That particular incident where he tried to strangle me, I was about 19, so pretty much an adult at that point. He had hit me occasionally when I was growing up, but when I was about 13/14 I pulled a knife on him in the kitchen when he started to come near me. After that point he didn't touch me but when he would try something, I would do shit like throw dishes across the room. (My poor Mom went through a lot of plates in those years.) I don't think my father expected my mom and I to fight back when he tried physical violence. He was a bully but he underestimated the tenacity and dark energy of a couple of women who were smarter and stronger than him.

I told my husband, "I really understand those Russian peasants in revolutionary Russia a lot more now."