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materials are copyright© 2005
by Michelle Weisblat-Dane. All rights reserved No portion may be
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without written permission.
The Begining Years
(1063)
By Michelle Dane
When I was 8
years old, I wanted to be one of The Brady Bunch.
It seemed to me that the Brady kids were
never alone. There was always someone to do something with; play,
fight, or get
into trouble. I was
an only child. This meant
great periods of loneliness. They did all these neat family activities,
like
singing on stage at the mall.
One day I even got to meet the actor who played Greg Brady, and he gave me an autographed picture of himself. I took that picture everywhere, school, playing out in the yard, and even to camp. What I wouldn’t have given to be a Brady!
My parents were
divorced, so it was just my mother and me. I
was the only child in my school that had divorced parents. I was also
the only
child in school to have a working mother.
This led to even more loneliness.
I kept hoping that my mother would meet someone like Mike
Brady, who had
children. Then we would be a big happy family - just like the Bradys.
That never
happened.
I wanted a
mother like Carol Brady; always home to help with
any problem that may have come along and to have cookies baked for me
and
waiting. Someone
that would take care of
me when I was sick, and wait on me hand-and-foot. That was never going
to
happen; my mother loved her career.
Therefore, I
vowed that when I grew up, I would never have
just one child. I
would stay home and
take care of my children. I
would have
those cookies baked for them after school.
We would do many family activities.
We would be one BIG happy family, with a mother and a
father and lots of
children.
Little did I
know.
When I was 19, I
met my husband. He was just getting divorced
from his first wife and trying to get custody of his 4 children, Meera
8, Kelly
5, Rachel 2, and Karen 6 months. We had them for awhile before his
ex-wife
managed to get the younger two children back. The court had said that
even
though all the children had been abused and neglected by her, if she
only had
two of them, she could take care of them properly. Since Rachel and
Karen were
so young the judge gave them back to her.
This
was the start of
our wonderful family for me. Because of their abuse and neglect and
with me
being so young, it was an interesting challenge.
We lived in a two bedroom apartment in the
San Fernando Valley of
I did everything
my mother didn’t. I was the only mother in
my children’s school that didn’t go to work.
I cramped my children’s style by being home and
not letting them do
whatever they wanted. Oh well.
Bruce and I got
married shortly after taking custody of the 2
older children. We didn’t have much money between lawyers and
expert witnesses
and court costs. The total cost was over $10,000. We were broke. So a
friend
offered to have the wedding at his place.
He had a large yard with lots of flowering plants on the
edge of the
ocean. We mailed hand-made invitations, ordered a cake, wrote our own
vows and
put together our own music. However, the best laid plans of mice and
men… you
know the rest.
We chose to be
married on the first day of Spring at
sunset. This was a
mistake. We woke to a
horrible storm and turned on the news. The news explained that the
storm
covered most of the coast and that there was flooding in the very place
we were
to hold our wedding. We tried contacting our friend, but to no avail.
“All the
circuits are busy now, please try your call again later,” was
all that came out
of the phone. With no idea of the condition of where we were going to
hold the
wedding, we started making new plans. We called all the guests and let
them
know we were having the wedding in our itty bitty apartment. We were
determined
to get married. Bruce’s best man Randy, and my maid of honor,
Kim showed up at
our apartment to help. We quickly rearranged all the furniture, pushing
the
couch back under the window, and lining what few chairs we had in rows
across
our living room. With that done, Kim and I headed off to find food and
cake,
and to get our hair done. All this on $150. We left the guys in charge
of
finding and renting a video camera. After all this I wanted something
to
remember the event by. We got everything we needed, and realized as we
were passing
a florist, that we had no flowers. So we stopped. I went in and
explained to
the clerk the story of our wedding and that I only had $35 left for
flowers.
The clerk, who was also the owner, explained to me that this was their
first
day and that he felt so sorry for me that he gave me all the flowers in
the
store for my $35. I was elated that someone would actually do this for
me. We
loaded up the car and went back to the apartment. When we arrived we
discovered
6 dozen roses. Randy had apparently gone out to get the video camera
and
realizing we had no flowers bought them. I now had more flowers than
room for
people. We had flowers everywhere, and it certainly made up for not
having it
outside.
The age-old
adage that you should not see the bride before
the wedding is gospel. Between the sudden place change, and stress of
trying to
just get the wedding to come off, we had canceled and uncanceled 22
times. At
one point I found my self sitting on the floor in a locked bathroom
sobbing. My
soon to be sister-in-law, Robin finally convinced me to come out and go
on with
the wedding.
Just before the
ceremony, Kim, Robin and I frantically made
bouquets out of aluminum foil and flowers.
The person who volunteered to film the wedding perched
himself on the
back of the couch and then leaned back to get a wider shot. He
proceeded to
almost fall through the window of our second story apartment as someone
grabbed
his feet. After much commotion the wedding went on. It was lovely, and
a moment
I will never forget. Unfortunately my parents didn’t believe
I was going to get
married and never showed up. We watched the video after the wedding and
discovered that Bruce’s tie was so crooked that it actually
was diagonal across
his chest. I don’t think he could have gotten it that way if
he tried. We were
now a mom and dad and two kids. This did not last long.
In the apartment
building we lived in there was a little
girl, just a few months younger then Kelly.
Her name was Olivia, and we called her Libby for short.
Libby was very
sweet. She was part Native American and came from a tribe in northern
