3-1-1945
She breezes downstairs and into the living room, in full regalia – two old print dresses of unequal length, an old hat, and a pair of leather gloves flapping limply from her fingers. She bustles to the bookcase, takes out the Thesaurus and settles herself in the big chair.
"How do you do, Mrs. Jones?" she greets me.
"How do you do?" I answer wearily.
There is an ominous thump overhead and I ask, "What are the boys doing up there?"
"Oh, they're snortysack," she replies.
There is a blank pause. Then she chuckles. "I guess you don't know what snortysack means, do you?"
Hearing the same word twice completely unnerves me but I'm able to murmur, "No – I guess I don't."
"Of course, it isn't English, but of course English isn't always people and people are to us. They don't talk. And so do I."
I am not sure what to say to this, so I retire behind my magazine. Then getting up courage I venture timidly.
"What did you say the boys were doing?"
"Oh," she says airily, "They're throwing all their toys around. That's what – well that word I said. That's what it means. Good-bye."
And off she goes – and I mean off.
I have a nice system for keeping track of the sock situation. After each washing, when I’m folding socks, I knot the holey pairs together and put them away so if I bother to investigate at any time, I can tell at a glance which socks need darning and which are still usable. When the pile of knotted socks almost completely eclipses the neatly folded ones, it is time for me to get out the darning needle. I usually don’t investigate though, for fear of what I’ll find I suppose, and one fine morning I’ll be confronted by an outraged male with blistering words on his tongue and will know that inexplicably the neatly folded socks have come to an end. I have sense enough to hold my tongue at a time like this. I just busily rummage around and mate him up a pair that has no holes – and that evening finds me agonizing over darns.
Sewing on buttons isn’t quite so bad – but bad enough. It doesn’t take so long, for one thing, if I can find a button. When I’m straightening the bedroom and find a clean shirt wadded in an eloquent ball in a far corner, I know what’s the matter with it and why it’s there. And I recognize it as one that I ironed last week and planned to hide in the back of the closet until I got around to sewing that button on. But I forgot it when I put the shirt away and here it is. After I pick it up, if I had a button and a needle and thread, it wouldn’t take a minute to sew the thing on, but a quick glance informs me that there are still several good shirts hanging up there, so there is no hurry. And why, with all the shirts that he could wear, should he pick on the very one that was minus a button. I can work myself up into quite an indignant state just mulling over that problem.
I am not a bad darner. I can do a good job sewing on buttons too. I just don’t like to. When I have a needle in my hand, all my brain and energy and nervous system are concentrated on its job, I can’t think or talk or listen. I sweat and get cramps and suffer.
Ice cream, however, is heaven sent, easy going down and satisfying. Wonder if my ice cream money will hold out until I get my teeth?
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3-8-1945
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3-15-1945
- "Well, did you have a good time, Bruce?"
- "Yeh," he replies in that lilting indifferent tone that is all his own.
- "Did you go to the barber shop?"
- "Yeh."
- "Were you a good boy?"
- "Yeh."
- "Didn't you cry at all?"
- "Yeh."
- I decide to abandon discussion of the barbershop. "Did you have an ice cream cone?"
- "Yeh."
- "And what's in the package? My goodness, new shoes."
- "Yeh."
- "Well – shall we try them on?"
- "No."
But not to Bruce. He'd rather not wear any in the first place. And old or new, there's simply no thrill connected with them. An ice cream cone, though – there's some sense to that!
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3-22-1945
"Well," he exclaimed, "Rice pudding! What a relief from that everlasting pie!"
The poor girl was mildly upset, reflecting on that pie she had baked for the next day. When she served it to him, she apologized profusely and promised that it would be the last pie for some time. He had quite a time convincing her that he had really been kidding.
I vividly recall one supper I prepared in the first year of our marriage, a lovely potato salad, broiled wieners, hot biscuits and honey. That wretched man sat there and ate biscuits and honey the entire meal and didn't touch another thing. Then he couldn't understand why I was provoked. For a year and a half I frequently served my favorite salad, a wedge of lettuce with French dressing, and he ate it until one noon he said, "You know I don't really like lettuce." Well, why didn't he say so before?
Curiously enough, he says that the most fun he had eating was during that period. B. C. (before children) when I poured over cookbooks and recipes in magazines and concocted new and different foods every day. He'd come home, look at the table and say, "Well, what magazines have you been reading today?" Then he'd pick things apart and demand an itemized statement and everything that had gone into the puddings, etc. so I didn't know until long afterward that he had been enjoying my messes.
Now, of course, I don't get many surprises into my meals – unless it's a surprise to have a meal at all – and I do get into ruts. Proof of this was made clear to me one evening last fall when there was a minor explosion at the table when I served chili – again. So I haven't had chili since.
Men and food – you just never know. Like Dr. Braley in his office one evening toward supper time and getting hungry, when a telephone order from his home requested him to bring home a pound of wieners. "Well," he said, "I wasn't exactly feeling like wieners, but I'll bring them."
But if you ask them what they'd like to have for supper tonight, they'll invariably reply, "Oh, I don't care," or more emphatically, "Oh – food."
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3-29-1945
"I'll get the basket and go after some cobs f0r you."
So he came out of the basement with the basket and went to the door.
"I'll get the cobs now. Then the next time you want to build a fire, the cobs will be there." The light of virtue made his face gleam. "Don't you like me now, Mother?"
"Of course, but I always like you, Steve,"
"Oh, well," He fumbled with the door knob uncertainly, then with a grand gesture, opened it and called back, "Well, I'll get the cobs for you anyway."
"What you need, my dear," I told her, "is a trained nurse to sit at your bedside in constant attendance with nothing to do but wait on you!"
"Well," she replied reasonably. "Why don’t you?"
"It's funny about eggs, isn't it?" I say as I am struck by a sudden thought.
"Hum?" He tears his attention from his book to take a bite of sandwich.
"I didn't give you a fork, did I? What are you eating your eggs with?"
"My mouth," he replies.
"Don't be silly!" I say loftily.
"I'm using my spoon."
"What are you going to use for your pudding then?"
"Same spoon. I just pick up the egg and slip it in so I'm not getting it very messy."
I am horrified. "You mean you're eating a whole egg at one bite? How can you?"
"Easy. And besides it's only a half egg."
"Same thing," I reply unreasonably.
"OK. Next time you want a dollar, I'll give you 50 cents. Same thing, I'll say."
I ignore this and plunge on before he loses himself in his book again. "But it is funny about eggs, isn't it?"
He resigns himself and puts his book down. "How do you mean – funny?"
"Well – you can eat so many more when they're boiled. They seem like more fixed other ways. Suppose I gave you two boiled eggs and two pieces of toast for lunch."
I pause and my husband says – "Well –."
"Well – you'd be insulted. That's no meal. But I give you two poached eggs on toast and you think you've had a nice lunch."
He mutters something. I am suspicious and ask him to repeat, but he refuses.
"Why is it, do you suppose? Why are boiled eggs so different?" I prod him.
He has evidently had enough. He looks at me – then at his book and apparently the book has more charm and appeal. He opens it.
"I don't really care," he says gently, firmly and finally.
"Nervous broke down?" Vactangi asked, "What means that?"
"It's American sickness," I said. "When your brain ain't interested in you any more."
Or the place where an American stops on the road to tell George he can't possibly put a Nash wheel on a Ford car. George remembers that Americans will bet on anything and ends up with $20, whereupon the stranger drives off with a parting word, "You're wasting your time on automobiles. Try the horses," But George decides he is joking because, "Even I know it is impossible to change horses legs around. If they break one, have to shoot."
Or the time he was aroused from sleep by a friend who demanded that George take over his restaurant for a few days. "A thousand sandwiches before noon," the friend instructed him and left. George ponders his fate. "Was unluckier man than me ever born? If there was, he didn't trouble himself to grow up!"
And the time – but read it yourself and forget your troubles.
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