Cockroaches
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I had a terrible time trying to decide what to talk about. I found myself sitting on the back porch after school with my battered red notebook and a glass of cherry Koolade. I got up to refill my glass and get a Twinkie or something. Little did I know I was about to be enlightened. I passed the porch door and saw something moving. I looked down. Chic, chic, chic, chic. I turned toward the sound. Waving his little feelers at me was a cockroach. It disappeared under some rocks. Chic, chic, chic, chic. Suddenly it came to me. After all, it is we who will inherit the world's problems and be called upon to find solutions, right? You know that biblical saying: The meek shall inherit the earth? After vast research I have concluded that saying did not refer to meek people. It referred to the cockroach. One need only study the evidence. The little cockroach is as meek as you can get. It is unassuming, the humblest creature around. No one's ever been bitten by a cockroach. It just sits under the sink and waits. Another reason the cockroach will inherit the earth is its amazing adaptability. Man is more adaptable? Where you find man, you invariably find the cockroach. On the second moon mission one of the astronauts radioed back that they had found a cockroach in the capsule. That cockroach was not found coming back. We can only conclude the moon is no longer uninhabited. Another attribute is hardiness. Every time they come out with a new roach poison, the cockroach develops an immunity to it. They are creating a cockroach that is immune to everything. I am not lying. Dow Chemical can produce a super roach powder. It will succeed only in producing a super cockroach. The most important thing the cockroach has going for him is his astounding powers to multiply. If you put one cockroach in a room, 20 minutes later you're knee deep in them. The cockroach is also infesting the media. There are more and more short stories about them. There are plans in Hollywood to make a full length movie starring a cockroach. To me personally, the cockroach does not pose a threat. On the contrary, he gives me faith. It gives me faith to see every spring a generation of cockroaches rising out of the ashes of the preceding generation. I put down my notebook and looked down. Chic, chic, chic, chic. My friend reappeared, waving his little feelers. He knew... And so today I salute the Spring generation, the 1974 generation of cockroaches who are carrying the cockroach torch high and who will ultimately march off into the future with pride and elan. And fellow graduates, if you can't beat them, join them. It is time for us to crawl out from under the sinks in order to infest the world. I quote author Jean Shepherd: "To the cockroach, may they proliferate, and may they enjoy the fruits of our labours!''
Amalia's Story, Chapter Sixty-Two
= Amalia Angeloni Jacobucci
1000 Characters About My Mother #15:
"What happened after the Cub Scout Banquet?"
"That would have been in March of 1965 . . . "
"Here's something! First published April 1965 -- "
"Louis Jacobucci, Casework Treatment of the Neglectful Mother."
"Families in Society: The Journal of Contemporary Social Services, Volume 46, Issue 4."
"Oh, look! They had references!"
“The Protective Service Caseworker: How Does He Survive Job Pressures?”
“Use of Homemaker Service in Families That Neglect Their Children."
“The Team Approach in Protective Service.”
"Character Disorders in Parents of Delinquents."
"There's more."
"That's OK."
Presently . . .
"Loneliness and Isolation in Child Neglect."
"Dispositional Empathy in Neglectful Mothers and Mothers at High Risk for Child Physical Abuse."
"The Training of Neglectful and Unsatisfactory Mothers."
"The Socialization of Emotional Understanding: A Comparison of Neglectful and Nonneglectful Mothers and Their Children."
"In ...
"What?!"
"I didn't say anything."
"How can you say such a thing?"
"I'm not going through this again."
"What do you mean?"
"All this -- denial. I'm done. I'm just going to say exactly what happened as I remember it."
"It never happened!"
"The reason I know it happened is that I renember it. I was eight years old. My brother was twelve years old. I was able to recover the date because I remember at some point in the week preceding the event, our father for some reason had told us, I'm going to be speaking at the Unitarian Church this Sunday at 11:00. It did not seem weird to me at the time, because he was always out of the house anyway. Plus all he used to when he was home was harangue me, so good."
"You lie."
"In fact, I remember thinking, it made sense that he would get something going on Sundays, because that was the only time he was ever even around anymore. Weekdays he was working, of course, and weeknights he was always at one of his many, many important community activities."
"You are delusional."
"Then, I found this article, and it all ...
"I have a thesis. My thesis is: In any woman's life, having children would have to be the most significant event. So, in my mother's story -- "
"Her family wasn't really any different from any of the other families."
"Yes."
"In what way?"
"She and her husband were both very active in community affairs. Both her children went to school."
"What else?"
"They were both boys?"
"Anything else?"
"No. That's it."
"So you said, that one way in which your mother's family wasn't really any different from any of the other families, was that she and her husband were both very active in community affairs. Can you tell me a little more about that?"
"Oh, sure. There was always something going on. Cub Scouts, she was like Den Mother of her older son's Cub Scout Pack. Pack 54. Plus the Comedy Club. Plus I'm pretty sure, she was involved in the kindergarten. She and her husband both. And politics. It was the Sixties."
"Just normal 60's Mom stuff."
"In any case, it's time to forget the past."
