Pamela Jane - An Incredible Talent for Existing: A Writers Story

An Incredible Talent

for Existing

A Writers Story

Pamela Jane

Copyright 2016 Pamela Jane

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

While all the stories in this book are true, some names and identifying details have been changed to protect the privacy of the people involved.

Published by Open Books Press, USA

www.OpenBooksPress.com

An imprint of Pen & Publish, Inc.

www.PenandPublish.com
Bloomington, Indiana
(314) 827-6567

Print ISBN: 978-1-941799-21-5

eBook ISBN: 978-1-941799-22-2

Library of Congress Control Number: 2015955749

Cover photograph of Pamela Jane by Deborah Guyol

Cover design by Desiree Rappa

Pamela Jane

www.pamelajane.com

@austencats

For John

You are the only reason I am. You are all my reasons.

John Nash, A Beautiful Mind (film)

Advance Praise

This memoir takes us into the heady, rollickingand ultimately terrifyingsixties. We are right with her as she tries to find herself through sewing and sex and psychology. And we breathe a sigh of relief when she finally realizes what one of her high school teachers knew long before she didthat he would have her books on his shelf. With passion and compassion, Pamela takes us masterfully through this story of a lifelong writer struggling to emerge.

Deborah Heiligman, author, Charles and Emma: The Darwins Leap of Faith, a National Book Award Finalist

An Incredible Talent for Existing is a poignant life chronicle, searingly honest, and richly written. Pamela Janes memoir is a testament to story, how its power helped her imagine, imitate, and finally create her own unique narrative. Through the beauty in her language and the empowerment in her message, Jane has given us a book that will touch the life of every woman who has ever questioned who she is, where she is going, and what the future holds.

Matilda Butler, author, Rosies Daughters: The First Woman To Generation Tells Its Story and Writing Alchemy: How to Write Fast and Deep

... incisive, funny, and touchingly candid evidence of the power of the stories we tell ourselves.

Howard Rheingold, author, The Virtual Community and Net Smart

An Incredible Talent for Existing is harrowing story that invites the reader to experience the thrill and danger of the Sixties from a place of safety and acceptance. Its the story of hundreds of thousands of women; our lives were huge experiments.

Tristine Rainer, Director, Center for Autobiographic Studies, author, The New Diary and Your Life as Story

Her prose reads like poetry and her imagination is like magic!

Jacopo della Quercia, author, The Great Abraham Lincoln Pocket Watch Conspiracy and License to Quill

Prologue

Dearborn, Michigan 1965

In 1965, when I was eighteen, I ran away to Portland, Oregon. Running away was an act of rebellion, but also of faith. In one beautiful leap I would escape my family, my past, and the insufferable person Id been living with for the past few yearsmy teenage self. This person was quite obviously screwed up. She had way too many problems. No one wanted any part of them, especially me. In Portland I could reinvent myself and leave the past behind.

My brother agreed to drive me to the airport on the condition that I stop to say goodbye to my parents. So on a gray November morning, I found myself driving down the flat Midwestern streets where the silent, respectable houses stared impassively out of the dawn. We turned a corner, and my brother slowed down. There it wasthe familiar red brick bungalow with my writing alcove overlooking the maple tree.

My brother pulled over and turned off the engine.

Do I have to go through with this? I asked. My heart was thudding heavily and my mouth was dry. I had called my parents only that morning to tell them I was leaving.

You know the deal, my brother said. He grinned and tilted his Che Guevara beret rakishly over one eye. Come on, lets go.

I followed him slowly up the front steps into the house. Inside, my parents were sitting at the kitchen table, breakfast dishes scattered around them.

Please mom, dont make a scene, I prayed. Just let me go.

When she saw me, my mothers face cracked open like the eggshell on her plate, and she started sobbing. My father watched in silence. I suspected that he was secretly relieved to be getting rid of his expensive troublesome daughter with her therapy bills and college tuition.

Why does she have to go? my mother cried, as though she were appealing to an invisible jury who would render a verdict on the crazy actions of her daughter.

How could I explain what I didnt understand myself, that it wasnt only what I was running away to that mattered, but what I was running from?

To my mother I said only, My boyfriend and I want to be together, Mom. (Boyfriend was an overstatement; I had spent one weekend with him the summer before.)

Cant you just get married? my mother asked.

Well get marriedlater.

I was putting up a smooth front, but inwardly I felt guilty and callous. How could I cause my mother so much pain just when my dad was divorcing her? She may have been a disaster as a mom, but at least she had tried, and in her own inscrutable way she cared. Now I was walking out on her when she needed me most.

My mother started crying harder. But youre going so far!

Ill write every week, I promise, Mom.

Id hoped for a clean silent break. This break was anything but clean and silent; it was noisy, messy and painful. But it was, finally, over.

Almost. As I was walking out the door, my mother gave one last anguished cry. She doesnt even have money for an emergency phone call!

Emergency telephone calls were sacred in our household. My mother was always giving my brother and me money for them that we promptly spent, knowing she would replace it.

This time, however, I was prepared.

Yes, I do, I said, digging into my pocket and producing the nest egg I had put aside for my future. I had exactly one dime.

Part 1
An Existential Childhood

Stamford, Connecticut, 1950

The Power of Story

Until I was four or five, I thought my mother was a witch, a composite of all the witches in my favorite fairy tales Snow White , Rapunzel , Hansel and Gretel . Her wavy jet-black hair framed a face with cold eyes and a misshapen nose. There were whispers among the Italian aunts about a nose job. (If this was true, it must have gone horribly wrong; my moms nose looked like it had been broken about six times.)

Youre getting so big! Almost four years old! she would cackle, rubbing her hands together. At least it seemed to me she was cackling. Why else would she be so thrilled that I was growing older? She must be planning to fatten me up (to the best of her ability; I was a fairly skinny kid) to boil me for dinner. Since my mom hadnt eaten my brother yet and he was three years older, I figured I had at least a few years to go.

My brother was not afraid of getting eaten by my mother. He wasnt afraid of anything. He was busy catching bugs, chloroforming butterflies, and driving our beagle, Lolo, crazy by running around the house yelling Yams! while she raced after him. Eventually my parents sent Lolo to a special farm for crazy dogsat least thats what they told us. And much later, my brother, Phil, would become an entomologist.