July 5: L.I.W.

I know that Laura Ingalls Wilder is now declasse, but I want to hearken back a moment to 1981. I was in first grade. I'd just moved to Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. I spent half the day in a first grade class and the other half in a second grade class and in the process had zero friends beyond my 3 1/2 year old brother. But I could read on a 4th or 5th grade level and I received this set for my birthday. I made it through the first three that year (Big Woods, Prairie, Farmer Boy) and finished the set over the next few years.

I know it's full of racism and I find them, as an adult, troubling not just for that but for the fact that Laura's father, Charles, is a lunatic. He's a fucking lunatic! He left a completely normal enclave of relatives and supports in Wisconsin and trespassed into Indian Territory. He made it out west and Laura's depiction of the "long winter" (I know she has some historical fiction issues as well regarding which winter that would have been) describes a man who was willing to put his family at risk for no fucking good reason.

I related to these books, not seeing Charles that way as a child, of course, but the constant moving. The disappointment driving away from a house that I'd grown to love and feel comfortable in. Leaving relatives behind that I wouldn't see for years. Friends I would never see again. The adventure of a new place soaked in the misery of being the new girl. The hope that I could reinvent myself or try harder this time or find good friends or be important somehow.

I know she's a mess, and I'm not apologizing for "The only good Indian is a dead Indian" or any of the rest. Just, at 6, 8, 9 years old, I didn't even see that. I saw a frustrated young girl who idealized her father and went along, with each step just growing tired and wanting the stability of one place, one man, one house, one kitchen window.