The summer came and Geronimo was a yearling now, beautiful and playful. We still raced each other up and down our five-acre pasture but one day Geronimo began to charge me in our games of tag. I had to get out of his way now; the kind little colt who’d been careful not to run me over as I slowly ran in front of him now attempted to mow me down, ears back, hoofs aloft.
Fourth grade was harder than third. I was plagued by an enemy, Jo Ellen Hassle, who took every moment to browbeat me into isolation. Had it not been for Mr. Ellis, the music teacher, school simply would have been unbearable. I looked forward to seeing Mr. Ellis three times a week as I learned to play the violin. Mr. Ellis played every instrument he taught: percussion and piano, cello and bass and violin. He could take the sax out of a kid’s hands and show them what to play right off their sheet music. He played all the brass, and his temperament was always gentle. I admired his patience, knowledge, and his humor. I recall my one concert recital with the orchestra, I could not quite keep up with the reading so I faked what I thought the notes might be. As he conducted, Mr. Ellis looked over at me and shook his head, nothing more. A secret between us. And perhaps the guy sitting next to me.
My dad came home from months of being away, a stranger in our house. That was when he first heard me singing harmony on “Side by Side.” Father came into the kitchen and announced:
“Rickie Lee can sing harmony.”
“Yes she’s been doing it all year long,” Mother replied (as if to say, “If you were ever around you might know something about your daughter”).
Dad seemed to suddenly see me as part of his family of singers. There was a delight in his eyes, he was excited and I was the reason. Father taught me the harmony on “You Are My Sunshine,” recording us together on his expensive new reel-to-reel tape recorder. I liked singing into the microphone and I loved harmony. I understood it immediately. I felt good. I had always been “different” somehow, but now singing with my father I was something special and my father knew it. Not only was I being included, but I was actually “number one” on the hit parade! My dad thought I was like him—a singer!
His mind was moving a hundred miles an hour. I had learned the songs easily: “On the Sunny Side of the Street,” “Bye Bye Blackbird,” and then Dad went for the big one—“My Funny Valentine.” A challenging song, I had a difficult time with the change from minor to major (You make me smile . . .), and Father’s expression of impatience as I tried to understand the major note for “smile” told me I was about to lose the attention I had finally won. I was disappointing him. When I finally understood the midsentence change to a new mode, I was able to sing the song pretty much as I sing it today, the way my father sang it, the way he taught it to me that day in 1963.
Dad was so impressed with my natural entertainment ability he took me on an audition for “The Lew King Show,” the local television talent show. They offered to hire me but only if my parents bought an insurance policy from one of the staff there. My father was furious. Mother said they would find a way to pay for it if I really wanted to be on the show. I said no. It was a huge grown-up decision to deny myself a chance to be on television—and to have status in my lonely schoolyard hell. But this was the wrong time, the wrong place, and to accept the prize would hurt my parents. “The Lew King Show” was my first lesson in the dark corridors of the music biz, where favors are exchanged and sins offered up as collateral. Of the many exercises in integrity I have achieved or endured, or failed, this was my greatest. This performance would have served so many devils, least of all my ability to knock the song out of the ballpark. When performances are used to gain footing, or used for anything other than the purity of the performance, bad things happen. My choice to wait for a better opportunity was a turn of the dial of growing up. I went to sleep that night a little closer to my parents, for they came in a little closer to me. I knew, too, that I had something in my pocket now, made from doing the right thing. I had a compass of sorts, the one that comes to children who sacrifice their dreams for family. All around me, childhood was slipping away. But to my north I had a dream. I had one direction I could call my own.
My older sister Janet had a harder time than I in her new sur- roundings. She had an undeniable sexuality and it had come too soon and probably been taken advantage of. My sister had been my second mother in Chicago, but now something was broken that we could not fix.
In 1962, the higher a girl’s hair was ratted the more available she was, it was simply understood. There was something immodest or worldly about ratted hair. (That was what made Bob Dylan’s ratted hair so complex and interesting—it wasn’t only feminine, it was nasty.) My sister ratted her hair according to her nature. At Washington High School, Janet had a rough Italian boyfriend, let’s call him “Bob M.” Janet was becoming a problem child, lying, sneaking out, and getting into trouble. Her reputation was being passed around like an old cigarette, and my brother got in more than one fight defending her. Bob M. was the local hoodlum, a mean teenager who would pinch me when no one was looking. He pinched really hard, intending to hurt me, and I would cry out, “He pinched me!” and he would say, “Me? I didn’t do anything.” No normal person would believe someone could be so cruel as to hurt a child, then lie about it, so nobody believed me. I was incredulous. This betrayal by my mom and sister? They laughed each time.
Good Shepherd
Eventually the State of Arizona placed Janet in the Good Shepherd Home for Girls. Every Sunday, we would picnic on the lawn where each family’s “troubled girl” sat on a blanket eating chicken or tacos or crying to go home. Sinners on display for all the passing cars to see.
My very first public singing engagement was there in the chapel at Good Shepherd. It was Christmas Eve and I was invited to sing “Silent Night” at the big gathering. As the nun bent the microphone down to meet my voice, stage fright nearly knocked me off the chair I stood on. I sang it a cappella. Midway through my song the whole congregation started singing along. It felt incredible! I was a hit! That—I want to do that again. Sing.
Janet ascended through the privilege and trust levels of her deten-tion. Maybe she shared my parents’ wishes that she would be a good girl, but she was already a crack manipulator. Now that she was unmonitored, Janet ran away again. It was too bad, I was so proud of her when she took me to see her new “house,” earned through trust. A private bedroom, she was so excited. A room of her own. A week later she disappeared from the Good Shepherd Home For Girls.
Coming home from visiting Good Shepherd, my mother sometimes whipped out a warning out of nowhere.
“Don’t you ever be like your sister. Do you hear me? Don’t you grow up to be like Janet.”
Every time she said this to me I was devastated. I was nothing like my sister. I was me. Didn’t she even know me?
It was a seed of doubt inadvertently planted by my mother. I began to wonder if I was adopted, and so began the year known as, “Was I adopted?” Each week I’d ask a family member, “Seriously, was I adopted?” Finally Danny said, “Yes, you were adopted. Go away.” Nothing they could say could make me stop doubting my place in our family.
“When the policeman come don’t say nothing”
One morning I woke up to find my sister sitting at the kitchen table. I was happy to see her but she was supposed to be “bad” and this morning she seemed normal. Yes, there they were, talking like normal, my mother and Janet. Mom was smoking, as usual. I was confused. I didn’t know what to do with my hands. What should I say?
“Aren’t you going to say hello to your sister?”
Now that was a good question. Did I have a choice?
“Hello.”
Janet smiled at me.
“What are you doing here?” I was careful not to show affection—to anyone. Janet grabbed me and hugged me.
“She’s only staying for a few minutes. She can’t be here.”
She ran away?