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| Photo: "FURY!" By Skitch |
THEN & NOW:
Both my parents came from dirt poor Appalachian homes, both were small in size, even for their era, and both of them had tempers that put the fear of Fury into, to date, anyone that's ever ran into it. It is for a reason that the people of the Appalachians are labeled "rednecks." Fury tends to make your neck and face red.
My Dad says they used to call him "Redneck" and "Irishman" because his neck was actually red all the time and his temper was infamous. My mother, who came from a family with more than one child molester said one of her older brothers once told her that he "bothered" her sisters and not her because when she was barely more than a baby she chased him out of the house with a poker for some small offense that he could not even remember. My mother didn't remember any of the event but her response was, "Good. I'm sure you deserved it."
I've seen my dad beat a horse nearly to death and by the time I came along (a "surprise" late baby, nearly a second family all by myself) he had mellowed and learned a great deal about controlling the temper that had once controlled him. Today he is one of the most gentle, calm, self sacrificing people you could ever meet. "Humble" that's the perfect word for him now. People who knew him only in his later years would never believe that he used to have a temper that raged like a bonfire. He gives his God the glory for the passive man he is today, saying that only after he "was saved", as they call it, and prayed about it long and hard, was he able to rope in the Fury that had once dominated a large portion of his life. I was seven when both my parents were saved and baptised, and suddenly church, which I'd rarely been to, was a three time a week event. It was mere months later that someone rear-ended my dad's pick up truck with Mom, Sandi, and me along. (Daddy was the family's only driver at that time). I remember that Dad said some frustrated words, wondering how the guy could have missed Dad's turn signal. I remember he leaped from the truck, pulled the seat forward with one angry motion, though we were all leaning on it, and pulled out a lug wrench. He headed to the car behind him with my mother pleading loudly for the guy back there that had no idea that a furious Irishman was heading his way with a weapon. I watched in the big mirror as Dad made it to the end of the truck bed, stopped, swore, and returned with the lug wrench. He opened the door and almost mechanically placed the lug wrench back where he had found it. I thought my mother's pleas had gotten through to him, and I'm sure they helped, but it turned out that Dad had been thinking right away that the guy behind him could have killed one of us, Dad's "girls" or his much loved wife, and he wanted to beat the hell out of him for flirting with that possibility. But as he reached the end of the truck bed, the "still small voice" that is our conscience or the voice of goodness, or God, if you will, spoke to him. Telling him it was just an accident and the family was okay, and to put up the lug wrench. God certainly saved some guy a world of agony that day, and it's the last time I remember seeing my dad in the grip of Fury.
I don't know if my mother was a harder nut for God to crack or if she had just been through so much that He let her keep her Fury for those times when she needed it, but whatever the reason, she held on to it much longer than Dad did. I have not seen her temper flare in over a decade. Though Dad was more famous for his temper and has been known to do a lot more damage to people and things, I have seen my mother in the grip of Fury many times since the day Pop last truly battled his. She rages, and spits, and practically foams at the mouth. She will not hesitate to say the cruelest things she can pull out of her arsenal. I've been the recipient of her temper many times. It is a fierce and fearsome thing. If I were not her beloved child I have little doubt I would have been in fearful danger. As it was, I was slapped repeatedly as a teenager. My mind would get so rattled and foggy that I would lose count of the blows.
My oldest sister Sandi seemed to inherit all the calm our parents lost. I have seen her angry less than a handful of times and the worst thing she does is cry and maybe stomp her feet a little. It skipped right over Sandi like a flat pebble on the surface of the water but it landed squarely on Lila, and then ten years later on myself as well.
Lila has shot rings around people, chased them with a gun in her hand, and chased a grown man with a cinder block held over her head because she had every intention of slamming it down on his. If the heavy thing hadn't slowed her running and allowed him to get away from her, she would probably still be in prison for murder. I have taken guns from her and I've been unable to wrest some from the strength of her anger. You don't actually touch the gun if you want to take it from her, you appeal to what's left of the reason in her brain if you can reach it. So you are wresting the gun from her will, not her hands. To attempt to wrest it from her hands would only get you killed, adored little sister or not... Don't go there.
As for myself, my Fury has a name and it is Ella. When I was a very small child I wanted to be big and important. I wanted to be strong and safe. I had a toy elephant named Ella and I thought, in my little girl head, "If I were a big, strong elephant people would leave me alone. I would be safe, always." I was very young and naive to think so, but that is how I thought. I wanted to be "Ella". And so my lost temper now had her own name and began to develop her own personality. I can remember the first time I completely lost my cool in front of people that were not family. I remember the wariness in their eyes, the fear that was hiding right behind a veneer of disgust. I remember thinking that I didn't care if they feared me or hated me, as long as they left me alone. The fear actually fed me. Every time they looked at me with such caution in their eyes, I felt powerful, safe, and in control. So, I began to loose Ella on the masses whenever I felt unsafe and there were no authority figures around. It is amazing how many fights you can avoid by seeming insane. It is amazing how many fights you can win by being on fire with Fury. Sometimes Ella would yell, and scream, and call someone names that other children did not dare to utter in whispers behind closed doors. The opponents would back down, and that was the end of that. Sometimes she had to put her money where her mouth was and "pull" someone "bald headed," or "take a bite out of the soft skin on the inside of your thigh," or "take that stick away from you and beat you with it." Only once did I black out and not remember part of the fight. More than once I was pulled off of some poor unsuspecting fool that did not realize that a small person with a large dose of Fury is more than a big person with a desire to bully can handle. Mostly, those people were boys. I cannot tell you how many physical confrontations I've had with males, but I've had three actual fights with females. One of which I was pulled off the girl because I had started bashing her head into the floor and it was becoming obvious I had no intention of stopping. One of which I managed to rein Ella in and walk away because the girl was pregnant and I knew Ella would probably kill the baby if I did not keep control, so I had never completely loosed my Fury. I lost a tooth in that one and I'd earned it. It is the only fight I've been in that I started and one of two that I truly regret. The last one was a fight with my sister Lila, which I also regret. This fight was like a clashing of titans. It was carried on in three places. It included nearly having a car accident, having MY face imbedded in gravel, and both of us rolling over a briar and bramble filled mountain. It left us bloody and bruised, and my sister Sandi crying and stomping. It was the only fight any of us girls ever got into. You couldn't pay Sandi to fight and Lila and I learned that time that we frustrated each other a lot with our equal tempers, but the main reason it was the only fight we ever got into was because of our mother: She told us both, "I have never been ashamed of my girls, but today I am ashamed to my bones of both of you! You are SISTERS! You fight FOR each other not WITH each other! How does this reflect on your parents? Did you even think one thought about that?" (I had not.) She ended with, "I am not speaking to either of you until you apologize to each other and put this behind you NEVER to happen again!" My mother was not a perfect mother, but she hit the nail on the head pretty often, certainly that time, and I have never since forgotten that I fight FOR my sisters not WITH my sisters.
Of Lila's children only Shana seems to have inherited the temper and both of my own children fight a version of the rage. Shana put someone in the hospital once and pulled a nurse through a hospital by the hair on the poor woman's head. My niece thought the nurse was ignoring my other niece, Shana's very sick little sister. Cory has mostly hurt himself with his rages, and while I am glad he's not hurt others or been jailed himself for it, to see him hurt himself was possibly more painful for me than for him. Any time he wants to hurt me, all he has to do is hurt himself. I worry so much about his temper. His Fury is huge and wild, frightening, even for me, who has been surrounded by and filled with Fury until I became an old hand at tempers. Liam seems to have the patience of a saint, but if you push him far enough he blows up like a volcano. I had to lock his collection of knives and swords up for two years when he was in his early teens. The child that I'd seen angry less than a handful of times, become so enraged with his brother that he charged at him with a sword. I was shocked and frightened. I kept asking myself what would have happened if I had not been home. I had long hard talks with both boys and Liam's collection went into my locked trunk for years.
Like Daddy, Lila has a great deal of control over her temper now. It would shame her to read the words I have written about her as she is sure that God wants her to turn the other cheek. She's a different person now and so is my Dad, and so am I. We've all learned to control the beast inside us. When I was sixteen I decided that God did not want me to be an uncontrolled ball of anger. I made the mistake with my sister and with the pregnant girl and it was like life said, "Hey girl, rein it in." I began to work on keeping my cool, and turning the other cheek, and loving not only my neighbor (because as Jesus said, anyone can do that!) but also loving my enemy. Over the years I have evolved from a redneck drama queen to a pacifist. I am ashamed these days if I let my temper control me instead of the other way around. I am ashamed of the "redneck" label that I, for years, deserved. And yet, I am not shamed by the Fury that my family has fought. For one thing, "fought" is the operative word there: Dad, and for the most part Mom, Lila, and myself have FOUGHT our Fury! We saw the bad side of it and we waged wild wars against it! And just as you learn from all pain and every battle, we have gained an insight that we would never have had if we had not been forced to subdue the dragon inside our own souls. We have sympathy for others that fight the same sort of battle. We can give advice to the next generation of Rednecks. And let us not forget, we won our wars! That in itself is something to be proud of. Conquering a huge temper is no small feat. For another thing, there was a time and place when we needed that anger, when it kept us alive, or sane, or in control of our own lives -- if not in control of our own emotions. My mother's temper saved her from additional and horrible abuse as a child. Fury saved my father and myself from being bullied. It saved my sister and myself from being beaten down in difficult abusive marriages. Fury has been our friend as well as our foe. And now, knowing how to control it, we can keep the friend and throw out the foe. If ever I or someone I love is attacked, there is the possibility that being able to tap into a wild anger that frightens any sane person may come in handy. For now, I am glad to be thought of as a hippy. Make love not war. I am often told I am "one of the sweetest people" that many of my friends know. But I know that Ella waits. I know that just below my calm, middle aged demeanor resides a hot and formidable Fury, I know that conquering her taught me a lot, and I know that she will be there for me, if ever I need her.
Lila has shot rings around people, chased them with a gun in her hand, and chased a grown man with a cinder block held over her head because she had every intention of slamming it down on his. If the heavy thing hadn't slowed her running and allowed him to get away from her, she would probably still be in prison for murder. I have taken guns from her and I've been unable to wrest some from the strength of her anger. You don't actually touch the gun if you want to take it from her, you appeal to what's left of the reason in her brain if you can reach it. So you are wresting the gun from her will, not her hands. To attempt to wrest it from her hands would only get you killed, adored little sister or not... Don't go there.
As for myself, my Fury has a name and it is Ella. When I was a very small child I wanted to be big and important. I wanted to be strong and safe. I had a toy elephant named Ella and I thought, in my little girl head, "If I were a big, strong elephant people would leave me alone. I would be safe, always." I was very young and naive to think so, but that is how I thought. I wanted to be "Ella". And so my lost temper now had her own name and began to develop her own personality. I can remember the first time I completely lost my cool in front of people that were not family. I remember the wariness in their eyes, the fear that was hiding right behind a veneer of disgust. I remember thinking that I didn't care if they feared me or hated me, as long as they left me alone. The fear actually fed me. Every time they looked at me with such caution in their eyes, I felt powerful, safe, and in control. So, I began to loose Ella on the masses whenever I felt unsafe and there were no authority figures around. It is amazing how many fights you can avoid by seeming insane. It is amazing how many fights you can win by being on fire with Fury. Sometimes Ella would yell, and scream, and call someone names that other children did not dare to utter in whispers behind closed doors. The opponents would back down, and that was the end of that. Sometimes she had to put her money where her mouth was and "pull" someone "bald headed," or "take a bite out of the soft skin on the inside of your thigh," or "take that stick away from you and beat you with it." Only once did I black out and not remember part of the fight. More than once I was pulled off of some poor unsuspecting fool that did not realize that a small person with a large dose of Fury is more than a big person with a desire to bully can handle. Mostly, those people were boys. I cannot tell you how many physical confrontations I've had with males, but I've had three actual fights with females. One of which I was pulled off the girl because I had started bashing her head into the floor and it was becoming obvious I had no intention of stopping. One of which I managed to rein Ella in and walk away because the girl was pregnant and I knew Ella would probably kill the baby if I did not keep control, so I had never completely loosed my Fury. I lost a tooth in that one and I'd earned it. It is the only fight I've been in that I started and one of two that I truly regret. The last one was a fight with my sister Lila, which I also regret. This fight was like a clashing of titans. It was carried on in three places. It included nearly having a car accident, having MY face imbedded in gravel, and both of us rolling over a briar and bramble filled mountain. It left us bloody and bruised, and my sister Sandi crying and stomping. It was the only fight any of us girls ever got into. You couldn't pay Sandi to fight and Lila and I learned that time that we frustrated each other a lot with our equal tempers, but the main reason it was the only fight we ever got into was because of our mother: She told us both, "I have never been ashamed of my girls, but today I am ashamed to my bones of both of you! You are SISTERS! You fight FOR each other not WITH each other! How does this reflect on your parents? Did you even think one thought about that?" (I had not.) She ended with, "I am not speaking to either of you until you apologize to each other and put this behind you NEVER to happen again!" My mother was not a perfect mother, but she hit the nail on the head pretty often, certainly that time, and I have never since forgotten that I fight FOR my sisters not WITH my sisters.
Of Lila's children only Shana seems to have inherited the temper and both of my own children fight a version of the rage. Shana put someone in the hospital once and pulled a nurse through a hospital by the hair on the poor woman's head. My niece thought the nurse was ignoring my other niece, Shana's very sick little sister. Cory has mostly hurt himself with his rages, and while I am glad he's not hurt others or been jailed himself for it, to see him hurt himself was possibly more painful for me than for him. Any time he wants to hurt me, all he has to do is hurt himself. I worry so much about his temper. His Fury is huge and wild, frightening, even for me, who has been surrounded by and filled with Fury until I became an old hand at tempers. Liam seems to have the patience of a saint, but if you push him far enough he blows up like a volcano. I had to lock his collection of knives and swords up for two years when he was in his early teens. The child that I'd seen angry less than a handful of times, become so enraged with his brother that he charged at him with a sword. I was shocked and frightened. I kept asking myself what would have happened if I had not been home. I had long hard talks with both boys and Liam's collection went into my locked trunk for years.
Like Daddy, Lila has a great deal of control over her temper now. It would shame her to read the words I have written about her as she is sure that God wants her to turn the other cheek. She's a different person now and so is my Dad, and so am I. We've all learned to control the beast inside us. When I was sixteen I decided that God did not want me to be an uncontrolled ball of anger. I made the mistake with my sister and with the pregnant girl and it was like life said, "Hey girl, rein it in." I began to work on keeping my cool, and turning the other cheek, and loving not only my neighbor (because as Jesus said, anyone can do that!) but also loving my enemy. Over the years I have evolved from a redneck drama queen to a pacifist. I am ashamed these days if I let my temper control me instead of the other way around. I am ashamed of the "redneck" label that I, for years, deserved. And yet, I am not shamed by the Fury that my family has fought. For one thing, "fought" is the operative word there: Dad, and for the most part Mom, Lila, and myself have FOUGHT our Fury! We saw the bad side of it and we waged wild wars against it! And just as you learn from all pain and every battle, we have gained an insight that we would never have had if we had not been forced to subdue the dragon inside our own souls. We have sympathy for others that fight the same sort of battle. We can give advice to the next generation of Rednecks. And let us not forget, we won our wars! That in itself is something to be proud of. Conquering a huge temper is no small feat. For another thing, there was a time and place when we needed that anger, when it kept us alive, or sane, or in control of our own lives -- if not in control of our own emotions. My mother's temper saved her from additional and horrible abuse as a child. Fury saved my father and myself from being bullied. It saved my sister and myself from being beaten down in difficult abusive marriages. Fury has been our friend as well as our foe. And now, knowing how to control it, we can keep the friend and throw out the foe. If ever I or someone I love is attacked, there is the possibility that being able to tap into a wild anger that frightens any sane person may come in handy. For now, I am glad to be thought of as a hippy. Make love not war. I am often told I am "one of the sweetest people" that many of my friends know. But I know that Ella waits. I know that just below my calm, middle aged demeanor resides a hot and formidable Fury, I know that conquering her taught me a lot, and I know that she will be there for me, if ever I need her.
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