streaked down my face. I told myself it couldn’t get any worse than this.
I was wrong.
ANOTHER PERSPECTIVE ON GREGG AT THIS TIME
By Lori McBride, Gregg’s Sister
It was surprising for me, when I read these pages, to discover that Gregg felt insecure about his weight when we were children. I was younger, so maybe I wasn’t always aware of the nature or the extent of the elementary school taunting, but he always seemed “larger than life” to me. No pun intended . . . really. It was as though his resiliency made him that much more determined to be noticed for something other than his weight.
Growing up in the military we moved a lot and it was thanks to Gregg’s outgoing personality that we made new friends quickly wherever we moved. He always took charge in a creative way—if you wanted to have fun, you wanted to be with Gregg. He was always making a way of escape, whether by producing elaborate home movie “blockbusters,” or fabricating tiny items to stock the shelves of a Barbie store, or by “producing” The Gregg & Lori Show. He was so quirky and original. From my viewpoint, looking up to my big brother, it seemed like everyone wanted to be his friend.
Living in Singapore as children was amazing. I remember Gregg getting a lot of attention wherever we went. The combination of his red hair, freckles, and excess weight was unusual to see in that Asian culture. He often wore football-style T-shirts that had a large number on the front and back, which seemed to bridge any language gap. Whenever we were in town, people would call out whatever number happened to be on his shirt as a way to get his attention . . . or to ridicule him . . . I guess we’ll never know.
I was aware of some of Gregg’s bingeing. Occasionally I was included—if only to buy my silence on the matter. One time, I remember Gregg eating ice cream in his bedroom, having emptied the carton into a Tupperware bowl. Our mom knocked on the door, so he hurriedly stashed the bowl on the floor of his closet. When he opened the door, our Irish setter, Mac, bounded in, and his nose quickly found that bowl. He began crazily lapping up the ice cream, so Mom investigated . . . and Gregg was busted.
Our parents' well-intentioned efforts to control the binge eating only served to light the fire under it. They installed locks on our kitchen cabinets and routinely inspected the garbage cans. If any contraband wrappers or containers were discovered, they were kept until weekend afternoons, when we were whipped with a belt for each offense. The ensuing misery required more binges to help him forget.
Some of the details of our upbringing are pretty hard to re-live. Through the years, it seems Gregg and I have honored an unwritten pact, as fellow survivors. The pain of our childhood can't be taken off like a coat, but must be shed more like skin . . . cell by cell.
Moving to a new town and new school right before the fourth quarter of eighth grade was no picnic. Although it did offer some relief, considering that Ramstein Junior High considered me to be a petty thief, with perhaps the biggest penis, thanks to Judy’s ruminations. I had stopped stealing money for food at that point, but I never managed to regain my honor before leaving town.
Our new hometown of Wiesbaden, Germany, offered a brand new world, but one that wasn’t too receptive given how late in the school year it was. After an uncomfortable quarter in junior high, I finished the year without making any new friends in the area.
Lori and I continued to lead an active fantasy life at home—constantly singing and acting into the tape recorder—ready for discovery by Hollywood at any moment. We were too clueless to realize there weren’t a lot of Hollywood talent scouts in Wiesbaden, Germany.
During the summer before high school, I volunteered for the Red Cross where I met two of my soon-to-be good friends, Diana and Rhodonna. It was our shared love of Charlie’s Angels reruns that brought us together. We spent the summer bringing playing cards to hospital patients and practicing our dancing when no one else was around.
I was volunteering at the same hospital where my mom had gotten a job, but for some reason she did not want me visiting her office. So I would call her from time to time from within the same building. Oddly, her receptionist used to correct me when I would ask for “Diana McBride.” She’d say, “You mean Dee-ana.” Looking back now, I realize that at that point my mom’s metamorphosis into the blonde vixen of the Wiesbaden Military Hospital was already under way. But back then, I just thought the receptionist was being passive aggressive.
As my dad was no longer on TDY (away on business), the plan was for him to live with us at the apartment.
One big happy family. Not.
Dad was still drinking heavily and would come home late at night from his alcohol binges at the Officer’s Club. He’d wake up early in the morning and leave for work and return very late at night. We barely saw him.
My mother used this time to paint a terrible picture of how “bad” my dad was. One morning I woke up to her telling me that my dad had completely disgusted her. Delighted to have my mother confide in me and seeing it as a potential bonding experience, I asked her what was wrong. She told me she had gotten up in the middle of the night and had found my dad in the kitchen, masturbating while looking at the bra section of the Sears catalog.
Why my mother, any mother, would tell an impressionable adolescent boy this story—about his own father, no less—is beyond me. It skewed my view of masturbation and sex for years to come.
Soon after that my father moved out and lived away from home—though we were not allowed to admit that to anyone. If we did, we’d risk losing the military housing we were living in, since the service person in question wasn’t actually living there. Lori and I were instructed to act like we were the normal military family, which, ironically, we were—marital strife is quite rampant among military families.
So Lori and I pretended Dad still lived with us for the sake of our military-sanctioned housing. While I no longer had to be “Sue,” I was still the appointment secretary for my mom and dad. Eventually my mom instructed me to answer the phone with “Diana McBride’s residence.” And so I did. Every time the phone rang, I’d answer “Diana McBride’s residence.”
I was never as good at saying “Dee-ana” as my mom’s receptionist at the hospital. Perhaps that’s why Mom would acknowledge the receptionist’s presence in public, but would barely acknowledge mine.
Dad came around once a week, usually on Saturday mornings. He would pick up the grocery list and go shopping. I was responsible for compiling the list. Needless to say I couldn’t request any type of sweets or junk food—in fact, I was supposed to be on a strict diet assigned, via a badly Xeroxed handout, from a doctor at the hospital.
The diet’s day plan was a joke. That a doctor would put a growing teenage boy on a diet like that is a testament to what the medical community did not know about dieting or healthy eating at the time.
High School Gregg’s Joke of a Diet: Typical Day
BREAKFAST
2 pieces of Wheat Toast
Pat
