Where do you begin to write a story about a wonderful woman, who no one in the entire world really knew or understood. Oh, there were lots of people who knew her, and she did have five children, but who really knew her? Who really knew what made her tick? Two out of five children seemed to have a closeness, but did they really know her.

I am one of her children. I am the youngest of the youngest set of twins, and Dorian is the oldest of the oldest set of twins. We are the two that seemed to have that secret bond with her,...who understood her..who wanted to make her life wonderful, but never knew how, and now we will never have the chance.

I sit and think about her birthday. It seems like it was so long ago, and yet she only was on this earth for a short time. She was only 68 years old when she died. The sad part was her 68 years were filled with pain, suffering and mental anguish. She was always reaching for something but never seemed to be able to touch it. She could feel it in her heart, but it never was obtainable.

I sometimes think that "death" was her goal. Finding everlasting peace and rest encompassed with tranquility, love, safety and happiness. I imagine that the key word was "happiness." She never seemed to find it on earth, but yet, she was always helping others have it.

My happiest thoughts, and my saddest thoughts are of my mother. She was strong and weak. She was happy and miserable. She was full and empty. There was no rest inside of her...peace did not come until the end.

The end...Was it the end, or was it the beginning? She knew when her time had arrived. She knew days before it came, when it would be. She welcomed it...she beckoned death. She called for it, and finally it came to her like a long lost love. It caressed her, and held her and she left with it ...she found what she was looking for.

I can remember looking at photographs when I was a child. Mom was helding me and my twin brother outside our New Jersey home. She was smiling and crying at the same time in this photo. I asked her why...and she told me that she was happy and sad. I asked her why and she said: "I dreaded the thought of raising twins again, but I was happy I had you. I hated the house and the place where we lived, but..."She never said any more she just cried. Throughout the years to pass I came to realize that the house was just a house. The tomato field that it was built in was her prison. It would always be her prison, and no matter how she begged and pleaded, she would never leave that house.

DORIAN

Dorian was, and still is, my "secret pal". It's not often that you find a sister who really loves and relates to her youngest brother by 13 years. Dorian was always special to me, from the beginning of my ability to remember, there was always Dorian, and there was always Mom. They brought joy into my life.

Henry-etta was my mother. She was named after both her father and her mother. Henry C. Layer married Mari-etta Mathis, and their second child was a girl and they named her Henry-etta Dill Layer. Mom never used the hyphen, but she was very proud of the "y". Even her signature had character. It was a backward type of script printing. But the tension poured out of her, even through a pen. Whe she wrote the pressure would engrave the letters through the next few pages. I often thought that if I were blind, I would be able to read her letters simply by running my fingers over the lines, as blind people do with braille.

Dorian and I often sit and talk about mother and we compare notes since we are basically two different parts of her life. Dorian is a twin from my mother's first marriage, and I am a twin from my mother's second and last marriage. The thirteen years between Dorian and I leave a lot of room for change...and changes did occur, and stagnation also set in.

I was only about 5 years old when Mother told me that Dorian was moving far away with her new husband. I couldn't imagine that she would leave me, and I had no conception of how "far" far away was, since I never travelled past our little house in the middle of the South Jersey farm land. Dorian didn't look happy that day, but she kissed everyone and said good-bye. I don't think she spent a lot of time saying good-bye to me, or maybe she did and I don't remember.

I followed the car out the drive way and we waved our hand and arms until we couldn't see each other any more. I went in the house and Mom was crying, and I cried with her. She looked at and said..."Go to the corner and look for Dorian. I just know she will turn around and come back home; I just know she will!"

I ran to the corner and sat on the cement steps of the "packing shed" that was there. This was a large road-side fruit stand where they packed peaches, and apples through out the harvest producing months. I sat there almost all day. I can remember that the cars on the highway were putting their lights on when I finally got up to go back home...but I went home without Dorian. She never turned around.

My life as a child was a tough one, but I didn't know it then. I honestly thought that all children and parents like I did, and all kids had fathers that beat them, and punished them, so it was never discussed outside of the home.

Mom was always a loving and caring mother...but also she had a sadness inside her that was always present. Maybe it was only seen by me, because my brothers never seemed to see it or be touched by it. After many years, I realize that both Dorian and I knew it was there and we both feel Mom's inner "secret sadness beam" only showed itself to us. (Maybe she knew she could bear her soul to us without fear of rejection or criticism).

Dorian left when I was five years old. She was an eighteen year old kid who had just married a guy from Lousiana, and she only married him to get out of the house and away from Pete Rubba...her stepfather and my father.

I wasn't left alone at home. I had two brothers with me. Peter was the oldest. He was four years older than I was and he was the first born of the marriage between my mother and Pete Rubba. Four years later Joel and I came along. We were twins and the second set that mother had had, but I wouldn't know that until another 13 years had passed.

Growing up on Oak Road brings back some terrifying memories, and then mixed with thoughts of my Mother, they seem to turn semi-sweet, filled with sympathy, understanding and acceptance. Father was a physically strong man, with a very strong hostile, Italian background. Listening to stories from his childhood, I can now understand why he was the way he was.

Discipline is too meek a word to use to describe the type of control he had over his children and the types of physical punishment he inflicted upon all of us. Physical beatings were almost a daily routine, but they didn't seem to be as bad as the mental torture that accompanied it.

Spring and Summertime were the two seasons out of the year I hated the most. They not only produced more time at home and with my father, but they also inspired the grass to grow, and that meant cutting the lawn. I used to pray that it would snow twelve months out of the year, just to avoid having to cut the lawn with my father as the "supervisor" and my two brothers as partners in the slave-like procedure.

The "lawn" at Oak Road, was not really a lawn. It was simply what grew after the earth was packed down and rains brought water and netrients to the multitude of different seeds left in the earth. Any type of growing green, including dandelions, can look nice if properly cut and edged.

We were not permitted to have the conventional type of lawn equipment. The lawn mower was a 1930 model of the first lawnmower made. It was the old push type with a cylinder type of rotary blade that spun around as you pushed it. It was very dull, therefore it did not cut very well. Dad would stand over us with a limb from a peach tree and give us a crack every once in a while to make sure we did not stop and rest, and to insure that the job was done to his specifications and standards.

Since there were three laborers and only one lawn mower, two of us had the opportuniity to use sissors. Not shears, or pruners, but regular large sissors, normally used to cut paper. The lawnmower was passed over the grass several times. Once you cut it going north to south, then you had to cut it going east to west, and finally you cut it diagonally, to make sure that it cut all it could possibly cut. Following behind were the other two using the sissors to make sure that the lawn was cut close enough, and even. Since the lawn-mower was not sharp enough to cut properly, the sissors produced a more manicured look and produced huge blisters, which would "add character."

Water was not allowed, because it would take away time from the job that had to be done, and it would only slow us down. I honestly felt that the more difficult my father could make the job, and the more unbearable, the more pleased he became.

Summertime also brought day in and day out of working with dad. My father was a self-employed contractor, and his "boys" went on jobs with him at every opportunity. during the summer it was a minimum of six days a week. The days usually began around 6 AM with dad screaming up the stairs: " Charles & Joel...GET UP!" We always got up at the first call, only because we were terrified at what would happen if he had to walk up the steps to get us out of bed.

We were usually on the job site by 7:00 AM. When we were younger, my twin brother, Joel, and I were the "clean up crew" or the "go-fers." As we matured, we became his assistants. We very seldom did anything that pleased him, but we never stopped striving for his approval and any type of recognition or signs of satisfaction.

It was on October 8, 1986, when I telephoned my Mother, so she could wish me Happy 35th birthday. I moved away from New Jersey in 1997, but from that time on, I phoned home every Sunday afternoon, and usually on Wednesday evenings. Sunday was the time for me to say "hello" to my father. That was basically all we could manage to say to each other. It wasn't because there was any bitterness, there just wasn't anything to talk with him about. We never became friends. He was my father, and I was one of his sons, and that was all there was to our relationship.

After saying hello to Dad, he would usually put Mom on the phone, and we would superficially talk. She could never relax and really talk with me when Dad was home. That is why I would also call her on Wednesday evenings. Wednesday night, Dad was always, as Mom would say: "playing cards with his friends."

Getting back to October 8, 1986...We talked because it was not a Sunday, and Dad was not home. I told her that I would probably be home for Christmas. She told me that would be nice, but it would be much nicer if I would wait until nicer weather to come home and it would not be so confusing, and she could spend "better" time with me. I brushed it off and assured her I would not be home at Christmas, I would probably wait until mid May.

Mom was always nervous when ever anyone was home. Even with her own children. I never did understand this fear, I just accepted it and chalked it up to her nerves.

The week of Christmas came around, and something inside was compelling me to go home. I called the airlines on December 23rd, and was surprised that I got a flight from New Orleans to Philadelphia for the 24th.

I wanted this trip to be a surprise, mainly so Mom would not get nervous about my arrival. I phoned her about two hours before I was to drive to the airport. I was ironing the shirt I was going to wear when I called her.

"Hi Mom, how are you?"
"Oh Chalsey, I'm fine. I think I have everything ready for dinner tonight, and I sure would give my eye teeth to have you walk through the door."
"Mom, I'm sorry I didn't make plans to come home, because you told me it would be better if I waited until after Christmas and all the confusion. Anyway, I will be with you in spirit. I'm only calling now because I know I will not be able to get a telephone line on Christmas day, so I wanted to call earlier to let you know I was thinking about you and I love you very much, and I hope you have a great Christmas."

We chatted a little more, and I assured her that her dinner would be fine and that the, "Turkey would be done to a turn." This was a traditional line that my mother's brother Charles would say every Christmas. If he didn't say it, someone would prompt him or remind him so we could go ahead and have dinner.

After talking with Mom, I put on my freshly ironed shirt and drove to the New Orleans airport to catch my flight into Philadelphia. I was so excited. I don't ever remember feeling such excitement on any other trip home. Maybe because this was the very first time it was really going to be a surprise. I never was any good at keeping secrets or surprises; I always spilled the beans ahead of time.

I was finally on the airplane. I could relax, or try to relax. I sat and planned each step I would make when I arrived. I would first rent a car, then find a florist and buy some flowers for the table. I remember thinking: "I sure hope I can find a florist open on Christmas Eve!" After I picked up the flowers, I would drive to South Jersey, and pretend I was a delivery boy. After that I didn't plan any more.

Now that everything was planned, I could sit back and relax a little. I was calm, I was just filled with anticipation and excitement. I reclined my seat and started thinking about Mom, and everything she had done with and for me through the years.

Mom always told me the story of how I finally got to come home. She said that she and Dad and Dorian (who was about 13 years old then) would come and visit me at the nursing home every day. (They didn't have a hospital near by, therefore we were delivered in a "nursing home")

They would visit, and she said that I was not gaining the weight necessary to go home with her. The doctor insisted that I weigh at least four and a half pounds before I could leave. She told me that one day she and Dorian were in the kitchen talking, and Dorian told her that if they could bring me home, she would help "fatten" me up. That's when my father and my sister went down to the nursing home and brought me home.

Dorian and my Mother surely did "fatten" me up. Within two weeks she said I had gained two pounds. When I arrived home, Dorian told my mother that I was so skinny, I looked like a "wrenny bird."

I developed Bronchial Asthma when I was about three or four years old. I honestly don't remember any asthma attacks until after Dorian left home, so maybe I didn't start showing symptoms of asthma until around five. I can remember my Mother sitting up with me all night when I would have an attack. She was so worried, and so kind and loving. It didn't make any difference if she didn't get any sleep...she loved me and would do anything to make me better. She would talk with me, and soothe me so I would not think about how difficult it was to breathe. The vaporizer would run all night, and she was there to make sure it didn't run out of "Vicks."

We would talk about all kinds of things. Dream about when I grew up and we would make plans. She always encouraged me. I never had a doubt that I could do what ever I wanted, because my Mom would support me, and I would do things just to put a smile on her face. Anything to make her proud and hopefully make her happy.

The stewardess just announced that we would be landing in Atlanta. Her voice took me away from my daydream, but it was a pleasant interruption. The excitement started to build again. The expectation of bringing some surprise and happiness into Mom's life, by surprising her with my arrival at home, rushed through me like a "hot flash."

I would have about an hour lay over and in no time I would be in Philadelphia, and on my way home. I couldn't wait to see her face when she opened the front door. All I could think is "Oh, how much I do love that lady in New Jersey!"

It wasn't until she was dying, did I realize that I really wasn't her "favorite child." Dorian and I had teased each other for years about "who was mother's favorite child." It started off as; I was her favorite "son" and she was mother's favorite "daughter". We included mom in on the little bit of rivalry, and usually laughed and forced her to make a choice as to who her favorite child was. When I was with her she would say it was me, and when Dorian was with her, she would claim it was Dorian. When we were with he together, she would say that she had "two favorites."

There was no doubt that mom loved Dorian and I very much, and we each gave her something different. Dorian gave her the excitement of her life. Dorian would call Mom and tell her about her travels and adventures, and Mother would listen with great intent. it was almost like Dorian was doing the things that Mother had always dreamed about. Mother would dream and envision Dorian's travels as if she had been there herself, and this gave her satisfaction. She was never jealous or envious. She was satisfied, because she was doing everything she had dreamed about by proxy through my sister. This brought her joy and happiness.

I always strived to make her proud of me, but most of all I loved to make her laugh. I think I have always been a bit "insecure" but if I knew what I did would make Mother laugh, I always had the courage to do it. I guess you could classify me as the "odd seed." I would never say the bad seed, because I was never bad...I was daring...I strived to be "gutsy" just to make her smile. I could tell Mom off-colored jokes, and once she reminded me that she was not only my Mother, but a lady, we could sit and chuckle. We could talk about anything...we were "pals"...we were "friends", and I really miss my friend, my confidant, my mentor...that sad little lady who wanted to live and love life, but just didn't know how!

Peter, Jr., was the first born of the marriage between my Father and Mother. In many way, he had it the toughest. He was Peter Rubba's first born son, and Peter Rubba had visions that his "name sake" would be as perfect, as perfect can be. He was loved a great deal by both Mom and Dad, but the way Dad displayed his feelings caused only confusion within Peter's mind. I don't know for sure, but I would imagine that Peter was not mature enough to realize that his punishments, his beatings, his pain and suffering was being done because his Father wanted him to be perfect. His Father wanted him to be somone people would admire, and say..."That's Peter Rubba, Jr....Pete Rubba's son."

None of the boys ever really stood up to our Father. We feared him. We knew his "powers", we knew his "temper". I remember feeling no respect for my father, just fear, and I knew some day the fear would go away, and I often wondered what would take it's place.

I never felt "malice" toward my Mother, for the things that my Father would do to me. Although there was little that she did to stop his "strong disciplinary methods", I always knew that she had no control. She was too weak, and probably just as fearful of him, as we were. I would always get consoling from my mother, for my father's actions. She would explain to me that he was a "good man, and was raised funny, and he didn't know any other way of treating his children, that the way he was raised." This explanation didn't make it right, but it made it more bearable. Just knowing she knew and she understood, and she cared. It made the bad time easier to swallow, and live with.

I think Peter was different. I say "think" because I can't figure out any other reason for the "disgust", the "hatred" he felt toward my mother. I now sit and think about how he treated my mother, from the time he was about 16 years old and all through his college days. She was always hurt by things he would say or do and I now know in my heart that he deliberately did things and said things to "inflict pain and hurt on my mother." Maybe it helped him deal with the bitterness he had locked up inside from his childhood. Maybe the things he did and said were geared to "hurt" my father, but he knew they hurt my mother. If he knew they hurt her,...how could he do them?

Since my mother's death, I have only spoken to my brother Peter one time, and that was by accident. I happened to be at my sister's house on her birthday, and I answered the telephone when he called to wish her a "happy birthday". he doesn't know the "disgust" I feel inside for him. Not as my brother, but as my mother's oldest son. I can not find it in my heart to forgive him for the way he treated her and the many years of sadness and hours of crying he brought into her, already saddened, life. Maybe it's not my place to "forgive" him, but in any case, I find it almost impossible to talk with him, to respect him, or even to like him, let alone love him as a brother. It's a terrible thought, but I know in my heart that some day, his children will treat him the way he treated my mother. (I'm not certain, but I am "hopeful").

From the time Peter, Jr. was 16 years old, there was always conflict. There were always "sharp cutting" remarks from him towards my mother. Statements that inferred she was "neurotic", or just plain mentally disturbed. He tried desperately to knock her down, and he succeeded. The evidence of his success showed on her face. The hurt flowed from her soul in the form of tears, and Peter Jr. took satisfaction from each stab wound..from each tear.

I guess, at times, I can be just as "hateful" and revengeful as my brother Peter. It shows because I hae been emphasizing the "JR.", and I know that he has always detested being referred to as Peter Rubba "JR."

The saddest part of the relationship that existed between Peter "JR." and my mother was the denial. She denied that it was her son hurting her. She always managed to find an excuse or a scapegoat. For the last ten years or so, the scapegoat has been Peter's wife Sue. Sue has always felt that my mother "never liked her", and there is no doubt, she was not overly fond of Sue, but not for the reasons Sue and Peter thought.

Sue took Peter away from my mother. Sue took Henry-etta's FAVORITE child away from her and turned him against her. My mother would never admit to the fact that Peter had turned against her when he was 16 years old, not when he married Sue. I guess it's a mother's way of rationalizing the reason for the dissent and the harshness of her relationship with her son Peter.

Click to continue reading.....Charly's Journal