Bath time at our house in the 1950’s was routine and stimulating.
Three children needed a daily scrubbing, but mom had only two hands, so Stevie and I took a bath together. It saved water, and mom felt secure in leaving her son in the custody of her first-born daughter. Joan was right on the first count: bathing two kids in one tub did save water.
Having a bossy older sister could not have been easy, especially one who asked her younger brother to be her Footstool.
Dr. Levitt: Stephen, have there been any childhood experiences that may have contributed to your free-floating anxiety and psychosomatic aches?
Stephen: No. My childhood seemed happy.
Dr. Levitt: I realize this is our first meeting, but I want you to go home and keep a journal this week. Let your thoughts meander back in time to your childhood.
Stephen: OK. Sounds good. Will do.
Bath time went like this:
Joan turned on the water, put the stopper in the tub, added some pink bubble bath crystals, and told Cheri and Stevie to get in, wash up, and get out. This we should do while she put the baby, Cindy Lou, to bed.
Dad had put in a full day at the dental office and was out shooting hoops with the neighborhood big kids. In the Division of Labor at the Block house, bathing the children fell into Joan’s corner.
Looking back, I now admit that I liked control.
Stevie and I splashed and roughhoused like two baby sea otters. The soap bar became an abalone, so we bounced it off our bellies. Where was our mother? From the kelp bed that was Cindy Lou’s room, Joan yelled, “Finish up your bath and I will be there in a second. Cheri, make sure Stevie is squeaky clean.”
Dr. Levitt: Stephen, your face looks pinched.
Stephen: Yes, in my meandering this week, many repressed memories, almost like bubbles, are beginning to work their way to the surface.
Dr. Levitt: Excellent.
Stephen: In the shower this morning, I had thoughts.
Lingering in the tub, forestalling nightly prayers and room clean up, I grabbed all of the plastic bath toys from the Tupperware container. Like Andy Rooney, my bubble encrusted eyebrows arched in a magnificent moment of dilatory glee. Stevie must be decorated with bubbles, as well.
I gave him a moustache and a goatee. The bubbles began to disappear into the water; I could see the drain with its holes and silver. A small baby bottle from my No More Tears doll lay by the drain.
I wondered out loud…”Stevie, do you think this bottle would fit on your pee-pee?
Stevie didn’t know, so he shrugged.
Come here, Stevie. Let’s see if it does.
Dr. Levitt: Thoughts about what?
Stephen: The time my sister put a baby bottle on my, well, my, shall we say, my Johnson?
Dr. Levitt: And what happened to your Johnson?
Stephen: My memory gets stuck at that point.
Time was running out. I could hear Joan singing baby Cindy Lou a lullaby.
“Rock-a-bye baby, in the tree top…”
I grabbed Stevie’s pee-pee and popped that bottle right on it, just like I’d seen Dad do with PVC pipe when he was fixing our sprinklers last week.
Stevie stood up, a mini cuckoo clock, with his plastic appendage rotating left, then right. He wailed and said, “Off.”
I tried to pull it off, really I did, but it stuck there in a suction that only a gifted plumber could break.
Dr. Levitt: Steven, this week, I want you to concentrate on the effects that bath time with your sister may have had on you, physically.
Stephen: Well, I am happy to say that as a father of four sons, I have had no residual problems with my Johnson. But my relationship with Cheri throughout the years has been strained.
Dr. Levitt: Yes, sometimes our birth order does contribute to our reaction to life’s twists and turns.
Stephen: My fear of Cheri has nothing to do with birth order.
“When the wind blows, the cradle will rock…”
From Cindy Lou’s room, we could hear Joan’s soft voice as she enjoyed the nightly maternal routine.
Stevie howled, not so much from pain but from embarrassment.
The front door slammed, vibrating the bathtub. Dad was in the house, drawn to the shrieks of his screaming son.
What the hell? Cheri, what the hell have you done?
I retreated to the south side of the tub while Dad, the dentist he was, told Stevie to relax and pulled the bottle off (with a pop!) “Jo-anne…Cheri needs to be punished.”
“When the bough breaks, the cradle will fall…”
Bath time was over. The timer chirped on the counter. The bubbles evaporated. The water cooled.
Two large terry towels, placed by the tub, waited for wet bodies. A practice, known only to us, came next.
In his kind and obedient way, Stevie got out of the tub, one chubby leg at a time. The small space heater in the corner glowed orange behind its metal grate.
Stephen: All my life, I have felt the weight of the world on my back. Especially in the lumbar region.
Dr. Levitt: Tell me more.
Stephen: I sleep in a fetal position, my body locked into a crouch.
OK, Footstool. Into position, please. Stevie understood the drill. Covering him with the fluffy terry, I sat on him, and he became my Footstool. He said, “ I look like a ladybug with a towel over it!” He complied, curling up compactly. His limbs, thick and able, became furniture legs and his back became my seat. All that was missing was the embroidery.
There I sat, drying between my toes and admiring my knees. Every last molecule of moisture must be absorbed before Footstool may arise.
Eventually, leisurely, the routine ended. Footstool stood up and changed back into Stevie.
Dr. Levitt: Mr. Block, I suggest that you take your sister out to lunch and release these angry feelings. What will you tell her?
Stephen: That I am her Footstool no more. I will blame her for my back problems, my free floating anxiety, and my sleep disorder. However, because of her abuse, Dr. Levitt, I have made some sound life decisions.
Dr. Levitt: And what are those?
Stephen: I became a collegiate wrestler and made many opponents my Footstools. I have avoided a vasectomy and thus have brought four sons into this world. My home boasts Ottomans in every room, and we have only showers in our bathrooms.
“And down will come ba-by, cradle and all.”
Joan was so clueless.
How are my two darling children? Did you love your bath? I must remember to buy more bubble bath, right Cheri?
I don’t know Mom, ask Footstool.
Photo courtesy of Mike L. Baird, Morro Bay, CA 2007 bairdphotos.com Thanks Mike!
This is HYSTERICAL. I just got back from a month with my granddaughter (2) and grandson (5), and now thank my lucky stars that the worst interaction that occurred at bath time was “Whas dat?” and “Play with?”
Dr. Levitt would make Freud proud.
You’re terrible, Cheri! What a bully! Thankfully I don’t remember much of our 3 in the bath sessions or should I start therapy?!
DYING LAUGHING!!!
Cheri — I laughed out loud at this! I was raised alone, because I was born when my siblings were teenagers, and now I know what I missed! If only Mama had given me a little brother/footstool.
I knew that character was formed by the …. bottlenecks in our lives; I didn’t suspect it could be as literal as it was for Stephen….
Cheri – you are a brilliantly gifted writer. This is an awesome piece – It was so funny; I was reliving pieces of my childhood while reading it. You’re descriptions painted a movie in slow motion for me. Maybe I should finally laugh at the movie my brothers took of me taking a shower when I was ten – I could save a lot of therapy expense. I just marvel at your many gifts. Julie
I needed a good laugh today and I got it. This is hysterical and enjoyable and memorable.
Thanks for sharing!
The bottle incident is hilarious and then add the Footstool on top of it and it’s a hysterical classic. I love the way you told the story – interspersing doctor/patient conversation as the story played out. I also love the “sound life decisions” Stevie made as a result – especially ottomans in every room! As usual, great story!!
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My older sister (by eight years) was, and is still, at 73, my intellectual, emotional and physical dominatrix. So I side 100% with Stephen – not that it will do either of us much good.
Come to think of it, my personality is also totally absorbed (and has been for forty years) by my dear wife (much younger than me).
Good word, dominatrix.
Stephen needs all who are on his side.
Just what is this brother’s name?
Stephen.
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I was a footstool:
My big sister and I shared a room: Two twin beds, side by side, with just enough space for a bedside table in between. We imagined that the space between the beds was a river.
We played a game–not, I think, of my invention–called Bridge. It was my job to stretch myself out, feet on one bed, arms and head on the other, forming a kind of human bridge.
My sister walked across.
Thanks for the memory. Again, congratulations!
We have something in common, Jenny. I’m guessing your sister was light?
Footstool too, along with Cindy Lou, was my Bridge although I forced them to lie between two card table chairs.
Therapy anyone?
There is a swell anthology in the making here, I think: a collection of tales of benign sibling abuse. You should solicit contributions.
Jenny, I am in the process of culling and editing some of my stories here for publication, but something tells me I will be rejected because I am not a NAME.
We’re interested in the essays of famous authors, are we not?
So pleased to be putting this question at the end of a comment.
Cheri: Cull, edit and SEND.
My father has always said: You’ve got to send your ship out if you want your ship to come in.
Happy weekend!
Have you read Spoon River Anthology?
Something like that I’m considering. I have 282 little essays here. At least 50 need OUT of the bunch and 100 need tweaking. But I’m still unsure of how to categorize them.
Your father’s advice is correct.
Thank you, Jenny.