"Why"

By Lynn Renee Simon

My book is about physical, emotional and sexual abuse. Having a soul mate for over 40 years and feeling safe.
This is not a why me book. It's about the three letter word WHY. I use my own life story for my credentials.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lynn Renee Simon
• Release date: Jun 13, 2024
• ISBN: 9798227872029

Book preview

This is my story!

My husband Michael was 63 (64 come November) and I was 62 (come June I would be 63). We were married 41 years (It would be 42 years come September 7th). We were married in the Broward County's Courthouse (in the Judge's Chambers) in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

Seven and half years of our marriage we decided to have a religious wedding in Brooklyn, New York. So, our second anniversary (which was a Jewish religion faith) February 28th we were married 34 years.

We bought (went to closing) our home on the 13th day of January, 2015.

2015th Christmas we had my brother's 3 kids pick a day when they wanted to come and get their gifts. I made for each family a large ring of cold-cut platters.

Howard was the first to come. It was him, Brittany and the two girls (Sophia and Nevaeh).

Oldest son was the second to come. It was him, his wife and their youngest child. The rest of the kids weren’t interested in coming.

Youngest son picked the 23rd (the third to come). It was my Brother Allen, Lena, and his youngest son, youngest son wife and their two children.

I think all three families enjoyed the night and the gifts. I know Mike and I really enjoyed them all. I just wish they all would have gotten along and we could have had them all here at the same time. Brothers are brothers and that is all I will say about that.

For New Year's Eve Mike and I always stayed home and watch the New Year's Rock-in Eve with Dick Clark and then see the ball come down from Time's Square, New York. Then we would call everyone to say Happy New Years.

On (January 1st 2016th) New Year's Day we would call New Jersey to wish Uncle Stan and Aunt Phyllis a HAPPY New Year's.

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My Baby Picture 

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My Brother Ronnie and I

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My Brother Ronnie & I     

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My Brother Allen with a Cousin

standing behind him

––––––––

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Ronnie & I playing Cowboys

And Indians   

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Allen age 2.5 years old, My Dad,

My Mom and Myself

I was born on the 12th of June 1953 to Eva and Harry on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, New York. I had an older brother, Ronald who was born three years prior on the 3rd of April 1950. From what my mom said, she had three miscarriages before Ronald was born.

I remember when I was somewhere around 3 or 4 years old we moved to Long Island, New York. I liked living there. During the summer months our cousins would come to us for a week and stay in our home. (Even the older cousins would come for the summer). Well this one year my cousin Sheila came for a week to stay with us. My dad would set up the sprinklers for us to play in. While we had a good time, my dad would be getting the barbeque ready.

After dinner we would watch TV till it was bed time. Sheila was to sleep with me. I always liked her. I thought of her (Sheila) like a big sister.

I went to bed first because I was the youngest, then my brother Ronald and last, my cousin Sheila.

In the middle of the night I felt something wet and warm on the palm of my hand and my fingers. I didn't know what it was but I went to pull my hand away. Sheila grabbed my hand and said, Don't Pull It Away. Just leave it there. I said no! I don't like that feeling and I'm going to tell my mom. Sheila said, oh no you won't. Your mom will believe me and you will get punished. You won't be able to play with us under the sprinklers tomorrow. I started to cry as she took her hand and placed it on her vagina. Then she placed her hand on my vagina. I didn't know what she was doing to me. She said now doesn't that feel nice (As she kept rubbing my vagina). She held my hand on her as she was moving around and making sounds. It felt like it was there for hours or at least it felt that way and I cried the whole time to please let my hand go and just stop touching me.

In the morning I just sat on the floor of my bedroom while my brother Ronald, my cousin Sheila and my parents were eating their breakfast. (My mom was due to have the baby in three months, November).

My mom came into the room and Sheila followed her in. My mom asked me if I felt okay. I pointed to Sheila and said I don't like her. I wish she would go home. Instead of asking me why, my mom said I should say I was sorry for saying that to my cousin Sheila. I said no and cried. My mom punished me and said I was not being nice. I said I don't want her to sleep with me. My mom said after I eat my meals I have to stay in my room.

That whole day I listened to everyone outside playing in the sprinklers. I sat and cried while being in my pajamas.

As each day went by my mom would ask if I would say I was sorry. My answer was the same NO. Sheila each day kept saying to me; see I told you this would happen if you said something. Each night I lived through this hell. I couldn't wait till she went back to Brooklyn. That week felt like a lifetime to me.

I was a handful for my mother after that summer. I must have been about 5 years old and a friend and I were eating cookies out in the backyard of my parent’s house, and another friend from a few houses down. She wanted to come over to play with us. She asked if she could have a cookie too.  I told her to close her eyes and that I would give her one cookie but she would have to put out her hand. I reached down in the ground and made a mud cookie and gave that to her to eat while she kept her eyes closed. My other girlfriend and I sat there laughing while she put the mud cookie in her mouth. She ran home crying and told her mother. Her mother called my mom and told her what I had done. I got hit and was punished by being told to stay in bed for a week. No TV. No playing with my friends outside. I had to stay in bed and think about what I did and could only come out of the room for meals.

You would think for the kind of messes I got into I would have learned my lesson. But that still didn't stop me. I remember these 2 boys and I decided to play doctor. So, we got a string with a big button and made a thing to listen to the chest like our doctor did to us (stethoscope). Then we found a big nail which was about 3 to 4 inches long for taking temperature (thermometer). Then we needed to find a place to have a doctor’s office. So, we made a box fort. I told one of the boys to pull down his pants and turn over so I could take his temperature (just like the doctor would take our temperature). He did and I took that old big long dirty nail and put it in his butt, and began to count to ten. Well his mother came looking for him and he ran out to her with the nail hanging out of his butt. Oh, did his mother yell, and my mother and the other boy’s mother came running out to see what was going on. That’s when we took off and ran to hide under the house. We moved 2 cinder blocks and we crawled under. We heard our mothers yelling for us (and saying, Oh, are you going to get it now). After a while we came out from under the house and we just said What did we do wrong? We were playing doctor. Did I get a beating for that one! At 7 years old my life was soon going to change. Mom was pregnant at the time still.

As the few months passed by and my Mom was due any time now to have the baby. I was hoping for a sister and Ronnie (Ronald) of course wanted a brother.

On the 10th day of November it was a little before dinner time and Dad wasn't home yet. Mom went into labor. The neighbor took my mom to the hospital while Ronald and I stayed with the neighbor's older children.

On the 11th day of November 1960 my baby brother Allen was born. We had a big snowstorm of at least three feet deep.

Ronnie and I went with my dad to pick up my mom and my baby brother Allen. My mom said isn't he a beautiful baby? And Ronnie and I said at the same time "Oh my goodness he's ugly!" My mom said no he's beautiful and then turned around and said we were ugly when we were born too.

Then Ronnie and I started talking about the snow at the house. I remember the snow was so deep that Ronnie and I made igloos and connecting tunnels and played in them at the same time, while Allen slept in a carriage all bundled up.  Mom watched us while she sat on the patio with Allen.

I remember one day Allen was in the crib sleeping and some of the neighbors came over to watch the Ed Sullivan Show with my mom in our basement. It was a little white 5-inch black and white screened T.V. with wire things my mom called rabbit ears. Next thing I know Ed Sullivan said here is Elvis Presley. Oh my God, my mother and her friends were screaming and then my mother was yelling at the TV. I didn't understand that. Then she said Why would they cut him from the waist down.

I didn’t understand how Allen slept through all that yelling. But he did. A couple of months after Allen was born my dad broke his right arm. He said there was ice on the step of the tractor-trailer he was driving and he just slipped and fell to the ground. He couldn't drive after that, so he lost his job.

I was really too young to understand what was really going on at the time. I remember hearing my mom crying and arguing with my dad and saying What are we going to do? How will we eat? Where will we go or move to?

Then I heard Allen crying in the crib. So, I went into Ronnie's room to try to make him stop crying. Ronnie was standing there saying to Allen, It's okay. I said to Ronnie, you think I should take him out of the crib? (Allen was about 7 months old). He was standing and holding onto the railing of the crib, when I opened up the latch at the bottom of the crib. I went to pick him up and the side dropped down fast, and Allen fell right out of my arms and onto the floor. Ronnie said, Pick him up and put him back into the crib. Then we both went to Mom and Dad's bedroom. We knocked on the door saying Allen's up and crying really loud and we don't know why. Ronnie had said, Don’t say anything about Allen falling out of the crib or we will get into big trouble.

Two days later my mom and dad said we were going to be moving in with my grandfather. He lived on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. I would be going to the school that was on the corner of my grandfather’s block. (PS2) I was in first grade and getting ready to go into second grade. I would be going for two months to this school in Manhattan. I really didn't want to move there. I had a lot of friends that I would miss.

I had made a plant out of the seeds from the watermelon and I asked my mom if I could give the plant to my teacher so she could take care of it? My mom said yes, I could. I brought it to school and my teacher put it on her desk and said she would take it home and care for it.

Manhattan, New York

My grandfather was a short man with a very little white-haired round face man that I loved. He lived in what they call a railroad apartment in the Lower East Side of Manhattan. The bathroom was right off the kitchen. It had a pull chain to flush the toilet that came from the ceiling. The kitchen table was different from what you would think of today. In the kitchen, there was a big oval table top; underneath the table top was a tub oval-shaped tub. To take a bath, you had to lift the top of the table off and put it to the side of the kitchen. Then, you would boil water in a big pot and put it in the tub to take a bath. When you were done with your bath, there was a plug that you would pull out, and it would pour into buckets till the tub was empty.

The refrigerator was about 4 feet tall, and on the bottom of it was a big keg of ice to keep it cold. I remember the Iceman used to come once a week with this big ice cube thing and put it in the bottom of the refrigerator.

In the middle of the apartment, there were four bedrooms. Two on each side and you could walk straight down the middle and you would be in the living room. My grandfather didn't have a T.V., but he did have a big box radio that was plugged into the wall. That's what we would listen to for the news and music.

My grandfather didn't speak much English. He was originally from Poland. But if you asked him where he came from he would say, Russia Poland (back then Russia took over parts of Poland). I once asked him what the numbers were on his arm. He said, When you went into concentration camps, they put numbers on your arm". My grandfather spoke three languages, Polish, Yiddish and Hebrew, and was now learning English I was helping him. He would hold up something and I would tell him in English what it was. He would say it in Yiddish to me. Every morning I woke up my grandfather would be at my side so I could repeat the Morning Prayer before getting out of bed I guess he did that with my brother Ronnie also. It was fun living with my grandfather because I got to see a lot of my aunts, uncles, and cousins who lived in Manhattan. Plus, there was a store called Mimi's that my father used to call a cockamamie (it was a shellac (junk) store). You would walk in there and see a little bit of everything.  Like candy, toys and clothing, you name it, she had it. It was a fun store and cheap.

I asked my mom where I was going to go to school. She walked me to the corner where the school was. P.S. 2. She also said it would be for only 2 months. I asked why? My mom said that we would be moving to Brooklyn, New York. But till we moved, we would be living with my grandfather. I liked that. Later that day my mom told me, that she had gone to the same school when she was my age!

One day my grandfather asked me if I would like to go with him to the Chicken Market and see all the Chickens. It was a big building with crates filled with chickens. He picked out a big plump chicken, and snapped its neck. Then he paid for it. They put it in a sack and we took it home. I saw other people having the guy by a machine cleaning off the feathers. So, I asked my grandfather why he didn’t do that. He said in our religion we need to do that ourselves at home. Then he told me that I would see. I watched him pluck all the feathers off the chicken. Then he washed it and then he salted it down with kosher salt. I told my mom I saw a chicken running around with no head. I didn't understand. I was starting second grade. We didn’t have chicken markets in Long Island.

Summer was just about over and I would start my new school.

The first day of school was very scary. When walking to school with some kids, they said there was an old lady who lived around the corner who kidnaps kids and cooks them. So, I should keep away from there.

While waiting for the doors to open, some big black kid was writing on the head of another black kid with a red marker. I never saw bad kids before. We finally went into the school. I don't know what happened to the little boy.

I got into the class. We were doing work when the teacher walked up to a boy in the back of the classroom. He scooped him up in one arm and took a bottle out the size of a glue bottle and shoved it in the boy’s mouth. I asked the kids what was in the glue-like bottle. They said it was soapy water that they put on your tongue.

I couldn't wait to get home. I had never have seen things like that before. I thought my mom sent me to a school for bad kids. All I knew was that I was going to be good in this school.

But I couldn't wait till we moved to the new place in Brooklyn, New York.

Brooklyn, New York

(East New York)

As we drove up to where we were going to live, I remember thinking to myself, wow it was a big building and we lived on the 3rd floor facing the front of the building.

I would be going to PS13 to finish my 2nd grade. I was hoping it would be a nicer school than PS2 (that was a scary school).

The second week of school I was walking home with my brother Ronnie and some kid on the way home started swinging a chain that kept hitting my brother. That kid wouldn’t stop hitting my brother with a chain on his backside (buttock). I remember crying all the way home yelling at the boy to stop hitting my brother saying, you’re going to hurt my brother.

I told my mom about it. Then my dad took Ronnie and taught him how to fight (something like a boxer).

I made it into 3rd grade, and Ronnie went to 6th grade. By this time my brother wasn't afraid of anyone. He joined some kind of East New York Gang.

The guy that hit my brother with the chain finally got what he deserved. Ronnie caught him in the stairway and beat him all the way to the ground floor of the school.

He never picked on my brother again.

This was sad times. It was November 22, 1963 when President Kennedy got shot. I remember walking in the hallway of school and seeing teachers crying. But then it was sad times besides that. Gang violence was at a high. Seeing teens getting beat up (black against white) in the streets. That part I didn't understand. I thought kids were just kids. Even in the bad school (P.S. 2); it wasn't like it was in Brooklyn

Allen was such a cutie. He once didn't listen to my mom, so she put him in the corner. He kept turning around and saying I sorry to my mom.  What a Two-year-old little cutie.

Ronnie had graduated and was going to George Gershwin Junior High School while I was going to start 4th grade.

That's where I met Gertrude (in 4th grade). She was in my class. Her mom was a beautician, so she was alone a lot. She didn't have a dad. Her mom had lots of boyfriends, she said.

We would play with her Barbie dolls and her Ken dolls. She had them with a Barbie doll house. I only had a Barbie doll in a case. It was a lot of fun playing with her Barbie dolls and Ken dolls. We would make believe they were boyfriend and girlfriend.

One day we were over at Gertrude's house playing.

While we were playing I said, Carl asked me to go with him to the school dance in the gym. I told her I was scared. I never kissed a boy. I was only 10 years old (5th grade). She said she would show me how to kiss and some other things next time I came over. She said as long as I didn't tell anyone. I had to promise her. She was my best friend.

She said kissing was like kissing your mom or dad goodnight but softer and on the lips instead of the cheek. She said I should practice on my wrist (kissing it softly). She said that is called the plain kiss and there's also another type of kiss, called the French kiss (also called tongue kissing). That's when your tongues touch each other while you kiss. It would turn you on. I said, that's gross, she said no, it's not actually. It'll give you tingles. You'll like it better than plain kissing.

We had the school dance in the gym. I was wearing a