The Early Years: Part 1

I was born November 11, 1974 in Riverdale, GA at Clayton General Hospital. I am the younger of two boys. I was supposed to be a girl, at least that is what the one and only ultrasound done had said. My parents had picked out Erin Elizabeth as my name. They never picked out a boy’s name. The story goes that I was named after one of the nurse’s sons. Of course I was born in a time before routine ultrasounds, so it is not unusual that only one was done and a mistake was made determining my gender.

My life started with drama at the very second I was born. From my first breath I struggled, immediately and with tenacity. I fought for the basic right to life. The legend goes that I died 4 times that day, though whether this is truth or family legend I am not sure. Each time I died I am told that my dad threatened the doctors; apparently something worked each of those times because I am here today. I was born with my insides out, due to genetic, congenital damage from my dad’s involvement with Agent Orange in Vietnam. The chemical warfare has been known to cause congenital defects in the children of Vietnam Vets. I certainly have the scars to show for the repeated surgeries I underwent. Every time I take my shirt off to go swimming, or for the first time in front of someone who has not yet seen me shirtless, I pause and worry for just a moment what someone would think when they see my external scars.


For most of my life in Georgia, we lived at 3252 Creekwood Drive, Rex, Ga. Our first house, or at least the first house that I have memories of, was a small 3-bedroom ranch-style house with one bathroom. Our house was a pale light blue-grey color. We had a big fenced-in backyard and a smallish front yard. Our house looked very similar to the other houses on the street. My brother shared a room for years, though I don’t know why since we had 3 bedrooms. We moved into this house in the middle of the neighborhood construction. As children we played on the construction sites of other houses under construction. It is a miracle that we didn’t end up hurting or killing ourselves playing around all the nail-studded lumber. This is where most of my earliest memories are from, the good and bad memories. Most of my bad memories are from when my parents were still married; the better memories came after he left us.

Mom was born and raised in Cincinnati, Ohio. My grandmother had moved up north to escape familial persecution because she had my uncle Don out of wedlock. My grandmother and her Northern family became something of a black sheep in our family. It seems as though I followed in her black sheep footprints by living a life different from our extended family. Both my grandmother and my mother have taught me independence by example in how they have lived their lives. Though the extended Tennessee family may consider us liberal, Northern families to be so very different than their conservative, Southern roots, it is from this northern family that I trace my strength. My grandmother became a strong woman by moving and thriving in a city so different from the Appalachian hills where she grew up. She made a life for herself and her kids against the norms of that time period. My mother did the same thing when she became a strong single mother raising two kids after dad left. She recognized exactly what was best for us and brought us back to Tennessee.

Dad was a policeman, and later became a detective, for Clayton County, GA. Memories of my father are negative and blurry at best. He was only in our lives for such a short amount of time, and when you are a very young child, holding on to memories of any kind are a challenge. Dad was only in our lives full-time until I was 8 or 9, and then our time with him was limited to every other weekend and time in the summer, the typical schedule for children of divorce.

Mom was very active in our early lives. My mother was always the one who took us to Awanis, who took us to vacation bible school, who took us to Cub/Boy Scout meetings, and anywhere else we needed to be. It was mom who signed our permission slips. It was mom who remembered that we needed to take 2 dozen cupcakes to school, even if we just remember to tell her the night before. It was mom who took us shopping for school clothes and who knew what sizes we wore at any given time in our childhood.
It always seemed as though my dad resented my mom’s involvement with us kids. He acted as if her love was finite and by loving us she somehow diminished the love she had for him. My father was both emotionally selfish yet emotionally needy as well.

Either by blessing or by curse, our neighborhood around Creekwood Drive included many, many kids to play with. As a blessing I was able to find kids with whom I felt comfortable with, but as a curse these kids were always girls. As a child, I found it easier to become friends with girls. Boy-things, such as sports, cowboys and Indians, cops and robbers - none of these things interested me in the least. But put me in front of an Easy-Bake oven and I was in heaven! The few times I tried to be one of the boys ended up not turning out so well. I was naturally small-framed and meek so I was a natural target for the roughness and meanness of boys. Being called “sissy” became the norm. My brother didn’t have these same problems because he was “normal”. My attempts to be like the other boys failed and usually resulted in getting beat up or shunned.

My father, the stern, typically Southern policeman, did not like it that his youngest son was displaying very definitive feminine traits nor did he agree with my disinclination to fight back with my bullies. I am unsure if my dad was upset at me being bullied or if he was upset because he was embarrassed by me. In my dad’s eyes he equated playing with girls as somehow demeaning and shameful. I remember how intensely my parents argued over my feminine hobbies and mannerisms. It remains one of the only times I remember my mother putting her foot down and fighting my dad over my right to individuality. I do not remember the issue ever coming up again between them, or if it did it was certainly not where I could have heard it.

Dad rarely became involved in my brother and me. As children it appeared we were an afterthought to him. One of the few positive memories I have of my father was that he would get up with us super early on Saturday mornings to watch cartoons with us. Our favorite was Superfriends; it was a cartoon about the Justice League, a group of superheroes who saved the world every Saturday morning. Dad would always make our cereal, and it was always a “fun cereal” like Trix or Fruit Loops. On rare occasions dad would make his world-famous pancakes. We always looked forward to Saturday mornings and Dad never shunned getting up so early with us.

Dad also enjoyed camping, and I have very fond memories of packing up and heading to Lake Lanier to camp. Going to the lake was a special event. Dad always had this dad-made wooden box that he would pack the food and supplies. We put our sleeping bags and everything else into the back of the wood-grain Chevy station wagon and headed off to the lake. Our family’s sense of excitement grew mile by mile and like any children, we drove our parents crazy with the age old question “Are we there yet??” One year we spent Easter at Lake Lanier and I was worried that the Easter Bunny wouldn’t know that we were not at home. But can you believe that when we woke up in our tent Easter morning and opened the tent, there on the picnic table were two Easter baskets! We thought it was a miracle to get those baskets.

Another time we had to hurriedly evacuate our campsite because a tornado was heading our way. We heard about it on the radio or there must have been a warning to the campers, I forget which. I remember us frantically gathering up our things and throwing them in the car. We barely got out of there in time because as we were driving away, we actually say the tornado coming towards us on the lake. Swimming, camping, and cooking out on the fire – these are all things I enjoy to this day. My dad did give me some positive things in my life, as much as I want to pretend otherwise.