Synanon Kid Read online

  Synanon Kid

  A Memoir of Growing Up in the Synanon Cult

  C.A. Wittman

  Copyright © 2017 by C.A. Wittman

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  For my Mother

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  A Short History of Synanon

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Prologue

  Childhood is convalescence from being dead for all eternity and should therefore be gotten over as quickly as possible.

  —CED (Charles Edward Dederich, founder of Synanon)

  Nature roots herself firmly in my childhood memories of Synanon. Rustling hills of tall blond grass scenting the air with subtle sweetness. An afternoon picking blackberries, so many that crimson juice stains my hands, face and clothes, the sticky residue gumming up between my fingers. My dark, sun–kissed skin muddied with Indian red.

  The creek, a wide rushing torrent of water taking all in its path, roars out a warning of danger. In the summer, deep, still pools, afterthoughts of brisk winter business left scattered along the banks, invite a swim, that first dip so cold it chokes the breath.

  The people are secondary, melding into the background; forgettable adults, their features wiped clean in my mind of any defining characteristics. Some stand out, the cruelest ones; the mean, unwanted children housed in bland dormitories, and the sterile “demonstrators.” Hate is a feeling to curl up with, a comfort in the sort of childhood that one longs to shuck off as quickly as possible.

  Chapter One

  Induction

  It was evening when I arrived at Synanon with my mother and her friend Mary Ann. I was six years old and tired from the long bus ride. Having lived all my life in South Central Los Angeles, I found nothing familiar in the country environment in which I found myself. It seemed as though I’d left somewhere and arrived at a place that felt like nowhere.

  No one greeted us. After we retrieved our minimal luggage, we walked in silence along a gravel road devoid of cars, the small stones crunching beneath our shoes. A sheet of white clouds covered the sky, lending an austere, colorless look to the shed-like structures that hunkered down on the dusky land. Within minutes we traversed the buildings, the road snaking through a natural setting. Dry, brittle-looking hills sprouting mushrooms of stunted, tightly clustered trees ringed the property.

  My mother, whose hand I held, was nearly a stranger to me. I had not seen her in more than two years; yet within the last twenty-four hours, she and Mary Ann had whisked me away in the night from my uncle’s home, where I’d been visiting. The three of us had spent the night in a rundown hotel in Santa Monica, California. In the early morning, we’d boarded a Greyhound-style bus called a Synacruiser bound for Marin, California, and the place called Synanon of which my mother had spoken.

  As we rounded a bend in the country road, a two-story building with a metal roof came into view. I tightened my grip on my mother’s hand. The building was still under construction. A new section had been added, though it was still just a hollow frame of wood. Other, similar structures fanned out, creating a cluster of dwellings. Without knocking, we went into one and walked along a short hallway to a living room, unfurnished except for a few good-sized beanbag chairs.

  Eight or nine children and two women sat on the floor with their legs crossed. Like identical paper cutouts, each of the children and the women were as bald as the next and dressed exactly the same, in overalls. Expectation seemed to crackle in the air, settling in gazes that became attentive and slumping shoulders that straightened as we came in.

  One of the children stood, walked over to me and without a word reached out a hand to touch my hair. I pulled back, but my mother gently prodded me forward. I remained still, allowing the child to stroke my hair. The others rose up, one by one. Crowding around me, they reached out their hands to touch and pet my head. Someone grabbed tightly at my hair, yanking my head back.

  I tried to pull away, feeling fear for the first time.

  An adult, one of the children’s supervisors, came to my rescue, pushing through the cluster of small bodies, separating them and swatting down their small hands.

  “Behave,” she said. “If you want to touch Celena’s hair, you must stand in line. Everyone will get a chance.”

  I didn’t want a group of strange kids stroking my head, but no one asked me or seemed to care what I thought. The odd-looking children, some of them sulking at the new arrangement, obediently formed a line.

  My mother handed a hairbrush to the child nearest to me, the brush ready in her purse, though she was as bald as the others.

  Wielding the prized tool, the child raked the bristles through my tresses, not at all like the soft motions of my mother’s hand. On the bus ride to Marin, she had unbraided and combed through my hair several times while I ate endless slices of carrot-raisin bread. I braced myself for some seconds until the brushing abruptly halted in mid-stroke as the supervisor put an end to the activity by taking hold of the child’s arm. “That’s enough. Give it to Becky now.” The ritual continued until each of the alien-looking children had a turn, touching me and brushing my hair as if I were a possession. My mother and her friend smiled approvingly. When it was over, my mother said, “I have to go now. I’ll be back later.”

  Until that moment, I had taken the situation in stride with my mother near me, her presence a lifeline to the real world we had left behind and to which I was sure I’d return. It had not occurred to me that I would be left with these people. I grabbed the lower fringe of her jacket. “Where are you going?”

  She removed my hands, and a flutter of panic rose in my chest.

  “It’s a surprise,” she said.

  I’d had enough surprises. My muscles tensed as she turned toward the hallway with Mary Ann behind her. I heard the door open, then click shut as they walked out, leaving me with the strangers who openly stared at me in my too-bright clothes with my big puffy hair fanning out around my shoulders after too much brushing. One of the women, tall and pale with a round moon face, broke the sharp awkward silence and told me to follow her. When I hesitated, she beckoned with her finger. We walked down another hallway to a bathroom where she positioned me in front of a long rectangular mirror mounted over several sinks.

  “You are very lucky,” she said, placing her hands on my shoulders while she stood behind me. “Not all children get to come to Synanon.” A tight feeling squeezed my insides, but I managed to nod. Seeming satisfied, the woman opened a drawer and pulled out a large pair of scissors. A sense that something very bad was about to happen pricked my skin. I wondered how much longer it would be until my mot
her came back.

  “Would you like to be a Synanon kid?” Her eyes narrowed, her gaze sweeping over my body.

  Barely nodding, I fixed my gaze on her fingers looped through the scissors’ handles.

  “I’m so glad,” she said, picking up a lock of my hair.

  The cold flat metal of the scissors rested against my scalp as she cut into my dark thick curls and a chunk of hair fluttered down to the bathroom counter. She snipped quickly, hair spilling onto my shoulders and hands and around my feet.

  “I am going to make you beautiful,” she said under her breath. “Bald girls are beautiful.”

  Unable to find my voice, I simply stared at the blunt tufts of hair sticking out from my head. She procured an electric clipper and turned it on. It buzzed and vibrated as she slid it easily over my scalp, leaving a path of smooth brown skin. In minutes, I was bald.

  In the mirror, a different little girl stared back at me, a girl whose head was too small for the rest of her body, her dark eyes now seemingly enlarged. I had become an alien like the others. I didn’t want to look at my reflection, but I couldn’t stop staring.

  The woman bent down to my level. Her eyes glowed with an intensity I would later learn to recognize as fanaticism.

  “Look how beautiful you are now.”

  I knew she was lying, trying to make me feel better about what she had done. Why had she done it, I wanted to ask, but I couldn’t seem to talk. I wanted to tell her I needed to go home—that I’d changed my mind; I didn’t want to be at Synanon anymore. Where was my mom? My thoughts clamored like frantic spectators at a show where things had gone drastically wrong. My words were stuck.

  “Today you are a new person, a Synanon kid. Today is your birthday,” the woman said. It wasn’t my birthday. My birthday was in October.

  “It’s your Synanon birthday,” she explained, as if she could read my thoughts. “Now what do you say?”

  I had no idea what she meant or what she wanted me to tell her. I felt numb.

  “You’re welcome,” she said in the absence of the “thank you” she’d anticipated from me. She smiled and watched for my reaction.

  I stretched my lips, imitating the woman, and the haunted-eyed alien in the mirror smiled back. I didn’t want to be her, so I looked away.

  After brushing me off and cleaning up the mess of my shorn hair, she took my hand again and led me back to the other children, who hovered around me. One spoke up, asking, “Who’s going to be her buddy?”

  “Theresa will decide,” the woman said.

  My mother returned shortly, much to my relief. In her arms she carried a box that held everything necessary for making popcorn. I immediately ran to her side. She oohed and aahed over my new appearance, although I felt embarrassed to my very core.

  “We are going to have a party to celebrate your coming to stay with us and your new birthday,” she said, seeming not to notice my discomfort. “But first I want to introduce you to a special friend of mine. This is Sophie. She’s going to be your buddy.”

  I looked at the chubby, potbellied child with the large, round head and round, rosy cheeks. So it’s a girl, I thought. She had been clinging to my mom ever since she’d come back into the room, and watching her, a faint feeling of jealousy tickled at my throat. I wanted to be the one at my mother’s side. I was her daughter, not this boyish-looking girl who possessively held her arm. As Sophie’s round, eager eyes took me in she leaned in closer to my mother, claiming the space.

  My silence hardly mattered because Sophie talked non-stop; there was little chance for me to get a word out, even if I’d wanted to. My mother busied herself setting up refreshments and Sophie grabbed my hand, her smile revealing severely bucked teeth, which I later learned were due to her habitual thumb sucking. She yanked me to her side and asked, “Do you want to help make the popcorn?” Her dark eyes jumped about with an agitated excitement that reminded me of my cousin Joey’s hamster.

  I picked up the bag of popcorn only to have Sophie snatch it out of my hands. “Do you want to pour the popcorn?” She looked up at my mother.

  “Celena, why don’t you get the oil,” my mom said.

  “I’ll get it.” Sophie angled me out of the way, grabbing the bottle. I wandered off.

  Sophie returned to my side, linking her arm with mine. “I am going to be your best friend,” she informed me, patting my hand as if to prove her point. With unusual strength, she pulled me back to the popcorn setup. Every time I attempted to talk with my mom, Sophie interrupted. If I said or examined anything, Sophie was right there with me, imitating my movements, copying my mannerisms, repeating everything, constantly interrupting and giggling. After an hour I began to despise her, the gummy bucked smile and anxious chubby hands grabbing at me. I pulled my arm from her with such force that she stumbled back. “Leave me alone!”

  I felt as if I were a doll for Sophie to do with as she pleased. I wanted to go home. The perpetual smile vanished from Sophie’s face. My mother’s face seemed to collapse with disappointment.

  “I don’t want her to be my buddy. Make her leave me alone.” My throat closed with the tears I fought to keep back.

  Sophie’s shoulders sagged, her eyes darting from me to my mom and the other children, who hung back, non-interactive and uninterested now that I was as bald as they were.

  “Oh, but Sophie’s such a good friend,” my mother said, squatting to our level and taking both our hands. “She’s all prepared to show you around and explain how everything works, and she’s been looking forward to your arrival. The two of you will be sharing a room, and soon you’ll enjoy each other’s company.”

  I didn’t want to share a room with Sophie, and I didn’t want to be a beautiful Synanon girl. I stared at Sophie, doubtful. It seemed she wanted to be me. I had not considered it possible to be given a good friend. I decided that I hated her.

  The next day I found myself again in the large room where the odd party had taken place the previous evening. I sat on a metal folding chair as part of a circle that contained my mother, two other adults and some children.

  “We are going to play a game,” said the woman who had shaved my head.

  “We don’t use the titles “mom” and “dad” or “mister” and “missus” here. We use our first names only. I’m Linda, and this is Theresa.” She waved toward my mother, who sat waiting expectantly. “Understand?”

  I did not understand, so I said nothing.

  “This is a special game. Here, you can say anything. Any words you like. You can say shit and fuck if you want. Try it. Say those words.”

  Linda waited.

  I waited.

  “Try it,” she urged, as if she were asking me to recite a nursery rhyme.

  I shook my head.

  “You must be very angry with your mother for leaving you for such a long time.”

  I folded my hands tightly in my lap, squeezing my fingers as if I could wring out my confusion and frustration.

  “We all know that you are angry.” Linda’s brows drew together, creating a deep crease in her forehead. “We don’t keep anger bottled up here.”

  I decided it was best to stay quiet. I didn’t know what she was talking about.

  “All right, I’ll have a turn,” Linda said. She turned to my mother. “Theresa, look at what you’ve done to your daughter. Do you know how much you’ve fucked her up?”

  My mother flinched as if someone had flicked water in her face. Then she recovered, her mouth quivering back into a smile.

  I bit my lip, tasting blood. Little girls didn’t say words like that. When I’d heard cuss words in the past, my first reaction had been to throw my hands over my mouth. I couldn’t remember a time when I didn’t know that cuss words were nasty. This woman, Linda, demanded that I say things that back home would have earned me a mouth washing with soap.

  When I remained silent, one of the other children said, “Last night there wasn’t enough fucking popcorn. I hardly got any.”

&nbs
p; This remark set off a litany of complaints from the other kids, who then turned on each other, remembering old slights and recalling incidents that brought them to a pitch of boiling fury.

  “You poop-head!” one of them screamed.

  “I know you are, but what am I!”

  “You stole my money!”

  “I told you, for the last time, I never took your stinking money, you stupid asshole!”

  The children began to scream, fighting to be heard. A few of them rocked manically in their chairs. One boy balled his hand into a fist and hit it against his palm while he yelled. Another snarled, baring tiny milk teeth.

  The high-pitched sound of someone yelling “Shit, shit, shit, shit” caught my attention. Across from me, the chanter’s eyes widened, boring into mine, the bald head tilting crazily from side to side. I didn’t know whether it was a boy or girl. “Shit, shit, shit.”

  I shrank back in my chair.

  Linda leaned forward. “Quiet!” The screaming continued. “I said quiet!” The arguing and yelling tapered off.

  Turning to me, Linda motioned with an open hand toward my mother. “What would you like to say to Theresa, Celena? Do you want to let her know how you feel about her leaving you for so long? You can say anything you want. Tell her, ‘Fuck you.’ Speak freely.”

  I shook my head, grimacing, and closed my eyes, trying to make it all disappear. But it didn’t. Instead, the other children started yelling at one another again. After a while most of them had exhausted themselves into a temporary quiet as a few talked about their irritations. Some listened attentively, offering advice or stating their disagreements more reasonably. Even when they were just talking, their words were blunt and crude.