Mom being pregnant with Lucy and telling me I had to sit in Dad’s lap because she didn’t have one any more. Mom coming in the front door (Towson?) carrying just-born Lucy home from the hospital and wearing that brown & black coat she had that I loved so much (I wanted one like it for years).
When we lived in Hyattsville we had rabbits, which Dorothy (wink) would let out of the cage and the cats would catch them and eat them. I remember Robin Zuber, a neighbor kid; she was a pill and I only played with her if no one else was around. One day, she made me so angry that I hit her over the head with an iron meat platter. She had to go to the hospital and get a couple stitches. I remember Mom laughing while she told me what a bad thing I had done, and said if ever a kid deserved it, it was Robin.
Mom taking us to Loon Lake where Aunt Cindy’s parents Len & Gertrude Chace had a home, to play with Kathryn and Fergie, swim, spend the night, play dress-ups, and hang out in the little playhouse they had in their yard.
Mom taking us to visit Wahwah (Julia Benton), the little Portuguese woman who was Mom’s & Uncle John’s 2nd mama/nanny when they were growing up. Gosh do I have a lot of memories of that place when I stop and think about it. Wahwah lived in a cute little house with her sister Rita. They were both very tiny women and we used to measure ourselves against them and brag when we were finally “taller than Wahwah!” They taught us our first Portuguese swear words (the only one I can remember is vay-ka gah…does that sound right?) and cooked Portuguese food for us when we visited. I loved their collection of cranberry glass.
Mom having her hair frosted by a lady who spoke Spanish and we girls thought she talked very fast. I think this was when we lived in Carmel. I also remember that Mom used to play tennis and she’d take us with her. Tom would climb to the very highest tippy-top of the pine trees near the courts and Mom would just call “come down Tom!” as calmly as she could.
I remember Mom dealing with Tom’s celiac disease, mostly when we lived in Carmel, and the time he freaked us all out when he snuck Hot Tamales (cinnamon candies) and then puked red stuff all over Mom’s VW bus. It was also in Carmel where Mom published her first little volume of poems with the help of her friend Harry Graham.
We took a trip to Yosemite one winter where Mom and Dad rented 2 little one-roomed cabins. They had beds to sleep 3 in each, a little table and chairs, and were heated by a wood stove. Mom or Dad had to come over to the cabin during the night and keep our fire going. Tom was just a little kid and that was the year of the famous picture of him catching snowflakes on his tongue.
Going burro packing with Tony Zufich, a man Mom met at her writing group in Carmel (he also introduced us to Judy Talley). If memory serves, we loaded up all our stuff and packed it on a burro, then hiked into some place in the Carmel Valley (Tom got to ride because he was little, but we girls had to hoof it the whole way). Tony taught us how to dig a bed in the sand that would make it more comfortable to sleep on the ground and that we should keep our heads outside our sleeping bags because breathing inside the bag would create moisture. We camped near a creek where we spent a day rock climbing, swimming, and hunting crawdads with some bacon and a coffeepot for a net. Mom told us to slather on sunburn cream & Tony teased her and said there was no such word as “slather”.
Scooping water out of the basement when we lived across the street from the high school in Lakeville. I’m not certain if we had a sump-pump and it wasn’t working, or what, but I remember that we all took “shifts” getting up during the night one year because the basement was flooding and we had a lot of stuff down there. I remember, too, when we lived in Assonet, Dorothy and I got to use Mom’s station wagon to drive to Catholic Memorial Nursing Home in Fall River, where we worked as nurses’ aides. Mom had just finished taking a home health aide course and was taking care of people in their homes.
Mom telling me I ought to marry a man who wears a tie to work. I had a beau in California who I’d told this remark to and who, when Mom was out visiting, took us out to dinner at the local Chinese restaurant and wore a tie! Strangely enough, this man whose name is Dick, is a friend of ours still, and shares the same birthday as Mom’s.
During the time we were all together at Halcyon New York for the wedding of Fransje Leonard & John Holloway, Mom & I were sitting together outside one afternoon. No one else was around. I went to the house to get another glass of iced coffee and while I was in there, I noticed the “bar” and thought, “I could have a drink and no one would know!” That idea so horrified me that I hurried out to Mom and admitted what I’d thought. She broke up laughing and told me that while I’d been inside, she’d noticed that I’d left my pack of cigarettes on the table and she’d suddenly thought, “I could have a cigarette and no one would know!” This story cracks me up to this day.
Submitted by Sara.
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