Nutmeg
Copyright 2011
Jacqueline Kelley-Kinnie
Prologue
There was once, really and truly there was, a wonderful place called “Children’s Garden,” in Marin County, California. In our country, many small children are released from the parentage of their dysfunctional biological parents by the courts. Most have been seriously abused, physically, sexually and/or psychologically. A good many passed through Children’s Garden’s doors, treatment homes and fost-adopt homes to live better lives in safe places with people they learned to love and trust.
Children’s Garden came about through the efforts of a wonderful dedicated woman, Doris Kirgan, a Boston Clinical Social Worker who, dismayed at the plight of children adrift in America’s foster homes, decided to try to show that there was a better way. Doris led us, her staff, to learn the developmental theory of “attachment,” originally written by John Bowlby and greatly elaborated upon since its beginnings. Doris knew that helping children to separate and re-attach was a monumental task and urged her staff onward with the simple sign on her desk: “I know you CAN, but WILL you?” Long before a campaigning young presidential candidate used the phrase “Yes we can,” we all knew the phrase as certain to come out of the mouth of Doris at every staff meeting. “Of course, you/we, they can” was her most frequent verbalization. And so we learned we could and we did.
My years at Children’s Garden were spent first as Coordinator of the Evaluation Program, then as Counselor and Coordinator to the Treatment Homes and their houseparents and children, thirdly as Coordinator of the Foster Home Program and finally as Assistant Director to Doris. I shall always cherish those years as the finest learning experience in human relationships I would ever have.
The story told in this book is fiction in that it does not really represent one child but is the culmination of the experiences of several staff members and many children who went through the doors of Children’s Garden. I have written this book to increase our awareness of the pain and suffering known to all too many children in America and the world, and to tell some ways in which we can provide a path wherein they may learn once again to trust a world from a safe haven for their young lives.
I am grateful to Doris, to the staff of Children’s Garden with whom I shared these experiences and years, and most of all to the children whose lives I shared for a brief moment in time. I am also grateful to the members of the Humanist Writing Camp of Sarasota, Florida which prodded me to write and complete this tale, and whose feedback has been so valuable.
Chapter 1
Nutmeg Arrives
She was, according to the records we had received, just seven years old, reportedly a bright child who had “failed” six foster homes and an adoption placement in the Bay area since the age of three months. When she was but three months old, the courts removed custody from her schizophrenic mother and made her a ward of the state of California. Now she stood here defiant, stating that she had indeed fried the goldfish on the radiator, and she was proud that she had.
“So what you gonna do ‘bout it?”
“Not much at the moment,” I replied. “What’s your name?’
“I am Nutmeg.”
“Hmmm, it says here your name is Katy.”
“My name is NUTMEG!” She screamed. I wasn’t at all sure the sounds coming from this cute little girl in front of me were human, but they were intelligible and very, very loud.
“How did you get the name Nutmeg?” I asked in a quiet voice.
“I made it up for myself and it’s MY NAME!” She screeched back at me, stomping a little foot in a Mary Jane patent leather shoe with a lacey sock above it.
“I see. OK, then Nutmeg it is.” I said quietly as I kneeled down to look eye to eye into this little girl’s face. She pushed me away. “I don’t like you,” she screamed.
“Well, welcome to Children’s Garden anyway,” I replied quietly. “Since this will be your home for the next few months, would you like to see your room?” I stood up and offered my hand.
“I get my own room?” She asked, peering at me finally with incredible deep brown eyes as a small tear fell from her left eye. “What color is it?”
“Pink and white,” said the housemother who had stood and witnessed these somewhat bizarre moments.
“I don’t like PINK!” she shouted.
It was clear to me that this little girl was used to intimidating people, with her temper and shouting. It was just as clear that we, the staff of Children’s Garden, were unlikely to be favorably impressed with such behaviors, though we were certainly used to dealing with them.
“Nutmeg,” I said very quietly, “Your room can be any color you want, but for today it’s pink and white. Tomorrow you can go with your house mom and pick out whatever color you want.”
At Children’s Garden, we sometimes worked from the “outside – in” to change the behaviors, feelings and self appraisals of our seriously disturbed children. We gave them beautiful rooms which they designed for themselves after moving in, and beautiful but sturdy clothes they were not used to. We made every attempt to let them know that though they often misbehaved in hateful ways, we respected them as people and we let them know we cared enough about them to not let them continue their sometimes hateful and usually less than polite and amiable ways.
“You’re lying,” said Nutmeg, but took my hand suddenly and pulled toward the hallway which was evident to all. So began a journey and a relationship between a little bi-racial child and me which I would never forget.