Her brothers tormented her. They threw her doll down the outhouse hole! But they also protected her. No one else could be mean to her. She recalled a time that a boy was trying to lure her back behind a building. Her brother, Paul, spotted this and came telling her that "Mom is calling you! Don't you hear?" She ran home to her mom who looked quizzical when asked why she had been calling Joe Anne home. When she heard that Paul had said so, she replied that she needed Joe Anne's help with some chores. As an adult remembering this, my mother realized Paul had been protecting her.
They also had an old dog named Scottie. He always walked on the street side of the sidewalk, keeping young Joe Anne herded to the inside. He would stop in front of her at the street corners.
In elementary school, she wore her long, red hair in pig tails. A mischievous boy named Billy House sat in the desk behind her. He would dip the tips of her pig tails into the ink well on his desk! He remained her very good friend their entire lives.
By about the fifth grade, she stood taller than her classmates and she developed sooner than the other girls. She felt embarrassed and awkward. She began to hunch her shoulders forward in an attempt to shrink herself. Noticing this, my grandmother told her, "You have beautiful red hair. No one has hair like yours. Hold your head high and show everyone that red hair!" Now there was something of her she could feel good about, and she stood up straight from then on.
Despite the hurts and negative interactions in their relationship that my mother held onto, she said there were two things her mother did right. One was telling her to hold her red head high. The other was that she did her best to speak openly and to the best of her knowledge about female development and body changes. She would try to answer any question posed even as she blushed at times. Many girls didn't have moms with the courage to do so. Joe Anne was present when one of her friends screamed in terror thinking she was bleeding to death. No one had given her any education. Joe Anne looked through the cupboards, found menstrual supplies, showed the girl how to use the belt and to hook the ends of the pads. Having witnessed this girl's fear, she was so glad her mother had educated her before hand.
Her mother had a strange hang-up about bathing, however. She seemed to think Joe Anne wanted baths too often. The house had a side porch that was loosely enclosed. Joe Anne would put the tub full of bath water on that porch, close off the entry to the house, and she would bathe and brush her hair and care for herself as if she were in the middle of luxury. Her mother viewed this with disdain. (As an adult who designed her own house plan, she created a beautiful master bath!)
She was the daughter of a teacher. This was similar to being the daughter of a preacher. She felt the need to be somewhat wild. She started smoking cigarettes at age 14. She skipped school! A boy with a bright red car caught her attention and she saw him as the source of fun and happiness. They eloped during her senior year of high school. When they came back around home, her mother told him, "Jerry, she needs to finish high school. You need to ensure she does. If not, I will have this marriage annulled." He responded, "Oh, yes, Mrs Donahue, Joe Anne will finish high school." And she did. They took off to live in California.
She had her baby girl when she was 18. She wasn't happy. Jerry quit his job "because he just wanted to go fishing." She described not having enough money for food. "There was a can of tomato soup in the cupboard." The marriage lasted about a year. Knowing my mother, she probably left after a screaming argument, likely with a door slamming behind her. She didn't tell me this. She said they had an amicable divorce due to "irreconcilable differences." My grandmother told me that after she was home a few days she began crying, saying, "I want my baby!" They went to Jerry's sister who was caring for Christine and retrieved her. She became a divorced woman with a child.
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