| Caprice The Teens |
| Cara's first name was Caprice. Nothing could have fit her better. Caprice, whimsical, fanciful, changeable. The name Cara means beloved and she was certainly that. My husband and I had agreed to give her, his initials, and in the process gave her a name that truly fit her. She was never very tall and while she claimed to be 5'2" I don't think she ever truly reached that height. I think when she went to try on clothes, she was always looking for something that would make her look taller. When nothing ever did she really had no interest in buying them. She now bought jeans and shirts and going shopping with with her to buy school clothes was like hitting my thumb over and over with a hammer. I finally decided to let her go on her own, and I took her to the department store and said "I am going to the book store, when you find what you want come and get me." About 30 minutes past and she came and said "I have what I want." She had bought "one" pair of jeans and she was done. She always knew what she wanted in shoes, but she really hated buying clothes. So it was usually all jeans and shirts and in the summer shorts and shirts, and sometimes I could slip in a couple blouses or sweaters. I know that I was very lucky with my daughter in high school The first 4 months of her freshman class was the worst part of the entire four years. A senior girl decided that Cara was to be her best friend. How flattering to be accepted into the senior crowd when you are just a freshman. I choose not to tell her she could not be friends with this girl, but I did severly curtail her activities with her. It took about four months and she realized she really was not happy and wanted to be with the kids her own age and grade level. Her mother was greatly relieved, and I never seen her make that kind of a mistake in choosing friends again. Now she was back to just being silly and having her friends over to watch scary movies. When they would frighten themselves they would come and jump into my bed. One close friend lived a couple of blocks away and her Dad had a big red bread van. To Kim and Cara that was the horror of the neighborhood. They would get to talking about when they got old enough to drive, they would cruise around and pick up boys. One day I finally ask "Who's car are you guys planning to use? Not mine." They sat for a minute and Kim said "We'll use the bread van. Then we can pick up a truck load." The idea tickled them so much that it was the standard joke for years, about how they were going crusing in the bread van. Cara who had always excelled in sports and had a box full of trophies came home about the second practice of Basketball and informed me that she was not going to play. The young man coaching seem to think he needed to do a lot of yelling and she said girls were no fun to play with. They would try to scratch you with their fingernail, and cry if you took the ball away from them. She Quit. I have always known the problem was she had been use to playing with boys, and older kids. She never took kindly to being yelled at. She never changed her mind. Even though each year she found herself trying to avoid the coaches. She was not allowed to date until she was sixteen. She could go with a crowd of friends and even had a couple of boy friends, but she wasn't allowed to date one on one. She was to tell me later she was very happy I had that rule. She wasn't in a hurry to date and it gave her a perfect excuse. She could always blame her mother. |
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| Still friends at 18.... |
| The wild ones who were going crusing in the bread van!! |
| When Cara did get a drivers license she took a job at a Safeway Grocery Store. This was one of the best things that happened to her. She loved working and being around people. With in a couple weeks she was getting a lot of hours and she gained a new confidence in herself. I know there are many good teachers in school and Cara did have a couple. But there are also many bad teachers and she had more then her share of them. When she had went for her interview for the job they had ask her if there was anything to keep her from working. She told them that in a few months I would be taking her to England for 3 weeks and she would not be there to work. They always laughed and told her she was the first one to make arrangements for her vacation before she took the job. |
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| Waiting in line out side the tower of London. It was one of her favorite places. |
| To write about our trip to England would nearly take a book in it's self, so I will confine it to just a few memories. First after flying half way around the world my daughter begged me to take her to Pickadilly Circus the first night so she could go to a record store there. She also insisted that we eat in McDonalds. I did not expect to go that far just to eat at a McDonalds, but that is where we ate. I was told by my travel agent to spend 3 nights in London before renting a car, to give myself time to recover from the Jet Lag. I had agreed and was very thankful that I did. I found my self unable to sleep at night, (which was our day) and then unable to keep my eyes open during the day. I was all right when I was up an doing things but when I had to sit for any period of time, like at the Paladium and on the tour buses, I would instantly doze off. Cara was constantly waking me up. She informed me that she did not mind me sleeping but I would start to snore and she did not like people stareing at her. I have so many wonderful memories of England and Cara. Driving was such a terrible experience at first and she gave me such a bad time, just making fun of me and laughing. I remember a street vendor in down town London. Cara had not learned to count the money and when he ask for an amount she held out a hand full of money for him to pick it out. He looked at her and said "Oh no Love, you have to learn to count the money or you will be cheated" and right there on the streets of London he made her learn how to count their money. I knew how but it was wonderful watching this man teach her. She crabbed because I was dragging her to all of these historical sites. But once she was inside and began to realize what she was seeing she really enjoyed it. She had always wanted to return to England. |
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| High School and her friends. |
| These are the years I learned to trust Cara's judgement. I remember one night as she ran out the door a friend who was here visiting said "You did not tell her what time to be home." All I could do was laugh and say, she knows what time to be home I don't have to tell her. She came to me one day and said, Mom, there is a boy at school. He is very artistic, he doesn't talk to anyone, he wears his hair long and he always wears a long black coat. I have never talked to him but I think I will ask him to the Tolo (a dance where the girls ask the boys). This is hardly the image that a mother is looking for as a date for her daughter, but I am thankful that I did trust her judgement. Jeff was one of the nicest young men you could meet and they continued dating through high school. Her father and I both thought the world of him. Jeff was a recluse and only socialized when he was forced to by Cara. While Cara loved people and was very out going. Yet they thought the world of each other. |
| Cara and I did have our ups and downs. Many times I found my self saying, "I am not here to be your friend, I am your mother." I am also sure that many times she went up the stairs saying under her breath "I hate her." But the arguements were few and I was always so proud of her. I have always thought I was extreamly lucky with my children because I loved them, but I also "liked" them as people. Yet as my boys grew up the last thing they wanted was there mama around. Cara was the opposite and she just moved into the space they vacated and took over my life. I said to a friend after her death, "I bored people to death always talking about Cara." She told me, "I didn't know you knew you were doing that." How could I not know........ she was the center of my world. |
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| I was surprised that she ask me to make her a strapless dress for her senior prom. It is the most dareing outfit she ever wore. |
| These are the years I also begin to see a side that cared deeply about other people. Often she would come home concerned about someone she had met. Cara could always see everyones faults the same as we all do, but she also could dig below those faults and see qualities in that person that she did like. She choose to be friends with everyone. I found this written on a piece of notebook paper when she was 15. I was a little taken back by the title, but I was so impressed by the words she wrote. I put the paper away to save with all my other treasures. |