The Immaculate Conception?

I was three months shy of 17 when my mom had my baby brother, Dino.  The neighbors on my street who knew us figured if there was someone pregnant in my house, it had to be me, after all, I was the age for “trouble.” I dated regularly, but there was an innocence back then that cannot be described in today’s world.

I remember getting home from dates after the folks went to bed, and tiptoeing into my parent’s bedroom to wake Mom to announce that I was home safe.  I was careful not to wake up my dad because he would have looked at the clock.  Mom was easily bluffed to hear my 2 AM arrival marked down to 11:30 PM.

Sometimes, the folks had their bedroom door locked and I could not get in to let them know I was home. Being naïve about my parents’ intimacies, I could not understand why.  I was a late bloomer. I had no idea people their ages did “that.”

Dad was clever though.  He put this musical contraption on the front door. When it was in closed position, it wound up.  When it was open, it played music.  I remember the old television program “Name That Tune.” Well, I renamed it “I can get in the house in one note.”  I positioned myself just so and stuck the key in the lock, turned it just so, opened the door with only one note playing, got in, and shut the door. I got pretty good at it.  I had to.

Only once, after being at a graduation party for my Hawaiian twin classmates, I was a little tipsy because I had a drink at the party. I got in my house ok, but standing inside behind the door was my Dad.  Careful not to breathe in his face, I acknowledged him and said I had fun at the party with my friends and their family. I then proceeded carefully up the stairs in my high heels to my bedroom. That was the closest call I ever had. 

When Mom got pregnant at 39 years old, Dad was not ready to have another mouth to feed.  He acted like Mom got pregnant by the Holy Ghost, or that it was another Immaculate Conception. Catholics use the rhythm system for birth control.  Unfortunately, the rhythm system didn’t work this time. After having us first two kids 23 months apart, the next child came with my Mom’s cycle changed five years later. And so it was with the next brother.  When the next five year point came and went, Mom felt she was safe, I guess.  So, the sixth year gave her an unexpected surprise, pregnancy at 39 years old. 

Dad had a pharmacist friend and Mom was so worried Dad would get something from him to put in her food or drink to make her abort the pregnancy.  I became the living guinea pig. Mom had me sip and taste everything Dad put on the table.  Not that he would hurt her in any way, but she knew he would never do anything to me. 

Mom was happy she was pregnant again.  Maybe she would have another little girl.  No one knew back then what they know now and Mom started smoking for the first time in her life at 39. She smoked the light menthol cigarettes and especially loved the cigarette holders like Holly Golightly used in “Breakfast at Tiffany’s.” She and lots of other women back in the day thought that smoking with a cigarette holder looked rather sexy.

Mom only gained 12 pounds during her pregnancy.  When our friend and neighbor, Mary, and I took her to the hospital to have the baby, the nurse had to ask which one of us was going to have a baby, since all three of us were thin and none of us looked pregnant, even though Mom wore a coat.  While Mom loved that statement, just like she loved when people told her they thought we were sisters, it kind of upset me that the nurse could have thought I was going to give birth at almost 17.

Dino was born mid-May and was the apple of my Dad’s eye.  I think having him at their ages of 39 and 40, made them young again. For me, Dino was a gift. I loved all my brothers, but the youngest born before Dino, happened when I was 12.  At 17, little baby Dino felt like my little kid and I doted on him.  I was more like a second mother to him.  I loved his little face and showered him with kisses.  What I did not know was that I was making marks on his little face which I later realized were like little hickies. 

When I started dating my ex-husband, at first I think he thought that Dino was mine.  I remember one of my favorite movies, “Susan Slade” when they pulled off the character played by Connie Stevens’ unwed motherhood by saying her child was her parents’ child. It couldn’t have happened in my family. My Dad had a chastity belt on me that could choke a horse.

I always loved kids. I couldn’t wait to have one of my own. Dino was my everything. He was my little “cupcake.”  When I got married and had my first born, Dino was not even three years old yet.  I worried that there would be some kind of sibling rivalry between him and my little girl.  When I came home from the hospital with her, we stayed with my Mom and Dad for a few days.  The first thing I did was to put her in Dino’s arms.  He loved her so much right away. He was her “Unkie.”  When I went back to work, when she was ten months old, Mom babysat for me so my daughter and my son two years later were raised with Dino like brothers and sister for several years. 

This just reinforces that something you think could be the worst thing that could happen, really could be the best thing that could happen. What it also told me was that people mellow with age. My Dad who was super strict with me really changed with his fifth born child. He practiced enough with the other four of us and learned to lighten up finally. It is not easy being the first born and the responsible one but it is good being the Queen of la famigilia.