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well-being of her children. If she suggested that she was looking for a man to be the replacement father to her children, she was lying to herself. She was looking for a man to make her feel desirable.
    I knew that I had to find something to lower the volume on my loneliness, something that I could excel at. I needed to succeed in order to escape my tormented family.
    Little did I realize that my reinvention would play into the Kearns family railroad motif. Well, kinda.

CHAPTER 8                
    “Pardon me, boy, is that the Chattanooga Choo Choo?”
    Miss Kohl, my otherwise demure third-grade teacher, placed herself in front of the classroom, histrionically gesticulating and mouthing the words to a recording (45 rpm, spinning on a player about the size of a birthday cake). She tapped the shoulder of an imaginary boy and then pointed in the direction of the imaginary train.
    We, her students, had been instructed to stand next to our desks and try to capture Miss Kohl’s precise physical moves, not to mention her animated facial expressions, which were right out of a silent movie.
    “Boy, you can gimme a shine.”
    I could almost see my dilapidated tennis shoes begin to sparkle as I performed the shoe shining bit, buffing them with a make-believe cloth. Even while studying Miss Kohl’s every subtle twitch and shift, I was able to steal a glance at my classmates, most of whom were not even trying. The boys were downright clumsy and even the girls were a bit stiff.
    Me? Well, let us say that I was aware that Miss Kohl, without missing a beat or letting on to the other students, was watching me more intently than she was the others.
    “Nothin’ could be finer than to have your ham and eggs in Carolina.” Gosh, I could taste the yummy ham and eggs. My mouth was watering.
    One of us, only one, would be chosen to act out the song, front and center, while the less talented third graders huddled in the background, singing the lyrics. This big number was for the upcoming school assembly with a train theme.
    Some of the other kids had virtually given up and stared at me in envious disbelief. Many of them were the same kids who had routinely made fun of me.
    “There’s gonna be a certain party at the station. Satin and lace …” Miss Kohl caressed her body like she was Marilyn Monroe. So did I.
    I’m gonna win, I thought. I can’t do math, I can’t catch a ball, I can’t spell, but—more than any of my schoolmates—I can make it look like I’m wearing satin and lace. In truth, I was doing it better than Miss Kohl was.
    Never in my life had I felt so powerful. Finally, after nine years of feeling like a loser, a misfit, a freak, I was winning.
    After we’d gone through it three or four times and I got even more connected to the material (especially the satin and lace), Miss Kohl looked at me pointedly and said, “I’ll let you know who will perform in front of the rest of the class tomorrow.” The bell indicating the end of the school day rang on cue.
    I played it cool, and gathered my books together and affected a nonchalant air of self-confidence. I floated out of the room, giving Miss Kohl a meaningful half smile. She knew I knew and I knew she knew I knew.
    I couldn’t wait to get in front of the full-length mirror that hung on the inside of my mother’s bedroom door so I could watch myself do the song and dance.
    With the divorce finalized and my dad officially moved out, my mother spent hours in front of that mirror. Usually with a freshly made drink nearby, it was where she readied herself for her forays into the night in search of the next husband.
    I bought a soda on the way home with money I’d saved from one of my many odd jobs (the most lucrative was working at a Laundromat with pale blue washers and dryers). I planted myself in front of the mirror, attempting to perfect every move. My mom wouldn’t be home for at least two hours, maybe more, depending on whether or not she had to