services) as competent, loving, and deserving parents.
Go figure.
*****
Nancy Lee VanDusen writes novels for middle grade children and young adults as well as creative nonfiction and poetry. Her work has been published in a handful of online journals, including Wilderness House Literary Press and Grande Dame Literary. She is a seventy-three-year-old retired educator, a grandmother of two, and lives in Southern California with two extremely lucky rescue cats.
