This story goes way back to the early 1970’s, when my parents experienced the biggest disappointment of their lives; the birth of an average child.

I was the first born into the prestigious Wilson family in a little town in NC that thought they were too big for themselves. I actually remember thinking this town was the end of the world, the last stop on a road to nowhere where I was accidentally put, a place I didn't fit in or belong. I still hope to hear any day there was a mix up in the hospital and my real parents will drive up in their hippie Volkswagen 1960's bus, place strands of handmade love beads around my neck, tell me my real name is Moon Flower and take me to their Earthship  in a New Mexican commune.

My mother was given no self-worth through her parents and I believe she thought her first born was going to change that as she would finally be recognized for everything wonderful she may have been. But I came instead of that wonder child that could write their Roman Numerals and speak three different languages by the time it was 2yrs old. I was a daydreamer and underachiever. Something was wrong with me. I did not excel in math, social studies or science. I liked to, God Forbid! Draw and Pretend!  Apparently, I was also evil. Almost 40 yrs later and my mother still tells the story when I was 3 yrs old,  waiting until she was sitting down to feed my infant sister, I went to the fridge, got out the juice container and spilled it onto the floor as I tried to fill my cup!  Obviously, evil is the first thing one thinks not maybe my toddler is thirsty.  I was a malicious bad seed according to her, a toddler, none the less a thirsty one!  Was I a bad seed?  Does a person possess the knowledge to know if one is a bad seed or do they have to rely on others to tell them?  I ponder.....

I didn't go to pre-school therefore I was severely behind all the other children in kindergarten who had been to pre-school; learned their colors, ABC's, those nifty songs about farm animals and school buses.  I also had the curse of the late birthday. I was a painfully shy child, which may have had a part in me being labeled slow and having to sit in the makeshift classroom closet, an actual closet with raincoats and lunch boxes in the back of the kindergarten class with the other 4 dumb kids.  We got to play with mud colored clay in the dark closet that smelled like Elmer's glue and peanut butter sandwiches while the normal kids worked on the alphabet and numbers. I had ended up in the closet classroom mainly because I was unable to write my name and then glue macaroni to the letters on the big orange sheet of construction paper. Oh the shame! This of course was my entire fault because I didn't want to go to pre-school and because I chose to be born in July, late July, such a stubborn child I was.

Because I was apparently making all the decisions in the household at 4 yrs old, I can imagine the stress my mother was under, but then there was my father, no wait, that was just the mailman. At 4 yrs. old, I still wasn't sure what my father looked like as I saw him so infrequently, thank goodness for Polaroids. My father called his absence making a living; my mother called it screwing anything that stroked his enormous ego. They were quite a pair and later my therapy bill would prove they really weren't a great example for raising children. 

So school was tough for me from the start and being labeled slow because I was too afraid to speak or draw attention to myself didn't help. I could think of a million other things to do than read my social studies book and most of them were just outside the classroom window. I was told I was too shy. My mother said I was stupid. So I accepted that along with slow, not there, a daydreamer and foggy. She was beyond horrified and my father pretended I wasn't his child. I was a dumb kid, never to amount to anything or god forbid...become a waitress.  If this were a movie, this statement would be followed with screams and horror music in the background.  Did I mention my mother also happened to have a hobby, elementary school teacher?  I remember her screaming and slamming a ruler down,  threatening to hit me with it on the "real" wooden desk while I tried to get through her old musty Dick and Jane books while sobbing out of fear in my bedroom.  She had brought the wooden desk home for me like it was some sort of prize I would be thrilled with. Oh great, I thought, a desk, as if I don't get enough of sitting in one 8 hours each day that I will have one next to my bed in the only place I can feel safe in my home. Thanks mom!

So here we are, a well known family, a father who was worshiped by his own family for his "player" charisma, the UNC Graduate and a mother, the elementary school teacher who gives birth to a 7 lb baby girl waitress. They really should have flushed me right then and there like yesterday's poo, but I think that requires a prom dress or something. Had they known I wouldn't grow up to be a successfully married woman to a golfer at the Country Club,  with 2.5 perfect children, driving my mini-van and hobnobbing with the small town socialites, I'm sure they would have gotten rid of me immediately, but they had no way of knowing I was here to ruin their very lives. On the way home from the hospital, I'm sure there was conversation of higher education, winning the coveted  Jr. Miss pageant and a photo of my lovely home on the cover of Good Housekeeping. But, oh well, it was just me, the waitress.