Street roots
7
Nov. 7, 2014
From pole dancer to Ph.D.: one woman’s empowering memoir
BY J O P M A D T IK I
C O N T R IB U T IN G C O L U M N IS T
BY JOE MARTIN
arly in her life, author Lacy M.
Johnson was made aware of her good
looks. When she was only 7 years old,
her mother entered her lovely blonde
daughter into a beauty pageant: “In the
pictures, I don’t look like a child of 7 .1 walk
in that sashaying pageantry way I’ve learned
from watching Miss America on television —
I ve practiced in the hallway of our house
for hours, for days — back and forth across
the stage, back and forth in front of the
audience, the judges, all of them veiled in
shadow, only their smiles visible.” She
blossoms into a young woman with abundant
physical charms. Compliments and admiring
glances came her way easily. Of such
routine attention Johnson admits, “I would
give anything to keep getting i t ”
This captivating memoir is as troubling as
it is compelling. In “The Other Side,”
Johnson relates the wrenching story of her
victimization by an older man with whom
she willingly became involved. Although she
is intelligent and capable of reaching out to
friends and family for help, Johnson instead
endured spiraling verbal and physical abuse
in isolation. Later asked by a therapist if she
ever told anybody about the twisted travail
as it was unfolding, Johnson admits: “’No,
not ever... I still don’t understand it
myself.’”
The only real name in the book is
Johnson’s. Every other person in this
collage of fragmentary recollections and
vignettes is designated “My Older Sister,”
“My Good Friend,” “The Detective,” “The
Man I Live With” and so on. This device
tends to enhance the focus on Johnson
herself while conveying the sense of
disconnection she experiences in the
confused course of her uncertain journey. A ,
rebellious small-town youth, Johnson leaves
home as she enters her young womanhood.
Residing in a larger university town she
attends classes and works “one crappy job
or another.” She also engages in
unprotected sex and excessive drug and
alcohol use.
E
The Other Side:
A Memoir by Lacy
M. Johnson
.
.
Her attractive appearance allows J o h n s on
an effortless entrée into all kinds of
situations. For a time, she works as a
stripper to pay her tuition: “In many ways,
it’s the kind of job a girl like me has spent
her whole life training for: there’s the
makeup and the costume and the hair,
there’s the stage and the way of coiling and
uncoiling my body until at least one man
wants to fuck me enough that he gives me
all his money.” She will leave that job, but
the experience follows the risky pattern of
Johnson’s young life. That pattern would
eventually lead to her gruesome brush with
death at the hands of a lover, an urbane,
multilingual man who turns out to be a cruel
bastard.
Growing up, Johnson’s family was
composed of her mother, father, herself and
two sisters — one older, one younger. Her
parents had a loveless marriage and
bickered frequently. While she was still in
high school, her father discovered a
notebook in the basement It was a journal
replete with Johnson’s jottings of sexual
escapades, real or imagined. As recounted
in this memoir, he gives the notebook to his
wife who then grills her daughter about its
graphic contents. Johnson tells her mother,
“It’s fiction, Mom. My way of d e a lin g ”
Though shaken by the journal’s contents
her mother accepts Johnson’s explanation.
She wants to believe that her teen is still a
virgin. Johnson did not reveal to her mother
- or to anyone else, apparently - that
sometime during the previous year she had
been “raped by a drunk boy in my friend’s
basement.”
Johnson is 19 when she enrolls in a
Spanish class. The instructor is a handsome
fellow who chats with her at various
opportunities. He makes it evident that his
interest goes.bqyond academics. He is
exactly twice her age. This does not deter
Johnson who in time leaves her boyfriend, a
hard-drinking biker, and moves in with her
teacher. She writes: “It’s sudden and it’s not
exactly about sex, though I give h i m
whatever he wants, whenever he wants it... I
want him to love me.” Her new lover’s
domineering side appears quickly. Any
noncompliance on her part is met with
violence: “He holds me down while I scream
and beg him to stop. I
cry out in real pain.
This is how he sees
me: a mirror that
reflects his power
always.”
Johnson should fly
out the door at the
first opportunity. But
she doesn’t It is
some time before she
finally leaves the
abusive relationship.
And in the most
horrific way, Johnson
will find that her
tribulation does not
end there.
In a recent
interview, Johnson
states: “When I was younger, before the
kidnapping even, I didn’t realize how much
my appearance participated in a much
larger economy of image and desire. I
wanted people to think I was beautiful and
crafted my appearance accordingly. Now I
realize the extent to which women are
trained to value themselves on how much
we are desired by men and how this training
is part of a larger culture that demeans
women as a general rule. Over time I’ve
stopped offering to the world an image of
myself that I think it wants to see and
instead offer the only one I want to show,
which is not an image of beauty but of
strength.”
Johnson now holds a Ph.D. in literature.
She is married to a decent man. She is a
mother of two children. She is an able and
successful writer. Given the turmoil of her
younger days, she is most fortunate. Indeed,
she is lucky to be alive. And her memoir is
an enticing and worthwhile read.
In a recent
interview, Lacey
Johnson (above)
states: “When I was
younger, before the
kidnapping even, I
didn’t realize how
much my
appearance
Participated in a
much larger
economy o f image
and desire. ”
Reprinted from Street Roots’ sister paper,
Real Change, Seattle, Wash.
B r o k e n A n g e ls
By Athena Street
When children are bom they’re still full of the light
We’d do anything for therft, starve, steal or fright
Somewhere inside we recognize God
They make us feel perfect although we are flawed.
So what happens next? Do we teach them to grow?
Not at all, we demand that they never let go
Don’t feel your feelings or try anything new .
Don’t do anything that the Joneses won’t do
We shatter their faith & we steal their belief
We murder their heroes & we insult their grief
There’s really no mage with a reindeer & sleigh
The unicorns are dead & the elves gone away
Don’t use your left hand. Don’t dye your hair pink
If you can’t just be normal then try not to think
Don’t love anybody who lacks the right part
Be creative, but make sure we preview your art
Coming of age means losing your wings
It means putting away all the magical things
But somehow we wonder why we’re all depressed
It’s cuz the divine deep inside’s been suppressed
But I’m not so broken I’m drawn to the light
I look for the others who glow in the night
There aren’t very many, it’s something to grieve
But I share of my fare & I still believe.
S h ip w r e c k e d
by Morgan W. Brown
no longer adrift
cresting white
capped waves
above a heavenly
flowing ocean
current of blue
upon a state
landlocked
beyond despair
swimming sorrow
faith long vanquished
comes the morrow
empty further tears
amidst the mist
hope rises still
welcoming spring
late in arriving
mother earth sighs
deeply breathing
dawn’s birth of dew
Order e-books and print copies at iamnotapoet.org or
streetroots.org/iamnotapoet