I’ve been thinking a lot about the House lately.
It’s probably because the country fair is coming up and I was shipped of about a week after it left.

Dr. U said something about checking my osteoporosis and provided me a date of my last one… which happened in the House.  Apparently, for insurance to pay, the bone scans * specifically * have to be after the last one.

For me, that was July 22.   So, I was in the House on July 22nd.   I’d probably had already been there a couple of weeks.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, I tend to have a pretty good selective memory.   If someone does me wrong, I tend to remember it for years.   When something bad happens to me, like the House, the memories become hazy and distant.  I’m guessing it’s a mental defense.

Used to, way back when, I prided myself on the ability to handle any situation.  Older, but none the wiser, I know I can’t handle everything.  I think I tend to delete memories from when I felt threatened.     It’s a type of coping mechanism.

I’ve been trying to remember the “classes.”

The “classes” (yes, I’m using quotation marks cause I never learned anything besides how important my thyroid medication is) where supposed to be “therapy” and teach “coping mechanisms” that would help with life after the House.   ..  Not that anyone could clearly remember what life was like after the first two or three weeks.

The “classes,” as I remember them.

*  Nutrition
The only real reason I remember this one is that we were allowed to talk about fats, carbs, and other food related topics that were forbidden during other times.  Forbidden, I mean forbidden.  We would get a stern talking-to is the contents of food were mentioned outside of this sacred class.

——->  Yeah, sure, a stern talking-to may not seem like much, but it sneaks around in other ways.  If a girl drew to much attention to herself, she’d be forced to add extra butter, syrup, cream cheese… whatever the flavor of the meal was… to the food.   And again, I understand that this isn’t a big deal to 99% of America’s population, but we were being force-fed and anorexic.   Having to fill every square of a high-fat waffle with full-flavored syrup until it became soggy is psychologically scarring.

* Body Image
This class was more like arts and crafts.
We had to paint, colour, and glue our way towards completing some sort of assignment…  and I don’t remember any of them.  When completed, we got to stand in front of everyone and explain it, which caused more than one person to cry.

What was unique about this “class,” is that we where allowed to browse food magazines.   We were also allowed to cut out pictures of super-models and what-not.

We wasn’t allowed to talk about the skinny women or overly indulgent food that was advertised, but we were allowed to use it in our projects – whatever they where.  Again, this didn’t seem to follow the main line of thought, but whatever.

The most notable thing about this class is that it was held in the garage of the House.    Art supplies were scattered in various corners and shelves.  This was the ** only ** place I was allowed to ditch the wheelchair and walk.  Mindful, I couldn’t walk more than five steps or if I stood up to long, I’d be reprimanded, but at least I could do something under my own power.

Of course, I did my very, very, very best to move around as much as possible.  Soggy waffles be damned.

*  Gratitude
In this “class,” we pretty much watched videos and talked about what we are grateful for.  This was mostly naptime for me, especially after the nurses started to experiment with my thyroid medicine.   I had a legitimate excuse for not staying awake.

There was this little dollar store mini-notebook that the short-plump warden kept.  At the beginning of each “class,” the girls had to name what were grateful for.  Usually, this consisted of coffee and other ‘safe’ answers.  If we spoke what were really thinking, everyone would have to eat ice cream sundaes everyday.

*  Cooking
Cooking class was an oddball.
This is where we’d torture each other.
Split into two groups, the girls were tasked to prepare a themed three-course dinner.  I remember the “Olive Garden” dinner with the very rich pasta and desert.  There was Harry Potter, tailgating, .. um…  something Greek maybe?  I have no idea.

However, each group tended to try to top or “improve” what the previous group did – to an extent.  There’s only so far extravagant food can go with what we had available.  – But that’s where the torture came in.

We were all shy of eating.  Some of us downright hated to think of what we were forced to ingest.  However, not to eat what the others prepared was an insult.

One of the very few things that we had was a common understanding, even if we didn’t express it well.  Hell, someone of us didn’t like each other at all.  We argued.  We schemed.  We formed protective clicks.  But, in our core, we knew we shared the same enemy.

On a deep and fundamental level, I don’t think we really wanted to alienate ourselves completely from each other.  Or, at least, I like to pretend that didn’t want to.  Rejecting food that a peer made would have been the start to sever any type of bond.

—  There was some sort of “class” with the chaplain.
I honestly don’t remember much about this, except sometimes she’d read us stories.

*  Horses and other “classes.”
Since I was in a wheelchair, I wasn’t allowed to go out to the barn for equine therapy… which seemed to be exceedingly popular as the other girls talked about it – a lot. –   Like rubbing salt in my wound, every time the horses were mentioned, I grew to hate the House a little bit more each time.

–  There was yoga, which I probably would have liked.  I used to practice yoga, in my own novice way, and really enjoyed it.  Again, wheelchair bound, I was not allowed to participate at all, never ever.

*  Weekend outings
Every Saturday (?) everyone but me was loaded on a van and taken to somewhere magical and mystical, like a bookstore, a movie, or Build-a-Bear.   I think one was Bath and Body (?).  Mani/pedi ?

I think I only got to attend two of these outings.
What was super irritating, besides not being able to go, was that I wasn’t going to be reimbursed.  All the girls were given an allowance of how much they could spend.   Since I wasn’t spending, I wanted my mother’s money back.

No, it didn’t work that way — greedy sobs.

* Church on Sunday
No, I never attended church while I was at the House.
Again, obvious reason, wheelchair… but there was another.
At one point, the devils-that-may-be thought I should actually get out a little more and socialize — not that looking at the same four walls for the past three months was enough — and I was “graciously” given the option to go to church.

At first, heck yeah!
Anything, anything, anything, to get outside… to breathe fresh air… to feel the sun on my skin…  The simple and wonderful things that are taken for granted and I was long denied.

But… and there’s always a but….  I would be in the wheelchair.   Despite two perfectly working legs, I would be pushed over the church’s threshold, an object of curiosity and pity by the parishioners.

Damn my pride, but I could not allow that to happen to me.
I would not give my jailors more to gossip about and hold over me.

And, even beyond – far beyond that, if there is a God, I was going to enter His house under my own power instead of being pushed when I damned well didn’t need to.

A girl has to have a little pride, right?
On the shield or under it?

So, no.   No sun.  No fresh air.   Just me, the four walls, and some pre-recorded spiritual crap that played for an hour before I could take my nap on the living room couch.

Bastards.

I’m sure there was more to the classes, but I don’t remember.
Even more, I probably don’t care.

At this point, the House is like a loose tooth – I can’t help but irritate it from time to time.

Regardless, it’s a part of me.
It’ll make great writing fodder one day.