Flawless

by Lisa Plantico Carlsson

Lisa Plantico Carlsson But Lot's wife looked back, and she turned into a pillar of salt. --Genesis 19:26

She looks back, when life is going well. She looks back to a time best left forgotten, and feels something shrivel within her as the tears begin to fall. Dry desert, dusty plain; she weeps until she is empty, the scorching air robbing her tears of moisture until there is nothing left but a salty residue. She turns for one last look. She will not turn again.

January 31, 1974. The air is damp. A biting wind fights its way around the buildings of Frankfurt, and Linda stretches a thin green polyester coat as far as it will go to shield her swollen abdomen from the chill. She's hurrying back to work after a failed attempt to swallow a few bites of lunch, and her thoughts seem mirrored in the restless world around her. Cars whiz by on the wet concrete, the sound of their horns slightly foreign to her American ears. She still hasn't gotten used to this country. Even after two years. The child she is carrying within her was conceived last summer during a furlough spent in Oregon, and she holds herself protectively, as if clutching this small reminder of a more familiar place.

The baby is more active, today. Slight flipping feelings that are almost tickles. This child doesn't kick like her first did, but merely unfolds quiet sensations in the pit of her belly. It's been a fairly easy pregnancy; today's indigestion is a rarity. A sudden twisting feeling within causes Linda to pause for a moment mid-stride, and despite the cool air, the small of her back breaks out in a sweat. She catches her breath at the straight core of pain that seems to push her stomach away from her spine. Something isn't right... something isn't right. The words beat a refuge in her head, away from the ache: something is not right.

She scans the block for a pay phone--she knows she's passed one on this route before. Something isn't right. One hand gripping the hard mound of flesh causing her this pain, she turns in desperation to a passing woman.

"Entschuldigung mich bitte..." she stammers in awkward German. Somehow she gets a hold of her husband at the army base.

In the early hours of February 1st, I am born--six weeks early. The doctors are concerned; something has gone wrong with the pregnancy, the position of my legs isn't quite right. It is hinted that I might never walk.

My mom looks at me, tiny womb-creature of soft flutters and searing pain, and wants to hold on even tighter to her living reminder of existence away from this land of foreign tongues. Child of strangeness, I will be her ticket back to familiarity.

Five months later, after weekly visits to doctors who forced my legs into one set of casts after another to "encourage" their proper alignment, our family returns to the States. I'm put under the care of an orthopedic surgeon, who with brushes of his scalpel will create the white rivers of scar tissue that line my feet and calves.

At two, I will succeed in walking. My wobbling more accentuated by the metal leg braces holding me up, I will lean forward somewhat and careen non-stop to an object across the room. I will be able to taste such things as success, when I am two. "Me do it myself!" I will crow defiantly, triumphantly. Like an arrow I will then shoot off to the adjoining room, my balance maintained by the speed of the action.

Always smiling. Things are right now. Everything must be all right now.

I walk: I am lucky.
I have a loving family: I am lucky.
I have beautiful, thick brown hair: lucky. Large, peaceful eyes: lucky.
It could be worse.

I repeat this mantra as I enter the treacherous world of childhood playgrounds. Repeat it to myself as children bustle curiously around me: What's wrong with your legs? Everything is all right now. Why do you have to wear those things? Must be all right now.

My mother sometimes reminds me of the fact that I could have been dependent on a wheelchair. She almost smiles as she recalls the promise she made to herself when the doctors first mentioned the possibility. She had vowed I would never miss walking. No, she'd love her little Anna Teresa, tie ribbons in my hair, clothe me in such cute dresses that it would not matter if I were confined to a chair. Growing up, I ponder her story on more than one occasion, and am troubled: am I cute enough for it not to matter that I am different?

I am cute enough for some things, it seems. Cute enough to be a March of Dimes' poster girl for one year, my poses switching between haphazard curtsy and a mischievous stance with a Raggedy-Ann doll tucked under my arm. Cute enough to be a favorite among my teachers--right beside Kirsten Maney, whose shiny black ringlets just covered the plastic tube of her hearing-aids.

Something separates me from the other children, though, and I am unwilling to explore what it is. I welcome Ginger, my imaginary poodle, into my life, and she is a comfort for a number of years. I take her for walks about the playground during recess, and gather quite an entourage of followers who beg for a chance to feed my friend a bone, or take her for a run. Sometimes I permit this, but generally I keep the leash in my own care. I am a faithful owner, dutifully dropping my pencil in class that I might reach down to give Ginger a quick stroke on the head. My neighbors peek out of the corner of their eyes as if hoping to catch a glimpse of taffy-colored fur and bright eyes beneath my hand's caress. Under their scrutiny, I offer my dog a bone.

At times, I feel almost normal. Then something will happen to remind me of my difference. Sitting on the patio at a new friend's house, drinking sugared tea as I wait for her to join me, I hear her mother's voice drift through the open window: "You better ask Anna if she can do that, honey." Moments later, my friend comes out. She suggests no new game, and as we continue our tea party, I silently wonder what activity she and her mother think I'd be unable to do.

Other, crueler memories are put from my head as soon as they happen. Mike Harrington, 5th grade dream-idol for all the girls, corners me one day as I'm standing by the outdoor basketball courts: "What's wrong with your legs?," he asks, pointing to the new plastic braces I had hoped were less apparent than my old ones.

"I was born with club feet." It is the simplest answer I've found to the questions that never seem to end.

"Yeah?... Is that why you walk like a pigeon?" The two boys on either side of him exchange nervous smiles; they're impressed by his bravery.

"I don't walk like a pigeon." I tell myself to smile. Things are right now... I am lucky.

"Like a clown, then..." With feet flung out to both sides, Mike begins to walk in front of me in a clumsy waddle. His friends are laughing aloud, now.

I wait until the torture ends, then walk into the school, conscious with each step of my slight limp. I sob silently in a bathroom stall until the bell rings, signaling the end of recess. I say nothing in class, and am completely dry-eyed by the time I get home. I have a desperate crush on Mike Harrington for the next year: if only he liked me, maybe everything would be fine.

At fourteen, I stop wearing my braces, and my mother doesn't comment. I take it as one more sign of the silent shame I bring into our family by being different. I, who caused suffering in my mother's womb, am the weak link in my family's chain of perfection. My orthopedic surgeon tells me that I will be ready for one final operation when my feet have stopped growing, and I cling to his words as my hope for redemption. My expectations soar far above reality. I picture my feet after the surgery, and they are flawless. Trim ankles complete with the protruding knob I lack; long, slender toes; feet gently uplifted by the curve of an arch. I don't reason that an operation will mean one more scar to mingle with the others--my "final operation" has nothing to do with dead tissue, in my mind.

My mother and I go to see Dr. Durand when when I am eighteen and it is she who asks about that one last operation. Dr. Durand has me walk back and forth in the small hospital room, and notes the way my ankles lean in as I slap my feet down on the cold white linoleum. He watches, then tells me my feet are probably as good as they are going to get: no final surgery is needed after all. He is pleased. I smile pleasure in return, anxious to depart. Mom and I return home--perhaps we talk about his prognosis, perhaps we do not.

That night in bed I cry, huge sobs shaking my body. I cry for the little girl I'd wanted to leave behind. I cry for the dreams of a better future that had no grounding in reality. I cry because I'm leaving for college in a few weeks, and am still painting myself the bitter victim. Still finding it impossible to love who I am. As I lie choking in the dark, I begin to pray. I wage war with God over the possession of my self-hatred, and in the end I surrender to His promise of love. I will follow. I will define myself by a new name that He will form. I will not look back.

Little girl, God is offering you a new life: don't you see? Don't look back don't look back don't look back.

But the salt creeps up, over my feet, and my head turns, involuntarily.

The Author

Lisa Plantico Carlsson lives in southern Sweden with her husband, one-year-old son and a house full of turtles. In the winters, they try to escape the cold and ice by heading to Lisa's native Oregon to bask in the raindrops. Their dreams of retiring young in Hawaii have yet to be realized.