Dear Aunt Myrna
Kit Duncan
~~~
Copyright ? 2007 by Kit Duncan
All rights reserved.
This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part by any means without express permission from its author.
For additional information:
Kit Duncan
[email protected] Cover photo by Kenny Brown
Other Books by Kit Duncan
Corban
Dandelions in Paradise
Tea With Mrs Saunders
Life's Road Trip
to
my aunt
Ruby Arlene Fisher
1926 - 1996
Some dreams come true.
Table of Contents
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
About the Author
CHAPTER 1
In the summer of 1962 Jackie Robinson became the first black man inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, my favorite song on the radio was Soldier Boy by the Shirelles, and my passionate ambition was to beat Danny Watson in our daily bike races up to the corner of Thistlewood Drive and Birchwood Avenue. Danny was eight years old, and I was six, and we both rode second hand bicycles. Danny always won, and I always adamantly vowed to win, and he always laughed good-naturedly as he sped away.
I had just finished first grade at St Leonard's and felt certain I had learned all the really important things I needed to know in order to succeed in life. My mother was at the kitchen sink chopping carrots and potatoes for dinner when I announced the end of my academic career to her on the closing day of school that June. She laughed without looking at me and said, "Yes, Sweetie. Now change out of your good clothes and go play outside until I call you for dinner."
The turquoise phone hanging on the kitchen wall rang, as if often did at our house, and Mama reached for it. I raced down the hall to my room, and perhaps thirty seconds later, clothes appropriately changed, I sprinted past my mother's phone conversation, out the back door that emptied onto a second story deck, hopped quickly down the steps, and went searching for Danny. I found him just inside the woods that grew thick behind the vacant lots next to my house.
"You pass?" he asked.
"Yeah."
"Me, too. I've got Mrs Carlson next year. I hear she's tough."
"I've got Sister Martha Louise. But I ain't going. I'm done with school."
"Oh?" he didn't look over at me, just kept idly scratching in the dirt and dried leaves with a stick.
"That's right," I said proudly. "I'm all through with school. Jeannie's sister Terry just finished up second grade, and she says Sister Martha Louise is mean. I'm not having any of that business!"
"Uh huh," Danny said absently.
It wasn't that I didn't enjoy school. Quite the opposite. One's teachers have has a great impact on how one experiences school I adored my first grade teacher. Sister Mary Frances was the only nun I ever knew who would jump rope, hoola hoop, and play hop scotch and jacks with us girls. She once had a bicycle race with four of the boys in our class and came in second. She was the hero of every kid in my first grade class.
Sister Mary Frances' only character flaw was her pathologically rigid intolerance for any of her young charges holding their jumbo sized light blue mechanical pencils in an unauthorized fashion. She'd rap the offender's knuckles, and thought the rapping would help correct our young erring fingers.
My fingers got rapped frequently.
To this day I still have penmanship that could easily be recruited by the CIA for top secret code. It is deplorable and verges on the illegible, and I cannot look at my handwriting without disturbing memories of Sister Mary Frances and her ruler. But these memories are quickly pushed aside to allow images of a young nun spinning her hips around and around, trying to keep a pink and blue striped circle of plastic rotating in the air while a group of short people clap and squeal in delight.
"What are you writing?" I asked Danny.
"Nothing," he answered. "Just scribbling."
Danny was a Baptist, and he and his younger brother Timmy, who was five months younger than I was, went to a public school. I didn't know where it was. I only knew that in the morning they took a left from their front porch and walked past my house and I took a right from my front porch and walked past their house, and after we had each walked about half a mile we were at our respective schools. Danny didn't know much about nuns and I didn't know much about lady teachers.
By virtue of his advanced age Danny was the unofficial leader of our neighborhood. Fortunately, he was a fair minded ruler, a kind hearted boy. Danny was the oldest of the four Watson children. He and Timmy comprised my main social group when we weren't at school. Their sister Janey was only four, and PJ was not quite three yet. The two of them were too boring and dull for me to associate with unless circumstances demanded it.
Our neatly trimmed neighborhood of brick ranch style houses was mostly occupied by middle aged or older couples. A boy, about my age, and his younger sister had lived across the street until the previous fall, but they had moved away. Steve Maynard lived on the opposite end of the block, just before you got to Birchwood. Safe from the little kids, I once overheard my mother tell my dad. He was ten or eleven years old, I don't think any of us knew for sure. "Bad seed," Mama had warned me, and she told me firmly I was not to play with him. Fortunately, Steve Maynard seldom found his way to our part of the neighborhood.
There was no end to adventures in my world which, in the summer, spanned from the corner of Birchwood and Thistlewood, dipped down a low graded crest, and stretched down past our houses, over the three vacant lots next to us, and finally ended at the old barn. We could play on foot as far as Riedling, which intersected Thistlewood just before you got to Birchwood. But we could ride our bikes as far as Birchwood; we just couldn't get off our bikes until we came back to this side of Riedling. If we ever saw Steve Maynard outside, both sets of our parents told us, we were not to ride pass Riedling.
The southwest end of Thistlewood Drive ran into a small road, more like a path barely wide enough for a single car to drive through. The old unpainted barn was across the path, out of range to us. It was a stately structure. It leaned slightly and was missing a a few of its oak planks, but not so many that you could get a good look in it from our vantage point. The front of it was gaped wide where a door, long gone, once hung.
In all the years I lived on Thistlewood, I never went past the point at which my street met that little road and the old barn. From my boundary, and through the heavy trees that sheltered them, I could see a few small clapboard houses, most of them painted in vibrant hues of blues and yellows, pinks and greens. The houses were exotically different from the brick ranches that lined Thistlewood.
We called it the Rainbow Forrest. Our parents called it the Colored Neighborhood. For reasons I was too young to understand, for reasons that now, over forty years later, I am still too young to understand, I was restricted from entering this forbidden area.
We kids seldom ventured too near the end of our world anyway; usually the furthest we got was the second vacant lot from my house. But each morning during the school year Danny and Timmy walked down that narrow little road, disappeared into its shadows,
and re-emerged a few hours later. They never said what was there, and I never learned to ask.
It was a mystery to me why Mr and Mrs Watson allowed their two sons to walk through the Rainbow Forrest on their way to school but forbid them from playing there afterwards. The only spanking I remember Danny Watson ever got from his dad was the day Timmy came home from school alone; Danny had remained behind to play pitch and catch with a couple of his friends. Danny's friends, Timmy explained to me while we listened to the paddling in the bushes under their bedroom window, were the wrong color.
In a hushed whisper I asked, "What's the right color?" But Timmy just shrugged and said he didn't know.
There was a large hill behind our houses. It was nearly as long as Thistlewood, bordering Reidling on the northeast side and tapering off where it met the woods to the southeast. At the top of the hill were several new apartment buildings, and every now and then we'd meet a new kid who moved into one of them. They usually didn't stay very long.
The hill was the most wonderful playground we could ask for. In the wintertime we sledded down into the dried up creek bed at the bottom. In the summer time we slid down the hill on old discarded corrugated boxes. We destroyed the grass with our boxes, and finally someone cornered off a ten foot section to the side, where the hill met the woods.
We could slide in that corridor only. At first I was disgruntled and aggravated about having my freedom curtailed. Timmy mirrored my sulk and pouted with me. But Danny told us at least we still had an area to slide, so why whine about it. I was reluctant to listen to reason, but Timmy saw his older brother's wisdom immediately and his face brightened up.
It's difficult to pout alone. So, though I did not entirely espouse Danny's rationale, for social convenience I abandoned my disdain, and the three of us spent the afternoon christening our new speedway.
My dad sold cars at a new Ford dealership. It wasn't a job for him, it was his reason for being, his raison d'?tre, I had once overheard my mother tell her older sister on the phone. For many years I thought raison d'?tre was Latin. For many years I thought any language that wasn't English was Latin.
Whatever language one used, my dad was passionate about selling Fords. He left for work just before I left for school, and he didn't return home until supper time, and sometimes he'd leave again right after supper. But he never missed eating our evening meal together, no matter what was happening at the lot. He worked nearly every Saturday morning, but Saturday afternoons and all day Sunday he was with us.
I was the only kid on our block who called my dad Papa. I don't know exactly how it came to that, except he always referred to his own father that way.
I never met Grandpa Wilhelm. He died of pneumonia four months after I was born. Papa's family had been pioneers in Nebraska, and his dad was the son of German immigrants who had settled in Furnas County in the 1870's. I had never met any of my Nebraska family, though different ones of them called my parents on the phone from time to time, and at Christmas time there were always many cards with Nebraska postmarks.
We were two weeks into summer vacation. My mother had spent the afternoon cooking fried chicken and mashed potatoes, and my father got home just as the old cuckoo clock in the living room was striking six.
"Cutting it kind of thin, aren't you?" my mother asked him as he pecked her cheek and sat down at the table. I could tell her admonition was biteless; her lips curled into a flirt, and my dad's eyes twinkled at her.
We said grace and began passing food around the table. In my heart I wondered why God would want us taking up time to talk with him while our food was getting cold, and thought it was a cosmic tease that I had to focus on Him when all my senses compelled me to eat. It was hard to say "Thanks for the chow, God," when the aroma of Mama's cooking was wafting up my nostrils. I imagined God wouldn't mind waiting to be thanked until dessert. But my parents disagreed.
At first the conversation at the table focused on my dad's work. He had closed two deals, and he had another one brewing; he was meeting the prospective customer for a drink later that evening. His face lit up when he talked about cars and selling, and my mother, who didn't care much for the selling of cars but adored her husband, listened attentively and waited patiently until he had given the highlights of his abundant day at least twice.
When he finally took time to take more than two bites of chicken before gushing additional details, my mother said, "We got a call from Nebraska this afternoon, Walter."
"Oh?" Papa mumbled with a drumstick in his mouth.
"Myrna."
"Really!" he swallowed a piece of chicken that likely should have been chewed several more seconds, coughed, and grabbed his glass of lemonade. When he had regained his air, he asked, "So how's my big sister these days?" Before my mother could answer, he said, "It's been, what, a couple years since we heard from her? What's she been up to?"
"She didn't say, really," my mother said. "But," she paused and looked into my father's face to catch the first hint of expression. "She's coming over." Papa stopped eating, stopped drinking, and looked at my mother, checked her features to assure himself she wasn't teasing him.
"You're not kidding," he concluded. "She's really, finally coming?"
My mother nodded a smile.
"Oh mein Gott! I can't believe she's finally coming to Kentucky!"
My dad, who had a thick German brogue, grew up hearing German, spoke broken German much of his childhood. After he joined the Army near the end of the Second World War Papa seldom spoke German, and by his report, had forgotten most of it. But when he got very excited he lapsed into it with a primordial passion that amused all of us.
Of course, I also thought the German Papa spoke was Latin, and I was certain that his command of it was proof of his great devotion to Catholicism. Papa had not been brought up Catholic. His family was Lutheran, and they had been quite disappointed when he converted to his bride's faith. In truth, he wasn't much of a Catholic, but as promised before their marriage, he attended Mass with us faithfully, and he supported my mother's ardent commitment for me to be brought up in a strong Catholic community.
"When is she coming?" Papa asked, wiping his hands on his napkins. Mama always gave him two napkins at dinner because he was meticulous in his dress and manner. He detested his fingers being sticky.
My mother giggled a little at his boyish enthusiasm and said, "Next week. Monday or Tuesday, she wasn't exactly sure."
"Well," Papa boomed. "I'll take off work and meet her at Standiford Field!"
"Oh," my mother said, resuming her dinner nonchalantly. "She's not flying." She ignored the significance behind my dad's planned absenteeism from work. My dad did not miss work for anything unless it was of colossal importance.
"Then how is she??"
"Driving."
"Driving?" Papa repeated. "Driving what? Does she still have Papa's old truck?"
"I didn't ask. She just said she was driving, and was planning on getting as far as Columbia the first day, and then would come on through St Louis and on over to Louisville the second day, unless, well, unless she was delayed. She's leaving Sunday morning, so that puts her here by Monday night. Unless?."
"Unless she's still driving that beat up old truck," Papa said with a concerned growl. "I'm going to get her into a Ford if it's the last thing I do."
My mother laughed long. "That I want to see, Walter! You getting Myrna into anything she doesn't want to get into. I'm lining up for tickets!"
"Well," Papa huffed with a chuckle in his deep voice. "Nevertheless, Laura, if she's bullheaded enough to drive a thousand miles she may as well be driving something reliable. You just don't get that in a Chevrolet, especially one that old. My God, I think Hoover was still in office when Papa got that old can, and it was used when he bought it."
"You're exaggerating again," Mama said. "Roosevelt maybe. And you think any car over five years old is ancient."
"Well," my dad said monosyllabically, defending his position like a Spartan.
He wasn't opinionated about many things, but he prided himself on being a connoisseur of vehicles. And a good solid Ford, he repeated often, was the best ride money could buy.
Working at the dealership, and selling more Fords than nearly any other salesman in the showroom, earned my dad a new demo each September. He didn't like Mama being home without a car, so in addition to his demo he bought a new car at least every other year. Our family car that summer was a 1962 Falcon, four doors, white. My mother loved all things white.
Papa drove a 1962 burgundy Galaxy 500, white hardtop, two doors. Papa loved color, and he thought the two doors gave it a sporty look. Mama said it wasn't very practical, but my dad was a dreamer, and that car carried some precious, hidden dreams that he never shared with us. But I could see them in his eyes when he drove that car.
"Besides," my mother added, "Even if the truck's old, it's not that old. And your father took wonderful care of everything he owned. His farm was the cleanest I've ever seen. And Myrna's the same way. She treats that house and farm like a shrine to your dad. I'm sure she'll be fine if she drives the pickup over." She patted my dad's hand to emphasize her reassurance, and he smiled weakly.
"Just the same, I?"
"I know, Dear, I know. Myrna will be fine. Myrna is always fine. I swannee, I don't know where she gets her strength, though. Leaving that first husband of hers, and that was way before it was fashionable to leave one's husband. And that terrible business with the?." She caught herself abruptly, glanced at me to evaluate how closely I was following their dialogue. I was playing with my mashed potatoes. Mama quickly added, "Then losing your parents, and then Paul. And she lives out on that farm all alone, not a neighbor for half a mile. I don't know how she manages, but, Walter, she always does. You know that."
My ears had pricked up at Mama's self interruption. She seldom found the need to correct herself. But I hadn't been paying close enough attention, and I soon lost interest in their conversation again and built a tiny teepee in my potatoes.
"I know," Papa conceded. "She's a tower of strength, that woman is. Always was. Always has been. Tough as nails, though, that's a fact."
"And a heart that bounds to the four corners of the earth," my mother said.
"Not so's you can see it half the time, though," my dad chuckled a little. "She's got a pretty tough hide on her."
"Guess she had to with what she put up with that first louse of a husband, and then, well, everything else."
"Yes," my dad agreed. He looked at me with a sad smile that said he was hiding some great secret from me, something I was not old enough to understand. I flattened my potato teepee with my spoon.
"Losses can define a person, that's a certainty," Papa added quickly. He sat quietly a minute or so and then told Mama, "But, no, you're right, you couldn't ask for a more compassionate woman. She's not soft, not gentle even. But she's got more heart than anyone," he smiled at my mother apologetically and corrected himself, "well, almost anyone I know." My mother smiled back and nodded.
"How long will she be able to stay?" Papa asked.
"She didn't say, and I didn't ask," Mama replied. "I was just so thrilled to hear she was coming. I know how you've always adored her."
"She took care of us after Mama died," Papa said. "Myrna was, what, maybe fifteen or sixteen at the time. Lonnie and I were only four. Even after she married that scoundrel she always came over every day, was always there when we got in from school, always fixed our dinner, and stayed at the house until after Papa came in." Papa's eyes fixed on a past long faded, smiled a dry smile, and he and my mother sat silently for awhile.
I tired of my invisibility about this time and started squirming and made an impatient, attention-seeking noise with my feet dangling and clapping together under the table. My dad looked at me, and my mother looked at me, and they looked at each other.
"So, anyway," Papa smiled softly at my mother, "How was your day?'
"Oh, the usual," Mama looked back at him, reflecting his smile. "A little cleaning, a little laundry. Emily and I sunbathed a while this afternoon while the kids played." She glanced playfully at me, then continued talking to my dad. "Her parents are going to Florida in the fall."
"Moving or visiting?" my dad shot a twinkle at me, then looked very seriously at my mother as if whether or not Emily Watson's parents were staying in Florida was of vital importance.
"Oh, I think just a vacation," she answered. And he nodded approvingly.
I squirmed harder, I cleared my throat conspicuously, and I kicked my feet so hard I knocked my toe against one of the table legs.
"Ouch!" I yelled. "That hurt!" If subtlety does not succeed in securing appropriate parental attention one should dispense with subtlety.
"Stop squirming, young lady!" my dad ordered with mock sternness, and then, unable to restrain himself any longer, he laughed, looked into my frowning face, and said, "So, what have you been up to, Shorty-Pants."
I needed little coaxing to give a full account of my day. There were many very important things to report. Timmy and I had found an old magazine in the hollowed out log in the woods and we were very concerned somebody had discovered our hideout. But Danny reassured us that nobody but us would want it. It was crawling with tiny insects and it smelled funny, and it was very damp. In my recitation to my parents, though, I left out the part about the insects and the smell and the dampness; those were log qualities that my mother would find unsuitable for her daughter. And Danny's dad was getting him a new bike, and could I get one, too? Maybe next year, Papa suggested, and I continued the narrative of my day.
Mrs England's flowers were blooming and she offered us each a quarter if we'd weed the bed, so we did that, and then Mama let me go with the Watson boys to Whirley's for candy.
Whirley's was on the far side of the earth. It was two blocks out of my boundary, and I was permitted to go only if I stayed very, very close to Danny and promised to hold his hand when we crossed Birchwood. Normally holding a boy's hand was anathema to me but it was a small price to pay for a trip to Whirley's.
"And after that?" my dad asked.
"We played King Arthur and the Round Table," I informed him. "Danny was King Arthur, naturally, and he wanted me to be Queen Guinevere, but I said what's the fun in that. She sits around smiling pretty while everyone else gets to go to battle. I may be able to smile pretty but there's more to living than smiling or being pretty!"
"How'd that get resolved?" my mother asked, and she winked at my dad.
"Well," I said with a defiant triumph, "I told him I'd be Lancelot or, what's the other fellow's name, starts with a G?"
"Sir Galahad?" one of my parents suggested.
"Well," I snorted, "I don't know what he had, but anyhow, Timmy wanted to be him, so that left me with Lancelot, so that was that!"
"Who'd you fight?" my dad wondered, and I believed he was suddenly more interested in my conquest of the day than any car on his lot.
"Oh, all sorts of tyrants and dragons!" I exclaimed, fully animated. "There is no shortage of enemies when you're part of the Round Table, you know. Well, anyhow, that's what Danny says."
"And were all opponents summarily defeated?" Mama asked.
"Summarily and decisively!" I announced with great pride.
"Then it was a productive day!" my dad said as he scooted his chair back from the table. My mother joined his scoot and stood up, reaching for what was left of the chicken.
"And now, Sir Lancelot," Mama smiled at me, "perhaps you will take off your armor long enough to help your dear old mother with the dishes."
CHAPTER 2