Early Life as an Eaton

Originally written in the Fall of 2003
 
I was born with a full head of black hair. At Western Medical Center in Santa Ana, one of the nurses' jobs was to stick a red bow on the girl babies' heads. That way, at a glance, baby observers could tell which red-faced, squished up piles of human were boys and which were girls. In a photo taken hours after my entrance on that day, April 6th, 1982, it's obvious that my dad was so proud of me. I hope that when I have my first baby, my husband looks at it like that.

My first home was a condo that my young new parents owned. Apparently I was quite the crier, and my internal rhythm kept me on a very strict schedule. Every night, right as my parents were sitting down to enjoy dinner, I would find something to scream about. (Now that I'm a mom myself, I realize that sometimes the only reason a baby needs to cry is the fact that she's alive.) My mom and dad would try to feed me, hold me, talk to me, rock me around the room, but I remained inconsolable.

Our stylish 80s furniture collection included a couple of small wooden end tables. They looked like they were from the Old West, stood about the height of my parents' knees, and had just enough area to accommodate a couple of magazines and the occasional plate of food. Somewhere in the midst of one of my best performances, Dad came up with a fabulous idea: let's stick Heather underneath one of those. It was brilliant. Not only did it muffle the sound for them so they could enjoy a hot meal, but usually after a couple minutes, the resonating echo of my own screams of fury eventually annoyed even me, and I would stop. The folks called this the Doghouse, but I was the only dog around to use it.

*            *            *

Our next home was another condo, this one in Laguna Hills, California. This is the first place of which I have real memories. We moved there when I was three. It had a cozy living area, bathroom, and kitchen downstairs; the bedrooms were upstairs. In my room, next to my full sized bed, there was a window.

When I eventually grew tall enough to open it myself, I wondered one day what would happen if I left the window open and hid in my closet. (I was a very considerate preschooler.) Naturally, my parents came looking for me; I then learned that this had been a terrible idea. They thought I had fallen out of the window. Frantically, they called my name, taking turns poking their heads outside, searching for my lifeless body on the sidewalk below. 

I hesitated, not understanding the distress in their voices, but knowing enough to assume I'd be in a predicament if I responded. I was right.

*            *            *

Although I don't remember my mom being pregnant, I do remember the day my brother came home from the hospital. It was about three weeks before my fourth birthday. He was small and helpless, didn't open his eyes even when I talked to him, and had an abundance of soft red hair. I liked the way my parents looked at him. I never hated my brother like some jealous firstborns. I'd been excited for Jesse's arrival, assuming that it meant I would have an instant new best friend. I was a tad disappointed when he came home and all he did was sleep. From the moment he was placed in the wooden cradle downstairs, enveloped in pastel colored blankets, I loved him, but I wanted him to play with me. 

I adored holding him. I must have liked the idea of having a real live doll to carry around. I was very careful with him. The fiery red hair he wore coming out of the womb never thinned, and the color never faltered. My dad was my favorite man in the whole world, and Jesse came out looking just like him. That might be why I loved him so much. I wanted to protect him from the hypothetical bullies that I figured could show up later in his life. He was helpless, and my new mission in life was to keep an eye out.

We'd have plenty of time to drive each other nuts later.

*            *            *

One day my neighborhood buddy, Johnny, and I were sitting on the fence in front of my condo that overlooked The Ditch. Really just an old rock quarry (that is now home to a track housing complex), it was The Ditch to us. As we were sitting on that fence, Johnny noticed movement down below. A live creature slinking along, probably searching for young children as prey. Somehow he knew its identity: a coyote, something I'd never seen before.

After hearing about them, I thought of coyotes as devil animals, since for years I'd had recurring nightmares about wolves attacking me (my parents had let me watch the animated version of Peter and Wolf an unhealthy number of times). Coyotes were brothers to wolves, as far as I was concerned, and much more mysterious. This coyote, at least a mile away, would never consider traversing the gigantic hill up to my patio, but even still... I had nightmares about wolves and coyotes for years after our "encounter".