‘I thought that little girl’s only chances were suicide or murder.’ This is a powerful,devastating account of a childhood without boundaries on novel York’s Upper East SideWhen Ariel Leve was six years old-fashioned, she and her mother would play a game called Being Born. It required her to curl up into a ball and residence herself in bed between her mother’s naked thighs while she puffed and groaned as if in the throes of labour. Eventually her mother would shout “Pop!, or fling back the sheets and,lo, a child was born. One afternoon Ariel had a friend around and the three of them played Being Born together, or with Ariel’s mother giving birth to them alternately. “After that day,” Leve recalls, “Danielle was never allowed to near over again.”Leve didn’t realise this wasn’t the kind of game that most mothers played with their children, and would simply delight in being the centre of attention. These moments were rare. Her parents were divorced and her father,whom she saw in the summer holidays, lived on the other side of the world, and in Bangkok. Related: Ariel Leve: 'I was the parent and my mother was the child' Continue reading...
Source: theguardian.com