Rosa, Sam & Sam, the Prostitutes  2-7-23

 

          Rosa, Anna’s mother, was a saint. One of the guys who hung out at her General Store suggested she put a sign in front, as all she had was ‘Open’ – lit up in red. He said to name it ‘Rosa’s Café,’ it sounded svelte – after all their gang sat there every day drinking coffee after coffee, but she said, writing something down,

          “Put this up there.”

          He looked at it & took off. He came back with a piece of wood four feet long, two feet wide. It was etched by a wood-burning rod in black – On top,

          “Love thy neighbor”

          and bottom,

          “As thyself.”

          And there is stayed forever more on top of the door. It was her motto.

Copyrighted Rasa Von Werder 2023, all rights reserved. This is part of the book ‘Church of Women’

          Many cases proved Anna’s virtue. One was Samuel. Samuel was a ‘maintenance man’ aka janitor, at the local school. He made decent money but why was his family so hard up? And why was his wife, Samantha, coming into the store & ‘round abut town with a black eye & bruises?

          The guys at the store hated Samuel, labeling him a whoremaster & wife beater, but when he came in, Rosa treated him with the same respect as anyone else.

“Good afternoon, Samuel, what can I do for you?”

He got what was needed. She smiled & said,

“Have a great day,”

and she said it with kindness, not like a machine.

 

 

One day he took his cup of coffee & headed toward the potbelly stove where the other guys sat – but their looks were so negative he veered around, went back to the counter & sat.

The guys later said to Rosa,

“Why do you tolerate him? Throw him out; tell him he isn’t wanted here.”

But Rosa said,

“That would be against God. Who am I to judge him? God alone is the judge.”

She was the same with the ones called ‘prostitutes,’ which the fair minded call ‘adult therapists.’

There were three females living nearby who frequented the tiny ‘red light area.’ It was a bar with an adult book store on one side & a diner on the other, all owned by city men & this area had both legit & not-so-legit practices.

These women hung there a lot, sitting in the bar picking up men, standing in front of the bar, walking up to men in the parking lot who stopped there or the adult store, or going into the diner on & off, especially to warm up in the winter.

When they found a customer the main place of practice was the parking lot behind the mall. No one went there except these people & those who worked in the three spots mentioned – the other stores – only the men who owned or worked in them parked or walked back there, the women felt unsafe. It was a large lot, most of the back of it gravel/dirt, large enough for two huge trucks if need be, & past that, wilderness.

These three ladies were friends & came to the Store from time to time together. You could instantly tell they were different. They were ‘poverty’ or ‘working class’ by their manner. Loud, crass & crude, they often chewed gum or smoked as they came in. They were ‘unrestrained.’ They were not beautiful or sexy in the movie star sense of the word, but they sometimes wore low cut tops or ‘pedal pushers’ {pants to the knees} with high heels. Heels were something none of the rural ladies wore except for special occasions like Church. But these females wore super high heels with platforms, a dead giveaway to their profession – perhaps they were advertising. In winter they wore warm thick coats, unzipped, which they would open & flash their bodies to potential customers.

These females would come into the store in the middle of the day. They slept until noon, at night they worked, so when they might amble in it was around two o’clock. The potbelly stove was crackling so they would take their sandwich & coffee & sit by it. They spoke sometimes loud, sometimes quiet, a unique way of conversation unique to them. Whisper, whisper, then loud laughter or exclamation. Quiet, quiet, then a raucous cry, on & on until their wares were done & they had to trudge.

Some of the regulars, both male & female, criticized Rosa for being nice to them. Rosa said,

“To me, they are like anyone else; God’s creatures. Why should anyone look down on them with hate? Doesn’t everyone do sex? Weren’t we born out of sex? If they do sex for money, it’s a business, they work to survive. They put food on the table, they have children.”

The critic would counter with,

 

“Yes, people have legitimate sex, inside of marriage but sex for money like this is a sin.”

And Rosa said,

“Don’t you have sex with your husband’s for money? Don’t they give you their paycheck, & part of your obligation is sex? If you stopped giving your husband sex, would he still support you?”

At that they were silenced.

“Whether a person sins or not is between them & God. What’s it to do with me? I treat everyone with respect.”

 

Back Story of the Red Light District – which later we’ll see Samuel Began Visiting

 

Matt & Bob Ricco had come into town from the city & took over the last three buildings, to the left, at the little mall. There were ten buildings in all – the extreme right housed the ‘redneck’ go-go bar where Anna later worked. The Ricco brothers had the adult book store, ‘sexy’ bar & diner. At first, they had no dancing in the bar. But they visited ‘Mr. Red Fox’ & saw the dancers & thought,

“If they can do it, we can do it better. It might be a good angle to jack up business & bring some hot girls in.”

This is the business setup, the details not yet explained. As I said, sex therapists hung around these three buildings. But the center of the action was the bar. They had an understanding/unofficial agreement with the brothers that went like this:

‘You hang around the bar, go up to a costumer & see if he wants to buy you a drink.’

 

The drinks could be FAKE or REAL. They cost $15 for the ladies & if the female wanted NO ALCOHOL she’d say to the bartender or waitress,

“Make mine weak.”

If she wanted alcohol in it – two shots, she’d say,

“Make mine strong.”

The bartenders put something with color into the large mug, whatever it was, soda, seltzer, so it would look legit. On the ‘drink menu’ it said 3 shots but it was only 2. The men never ordered these drinks, they were too weird. But if an outsider did, they’d get a real 3 shot whiskey with soda for $15.

If the male wanted to go further with the lady – get some ‘action’ they would go to a booth. Some of the new guys didn’t know the score & they’d sit with the female for a long time at the bar while she kept ordering these special drinks – she’d get $8 for each drink, the house $7. Most professionals did not see this as ‘good money’ & were eager to service the guy, so they would suggest they either go to a booth or, if they had progressed in their negotiations, behind the mall in his vehicle.

The booths were dimly lit. You could trip over your grey cat on the way to one. Each booth had a pack of handi-wipes – the kind you clean your baby’s diaper bottom with – on the table. If an outsider asked why they were there they would be told ‘to clean your hands after the food.’

But in reality it was to wipe up after hand jobs for the female & male. What they charged was what they could

 get. If they could persuade the guy to give them $50 they did but if he refused they would do one for as low as $20. After the job was done they usually skedaddled as those phony drinks brought little profit, they had to move for money, & mostly the guys were done & left the bar.

          She’d either move toward another likely customer there or go outside to look for candidates. The average female worker could make $300 a night from about 7-8pm to bar closing at 1:00 or 2pm. Weekdays they closed at 1:00, weekends 2pm. Women worked as many nights as they could so based on this, they averaged $1,500 a week – more than minimum wage. It mostly depended on how the female hustled, not how she looked. Men would go blind after a few drinks.

          Now food: They served food but only hamburgers with potato chips or corn chips. They were large, with lettuce, tomato, onion & pickle if you wished. If a person didn’t want the hamburger the other alternative was all cheese – they would put 6 slices of American cheese on the bun, with the lettuce, tomato, onion & pickle. Some men didn’t want anything but the grilled bun & cheese. Whichever you had, it was $10.

          Now if a family came up to the bar to order food & drinks they were told that the food was only for people who worked there – please see the diner next door. Although they could legally have children in the bar as they served food, they didn’t want a child to go there & see a male or female cleaning up after sex, or to spot condoms in the garbage.

 

          There had to be two rest rooms. One was within the kitchen, back room area, where the dancers changed & any female therapists or employees had lockers they could keep their things. This was used by females & the owners – the other 2 or 3 male employees used the men’s room in the main bar. When females finished with guys in the back area they could return to the bar by the back door & fix up.

The dancers were a separate lot from the therapists, although they could participate in the drink business if they wanted. All the dancers were hounded for ‘drinks’ & then sex. But the average dancer had her mind on dancing & tips. The men could sit around two sides of the stage – not the side that would be facing the main bar area so people could see. These were the guys who tipped the most, some were generous.

          The dancing system was two girls a night, half hour on, half hour off. During the half hour off is when they changed & could sit with a customer for a minute, as time was short they usually got $8 out of the one drink. But to go to the bar they had to put on their street clothes, then come back to change again. This took time & energy, mostly they stayed backstage, rested, refreshed their makeup & had to go back on.

          The outfits of these dancers were much sexier than the redneck bar. The bottoms were sometimes more like ‘thongs’ & the entire bikinis were of material sometimes so thin you could almost see through. They were often custom made, as women wouldn’t wear such deals on the beach. They wore high heels with platforms.

          And their dancing was more suggestive. Matt said to one girl,

          “You ain’t doin’ it right. Jiggle your tits, bump & grind, lick your finger – this ain’t the high School Prom.”

Whereas at the ‘Mr. Red Fox’ they wore normal beach bikinis, bathing suits & halters with cut off shorts, flat shoes or barefoot, their dancing was not suggestive. This suited the type of clientele, all locals, some with family.

There was also the smell of weed coming out of the office. The origin was unknown, only that some of the staff smoked it.

          No, the Ricco brothers did not get ‘free sex.’ That is, they did not demand it. They were decent looking, masculine, wore expensive clothes. So many girls went after them they thought they were the cat’s meow. It was mostly their money & latching onto them for survival, it wasn’t love. Half the time the girls were having sex with them or anyone for work they were thinking of getting home, cooking dinner for kids & family, resting & wiping clean their minds of what they had to do.

 

          Matt was 5’10”, 39 years old, shiny salt & pepper black hair & dark eyes. He looked rugged. He wore double breasted dark suits with white shirts. Bob was gentle-looking, sweet expression, straight brown hair & brown eyes, a thin mustache, 36, he liked grey double-breasted suits with white shirts.

          Although they looked like ‘gentlemen’ in their suits, when they started to talk you knew they were low-class. The vocabulary & idioms they used gave them away & the crudeness also. They’d use phrases – to the girls – if they were mad like,

          “Sit your ass down over here,”

          or

          “This ain’t your beauty parlor”

          or

          “You ain’t the star here, I am!”

          You can take the boy out of the ghetto, but you can’t take the ghetto out of the boy.        

          The guys were usually not there at the same time, they had businesses back in New York City. What other businesses they ran no one knew.

 

          The adult book store was a hoot. One local man got a job there. There were booths where men could look at porno & masturbate. Charles had to take the cash till to the office past the booths. As he walked he slid & the cash till went flying. He had stepped on some sperm.

          This is the world Samuel entered when he started to go astray.

 

When Samuel’s wife Samantha, would come in with a black eye, she would hold the bruised part of her face away from people but the more she tried to hide it, the more obvious it became.

She tried to make ends meet with three children; a one year old baby, eight year old girl & ten year old boy. She shopped for clothes only at the thrift store. She bought most of their needs at the dollar or discount store & she went to the regular grocery only when she had to. In summer she had the greens in their garden, in winter the

 

General Store would get fresh stuff from an 80 year old lady with a greenhouse.

Their house was a tiny two bedrooms on a postage stamp property, in front of huge fields that belonged to someone else. It was not decrepit or ruined, no holes in the roof, walls were fine, no broken windows. But they had little furniture, most of it came with the house when they

bought it & a couple pieces they got from the Salvation Army, that was it.

          But then, it got worse. About a year prior to the crisis

Samuel began to drink more. His drinking was moderate – he & Samantha watched TV Friday & Saturday nights drinking beer or a bit of whiskey.

          But now he absented himself on the nights he got paid, every two weeks. He’d go to the red light bar & drink. A back room sometimes had a poker game {a con man deal you couldn’t win}; he’d go in & lose a couple hundred bucks. He’d come back in the bar, drink some more. One of the girls there or outside would approach him; he’d give in & take her in his truck to the back lot. He’d come back to the bar & drink some more.

          He’d come home late & Samantha would be waiting for the pay check. But the money was drained, there’d usually be six hundred left out of the nine hundred & fifty cash he would get.

          Bills had to be paid. There was propane gas, electric every month, in winter, the fuel bills were terrible. They had gotten a small wood stove in the living room but the heat didn’t reach the bedrooms. And the wood had to be bought, she’d run out of wood.

          One horrendous incident Samantha was driven to was the theft of baby aspirin. In a discount store she got her items, all necessities, {no luxuries for them}, when she spotted the baby aspirin. But she already had got all she

could afford in the cart. The kids complained of headaches from what was going on. She looked around – no one was looking, she put it in her vest pocket & moved on.

          But a saleslady had seen her & told the manager. He came over when she was checking out & said,

          “Would you like to pay for what you put in your pocket?”

          She took it out & placed it on the counter, saying,

“I’m sorry—but I don’t have enough money for this.”

          This was seen by the customer behind her, it was embarrassing. And the manager added,

“We’d like you to do your shopping elsewhere from now on.”

Dash it – this was one of her favorite discount stores!

 

          Luckily, she had two dependable allies – Rosa at the General Store, & Joseph Leon, one of the regulars there, who was deeply in love with her.

          Joseph Leon had his own tale to tell. Ever since he laid eyes on Samantha he loved her. Sam was 33, he was 64 & married. He dared not show his love, he tried to keep his eyes off her when she came into the store. But the more he tried to avert his gaze the more it was noticed, as you could see his conversation stopped when she came in, his mind was diverted.

          His chance to meet her came when Rosa gave him a bag of groceries to take her.

          It was day – Samuel was at work, a good time to chat. Rosa knew better than to send a man there in the evening – husband’s get jealous, or else indignant by some man bringing help.

          But when he brought food she was grateful as the kids never got enough, milk for the baby was urgent, & sweets for the others were snapped up.     

 

Joseph then got the idea that if Rosa could send a care package, so could he, & that would give him the excuse to visit her. He didn’t tell her it was from him, he pretended it was the store but later she guessed it.

          After a while he told Samantha he was in love with her. He didn’t try anything – they never touched, but she now knew she had someone she could ask for big help. He wasn’t rich, but he was solvent; she wasn’t.

          Over that year he paid several bills for her, food constantly, electric bills, gas bills & even her taxes. They weren’t high as their property poor, but they had to be paid or the house could be taken away. All this was kept under cover, no one knew about it as her house was off to the side where you couldn’t see who parked there – he told no one – she told no one. Although Samantha was grateful she harbored no feelings for Joseph, she saw him as a father figure.

          But Joseph had other ideas. His mind ran to fantasies of Samantha leaving Sam & being with him. He imagined all sorts of setups. Samuel would meet another female – maybe one of the girls at the bars – & runs off with her. Samuel has a car accident & dies. Samuel gets sick & dies. Samantha gets tired of Sam’s shenanigans & wants to leave him & asks Joseph to help.

          Joseph liked his last fantasy the best. He’d find an apt for Samantha in the next state, not terribly far, about fifty miles hence. He’d get a van & quickly move her out while Sam was working. He would support her, could visit once a week & make love. If his wife died before him, he could then marry Samantha & live happily ever after. Anything is possible if you believe.

          But things were boiling over for the couple.

          Again, Samuel wasn’t coming home on pay day. Samantha called the bar – they said he wasn’t there. She didn’t believe them. She decided to do something she’d never done before.

          She couldn’t leave her kinds alone; she took them with her & went to the bar. She had the two older kids hold the baby. She walked into the bar & indeed, he was not there.

          But she knew about the parking lot behind. On a good hunch, she drove back there & there he was – in his truck with a female. At first, she parked discreetly & turned her lights off, spying on him. The light back here weren’t bright but there was a strong moon. She saw just him for a while, the female disappeared. She then saw him talking to her & giving her something. Was it money?

          She didn’t know what came over her, but she turned her car toward his truck – he was parked directed to the woods on the right side of the lot. She got behind him, put her bright lights on, hit the intermittent horn & jumped out of the car screaming, waving her hands & jumping up & down,

          “You beast! You take the food out of our children’s mouth!

          You waste money on other women!

         

You can get all the sex you want from me!

          I hate you – I hate you – I hate you!”

 

          There was another man in the lot busy with a female. He pulled out of there fast.

          The woman Sam was with quickly jumped out of his jeep & ran into the back door of the bar.

          And Samuel got out of there as quick as he could, some people were exiting from the buildings to see what was the noise.

          She screamed until he was out of sight, everyone back there heard her, the same tirade over & over. And she was justified. He was wasting all kinds of money on gambling – on alcohol he could drink at home – & sex when he could get it from his wife. What was wrong with him?

 

          She went home, shaking with rage & fear of what he would do to her. Their fights on Friday nights, Saturday mornings had escalated over the months. He would push her against the wall or hit her & then would stop, go to the bedroom, throw his clothes on the floor & pass out.

          She would then pick up his pants, take out his wallet & find what money was left & hide it under a floor board in the kitchen, a place he wouldn’t look. He’d wake up not

remembering & wondering if he spent the money, a female had rolled him or if his wife cleaned him out.

          But this night was a crisis & she was going to have it out when Sam came home, & she did.

          He arrived around 2:30 Am, she was waiting. As soon as he came in the door she began screaming, the same thing as before. Saying he was the most miserable wretch of a man, she hated him, he wasted their money, she couldn’t feed the kids properly & was late on bills. He was worthless, she was going to leave him.

          At those last words he not only hit her, but knocked her to the floor & jumped on top & began to strangle her. The table fell over as he did this & the kids woke up.

          They ran in screaming, pounding him with their fists but he didn’t seem to feel it. The boy opened a kitchen drawer, got out a hammer & hit him to the back of the head – it knocked him out.

          Samantha got up gasping for air, the kids were relieved she wasn’t dead. But Sam was out.

          They dragged him into the bedroom & left him on the floor. She put her face to his nose to see if he was breathing & he was. So he wasn’t dead. But usually he stayed unconscious from liquor for many hours – the conk on the head would help him stay that way.

          She told the kids,

          “We’re getting out of here.”

          Samantha had one ace in the hole. A sister lived about a hundred miles away, they could make it there. She took the money left in Sam’s wallet – abut $600.

          She took several comforters & pillows from the rooms, & grabbed whatever important things were needed. The marriage certificate on the wall she tore up. Everything else she could leave as her sister had these things.

The car Sam had bought her was a black Cadillac Eldorado, 15 years old. It had rust on the bottom, one of the automatic doors didn’t work, but the engine was fine.

         She felt a great relief as she pulled out of the driveway– the kids fell asleep quickly in the back; they were nestled in comforters & pillows. Samantha was gone.

 

          When Samuel woke up around 10 am he remembered nothing. But there was a note on the table,

          “Don’t look for me.”

          Samuel knew she had relatives including a sister, but he never met them, didn’t know where they lived or their addresses – & Sam’s sister would not be listed under her own name in the book as she was married.

          But he did look for her nevertheless. He called everyone she knew. He went to every store she shopped & looked inside & in the parking lots. He did this every day. No trace. Finally he went to Rosa’s.

          He walked in looking like a ghost.

          He asked Rosa if he could speak to her privately.

          Rosa asked Anna, her daughter to take over & took him to the kitchen.

 

          The kitchen was, luckily, far from the prying ears of other folks & they placed themselves at the table against the wall, each at a corner of the table, Sam his back to a wall, Rosa’s back to the door.

          “She left me!”

          Sam exclaimed.

         

“I can’t live without her! I don’t know what comes over me, but when I start to drink, demons take over & I can’t control myself!”

          He started talking in a mumbly tirade,

          “If she doesn’t come back to me, I’m a dead man. What have I done? Forgive me, God! I’ve sinned so much, so much, not meaning to, not wanting to, but I have, & I deserve punishment!”

          At that he got up & fell to his knees in front of Rosa & put his head in her lap, sobbing.

          Rosa tried to comfort him, not understanding the problem fully. She said,

          “It’ll probably work out. She’ll call you & you will discuss it & she will return.”

          He said,

          “But I don’t know where she went. I know she has a sister but I don’t know her name or where she lives. If she doesn’t come back I’ll die.”

          Rosa said every consoling thing she could think of, that he must keep his faith, not give in to despair, that this is temporary, every cloud has a silver lining, things will change, walk through the valley of death & fear no evil. God is with us & will not allow us to fall into the pit, give God a chance, etc.

          He listened & calmed down. She gave him a napkin to wipe his tears.

          He said thank you & good bye,

“You’re a good woman, Rosa, a friend to everyone. I thank you sincerely”

And he left. As he walked out the people in the store saw his eyes were swollen from crying.

All his efforts to find Sam had failed.

 

Joseph Leon was worried & angry. He hated Samuel, he now had all his dreams dashed, the dreams that kept him alive. Was his hope of joy finished?

But wait – she spoke of a sister. Maybe Samuel knew where the sister lived or at least her name. Surely, she would go there. If only he had a number, a town or a name, he could find her. He had to go to Sam’s & ask him. He’d get it out of him on the pretext he’d find her & persuade her to come back. So off he went.

The house was dark. He knocked on the door, no answer. Sam’s black pickup was there, so maybe he was asleep, most probably passed out from drink. He banged loudly. He went to every window, peered in, saw nothing. The back door brought no response. Then he saw a mallet – those things that have an iron head weighing a few pounds that you put spikes into a piece of wood to split it into firewood. He picked it up to bang on the door so even a deaf mute could hear it – Nothing. Suddenly, with that mallet in hand, all his unconscious rage shot up. If Sam was passed out cold nothing would wake him, why not just do what I feel like doing & destroy his house; instead of killing him, it’s the next best thing. So Joseph shot through the back windows, then the side windows, then the front. All the windows in the house were goners. No response.

He then went to Sam’s truck, pulled out his pocket knife & stabbed each tire, they all went flat. He then took that mallet & pounded the truck here & there & smashed the front window.

 

He heard a car coming in this direction; he quickly jumped into his & sped off.

It was the police – lucky for John they didn’t see him.

Sam’s employer had called – he’d not reported to work for days, did not answer his phone.

Seeing the truck & car, the cops immediately suspected fowl play. They had their guns drawn as they broke the front door down & looked around – no one was there. They saw a note on the table,

“I can’t live without her.”

They turned the note to the other side, where it said in different hand writing,

“Don’t look for me.”

They went outside, sifting through the weeds & shrubbery, but nothing.

Then they looked to the field beyond the house, way down, hundreds of yards, & saw vultures flying ahead – many of them. Could be a dead deer or a body, they better look.

They trudged down there & sure enough, there was Sam, lying on his back, arms open, a shotgun by his right hand. He had blown his brains out.

 

Samantha’s journey

 

    Samantha indeed, had reached her sister with no impediment. Her sister, June, had said many times

          “Don’t take his shit. The next time he might kill you. Come here & if he doesn’t straighten out, forget him.”

          Sam did love Sam, or thought she did. But the lives of her & her kids seemed more & more precarious. He was getting crazier, more violent.

          And the thing with the strangling was the final straw. He could kill her without even remembering. This she could not risk. Her sister had said,

“Who will take care of the kids if he kills you? They’ll put them in foster care, where they’ll be abused by the male.”

Samantha shuddered at this. It was life or death. That night of the crisis she flew with every fiber of her being to get out of that house. She called her sister to let her know she was coming – it was now about 3am so if she took but one break for coffee & donuts she could be there by 7am & so she was.

She saw Sam’s death in the local paper. It was on the News. People in their town were shocked, everyone babbled at the General store,

“We didn’t know Sam loved Sam – he was such a bastard.”

 

Samantha was now heir to their house. The real estate lady got an offer for $8k but 2k would go for new windows. It was good enough for Sam, the most money she ever had. The truck could have brought 1k, but in the condition Joseph left it, it was towed to the junk yard. And so Sam began her new life with what to her was a fortune.

It is also peculiar that Joseph, who loved her so much he spent about 3k on her that year, also deprived her of it by the damage he had done. {He went back to his humdrum life when she had disappeared, like the errant suiter of the beautiful married lady in ‘The Cherry Orchard” by Anton Chekhov.}

 

She settled in with her kids & June. June had three little ones also & a good husband – just a regular guy. There were four bedrooms, two downstairs, two upstairs. They let Sam have one bedroom for herself & the one-year old, while the other bedroom had the eight & ten year olds. Upstairs the husband & wife shared a room with their two year old in a crib, & their six & eight year olds had the other room.

Things worked out perfectly for the sisters financially, emotionally & practically. Samantha got social security death benefits – a check & monthly stipend. It was about $1,200. Now if a female lived alone with three kids this would be poverty. But here, with June, she didn’t have to pay rent, taxes, electric, propane gas & the like. This sum made her feel rich as she could use it for food, clothing & necessities, even tiny luxuries. She no longer felt insecure, or afraid, & that was priceless.

          June benefited equally well. She’d had two years of college; she worked as a receptionist in a large firm & liked it. But she met a man – they fell in love – & when she had kids – no more work.

          It wasn’t the money – they had enough as Ron’s job paid well – it was being stuck in a house with no connection with the outside world.

          At first, she had tried baby sitters but they all turned out unsatisfactory, she stopped looking for work.  

She had seen too much negative stuff on TV & from friends of children being harmed by baby sitters.  There was the twenty three year old female who took on a four year old female & six year old boy. She had a job at a fast-food place; she’d leave the kids with her boyfriend, who was sodomizing the son.

        The sis tried to help the bro but was kicked away. Eventually he had to have surgery on his intestines to fix the damage.

        Then there was the teenage male baby sitter – not abusive but neglectful – watching a five year old boy.  Filled the tub with water, let him bathe himself while he watched TV, the boy drowned.

        Females were not to be trusted either.  There was the nineteen year old Au Pair from Sweden who lit the fireplace, embers fell on the rug, fire started, she ran out of the house while the infant burned to death.  The parents tried to hold her accountable but the court let her go.  She was greeted by a parade in Sweden with her Dad, the FIRE CHIEF leading the crowd.

        She heard of many other cases, enough to make her stay home.

        A wise woman said that in the days of Matriarchy, women banded together in families.  Each knew the other intimately, if they had virtues or faults, if they could be relied upon or not.  But in a man-run world, women were separated, isolated, far apart, they didn’t know each other.  They weren’t families any more, they were strangers.  And so, reaching out to another woman for help did not mean the awareness of who she was or the loyalty that comes with blood.  You could put your hand out to one mentally ill, who appears sane.  You could find one unreliable like the girl who left the kids with her boyfriend.  All kinds of maladies & defects are in humankind & you don’t know if you’re hiring one of these for your children.

          When Samantha came, she took over the care of all the children, & she kept the house spotless & did most of the cooking. June knew she could trust her & she applied at her old job & got it.

          She went on a bit of a diet as she had gained twenty pounds. Bought a new wardrobe of beautiful dresses & business suits, high heels, fixed her hair & makeup, & put her best foot forward to the public. Doing this made her feel like a ‘lady’ again, to be admired & respected, not a frumpy, frazzled housewife always complaining what the kids had done or not done. In fact, Ron was tired of her endless patter of what the kids did.

         

Not only that, she had extra money & that didn’t hurt. She also had benefits – health insurance & a 401K savings plan.

          Samantha had good instincts. She knew what kids needed & she held both babies as much as she could, they needed rocking & close physical contact, & she also hugged a lot & spoke kindly to them & encouraged them in constructive activities. If they erred she corrected them gently not to frighten them.

          She also knew that couples needed privacy. Saturday weather permitting Ron played golf. It was good exercise for him & a sort of therapy. She & June took that day to kibitz, catch up, all the gossip women love.

          But Sunday Sam made herself scarce. She let June & Ron watch TV by themselves, she got a TV for her own room & set up games for the kids in their rooms or sometimes all together with her. She had a hot plate for coffee or quick snacks & a tiny fridge in the room. In summer she spent much of Sunday in the back yard with the kids. If June & Sam wanted to be there then she’d use the living room or her room – she understood the value of privacy. No matter how much she & June liked each other, she had to be alone with her husband – just her & him. Two is a couple, three is a crowd, & Sam wanted their arrangement to last, not to get broken for people stepping on each other’s toes.

 

         June & Ron were also free now to take tiny weekend vacations out of town & relax in luxury hotels.  Life got brighter.

Ron was planning to improve the back yard for the now six children, including swings, a slide, a merry-go-round, a sand pit & a baby pool.  He also said he’d get a barbeque out there. 

        Life was enhanced when the sisters united.

Copyrighted Rasa Von Werder 2023, all rights reserved. This is part of the book ‘Church of Women’