Still Growing: An Autobiography Read Online Free Page B

the rest).
    We were ready for him when he got home from work: He pulled in the driveway to find us circling the yard, chanting the slogans we had written on the signs. All he could do was laugh. He laughed so hard that the pictures he took of us were cockeyed and cut off. But the scheme worked—Dad lightened up.
    We used to watch my favorite show,
Happy Days
, after dinner as a family, but we never went to bed like ordinary kids. Dad loved affecting a voice from his barrel of bad accents. Instead of being told it was time for bed, Dad broke into song: “Happy trails to you, until we meet again!” or “The party’s over . . . let’s call it a day!” To this day, my sisters and I hate those songs, in part because we knew that the party
wasn’t
over. It was just beginning—without us. Once we were in bed, the Rocks would come over with (appropriately enough) Rocky Road ice cream for the adults to share.
So
not fair.
    Mom tried her hand at business when we were little. She taught macramé classes in our garage and made enough money for my parents to splurge on a family buffet at a sit-down restaurant once in a while. But she invested most of her time and energy into loving and caring for us kids. I remember Mom singing or humming while she did the household chores. I admired her from my earliest memories—but, like most kids, wouldn’t have admitted it on paper.
    Mom and I wrestled all the time. You’d think I would have won those fights, but she usually did. The Bausmith girls were all hearty and strong. My Aunt Joanne was a body builder and the first woman on the Los Angeles Fire Department. These were no helpless maidens. Dadoften had to intervene, “Careful, Barbara! Don’t hurt him! Watch the face! Don’t hurt the face!”
    Together we did calisthenics at rest stops on long road trips. Dad, whistle in mouth, marked how many jumping jacks or pushups we could muster.
    Mom and Dad encouraged us to get involved in anything that interested us. Mom was the taxi driver, schlepping us around town to this lesson or that practice. I played soccer and baseball and rode motocross. As I grew older I added racquetball, skiing, hiking, camping—anything active and outdoorsy. I also loved indoor activities that required precision and concentration, like putting together plastic models of Corvettes and Mustangs. I even put together a model of the human body.
Sisters
     
    To make my childhood even more traditional, I had three little sisters to tease mercilessly. I pinned their arms down with my knees and tried to dangle a long string of spit close to their screaming mouth without it actually falling in. (I didn’t always succeed.) I rubbed my thumb and forefinger behind their ear to make them think a bug had chosen their ear as a new home. I scooted up the walls of our darkened, narrow hallway—back against one wall, feet against the other—and perched against the ceiling for a few minutes. Then I called one of my sisters and when she came through the hallway, I pounced and flattened her.
    One day Melissa and Bridgette were swimming in the pool next door. With one of the frozen chickens I kept to feed my snakes, I sat on the other side of the wall and calculated where it needed to go. I yelled, “Bridgette! Melissa! Look out!” I made chicken noises—“Baccch, baccch, baccch baach.” The next thing they saw was a frozen chicken flying over the wall, landing in the pool. It made a satisfying splash and an even more satisfying reaction.
    I suppose one of the meanest things (not
the
meanest—that comes later) I did to my sister was when Melissa and I had to go to the doctor for something, probably to get blood drawn. All the way there I whispered, “Melissa, this is going to hurt
so
bad. It’s going to hurt morethan anything you’ve ever had done before.”
    At the doctor’s office I continued to harass her. “It’s gonna hurt so much, you’re gonna scream for your life.”
    By the time the nurse ushered her