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Title: Onions in the Stew
Author: MacDonald, Betty Bard (1908?-1958)
Date of first publication: 1955
Edition used as base for this ebook:
   Philadelphia and New York: J. B. Lippincott
   ["First Canadian Edition"]
Date first posted: 15 June 2012
Date last updated: 15 June 2012
Project Gutenberg Canada ebook #956

This ebook was produced by Al Haines






                          _Where hearts were high and fortunes low,
                                            and onions in the stew._

                                                     Charles Divine





ONIONS

IN

THE STEW



BY BETTY MACDONALD




J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY

PHILADELPHIA AND NEW YORK




_Copyright, 1954, 1955, by Betty MacDonald_

_First Canadian Edition_

_Designed by Stefan Salter_

_Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 55-6305_




PRINTED AND BOUND IN CANADA

T. H. BEST PRINTING Co. LIMITED, TORONTO




CONTENTS


    I  No Money and No Furniture
   II  Owner Desperate
  III  Two Million if by Sea
   IV  Life as Usual in a Very Unusual Setting
    V  God Is the Boss
   VI  We Made It Ourselves
  VII  The Problem Is to Hold It Back
 VIII  Cirripeds Not Wanted
   IX  Other Friends and Enemies
    X  Master of None
   XI  Bringing in the Sheaves
  XII  Triple That Recipe
 XIII  Why Don't You Just Relax, Betty?
  XIV  Advice, Anybody?
   XV  Adolescence, or Please Keep Imogene Until She Is Thirty
  XVI  Onions in the Stew




For Joan and Jerry and Anne and Bob--our best friends




ONIONS IN THE STEW




CHAPTER I

NO MONEY AND NO FURNITURE

For twelve years we MacDonalds have been living on an island in Puget
Sound.  There is no getting away from it, life on an island is
different from life in the St. Francis Hotel but you can get used to
it, can even grow to like it.  "_C'est la guerre_," we used to say
looking wistfully toward the lights of the big comfortable warm city
just across the way.  Now, as November (or July) settles around the
house like a wet sponge, we say placidly to each other, "I love it
here.  I wouldn't live anywhere else."

I cannot say that everyone should live as we do, but you might be happy
on an island if you can face up to the following:


1. Dinner guests are often still with you seven days, weeks, months
later and sleeping in the lawn swing is _fun_ (I keep telling Don) if
you take two sleeping pills and remember that the raccoons are just
trying to be _friends_.

2. Any definite appointment, such as childbirth or jury duty, acts as
an automatic signal for the ferryboats to stop running.

3. Finding island property is easy, especially up here in the Northwest
where most of the time even the _people_ are completely surrounded by
water.  Financing is something else again.  Bankers are urban and
everything not visible from a bank is "too far out."

4. A telephone call from a relative beginning "Hello, dear, we've been
thinking of you..." means you are going to get somebody's children.

5. Any dinner can be stretched by the addition of noodles to something.

6. If you miss the last ferry--the 1:05 A.M.--you have to sit on the
dock all night, but the time will come when you will be grateful for
that large body of water between you and those thirteen parking tickets.

7. Anyone contemplating island dwelling must be physically strong and
it is an added advantage if you aren't too bright.


Our island, discovered in 1792 by Captain Vancouver and named Vashon
after his friend Admiral James Vashon, is medium sized as islands go,
being approximately fifteen miles from shoulder to calf and five miles
around the hips.  It is green, the intense green of chopped parsley,
plump and curvy, reposes in the icy waters of Puget Sound, runs north
and south between the cities of Seattle and Tacoma and is more or less
accessible to each by ferryboat.

On the map Vashon Island looks somewhat like a peacock and somewhat
like a buzzard.  Which depends on the end you choose for the head and
how long you have been trapped here.  The climate, about ten degrees
warmer and wetter than Seattle and vicinity is ideal for primroses,
currants, rhododendrons, strawberries, mildew and people with dry skin
who like to read.  The population is around five thousand _people_ and
an uncounted number of sniveling cowards who move back to the city for
the winter.

Because of its location and the fact that it rises steeply from the
water into high plateaus, Vashon Island is plethoric with views.
Across the west are the fierce snowy craggy Olympic Mountains and the
magnificent untamed Olympic Peninsula, black with timber, alive with
game and fish, soggy with lakes and streams, quivering with wildness.
Separating Vashon from the Olympic Mountains and Peninsula is the
narrow, winding, lovely West Channel of Puget Sound.  To the east are
the smoky purple Cascade Mountains and Seattle.  North are other
islands, Bainbridge, Blake, Whidbey and the Olympic Mountains.  South
of us is Mount Rainier, that magnificent, unbelievably shy mountain who
parts her clouds and shows her exquisite face only after she has made
sure Uncle Jim and Aunt Helen are really on their way back to
Minneapolis.  Mount Rainier is 14,408 feet high which is higher than
Fujiyama but only half as high as Mount Everest.  It has twenty-six
glaciers, listed in the encyclopedia as quite an accomplishment, and
was also discovered by Captain Vancouver who seems to have spent a
great deal of time cruising around this part of the world discovering
things.  Except in the very early morning or rare summer evenings when
the foothills show, Mount Rainier appears to be a mirage floating in
clouds, appearing and disappearing (mostly disappearing) just above the
horizon.

It is described locally as looking "just like a dish of ice
cream"--strawberry or vanilla depending on the time of day.  To make
the description perfect, the ice cream should have pale blue sauce
drooled over it.

Everything on Vashon Island grows with insane vigor and you have the
distinct feeling, as you leave the dock and start up the main highway,
that you should have hired a native guide or at least brought along a
machete.  Alder, syringa, maple, elderberry, madroa, pine,
salmonberry, willow, wild cucumber, blackberry, fir, laurel and dogwood
crowd the edges of the roads turning them into green tunnels and only
the assiduous chopping and slashing by the county and the telephone and
power companies keeps this jungle from closing up the highways
altogether.

From the water Vashon looks like a stout gentleman taking a Sunday nap
under a wooly dark green afghan.  The afghan, obviously homemade, is
fringed on the edges, occasionally lumpy, eked out with odds and ends
of paler and darker wools, but very ample so that it falls in thick
folds to the water.  Against this vast greenness, houses scattered
along the shore appear small and forlorn, like discarded paper boxes
floated in on the tide.  The few hillside houses look half smothered
and defeated, like frail invalids in the clutches of a huge feather bed.

The farm land of Vashon--Vashon is famous for its red currants, pie
cherries, peaches, strawberries, gooseberries, boysenberries,
loganberries, raspberries, chickens, eggs, goat's milk, Croft lilies
and orchids--is gently sloping and covered with plump green and brown
patchwork fields tucked in around the edges with blanket-stitching
fences.  Scattered here and there over the landscape are rather
dilapidated out-buildings, placid cows and goats stomach-deep in lush
pasture, and churches.  Churches are everywhere.  Vashon was once,
perhaps still is, a mecca for the more vigorously religious--Free
Methodists, Baptists, and so on.  The other milder religions have their
small strongholds too.  As Vashon still retains a pungent frontier
atmosphere the over-all effect is faintly ridiculous--like a man
sitting in the parlor in his undershirt, drinking beer and reading the
Bible.  A tiny white church up to its knees in non-ecclesiastical
currant bushes holds a bony arm bearing a small cross high up toward
the pale sky.  A large hipped white church glares disapprovingly at the
movie theatre across the way.  A small brown church has its frail back
braced against a horde of immense invading alders, its front porch sags
wearily under a load of wild cucumber vines.  A very old trembly gray
church keeps its yard tidy and tries not to notice how its friends have
fallen off.  In among the churches are houses, mostly old, mostly
shapeless and paintless, set in neat green yards, rearing up wild eyed
and rickety out of tangles, peering out of thickets, hiding behind
orchards or teetering nervously on the edge of bluffs above the water.
The newly built, freshly painted houses are either along the main
highway or on the beaches.  Vashon is not a
geranium-planted-in-the-wheel barrow, wagon-wheel-against-the-fence, Ye
Olde Tea Shoppe community.  Our ugliness is rawboned, useful, natural
and honest.  Our beauty is accidental, untampered with, often
breathtaking.

Oval ponds with flat silver surfaces lying in green fields like
forgotten handmirrors.  White pullets flapping across a green broadloom
meadow like scraps of torn paper.  A solitary maple tree sitting
stolidly in the middle of an empty pasture, its full dark green skirt
spread carefully over its thick ankles, a stout lady looking at the
mountain.  A red water tank spraddle-legged above rows of greenhouses,
pale blue and cool like ice cubes.  Green dance-hall streamers of
boysenberry vines looped from post to post.  Scotch broom pouring in
over the hills like a flood of melted butter.  Currant bushes bleeding
red currants down their brown stems.  Peach trees with freshly
whitewashed trunks and crowded bright pink branches marching through
newly plowed orchards like stiff bouquets.  Strawberry patches rolling
right up to the edge of the sky, the troughs between the plants
scalloping the horizon.

Every road on Vashon leads to the water eventually.  From almost every
inch of the island we can see either the water or Mount Rainier or the
Olympics or the Cascades or all four.  All the edges of the island are
fringed with the black spikes of virgin firs.

There are several very high points, perhaps a thousand feet or more
above the water.  From these places we can look down at the gray-blue
Sound winding among islands dark and hairy with trees.  The tides and
currents show up in the channels like spilled ink.  The ferryboats are
white ducks waddling earnestly from shore to shore.  The channel
directly in front of our house, known as the East Channel, is the test
course for the Bremerton Navy Yard.  During the war our horizon was
crossed by a steady procession of large serious gray vessels.  Today we
see only occasional battleships, destroyers or aircraft carriers, but
every evening dark red and orange freighters glide toward the Strait;
their booms fore and aft, picked out by the late sunshine, look like
Tinker Toys.  Filmy scarves of gray smoke trail behind them, a heavy
wake thunders in to shore after they are out of sight.  At night or in
the early morning we hear the chunk, chunk, chunk of tugs no bigger
than chips, huffing and puffing as they drag huge fantails of logs to
the mills.  Sometimes we see a school of blackfish leaping about in the
sunshine like playful submarines.  They slap their tails on the water
and a glistening spray goes fifty feet in the air.

As I say, almost every inch of Vashon Island has a view, but the
gullies, ravines, deep hollows and collars of the highway with no view
except gray sky, wet woods and the ferry cars, seem to be the preferred
home sites.  We have our own school of architecture too--known in our
family as a "Halvorsen House."  A Halvorsen House, obviously the
offspring of the mating of a gas station with a park restroom, is
undeniably sturdy, has small high nearsighted windows under the eaves,
a narrow brimmed roof jammed low on its forehead, no fireplace, no
view, but it is anchored to its land by an enormous full cement
basement or cellar.  Even in the recent real estate slump Halvorsen
Houses sold as fast as they were built.

The town of Vashon, quite a typical western, crossroads settlement, is
small, flourishing, friendly, adequate and tacky.  It has a bank,
library, bakery (that bakes the most delicious bread in the world), two
restaurants, shoestore, movie theatre, ice cream store, television
shop, radio shop, state liquor store, bowling alley, drugstore, two
hardware stores, two grocery stores, beauty parlor, variety shop
(combination drygoods and ten-cent store) two dress shops, two doctors,
two dentists, an optician, a community club, several real estate
offices, a funeral parlor, three gas stations and car repair shops, a
post office, print shop and newspaper office, a bulldozing and
heavy-equipment contractor (whose huge machines scoop out dams, cut
logs, build roads down cliffs, push back the Sound with sea walls, and
clear land), a furniture store, cleaner, barbershop, taxi, beer parlor,
florist and of course its generous complement of churches.  All the
buildings are different.  Most of them have high fronts like caps with
the visors turned up--some are low and squashed like railway express
packages--some have glass bricks set into the wall like clinics--one or
two are made of banana-colored stucco--a couple are red brick.  Vashon
reminds me of a nice girl who doesn't know how to dress.  Her pink hat,
green dress, brown coat, black shoes, gray stockings, yellow scarf,
orange belt and purple gloves will keep out the rain but they'll never
get her elected Peach Festival Queen.

The stores of Vashon have nothing in common with the early day, "hay,
bacon, gasoline and soft drinks" country store.  Our stores are modern,
well stocked and obliging--if they don't have it they will get it.
Only occasionally do they show signs of navet.  Once when we first
moved here I sent Don to get me some wild rice purposely forgetting to
tell him it was $2.25 a package.  He came home with eight boxes and
after I had stopped screaming he explained defensively, "I only had one
but the woman at the checking counter said that as long as they were
two for a quarter why didn't I take a couple more, so I did.  We can
use it, can't we?  She said 'Wild rice don't go good in Vashon.  It's a
slow-mover.'"

Ten years ago a good steak dinner including soup and pie and coffee was
forty-five cents--now it is a dollar without the soup.  Haircuts used
to be thirty-five cents--now are a dollar.  Eight years ago half-soles
were $1.75--today they are $1.75.

Everybody goes to Vashon on Saturday.  The sidewalks overflow with
harassed mothers in blue jeans herding parades of lagging children;
worried old people talking in low voices as they try to stretch their
pensions; Indians lolling against the buildings eating ice cream cones;
red-cheeked farmers tossing plump sacks of feed into the back of old
trucks; husbands waiting martyred in parked cars; giggling schoolgirls
with shifty eyes pushing each other off the sidewalks; small boys
making odd buzzing noises as they dart around the shoppers; plump
gray-haired women in starched housedresses studying long lists or
giving the high school girls cruel eyes; spindly-legged grocery boys
staggering under mountainous loads as they search wildly for "that red
sedan with the dent in the fender"; men with greasy hair and pants, low
on their hips, hanging around the beer parlor; boys with crew cuts and
blue jeans, low on their hips, hanging around old cars.

At night from the north end of Vashon we can see the lights of Seattle
glittering on the horizon like a lapful of costume jewelry.  From the
south end the lights of Tacoma twinkle briskly along the water, then
blaze up and mingle with the stars.  We like this.  We say, there just
across the water is a city of almost a million--another of a quarter of
a million is there.  We can go _there_ any time.  It assures us that we
are here by choice.

How is it we moved to Vashon Island in the first place?  Well, it was
just after Pearl Harbor and my husband, Donald, and I had recently met
and married.  Up to the time of our marriage I had been living at home
with my two children, Anne twelve and Joan eleven, my mother and two of
my four sisters, in a brown house in the University District where we
had numerous pets, a great deal of fun, hordes of company and hardly
any money.

I was working for a contractor who was building something or other,
very vital, for the government at terrific expense in Alaska.  It seems
to me that I have heard that it was a dock and somebody forgot to take
the tides into consideration and so most of the times it stands thirty
feet above the water.  Anyway my title was Chief Clerk which sounds
impressive but wasn't, as I spent my days drinking coffee and checking
purchase orders for: 500 cans cabbage--#2-1/2--at 16 ea.... $80.00.  I
didn't have to check the price or the totals--we had a man for that job
(very responsible--required arithmetic).  All I had to do was to see
that the mimeographing was clear and "cabbage" was spelled right.  I
was paid $47.50 a week which was never enough but was considered
marvelous pay for a woman in those days in Seattle where it is still
the prevailing idea that all female employees (bless their little
hearts) would really rather be home baking Toll House cookies and any
male not down on all fours (this does not include the government where
you can be even farther down if political affiliations are okay) is
automatically paid twice as much as the brightest female.

Don, who was doing final test at the Boeing Airplane Factory (I don't
remember his salary, but it never seemed to be enough either), shared a
rather dank, dark hillside duplex just off the campus of the University
of Washington with an intellectual pal who read philosophy by
candlelight, never shaved, tucked fishbones behind the cushions of the
couch and considered a thorough housecleaning the tacking of another
Japanese print over another spot of mildew.  On stormy evenings, with a
fire on the hearth and enough martinis, the apartment seemed rather
desirable, but I shuddered when I thought of it in the daylight.

Then Don's roommate suddenly decided to take his fishbones to Algiers
and Don asked me to marry him.  We spent our weekend honeymoon (all
that was allowed defense workers) in the apartment sans the roommate
but avec the mildew, an eviction notice from the landlord who was tired
of intellectuals, a shutoff notice from the gas company (gas had been
roommate's responsibility, Don explained) and an old buddy of Don's who
turned up in quite an unsteady condition and couldn't or wouldn't grasp
the fact that "good ole Don" was married.  I was beginning to wonder if
he was, especially as Boeing for a wedding present had transferred him
to the graveyard shift, which meant that he would work all night, I
would work all day and we would see each other and the children briefly
on Sundays.  The eviction notice stated firmly that we were to be out
of the apartment by the following Monday.  From Monday to Friday I
visited practically every real estate office in the city
(roof-over-head seemed to be this roommate's responsibility) and was
told by each that there was nothing to rent, there never had been
anything to rent, there never would be anything to rent and "there's a
war on!"

Sunday evening Don and Anne and Joan and I were sitting in front of the
fire in his apartment feeling like people without passports, when the
very charming Japanese professor, who with his wife lived in the top
part of the duplex, came down and told us that they were being sent to
internment camp and we could have their apartment.  We thanked him
fervently, but felt like grave snatchers as we piled into the car and
raced over to see the landlord who was old and not friendly and brought
out a list two miles long of applicants who he said were of _much_
longer standing and _much_ more desirable and _didn't_ have children.
Don talked and talked in his quiet voice, I sat up straight and tried
to look like a good tenant and the girls explained earnestly to the
landlord, who had big tufts of hair in his ears, that they weren't to
be considered "children"--that most hated word in landlord language--as
they were very old and anyway they were just going to visit until
school was out.  Finally, grudgingly, the landlord agreed to let us
have the apartment but he called after us in a loud voice as we were
getting in the car, "I expect you folks to tend to business now.  No
wild parties and don't let the pipes freeze."  Anne and Joan thought
this hysterically funny and collapsed in the back seat in giggles.  I
was furious.  I thought the landlord was rude and unfair and I wanted
Don to do something manly and retaliative.  I demanded it.

Don looked at me quizzically and said, "'Hope not sunshine ev'ry hour.
Fear not clouds will always lour.'"  Don is a Scot.

Anne and Joan celebrated our good fortune with a root beer float.
Tuesday, Don and I moved in.

The upstairs apartment was light and airy, had a wood-burning
fireplace, a view of Mount Rainier if you had good eyes, two large
friendly gray squirrels who lived in the maple tree outside the bedroom
window, and a studio couch in an alcove for Anne and Joan.  We were
very happy and quite comfortable.  Then came warm weather and the
normally quiet hillside around us suddenly exploded with shrieking
children, barking dogs, yowling cats and yoohooing mothers.  Peddlers
followed each other up our stairs like ants and when they weren't
banging on the back door they were leaning on the front doorbell.  Don
made a large sign: DEFENSE WORKER SLEEPING--PLEASE DO NOT DISTURB!
which I hung on the door when I left in the morning.  It didn't help at
all.  The peddlers pushed it aside and knocked under it.  Don grew very
pale and much dourer.  Each evening when I telephoned the girls they
reminded me wistfully that school would be out in a few weeks "and
where am I going to keep my bicycle, skis, shell collection?" etc.  The
man across the street began digging up his vegetable garden.  The
people next door to him got a puppy.  I decided that I had better start
looking for a house.  Any house big enough for Don and me, Anne and
Joan, Mother's dog Tudor, my cat Mrs. Miniver, our several thousand
books and records, Joan's dried snakeskin and shell box of pretty
rocks, Anne's collection of Sonja Henie pictures and Alma Gluck
records, their bicycles, roller skates, ice skates and skis, my office
dress, my other dress, Don's college bluebooks, his elk antlers, the
brown suit he bought but could never wear because it had quite
obviously been fashioned for a chimpanzee as the sleeves of the jacket
were longer than the trouser legs, and the Jackie Coogan doll he had
won at a carnival in Council Bluffs, Iowa, some twenty-two years
before.  The only trouble was that in Seattle, where we lived, there
weren't any houses for rent and none for sale for nothing, which is
what we had.  We did like the country, it is true, we still do, but we
would have gladly moved into the police station if it had been for rent
furnished.  You see, in addition to no money, we had no furniture.




CHAPTER II

OWNER DESPERATE

I strongly suspect that most real estate salesmen have diplomas from
that charm school whose other graduates are the complaint clerk in the
tax assessor's office and all room clerks in large hotels.  The charm
school whose motto is: "A kick in the groin for everyone--we don't care
who you are."

"I would like to rent a furnished house," I said appealingly to Mr.
Swanson of the Cozy Homes Realty.

"And I would like a million dollars, ha, ha, ha!" said jolly old Mr.
Swanson, his eyes behind his spectacles as merry as cold grease.

"I would like to rent a furnished..." I said wistfully to Mrs. Wirts of
the Country Homes Realty: Just Ask Us--We Have It.

"Say, don't you know there's a war on?" yelled Mrs. Wirts from her desk
across the room--obviously a renter didn't warrant the unwedging of her
large tweed behind from the swivel chair.

"I would like to rent..." I said faintly to Mr. Evinrude of the
Evinrude, Rillets, Wasket and Fester Realty Company: Waterfront Our
Specialty.

"Listen, lady," said Mr. Evinrude jumping to his feet and digging the
point of his Eversharp pencil into my thorax, "we haven't had a rental
in this office for fourteen months and we prob'ly won't for another
fourteen months.  There's a war on, in case you haven't heard."

"I would like to rent...." I said wearily to Miss Chunk of the Rural
Realty Company.

"There's a war on ... it's Boeing ... the shipyards ... Alaska ...
Bremerton Navy Yard...."  It sounded reasonable.  A war boom equals an
influx of war workers equals no houses, but I wasn't convinced then and
I'm not now.  Because after _that_ war was over and _those_ war workers
had gone home one of my sisters wanted to buy a house with four
bedrooms for $20,000.  She went to at least fifteen real estate firms
and was told over and over again that if she wanted such a _big_ house
with inside plumbing she would "have to go thirty-thirty-five thousand
anyways."

A neighbor of hers had a four-bedroom house with inside plumbing she
wanted to sell for $20,000.  She was told over and over again that such
a _big_ house wouldn't sell.  That nobody wanted a _big_ house.  That
they would be lucky if they could unload such a _big_ house at $7,500.
My sister and her neighbor had been to the same real estate agencies
but they didn't find it out for four months and then only through their
milkman who introduced them and closed the deal.

Having, during the course of the last twelve years, had dealings both
as buyer and seller with about one hundred and ninety-seven real estate
agents here and in California where everybody is supposed to be
super-charged with enthusiasm and loyalty to the climate at least, I
have a few simple warnings to post:


1. Be prepared to answer all relevant questions such as: How old are
you?  How much do you weigh?

2. Do not be misled into thinking food will improve a salesman's
attitude.  "I never cared much for these rustic joints," Mrs. Morks
said frankly.  "Say, would it be too much trouble if I had another tuna
on white without the pimento, dear?  It's a long ways out here, you
know."

3. If you say specifically that you want to _rent a furnished_ house
_on the water_, be prepared to spend the next few weeks looking at
_unfurnished_ houses for _sale_ on _dry hills_.  Do not expect even a
view of the water in spite of the fact that any salesman connected with
any real estate firm in the Pacific Northwest cannot take two steps in
any direction without tripping over a lake or an arm of the Sound.

4. Remember that: STATELY WHITE COLONIAL FAMILY HOME merely means
painted white no matter how long ago.  WIDOW'S PARADISE indicates owned
by widow or should be owned by widow--obvious assumption being that all
widows are bead brains.  TERRITORIAL VIEW is phrase used for sewage
disposal plants, walls of other houses, street car tracks, gasoline
storage tanks, garbage dumps and telephone poles.  It is to be
distinguished from MOUNTAIN VIEW--any rise of ground, or FOREST
VIEW--one spindly fir with two pickers near the top.  RIGHT
NEIGHBORHOOD FOR KIDDIES describes main highways, gas works, red light
district, next door to tavern and all property on condemned water.


In the Pacific Northwest, there are several hundred islands, varying in
size from small enough to be cuddled in the crook of your arm to over a
hundred miles long.  Not one of them, no matter how small, has that
discarded floating paper-plate look so often associated with the word
"island."  These are young, virile, heavily wooded sturdy offspring who
have so recently burst from the water they are still shaking the drops
out of their high wooded crowns.  Five of the larger islands are within
commuting distance of Seattle.  They are all ringed with beaches both
sandy and rocky, and homes, both permanent and summer, some of which
might be for rent, we thought.  But when I tackled a reasonably
intelligent-looking real estate agent and asked him about these
islands, he treated me as if I had bounded in and demanded a snap
decision as to the exact number of female seals in residence on the
Pribilof Islands.  "Vashon Island?" he kept repeating incredulously.
"Bainbridge?  Whidbey?  What ever give you the idea to move over there?
My gosh, I've lived in Seattle thirty-one years and I never even seen
them islands.  Now we gotta little six-on-one dream for sale on Highway
99----"

"We'd better look for ourselves," I told Don after the tenth try.

We investigated Bainbridge Island first because I used to visit there
when I was a little girl and had pleasant memories of large,
well-furnished houses with inside plumbing, electric lights, even grand
pianos, all owned by _darling_ people who would undoubtedly not only
let us move in but would probably not let us pay any rent.  All the
houses, I remembered, were delightfully rustic, had orchards with
yellow plums, sandy beaches with clams and gardens with bulbs.

Don had also visited on Bainbridge Island.  Smiling dreamily he said,
"And then we chartered this boat and loaded on the beer, there were
about eighteen cases, and for three days Jack's girl sat in the bathtub
wearing the captain's hat.  We lost Bill overboard I don't remember
just where but I'm pretty sure it was near Bainbridge."

I decided to take the children with us because I wanted Don to see how
much fun an island could be with a little family, all _decent_ people,
none in captain's hats.  Friday night I told Anne and Joan that the
next day we were going to take a _lovely_ picnic and go across the
_beautiful_ Sound on a _funny_ old ferryboat and look for a cozy house
where we could all be together.  My voice oozed out of my mouth like
molasses, and because of the sentimental picture of our all being
together, I blinked up a few tears.

Anne and Joan looked at each other knowingly, at me suspiciously, at
Don belligerently and wailed at Mother, "But we always go to the movie
show on Saturday, don't we, Margar?  We promised Patsy and Genevieve
and anyway we're having macaroni and cheese for dinner, aren't we,
Margar?"

Don was frankly relieved, but I was hurt.  Not as hurt, of course, as I
had been when Anne was in the fourth grade and wouldn't let me come to
school on parents' night because she was ashamed of me because I didn't
look like Ethel's mother who had the general proportions and texture of
a Sherman tank.  Nor as hurt as I had been when Anne and Joan asked me
not to walk to church with them because I smoked (though not on the way
to church).  Or as hurt as I had been when Joan explained sadly that
the reason her friend Elma couldn't stay all night was because we
played the radio and kept Jesus out of the house.

The big weakness in a working mother is that absence does make the
heart grow fonder, even producing in her a half-baked tendency to
remember the children as lonely little angels with great big Valentine
hearts filled to bursting with goodness and love for Mommy.  It was
always a shock to be reunited with the truth, which is that a child is
a young human whose natural instinct is to get her own way one hundred
percent of the time, even if it involves moving the earth off its axis,
or Mother off her rocker.  My mother comforted me by explaining again
and again that "Anne and Joan are _too_ normal.  All children like to
do the same thing every day at the same time."

It was just as well that Don and I did go by ourselves as the day was
gray and raw and we finally ate our lunch in the car in a nice warm gas
station.

We took the nine o'clock ferry from Colman Dock in Seattle.  I told Don
we wouldn't bother about breakfast at home because they had such
delicious food on the ferry.

"Like what?" he asked suspiciously.

"Like buttermilk hotcakes and little pig sausages," I said, thinking of
my happy childhood.  "And the ferry ride takes forty-five minutes, so
we'll have plenty of time."

The ferry ride did take forty-five minutes, but a clammy doughnut
beaded with moisture and a cup of coffee evidently just dipped out of
the bilge were the only refreshments offered.  When the ferry docked we
drove off, and started looking for a real estate office.  We found one,
not too far from the dock.  It was small and white with vines over the
doorway and the proprietor, Mr. Haggerty, was so pleasant I had to go
out and look again to be sure the office sign did say Real Estate.  Not
once did Mr. Haggerty say "there's a war on," but only that he didn't
have much to rent because of a shipyard operating on the island.  "I'll
be delighted to show you what I have, though," he said, getting some
big old-fashioned keys out of a drawer.

What he had was one large thin-walled rickety summer house, miles and
miles and miles from the ferry, a store, a school or another house.  It
had no electricity and the bathroom was on the back porch.  The house
did have a fine view of the Olympic Mountains, a sandy beach, four
bedrooms, adequate lumpy beds and enough sagging wicker furniture and
it was for rent for sixty dollars a month.  Don wanted to take it at
once.  But I, who had lived without electricity or friends and with the
toilet outdoors, stood firm.  By standing firm I mean that I started
out in a well-modulated voice to point out the more glaring
inconveniences, especially to a working mother, and ended up bawling
about the hardships I had endured with my other husband.

Even then Don gave up reluctantly and I really sympathized with him
because in those days, giving up a furnished house for rent, any house,
was like kicking aside a big package of new fifty-dollar bills with an
elastic band around it just lying there on the sidewalk with nobody in
sight who might have dropped it.

The only other place for rent on Bainbridge, Mr. Haggerty told us with
unparalleled honesty, was much farther from the ferry, had no lights
either and was at the foot of a steep cliff.  "It's easy to get to at
low tide," he said, laughing.  "The rest of the time you'd better be a
fish."

"Let's go see it anyway," Don said, assuming a lifetime-lease look.  I
stiffened and got tears in my eyes and Mr. Haggerty winked and said he
had forgotten the key.

So then I told him about my happy childhood and the yellow plums and
asked about my friends with the grand pianos and chintz couches.  He
said, "The Garsons?  The Garsons.  You mean the Garsons at Willow
Point.  Well, my golly, they haven't even _been_ on the island for
fifteen years."

"What about the Emersons?" I asked.

"The Emersons?  The Emersons who used to live on Shady Beach?  Why,
Mrs. Emerson died twelve years ago and Mr. Emerson was so broke up he
went to California to live."  We went through the Hedlunds, the
Crawfords, the Wickhams, and the Taylors.  If they weren't dead they
had all been gone at least ten years, more like twenty.  So I brushed a
few crumbs off my Civil War uniform and we all got in the car and left.

We decided to try Whidbey Island next.  This time we will take a
picnic, I said, and invited Anne and Joan to go.  They looked at each
other and said, "Sunday?  You mean this Sunday?" and I said yes and
Anne wailed, "But I promised Marilyn I would go to her house right
after Sunday School and try on lipstick with her."

Joan said, "But, Mommy, Johnny and I are fixing up a camp in his
basement and anyway his mother's baking cinnamon rolls.  Why don't you
ever go on Saturday?"

"I've already tried Saturday," I said dryly.

"But that was last Saturday," Anne said accusingly.

"Why doesn't Johnny's mother bake on Saturday?" I asked rather sharply.

"Oh, she usually does," Joan said, "but her stove was broken."

So Don and I drove north and took a ferry from an improbable-sounding
place named Mukilteo.  Whidbey Island is approximately ninety miles
long, has hundreds of miles of beautiful sandy beaches, faces the
Strait of Juan de Fuca and the Olympic Mountains on the west and Camano
Island, Possession Sound and Saratoga Passage on the east.  It is
revered for getting less rain than Seattle and vicinity, _but_--and
this should have loomed large to someone who had to be at her desk at
seven-thirty in the morning after getting breakfast, fixing lunches,
making the beds, arranging about dinner and perhaps a little
mascara--its _southernmost_ tip was at least twenty-five miles from
Seattle and its most attractive beaches were at the northern
ninety-mile end.

But it was spring and the apple trees were sticks of pink cotton candy,
dandelions were flung over the green-velvet fields like gold pieces,
meadowlarks paused on fence posts to toss songs into the morning, and
the bleakness of winter, with its dreary getting up and going to bed in
darkness, seemed a long way off.

Enthusiastically I said to Don, "We just have to find a place on
Whidbey Island, it is so beautiful."

Just then the car got something caught in its throat and began gagging
and coughing in a very last-gasp manner.  We turned off the highway and
came to a stop under a maple tree newly equipped with pale green shiny
oilcloth leaves.  Don got out, lifted the hood of the car and began
poking around.  "The fan seems to be broken," he said finally, sadly.
"I guess we had better go home, if we can."

We made it to the Mukilteo dock where with one last belch and shudder
the car lost consciousness.

We walked up to a large gray building, about a block away, with GARAGE
across the front of its cap, and Don, in his low, quiet voice, told
some striped-overall legs sticking out from under a pickup truck what
had happened.  As Don talked the man hammered vigorously, loudly on
something, tap, tap, tap.  I didn't think he could hear but he
apparently did for after a few hundred taps he came sliding out, stood
up, wiped his hands on some waste and walked down to the dock with us.
He lifted up the hood of the car, looked at the engine, lifted up the
trunk and looked at the two hundred or so books Don kept there and
said, "I'd trade her in if I was you."

"All right," said Don amiably.  "What do you have?"

"I got a Chrysler sedan that's in awful good shape," the man said.
"Come on back to the garage and I'll show it to you."

When we got back to the garage he pointed out a dark blue sedan dozing
by the grease rack.  "She's a dilly," he said.  "Belonged to an old
lady who only drove her on Sundays.  Runs like a watch."

I, very innocent and not knowing that every used car on every lot in
the United States of America is supposed to have belonged to either a
sea captain or an old lady who only drove on Sundays, thought the car
actually looked like an old lady.  Plump and clean and navy blue and
responsible.

Don kicked the tires non-committally.

"Drive her around the block," the garageman said generously.  "She's a
sweetheart."

We drove "sweetheart" around the block.  She was quiet and sedate and
her clock ticked.

I said, "Let's buy her."  The car was definitely a she.  Don, who is
not given to snap decisions and can take fifteen minutes to answer "Do
you want mustard on your bologna sandwich?", said nothing.  He was
considering.

When we got back to the garage the man took us into his little office
where he kept parts, waste, cans of oil, copies of the _Police
Gazette_, empty coffee cups and bills of sale.  He sat down in an old
swivel chair and leaned way back.  I sat on a straight chair.  Don
leaned against a shelf stacked with cans of anti-freeze which was very
scarce at that time.  The garageman began to talk first.  He was very
very sad about Don's car.  After a while Don began to talk.  He was
very very sad about the garageman's car.  Finally, suddenly, when I
thought they were both going to cry, they came to terms and in
practically no time at all we were wheeling along the highway in
"sweetheart" who had only two noticeable flaws.  Her trunk was now
filled with books and she had no door handles on the inside.  When I
asked the garageman about the door handles he said, "Golly, I don't
know--probably took off because of children.  You know how you're
always readin' about kids openin' the door when the car's goin' and
fallin' out in front of a truck?"  He implied that we were mighty lucky
that someone had been kind enough to save us from this tragedy.
However, riding in a car without door handles on the inside made me
feel like a canned peach peering out of its jar at the landscape.

We were invited to spend the next weekend on Vashon Island.  The
Havers, whom we visited, had a charming house right on the beach, the
tides were perfect for clamming; and Saturday night as Don and I lay in
bed on their porch, listening to the slurp, splash, slurp of the waves
against the sea wall, and watching the ferry gliding across the moonlit
water, we decided that this was the perfect place.  The beach was rich
with clams and driftwood.  The water was filled with salmon, sole, cod
and Spanish mackerel.  The soil was so fertile that syringa and alder
grew twelve feet a season.  The climate was warmer than Seattle, the
ferry crossing took only fifteen minutes and it was walking distance
from the ferry.  The next morning, as we dug clams in the hot sunshine,
we told George Haver, "We like this place.  This exact spot.  We want
to live here."

George was glad that we liked his beach, but very discouraging about
our finding anything to rent.  He explained that all the people on that
particular beach had been coming over there for thirty-five years and,
even though there was no road and they had to walk in by a county trail
and bring in all their provisions and possessions by boat or by wife,
they were all very attached to their houses and never rented them.  We
were so downcast by this information that he took us for a boat ride
around the point.

In the course of the ride he said, "As long as you're disappointed
anyway, I'm going to show you a house that will spoil you for any other
beach house."

He steered the boat to shore, pulled it up on a log and we climbed a
small winding path to the house.

He had told the truth.  It was the most attractive house we had seen
and it certainly did spoil us for all the sagging
built-by-Grandpa-designed-by-the-cat structures we had seen and were to
see.  Unfortunately, however, the Hendersons, who were living in it and
who had bought it from the doctor who had built it, were very happy
there.

"We are going to live here forever," they told us, smugly.

The house, built of hewn fir timbers, was snuggled on the lap of the
plump green hillside.  The roof was hand-split cedar shakes, each shake
at least an inch thick.  The rain and the salt air had turned it all a
soft pewter color.  The kitchen, which was small, had knotty pine walls
with a bricked-in electric stove and a trash burner across one corner.
Against the windows which looked at Puget Sound and Mount Rainier over
an enormous window box filled with pink geraniums, was a Flemish blue
drop-leaf table and four stools.  The drainboard and insides of the
cupboards were the same Flemish blue.  The floor was pine planks put
down with wooden pegs and calked.  The living room, which opened from
the kitchen by a swinging pine half-door, was about forty feet long,
had the same plank floors (four by twelves), an enormous stone
fireplace that went up two stories, a small rustic stairway leading to
a balcony from which opened three small knotty pine bedrooms and a
bath.  At the south end of the balcony was the master bedroom.  It had
a beamed ceiling, pine walls and a fireplace with a copper hood.  In
all the rooms were hand-braided rugs and lovely pine furniture made by
the doctor.  There were two patios, one off the kitchen, one in the
angle of the ell formed by the master-bedroom wing and the living room.
They were made of rounds of cedar with flowering moss in between.
Around the south patio was a rockery filled with heather.  Above it on
a knoll was a gnarled old apple tree.  The ground under the apple tree
was carpeted with blue ajuga and yellow tulips.  Across the front of
the house and available to the living room by French doors was a rustic
porch overlooking the water and the sandy beach and facing Mount
Rainier.

It was the house everybody dreams of finding.  But it definitely wasn't
for rent or for sale, so we finished our drinks, patted the dogs and
said goodbye to Vashon.

Then my sister Dede found and rented a small beach house on
Quartermaster Harbor at the other end of Vashon Island.  For the next
few weeks each Saturday morning we would load the car with groceries,
the children, Tudor the dog, Mother and her sketching things, bathing
suits, sun-tan oil and fifty pounds of ice because the house had that
kind of an icebox, and go to Vashon.

In spite of having to stop the car every fifteen minutes for Tudor to
be sick and so often not making it.  In spite of my two dear little
daughters acting as if we had put leg irons on them and were dragging
them to the stocks because we were interrupting their regular Saturday
and Sunday plans.  In spite of the fact that the ice always leaked on
something not improved by ice water, such as cigarettes or Cornflakes.
In spite of the fact that the house was really very inconvenient with
remarkably uncomfortable beds and a filthy little coal-oil stove that
made even the orange juice taste like coal oil--we had a wonderful
time.  The water was warm for swimming.  There were huge silvery piles
of driftwood for beach fires.  There were the mingled smells of fresh
coffee and salt air.  And there was sleep refreshing as only a sleep
induced by too much sun, too much swimming and too much food, can be.

Don and I became revitalized and renewed our efforts to find a place on
Vashon on the water.  We went to see George Haver again and he produced
a brother-in-law in the real estate business who was affable, knew and
didn't care that we had no money, was familiar with every inch of
Vashon Island and told the truth.  He said, "Why don't you just look at
_everything_ for sale or rent?"  So we did.

We looked at houses at the bottom of cliffs.  We looked at crumbling
houses furnished in sagging wicker and discarded pottery.  We
discovered that beach houses, no matter how attractive they are on the
outside, are usually the catch-alls for things not quite up to snuff or
down to St. Vincent de Paul.  With unrelieved regularity we saw lamp
shades of pleated black chiffon over pink, black iron spears supporting
faded brocade draperies, mahjong sets, large wicker trays with tassels,
framed Maxfield Parrishes, frayed faded American oriental rugs, bulging
Morris chairs, mostly with broken back controls, and wine jugs made
into lamps.  To say nothing of the entire sets of clear green glass
dishes--the plates divided into stalls to keep three items of food from
touching--the wooden candelabra with imitation gold wax dripped down
the sides and the bunches and bunches of gilded cattails mixed with
magenta everlasting flowers.  Don and I got so that we could tell by
the kind of fern in the abalone-shell hanging basket whether the rugs
would be ragged Wilton or faded oriental.

Still we kept on.  After we had finished Vashon we went to Camano
Island.  We looked at Manchester on the Olympic Peninsula.  We drove to
Tacoma and Everett and even went clear up to the San Juan Islands, an
archipelago of 172 islands lying between Vancouver Island and the
mainland in the Strait of Georgia.  The San Juans are about
seventy-five miles north of Seattle but we told each other wistfully,
"If we do find the place in the San Juans, perhaps we can manage with
Mother until the war and our jobs are over."

Then one morning I was in a restaurant drinking coffee and dispiritedly
leafing through the "For Sale--Waterfront" section of the paper when I
saw what appeared to be an advertisement of the Henderson house on
Vashon.  The ad said: Lodge-type log house, huge stone fireplace, 400'
of sandy beach--for sale $7000 furnished.

I called Mrs. Henderson at the office where she worked and she told me
that it was their house.  That her husband had been offered a wonderful
job in California and they thought he should take it.  I asked her why
she hadn't called me and she said, "Oh, I thought of course you had
found a house by this time."  I choked back an impulse to say, "Oh,
sure and while I was at it I worked out a plan for world peace and a
cure for cancer."  Instead, I made arrangements to go over the next
weekend.  My hands were shaking as I hung up the phone.

The next Saturday, as Don and I swung along the trail leading from the
dock to the Hendersons' house, carrying our share of the groceries and
liquor for the weekend (unwritten law of beach Mrs. Henderson had said,
but one obviously repealed the day we moved in) I said excitedly, "Don,
I just know we are going to get this house.  I feel it was meant to be.
Won't living over here be wonderful for the girls?"

Don, who is a pure Scot on both sides of his family, is not exactly an
optimist.  In fact, if I were to be absolutely truthful, and I wouldn't
dare because we are so happily married, I would say that Don is a
charter member, perhaps the founder, of that old Scottish brotherhood
sworn always to bring bad news home even if it means mounting a rabid
camel and riding naked over the Himalayas in winter.

As we admired the huge virgin firs against the blue sky, breathed
deeply of the fresh salty air--Vashon air is really so pure and clean
that even coming from Seattle, which is also supposed to have good air,
seems like stepping from a coal mine into an oxygen tent--and listened
to the shrill happy summer sounds coming from the houses below us on
the shore, I said again, "Don't you have that feeling, Don?  That this
house _was_ meant for us?"

Don said, "I'd have more of that feeling if we had any money.  There
certainly is plenty of erosion along here."

But the house _was_ for sale and the Hendersons had gotten it from the
doctor who built it _with no down payment_ because the doctor had to go
in the Navy, and they were willing, really eager, to sell it to us the
same way.  We were to pay $150 a month until we had established a down
payment, then we would go into the bank and have it refinanced.  We
were all terribly casual and gay, made more so by the fact that none of
us had any money, didn't want the others to find it out and I kept my
hand over Don's truthful mouth practically all day Sunday.

We made arrangements to come out the next weekend with two payments
(which we intended to borrow) and the house would be ours.

"You see," I said to Don as we stood on the upper deck of the ferry on
our way home.  "It _was_ meant to be."

Don pointed at the cars bouncing onto the ferry, each one denting its
exhaust pipe because the deckhand hadn't lowered the ramp far enough,
which he still doesn't, and remarked gloomily, "That ramp isn't down
far enough."




CHAPTER III

TWO MILLION IF BY SEA

I guess that all of us have said at some time or another, "I will never
allow _things_ to dominate my life.  I will keep my possessions down to
a minimum."  If, like me, you have nurtured the idea that you have kept
your possessions down to Deargrandmother's Satsuma tea set and a few
first editions, then you should move to an island.  Try mixing that
minimum with water and see what you get.  Deargrandmother's Satsuma tea
set turned out to be three old trunks minus handles, filled with
clothes and/or ingots, eight barrels of vases and dishes, stuff out of
ten medicine cabinets, assorted boxes of canned goods, records, elk
antlers, photographs, pillows, pots and pans, record players, bamboo
rakes, skirt hangers, lamp shades, ironing boards and dog beds.  My few
first editions, supplemented by the contents of the trunk of Don's car,
were mistakenly left to rise in the moving van overnight and when we
unloaded them at Vashon they had swelled into eighty-seven cartons
filled with lead.

This was October after an entire summer spent with the fluctuating
Hendersons who would sell one weekend, the next greeted us with tears
in their eyes and said they couldn't bear to leave.  My sisters Dede
and Madge had married and moved into small apartments, Mother was to
stay with my sister Mary while her husband was overseas, so I got the
washing machine, the _Encyclopaedia Britannica_, Mother's portrait and
the Christmas tree ornaments.  There was also a gentlemen's agreement
that I would take my children, Mother's dog and my cat if Mary would
take the assorted turtles, goldfish and canaries belonging to the
household.  The first step was to move out of our apartment into
Mother's house.  This was accomplished easily.  We simply kept dumping
things in the car and driving them to Mother's until the apartment was
empty.  I packed.  Don carried and drove.  I started out very
methodically.  "Books--reference" I marked on the outside of a carton.
"Sheets--towels" I marked on another.  "Silverware" another.  When Don
attempted to help I said kindly but firmly, "You had better let me do
it, dear.  I know exactly what I am doing and I want things to be
orderly."

"Living room draperies" I wrote on a neat newspaper bundle.  "Candles,
vases, bric-a-brac" I marked a carton.  Then somehow I began running
out of enough of the same thing to fill a box--also out of boxes and
newspapers--also out of strength.  By the end of the day I was rolling
a jar of mayonnaise, a heel of salami and a half-filled bottle of
Guerlain's Blue Hour perfume in my tweed skirt and not even stamping
the bundle "Perishable."

Next came getting the things to Vashon, which was easy too.  Alison's
husband borrowed a moving van, someone else solicited an unemployed
musician to drive it, Don and the children and I loaded it and the car
and we were off.  One last sentimental look at the old brown house
revealed that we had left Mother's portrait, the skis, and Tudor the
dog, who didn't care for cars and kept oozing in one side and out the
other.  The rearranging to get these things in took just the right
amount of time for us to miss the ferry and wait an hour on the dock.
Also, just as we turned onto the West Seattle Viaduct, Tudor reared up,
put his paws on Don's shoulders and threw up down the back of his blue
cashmere sweater.  Don groaned and looked accusingly at me.  He
couldn't do much else because the traffic is always very heavy on the
viaduct and a sudden stop or swerve might mean being squashed by a
Standard Oil truck, and I for one certainly didn't want gasoline all
over my clean jeans, I told the girls gaily.  Crowded in the front seat
with Don and me were the two girls, the portrait, the elk antlers, and
a lot of strained silence.  When we got to the dock at last, I
carefully maneuvered the sweater and T-shirt over Don's head and
substituted the red sweatshirt still warm from Mrs. Miniver, the cat.
Tudor watched the operation reproachfully, the girls giggled behind
their hands and Don's expression, to put the kindliest interpretation
upon it, was rage suffused with despair spread thinly over a boiling
caldron of desire to commit wificide and dogicide.

Things weren't really going too badly, however, we kept saying loudly,
hollowly.  We _had_ intended to get the ten-o'clock ferry, but, as is
usually the case with expeditions of this kind, we weren't even packed
by ten.  The ferry we had just missed was the two-thirty.  Of course
everybody was starving and the little store on the dock had only a
gum-ball machine and a few O'Henry bars so stale the chocolate had
turned to silver and the peanuts tasted like peach pits, but we ate
them with gusto, even Tudor who the girls felt should be rewarded.

"For what?" Don asked grimly.

Harris, the musician, was sleeping in the van so we didn't bother him.

The day was lovely--hazy with a sun like a marigold.  The tide was
going out and the wet sand by the dock steamed faintly and gave off a
nice seaweedy smell.  "Wood will certainly be no problem anyway," I
said cheerfully, pointing out logs in huge jackstraw heaps along the
shores on either side of the dock.

"I like wood that is already sawed," Don said, unenthusiastically.

"Over at Marilyn's summer home we gathered bark," Anne said.  "Even
when it is soaking wet it burns keen."

"Remember those creosote logs we got at Dede's?" Joan said.  "There's a
nice little fat one.  They weigh a lot but they certainly make a hot
fire.  Let's get it, Don."

Don said sternly, "One of the first laws of the beach is that anything
on your property belongs to you.  The man who lives in that green house
is probably counting on that nice fat little log for his fire tonight."

"Darn!" Joan said.  "It's just the right size."

"If there are creosotes on this side there are probably some on the
other," Don said.

"But the tide will be high on our side," Joan said.

So Don explained about the tides and he apparently knew what he was
talking about because he used words such as "lunar," "barometric
pressure," "coastal configuration" and "tidal bore," but I only half
listened as I am very well satisfied with my conception of the tide
situation, which is that every twelve hours somebody, perhaps the man
in the moon, pulls the plug and lets out some of the ocean.  After a
while he turns on the faucet and fills it up again.  If he is in a
hurry we have a tidal wave.

The wash from an aircraft carrier suddenly began pounding the shore.
Because the tide was out, the waves slapped the flat beach with a
tremendous noise like giant handclapping.  The splintery old dock
trembled and Tudor barked.  Anne and Joan laughed and shouted and the
day lost a little of its grimness and took on more of a holiday aspect.

Then the ferry came in and Don bought our first commuter's ticket: car
and driver ten rides for $3.70; passengers, ten cents each.  Today the
fare is ninety cents for a car and driver; twenty-five cents for a
passenger--a commuter's ticket is slightly less.

Hamburgers in the little lunchroom on the ferry revived us all still
further--even Harris, who told us proudly he had drunk a pint of gin
while driving the van through the traffic.

Our new beautiful pewter-colored dream house had no road.  This tiny
flaw in its perfection, at first candidly spoken of and looked upon as
a flaw but so insignificant compared to things like a salt water beach
and hand-braided rugs, had during the summer of fluctuation and
persuasion somehow emerged as a blessing.  No road meant no bores, the
Hendersons said.  No road meant privacy.  No road meant nothing to run
over the children and animals.  "We don't want a road," our neighbors
said and are still saying, only each year more faintly, with less
conviction.  "We don't want a road, either," we said bravely that
summer when we were negotiating.  Then came the day of reckoning and we
were faced with the uncomfortable fact that walking the mile and a half
from the ferry on a beautiful trail along the water carrying a pound of
bacon and a quart of gin is one thing.  Hauling in a van load of
furniture and possessions is unquestionably another.

Thank God the civilization-ridden neighbors on the south side of us did
have a road.  They had a road that was steep and rutted and ended at
least two hundred feet from the beach, but they generously offered to
let us use it.  They also let us use three rowboats and an outboard
motor.  Don and Harris tied all the boats together and we all loaded
them.  Harris insisted on steering the lead boat, which was
unfortunate, as he seemed possessed with the idea (perhaps because of
the pint of gin) that we were moving _from_ Vashon _to_ Seattle and
kept heading out to sea, chairs, books and pillows spilling in his wake.

Harris, though confused, was eager and strong and by nightfall we had
most of the stuff on our sea wall, a few things in the house and the
washing machine in one of the boats.  I invited Harris to dinner, but
he pointed out that he had only six inches of beach left before high
tide, so Don paid him and he slithered off, the girls waving wildly at
his narrow back.

Then we all staggered wearily up the path to our beautiful new house,
which was as cold as a crypt and piled high with junk.  While Don and
Joanie built roaring, quick-dying carton fires in the kitchen trash
burner and the fireplaces, Anne and I pawed feverishly through boxes
looking for the food.  The night before, feeling just like Mamsie
Pepper, I had baked a ham and a pot of beans and had wrapped the stuff
for salad in a damp dishtowel, "so that everything will be ready and
cozy for moving day," I told Don.  But where were they?  They certainly
were not in this old box of pictures--or this one of vases or this ...
After almost an hour of fruitless search we decided that they might
still be on the sea wall.  I took Tudor and a flashlight and went down.

Even though my neck, my back, my arms, my legs and my palms ached and
with each step on the path little jagged pains ran down my earlobes, I
still experienced a wonderful feeling of security as I realized that
this was _our_ path and I was going down to look for _our_ ham on _our_
sea wall.

When I got down to the sea wall I had another surge of emotion as I
listened to the waves slopping against the wooden pilings and realized
that the tide was in and so these were our waves because Mr. Henderson
had explained that we owned the tidelands too.

I flashed the light over the heaps of boxes and trunks piled
higgledy-piggledy all over the sea wall, hoping against hope that I had
marked the box of food or that, if I hadn't, in some mysterious way the
ham would make its presence known.  I hadn't and it didn't, so I called
Tudor.

"Here, boy," I said kindly.  "Here, Tudor, boy."  As I have said Tudor
was my mother's dog and as I had heard my mother, who is a dog lover
and a better-than-average veterinary, say a million times that a dog
should be well trained, that it is not fair to the _dog_, and, as I
hadn't been around Tudor too much, I presumed that I might get a little
co-operation from him.  A little of the man's best friend, old dog Tray
stuff.  I called again with even more kindness.

"Here, Tudor, old boy."  Tudor, who was busy sniffing a rock,
absolutely ignored me.  "Tudor," I said rather sharply.  Instantly he
flattened himself on the ground, buried his head in his paws and
awaited a blow.

I sweetened my voice again.  "Tudor, old boy," I said, trying to speak
just loud enough to be heard over the waves but not loud enough to
frighten the little stinker.  "Tudor, old boy, food!  Good food!  Find
it, boy!"  I patted the piles of boxes and trunks enthusiastically.
Tudor raised his head, gave me a long disdainful look, then ran up the
path to the house.

Tudor was no help but he had given me an idea.  I began to sniff the
boxes myself.  It was not easy to get a true scent over and above the
salt water and the rich rotten cabbage smell of the Tacoma pulp mill
which occasionally rides in on the south wind, but I finally found the
ham.  It was under "Books--reference" and on top of "Living room
draperies."

I insisted on setting the big pine table in the north corner of the
living room and lighting the candles, but we ate clustered crossly
around the fire.  October nights on the salt water are penetratingly
chilly.

After dinner while Anne and Joan washed the dishes in our new sink,
which fact did not seem to lift their low opinion of this drudgery, Don
and I made up the beds.  When we went to find the blankets and sheets I
thanked God for that short-lived spurt of efficiency--the boxes were
clearly marked: "Blankets--raspberry jam--bathing suits--bed linen."

A fireplace in a bedroom is a very luxurious item.  Even poking tired
feet down into the icy reaches of clean sheets--"Teach me to live, that
I may dread the grave as little as my bed"--is not so painful when at
the same time you are looking into a merrily crackling fire.

After we had turned out the lights, Don and I watched the leaping
shadows on the pine ceiling and listened to Anne and Joan's childish
trebles murmuring insults to each other through the walls of their
adjoining bedrooms.  The wind had freshened and was making small
plaintive noises in the eaves.  The bed was very comfortable.  I sighed
deeply, contentedly, and closed my eyes.  Then suddenly I was aware
that in addition to the crackle of _our_ fire, the slosh of _our_
waves, the moan of the wind under _our_ eaves, the haggling of _our_
children, I was listening to _rain_ on our roof.

Fumbling for the bedlight I said wearily to Don, "Do you hear that?
It's raining."

Don said, "Swhat?"

I said, "Rain.  Listen, it's raining and the books and records are
still down on the sea wall."

Sighing heavily, Don sat up and reached for his bathrobe.  I got up and
put mine on.  Hearing sounds of activity from our bedroom the girls
called out in the owlish way of children, "Who?  What?  Who?  Where?
Who?  Who?  Who?"

I explained over my shoulder as I ran down the stairs and out onto the
porch where we had dumped the tarpaulins.  Snatching up a couple I
started down the path--Don followed with the flashlight.  The rain was
brisk and wet.  After we had tucked the tarpaulins over and around the
boxes and trunks, Don flashed the light on the washing machine
defiantly spraddled in the rowboat.  The waves were almost washing over
the stern.  "Come on," he said without enthusiasm, "we'll have to try
and pull the boat up the steps."  I jerked on the rope and he jerked on
the washing machine and we managed finally to get the prow onto the top
step, the stern in the water, the washing machine veering dangerously
toward the south.  Grimly tying the painter to a slender maple tree Don
said, "'An' lea'e us nought but grief and pain, for promis'd joy.'"

Busy threading my bathrobe cord through the oarlocks and then over and
under the wringer in the vain hope that I could keep the washing
machine in the rowboat but knowing very well it was like trying to
restrain a wounded buffalo with a piece of thread, I snarled and said,
"And I used to wonder why they sold the house furnished."

By the time we got back to bed, the crackling fire in the fireplace had
burned to coals, but it was still comforting and a delight after the
chilly interlude on the sea wall in the rain.

From far across the water a freighter tooted.  The rain on the roof
sounded like millions of birds' feet.  I said to Don, "Well, here we
are, all together at last in our own house."

Don said, "Unk."  He was very tired.  With a snap the last piece of
wood broke apart.  The glow from the fireplace was very faint now.  The
noise of the Sound less of the slurp, slop, splash and more of a
rhythmic thrummmmmm, like a drum roll, showed that the little waves had
matured to good-sized swells.  "A heavenly sound," I thought sleepily.

Then above the wind, the rain and the surf I thought I detected a heavy
groaning scraping noise.

"The washing machine," Don said suddenly, loudly, in my ear.  "The
little bastard is still trying to get away."




CHAPTER IV

LIFE AS USUAL IN A VERY UNUSUAL SETTING

Any change as drastic as moving from the city to an island should be
accomplished gradually, like reducing.  But there was old La Guerre as
well as time and tide, which were no longer merely figures of speech,
and suddenly we were up to our chins in a new life and with _one_ day
to adjust.

To make the move, Don and I had taken Friday and Monday off, and in
addition I had begged and been grudgingly granted a special
dispensation from the "big boss" to eat my lunch in half an hour and
not be at my desk until eight instead of regular wartime seven-thirty.
Don having finally finished his stint on the night shift, now had to be
at work at the enchanting hour of six-thirty A.M.  The children kept
assuring us that they could stay away from school for months, even
years--"Everybody does when they move," but Don and I callously advised
them that as long as we had to go back to work, we were enrolling them
in school on Monday.  "Yes, Monday!  This Monday.  Because we want you
to learn something.  Because people who don't go to school are dummies.
Of course, I don't think Abraham Lincoln was a dummy," and so on, and
so on.

We had moved Saturday.  That gave us Sunday to unpack, put away, look
around, plan ahead and get wood.  Sunday morning when I got up later,
tireder and nastier than I had planned, I found that the washing
machine had gotten away after all.  Joan and Don with their irritating
early-morning cheerfulness and 20-20 vision had spotted it riding the
waves halfway to Three Tree Point, directly across from us.

"See," they told Anne and me after they had dragged us out on the
porch, "there it is, right there by that white streak."

"I'm cold," Anne said.  "Let's go in the house and start the fire."

Joan said, "Can't you even see the rowboat?"

"No," Anne said, huddling her arms around her.

"You're not trying," Joan said.  "Now look right across the Sound at
that bare place on the hill."

Don said cheerfully, "The water's awfully rough out there.  I can see
huge whitecaps.  Let's row out now before breakfast."

"I'm not going any place until I have a cup of coffee," I said crossly.

"I'm not either," Anne said.  "Only I'm going to have cocoa.  Let's
start the fire."

"Ah, come on, Mommy," Joan said.  "A boat ride before breakfast would
be fun."

"Why don't you and Joan go," I said to Don, "and Anne and I will get
breakfast."

"Yes," Anne said eagerly to Joan.  "You and Don go and Mommy and I will
have breakfast all ready when you get back."

"We'll all have to go," Don said.  "Towing that washing machine in that
rough water is going to be very ticklish business."

So we had breakfast first and after my second cup of coffee I became
mildly enthusiastic about the boat trip.  "Hurry with your cocoa,
Andy," I said brightly.  "We're going for our very first boat ride."

"Does Don know how to row?" Anne said suspiciously.

"Of course," I said.  "Don't you, Don?"

"Well, I haven't had too much experience with boats," Don said
truthfully, "but I can manage, I guess."

"Can you swim?" I asked him.

"I would be able to," he said, "if my bones weren't so heavy.  I always
sink."

I looked out at the Sound again.  The water in the middle looked much
rougher and several large dark clouds grumbled menacingly as they
shoved and pushed each other around directly overhead.  I poured myself
another cup of coffee.

"Oh, Mommy," Joan said, "we'll _never_ get started."

"This may be the last cup of coffee I'll ever have," I said, "and I
intend to enjoy it."

"You may as well pour me one too," Don said, sighing resignedly.

"Well, I'm going down and get the boat in the water," Joan said.

"Go ahead," Anne said.  "I'm going to make myself another piece of
cinnamon toast."

"Why don't you get one of the neighbors to help you?" I said, peering
past the pink geraniums in the window box toward the horizon.  "If that
speck I see out there is the rowboat with the washing machine in it,
it's halfway to Alaska."

"Oh, nonsense," Don said.  "People row across the Sound all the time.
It won't take us long."

"I wish we had life jackets," I said.

"Oh, Betty," Anne said, suddenly switching loyalty in the irritating
way children do, "don't be silly.  Joan and I are wonderful swimmers.
We could probably swim across the Sound.  Anyway Don can handle the
boat.  Come on, let's go before it starts to rain again.  I'll eat my
toast in the boat."

When we got to the beach Joan had the big rowboat in the water and was
splashily rowing up and down in front of the sea wall.  We called to
her to come in and after Don had pulled the boat on to the beach with a
tremendous jerk that sent Joan, who was about to stand up, sprawling
and lost an oar overboard, we all climbed in and began arguing about
who was to sit where.

There was a great deal of unnecessary talk about my tremendous weight
and how if I sat on one side with only one of the girls' meager
flyweight to balance me, the boat would tip over.  This could have been
easily solved by my sitting in the prow but that was a favorite spot
and both girls wanted it.  They finally agreed to take turns, so that
when we were in the middle of the Sound in rough water, they vigorously
crowded past Don and the oars, rocked the boat dangerously and kicked
me in the ankles while they changed seats.

Don was not very adept at the oars.  He blamed it on "these damned old
oars which keep slipping out of the oarlocks," but Joan informed him
tactlessly that he didn't hold the blades straight, he should dip
deeper, he was rowing too hard with his right oar and he was getting
everybody wet.  She had learned _everything_ about rowing at Aunty
Dede's and she would be glad to help him.

Anne announced that she had learned _everything_ about rowing on Lake
Washington where she and Marilyn rowed the dinghy of Marilyn's father's
"enormous speedy cruiser."  She told Don he was dipping too deep, he
was holding the blades too straight, but it was all right for him to
row so hard with his right oar because it would turn us around and we
could see where we were going.  I, who had been rowing since I was five
years old and, in addition, had seen all the Washington crew races, and
really did know everything about rowing, kept my mouth shut because I
have never cared for this sport and was not anxious to take the oars.
With set lips, Don continued to dip and pull and splash toward the
washing machine, which finally even Anne and I could see.

Like a stout gray lady on an excursion boat, it had slid up and wedged
itself in the prow of the rowboat, from which position it stolidly
watched our maneuvers to ease alongside and get the painter.  This was
not too easy as the water was very choppy and the painter was tangled
around the washing machine's legs.  In his attempt to lift the washing
machine and untangle the rope, Don leaned so hard on the side of our
boat we dipped water.

Anne immediately began to shriek, "We're tipping over!  We're sinking!
Help!  Help!"

Joan stood up and shouted, "Watch out, everybody, I'm going to get in
the other boat!"

I yelled, "Don't get in the other boat, Joan!  Shut up, Anne!  Don, be
careful!" and Don said, "EVERYBODY BE QUIET!" just as the black clouds
above us released large wet raindrops, which began splatting on our
heads.

Joan said, "Please, Mommy, let me get in the other boat.  I can hand
you the rope."

Don said, "Okay, Joanie, but wait until I steady the boat."

I said, "Don, _don't_ let her!  The washing machine will come loose and
squash her and what if we can't get the rope and she drifts away?"

"Don't be silly," Don said.  "Okay, Joanie, here you go."  Nimbly Joan
jumped into the stern of the other boat which was clear up out of the
water owing to the weight of the washing machine, skipped down to the
prow, crawled _under_ the washing machine and fed the painter out the
small opening between the wringer and the point of the prow.  I grabbed
the rope and yelled at her to "get out from under that washing machine
right now!"  She did, announcing unconcernedly as she jumped back into
our boat, "It was caught on that faucet on the side and here's your
bathrobe cord."

As soon as we started rowing back toward home, the washing machine
became unwedged and slid down and leaned over the starboard side, thus
making it as difficult as possible to tow.  Of course Joan wanted to
get back in the boat and try to push it into the prow again, but even
Don vetoed this.  We finally reached shore, the washing machine defiant
and unco-operative all the way, and when we tried to maneuver it up the
narrow trail to the house, it weighed just as much as possible and kept
flinging its wringer around its head like a billy club.

When we had it comfortably installed in the service room, the girls
insisted that I test it out.  I filled it with water, threw in some
dishtowels and turned it on and it swirled and swished very efficiently.

Joan said, "I'm certainly glad it works because I didn't pack anything
but dirty clothes."

"How perfectly disgusting!" Anne said.

Don said, "I wonder if you'd rinse out a few pairs of my sun-tans."

Anne said, "Of course, all _my_ clothes are clean, but I think I'll
wash all my summer clothes again and put them away."

Joan said, "Can you wash coats in washing machines?  My school coat has
mustard and a lot of hamburger juice on it."

I said, "Before we get too enthusiastic about washing, let's see if the
wringer works."  I turned off the washing part and turned on the
wringer.  The rollers began turning smoothly against each other, neatly
pressing the water out of a piece of seaweed picked up on the trip.

"Okay," I said to Don and the girls.  "Everything's working fine.
Bring on your dirty clothes."

Then I reached in to get one of the dishtowels and the next thing I
knew I was across the room, crumpled against the cement wall, and Anne
and Joan were bending over me wailing, "Mommy, Mommy, are you hurt?",
and Don, who understands electricity was saying soothingly from across
the room, "Probably sand in the brushes."

Don finished the washing though, with Anne and Joan and me crouched in
the doorway waiting for him to be electrocuted.  Nothing happened
except that he took all the buttons off Joan's blouses with a popping
sound like shelling peas.  Afterward he took the washing machine all
apart, removed some seaweed and the sand from the brushes and a
clamshell or two from the tub, oiled it and said he could not
understand what had happened as he could find nothing basically wrong.
He intimated that it must have been some careless action on my part.
However, as long as we had it, that washing machine had those
occasional rebellious spells, shooting sparks from the water, grinding
things up in the wringer, secreting a red sock in its bowels so it
could turn everything pink, even knocking down a devout Christian
Scientist who had no fear.

After Don had finished the washing and we had all had some more coffee
and cocoa, we began the unpacking, the melding of our things with the
already established, the taking down of the flower prints and trying to
find the right spots for our pictures.  While I worked I handed down
rapid fair decisions on vital questions such as: "Isn't this my blouse,
Mommy, you can tell by the ink stain on the collar, see?"--"It's my
blouse, Betty, you know perfectly well it is.  Don't you remember, it
is the one Madge bought but it was too small so she gave it to Alison
and you took it because Alison had taken your checked one and you gave
it to me?" and "Betty, are you going to let the girls wear all my
sweaters?"  (That was the year for girls to wear men's sweaters.)
"They have already taken all my sweatshirts."  The last was wailed
plaintively at me from the bedroom where Don was rapidly filling up all
the drawers with _his_ things.  I still keep my underwear, stockings,
girdles, gloves, jewelry, diary, nightgowns, and scarves in the two
little drawers in my bedside table.  My sweaters and shorts share a
blanket drawer under one of the bunks with the bathing suits.

Those pictures in movie magazines of the star's bedroom with a separate
closet for purses and another separate closet for fur coats, make me
drool with envy.  Not that I would have anything to put in them but it
would be so wonderful, when wishing to change purses, not to have to
stand on the hamper and fish around in the top closet at the end of the
bathtub, where I also keep eight hundred clean flour sacks (remains of
chicken-farming days--second attempt--different husband) and suitcases.

The next problem was getting our food to fit into the medium-sized
icebox.  All refrigerators seem to be designed for people who buy half
a turkey, and as I am the type of shopper who makes butchers call out,
"Here comes Betty, Al--better get out that big new side of beef," I
ended up, as I always shall, with a large carton of green vegetables
outside on the umbrella table, and the icebox stuffed to the point
where I had to sneak the door open and even then the tomatoes
delicately balanced on top of the milk bottles bounced into the
woodbox.  The ham was as big as Tudor and required an unconscionable
amount of room.

"Oh, well," I said comfortingly to myself as I rammed the refrigerator
door shut against it, "we can have ham and eggs for breakfast, cold ham
and potato salad for supper, ham sandwiches, ham omelettes, ham and
lima beans, split pea soup--we won't have to buy anything for weeks and
weeks!"

Then we sat down to supper and Don said with disbelief, "Ham?  Again?"

Anne said, "Marilyn's family always goes to a restaurant on Sunday."

Joan said, "Johnny's mother makes fried chicken every Sunday.  She
bakes her own bread too."

Anne said, "Marilyn's mother certainly is a lot of fun, huh, Joanie?"

Taking a minute sliver of ham on his fork and staring at it without
enthusiasm, Don said, "Isn't that my yellow sweater you're wearing,
Anne?"

"You mean this sweater?" asked Anne in absolute amazement.  "This
yellow one?"

"Yes, that one," said Don levelly.

Carefully cutting off a piece of ham the size of a grain of rice Anne
said with elaborate unconcern, "I'm positive this is Uncle Cleve's
sweater.  I can tell by the way the cuffs turn back."

Joan who was fixing herself an enormous ham sandwich, an operation
usually forbidden at the table but now abetted by approving nods and
smiles from me, remarked in a pleasant conversational tone, "That's a
lie.  I saw you get that sweater out of Don's drawer over at the
apartment yesterday."

"What a sneak!" Anne said furiously.  "What a nasty little
double-crossing sneak.  All you ever do is spy and tattle and
get-in-good-with-the-company.  I just loathe you...."

"That will do," I said hopefully.

"Who took my navy blue sweatshirt?" Don asked.  "It is the only one I
have that is really big enough for me."

"Navy blue?  Sweatshirt?" Joan asked innocently.

"I have just a few things" (twelve drawers--two cupboards--three
shelves and he was not nearly unpacked), Don said plaintively, "and I
would like to keep them."

Her eyes brimming with hurt, Anne said, "I thought this was Uncle
Cleve's sweater but if you're going to be so terribly disagreeable I'll
take it off right now."  She flounced to her feet and I shouted, "Sit
down and eat your ham."

Joan said, "Does your navy blue sweatshirt have long sleeves and some
white paint on the shoulder?"

"Yes," Don said.

"I haven't seen it," Joan said.

"Well, now who's a liar?" Anne warbled.

"More ham, anyone?" I said my voice trembling with emotion.  "Please
have some more ham!"

Then came getting the girls ready for school.  Joan's approach to the
problem was very simple.  She merely asked me forty-two times if I had
put _three whole sandwiches_ in her lunch.  I said I had and she said
what about an apple--I said yes and she said cookies?  Yes.  She was
ready.

Anne's preparation involved first going through and despising all her
clothes, then choosing the least loathsome things and ironing them,
even things as smooth as mirrors.  She wouldn't allow me to iron
them--too careless; or Joan--too stupid.  She was halfway through her
third blouse--first one turned out to be "absolutely filthy"--tiny
speck on part that tucked into the skirt--the second--"entirely rotted
under arms from perspiration.  How I loathe hand-me-downs!  How I wish
we were rich.  How I despise living in the country.  Why do we always
have to change schools every five minutes" (this was the first change
to my knowledge).  I showed her that the "entirely rotted" was merely a
small wrinkle from being packed.  This brought tears to her eyes so I
let her alone, and went out to put breakfast on the table.  She called
to me excitedly.  I put down my spatula and went into the living room,
steeled to combat rot and filth.

She was standing by the ironing board, her face sparkling with
excitement and delight.  "Look, Mommy, isn't he adorable?" she said
pointing at a large buck standing on the porch peering in the window.
"Just imagine, a real live deer on _our_ porch.  Oh, I love living in
the country!  It's so romantic!"

So we enrolled the children in school.  Joan in the seventh grade of
the Vashon Grade School, a comfortable brown-shingled building about
three miles from us; and Anne as a freshman in the Vashon High School,
a large modern brick edifice about seven miles away.  To get the school
bus the girls had two choices.  If the tide was low they could walk to
the Sanders' (the neighbors with the road) and go up their road.  If
the tide was high they had to walk the county trail and get on the bus
down by the store at the dock.  Joan liked her school and seemed to get
along very well, only occasionally bringing me tales of hiding the lids
to the inkwells, breaking a window in the gym, eating somebody else's
lunch, for which misdemeanors she was, very unfairly, I thought, kept
after school, which meant she had to walk the three miles home, usually
in the rain.  The first time this happened I threatened heatedly to go
up to school and _do something_.  Anne and Joan were delighted.

Joan said, "Yes, and you just tell Miss Harwood that the _doctor_ said
I _have_ to chew gum."

Anne said, "Be sure and wear your gray suit and explain to her that we
are from the _city_."

Don told me not to be hasty and produced from his past several valiant
incidents having to do with his plowing through blizzards on cardboard
soles carrying mush sandwiches, he was so _eager_ to get an education.

Because of my job or weakness or both, I never did get up to school
until the night of the Christmas entertainment, which was absolutely
charming with Joanie singing a solo and a wonderful simplicity of
spirit which could be found only in a country school.  Even I didn't
have enough of the Hun in me to inject an old complaint into such an
atmosphere.  So on occasion, as long as she attended Vashon Grade
School and as long as she indulged in climbing out of windows and
throwing chalk, and so on, Joan was kept after school and had to walk
home.  Actually, now that I think about it, it was a very healthy
punishment.

Anne immediately loathed her school because: _a._ It was a school.
_b._ "They sing hymns at noon instead of dancing."  _c._ "All the
teachers are missionaries."  _d._ It was in the country.  So, many
evenings when I came home from work, I would learn that Anne had stayed
home with some mysterious ailment.  Aching toenails--non-focusing
eyes--pains in her heels.  On such evenings I would be greeted with a
sparkling, clean house, stuffed pork chops and hot apple pie for
dinner, all the ironing done, the beds made.  The temptation to keep
this little homebody home was almost overpowering.  But my conscience
told me that I must force her to continue with book learning,
especially in view of the fact that she was reputed to have a terrific
I.Q. 170 or -2--all she apparently wanted was to learn to card wool and
make biscuits.  Even when I stopped work the following February, I had
only a little better luck getting Anne all the way to school.  If I did
get her on board the school bus, with her books and the assurance that
her hot lunch was paid for (sandwiches from home were so vulgar), I had
no guarantee that she wouldn't go into a decline on the way to school
and have to spend the day lying on a couch in the nurse's room.  Also
she either did no work or work they couldn't understand.  How well I
remember the day I was summoned to school and presented, via trembling
hand, one of Anne's compositions entitled, "I Don't Believe in God and
Neither Does My Uncle Frank."

Joan's way was so much easier.  Explaining her A's and B's, she said,
"Well, all you have to do is to get a man teacher and be nice to him
and then he makes you a checker and checkers don't have to take tests."

As soon as we had the children in school and were reasonably sure they
knew where to catch the bus according to the tides, Don and I went back
to work.  Don had to catch (and that is the right word) the
five-fifteen ferry in order to be at Boeing's Renton plant, about
twenty miles from the dock, at six-thirty.

Our schedule then was: up at four-thirty (I fear if I have five
husbands I'll always manage to find one that gets up at some ungodly
hour)--Don make fire in the trash burner--turn on oven to defrost the
kitchen--Betty make coffee and Don's lunch ("Try to always use that
homemade mayonnaise that melts and makes the sandwiches like wet
wash-rags," Don said bitterly).  I usually set the table and laid out
everything the night before.  After he had dressed, Don unhurriedly
drank his coffee and orange juice, ate his poached eggs, and leisurely
lit a cigarette.  After the third drag, he would suddenly stare
unbelievingly at the clock, leap out of his chair, grab his raincoat,
hurl himself through the door into the rain and blackness.  I would
pour myself a cup of coffee and heave a sigh of relief just as Don,
having forgotten to put new batteries in his flashlight or to take his
lunch, would come bursting in again.  While he did either or both of
these things, I went out on the porch and tried to check by sound,
whether the tide was in or out.  If it was out we were glad because he
could go by the beach.  If it was in he had to take a tiny slippery
overgrown footpath through the woods to the Sanders'.  He was gone
again.  The clock said one minute of five.  Don allowed sixteen minutes
to run up the beach, get in his car, start the motor and drive the mile
and a half to the ferry.  He always made it unless the car wouldn't
start, there was a log across the road, the ferry left early or he was
out of gas.

At five-thirty I'd fix the girls' breakfast--at least set their places
at the table and get out the bread and the toaster and the peanut
butter and the cocoa--then I'd go through the icy living room, down a
dank passageway to the dark, cold little service room where the shower
was.  This location of the shower, so handy for swimmers, had seemed
adorable to me in the summer.  In the winter it seemed like something
overlooked by the Marquis de Sade.  After I'd checked the floor, the
bathmat and the inside of the shower curtain for slugs, spiders,
centipedes and wood lice, I would turn on the shower full force hot and
let it heat up the room while I ran up and made our bed.  About this
time I was not spilling over with wild enthusiasm for life on an
island.  Fortunately, five minutes under the hot shower restored my
spirits to normal, or is it?

At six-thirty I awakened the girls, refereed their morning quarrels
over underwear, skirts, sweaters, bobby pins, ironing, socks, who did
the most work the day before and who was my favorite child, decided
with Anne, who was and is a wonderful cook, what we would have for
dinner, reminded Joanie, who wasn't but is now a wonderful cook, to be
sure and bring up wood when she got home from school and checked them
both for lunch money and my perfume.

Then I kissed them, grabbed my flashlight and left.  It was always
seven o'clock and my ferry left at seven-twenty and I should have left
at six-fifty and now I would have to run the last quarter of a mile.  I
wore loafers and woolen socks over my silk stockings, carried my office
shoes along with my lunch, purse, current book and grocery list in a
large green felt bag.

The county trail connecting our beach with the rest of the world,
begins at a cluster of mailboxes down by the dock, meanders along the
steep southeast face of the island about fifty feet above the shore,
and ends at our house.  Years ago when the passenger boat used to stop
at the dock just south of us, the trail began there and went north,
probably ending about where it begins today.  Now all that is left of
this part of the county trail is a slender overgrown path through the
woods--a path that leads over huge fallen logs, through head-high
nettles, into a stream and right up the face of a blue clay bluff.
From the ferry dock to Dolphin Point the present county trail is quite
respectable, with occasional rustic bridges over steep ravines, wooden
flumes to carry off winter torrents, even small scattered pockets of
gravel, all evidence that the trail has at some time or other been
given at least a cursory glance by the county.  From Dolphin Point to
our house, it is little more than a cow path, narrow, garlanded with
wild blackberry, syringa, elderberry, salmonberry and wild cucumber.
In the spring and summer it is treacherous with the nettles which seem
to spring up even while they are being slashed, and crowd the sensitive
traveler from both sides.  In the fall the trail is slippery and lacy
with spiderwebs stretched trustingly every night from elderberry to
syringa about face high.  I used to try to catch these spiderwebs by
swinging my green felt bag ahead of me as I walked, but if it was dark
when I left the house (and it usually was) I often missed and ran the
rest of the way to the ferry clawing wildly at an invisible veil
complete, I was afraid, with a dot that was alive.

When I reached the "big tree," an old growth fir almost twelve feet in
diameter, and about a quarter of a mile from the dock, I could see
whether the ferry was in, really in or going out again.

It was from the "big tree" that I always had to start running.

According to a testimonial I read recently by a man who had lost
thirty-six pounds eating nothing but steak (typical male reducing
diet--wife no doubt expected to accomplish similar results on soup meat
and mineral oil mayonnaise), during the final twenty minutes of a
half-hour walk while the stomach is empty, one pint of bile is drained
and this greatly retards hardening of the arteries.  Just feel my
arteries, they are like velvet.

This boisterous early morning activity also started my blood
circulating, churning, really, and by the time I got to work I was not
only bileless, I was boiling hot and it was very disheartening to step
into an office heated to eighty degrees, blue with cigar smoke and
filled with bloodless co-workers who shrank away from even the tiny
draught of the swinging door and threatened to go straight to the "big
boss" if I didn't "close that transom right now!"

Why did I put up with so many hardships?  Why didn't I quit?  Because
when we bought the house we had counted on our both working for at
least six months.  Also there was a war and all able-bodied Americans
were supposed to work.  Also we needed the money.  This brings me to an
interesting observation on false pride.  Why is admitting that you work
because you need the money a shameful thing, like snoring?  Has age
anything to do with this?  Has it anything to do with inflation?  It
seems to me that every day I run into another "false pride" who says
about her job, "I'm not really working" (little laugh) "I just got
bored staying home and I love people.  I think people are so
interesting and one sees so many people in my work.  Honestly, Betty,
you could write a book about the people I see, though of course we do
get an awfully nice class of people but actually even _poor_ people are
interesting.  I just love to study people."

I have friends "studying people" in drugstores, dress shops (I.
Magnin's excluded, because to People Studiers even working at Magnin's
is grand), department stores, and insurance offices.  All People
Studiers are shifty-eyed, smoke cork-tipped cigarettes and have
crumpled faces.  They range in age from thirteen to seventy-five and
are predominantly female.

My first morning of walking the trail I had plenty of time.  I had left
the house at a quarter of seven and, when I got to the "big tree," the
ferry was just leaving the dock at Harper, a small settlement on the
Olympic Peninsula and the ferry's only other stop.  I made my way to
the dock in a leisurely fashion and leaned on the splintery old
railing.  A sea gull swooped down and lit beside me.  He had part of
one toe missing, his vest was dirty and he had a face like a Hollywood
producer, but I was grateful for his friendliness.

Together we examined the morning.  In the east the Cascade Range,
including Mt. Rainier and all of its foothills, was a purple cutout
pasted on a pale green sky.  Across the west the Olympic Mountains were
a white-crested wave.  The water, a rippleless sheet of foil, reflected
a single late-blooming star.  The fat little ferry, head high above the
water, swam steadily toward Blake Island, a plump lonely little place
without a single light or inhabitant.

It was nearly seven-fifteen and rosy-faced people began hurrying past
me along the dock.  Their feet made nice hollow purposeful clumps on
the boardwalk.  All the women carried bags containing town shoes.  I
wondered if I should change my shoes then or wait and do it in a
genteel fashion in the ladies' lounge on the ferry.  I glanced down at
my feet and there, lying between my two brown loafers, was a
five-dollar bill.

"It is an omen of good luck," I told Don and the children that night as
I stuffed it in the teapot, traditional place for Mother, even carefree
working variety, to stuff money.  It was too.




CHAPTER V

GOD IS THE BOSS

In the city, as I remember, weather was a topic passed around with the
salted peanuts and not expected to hang around much past the
introductions.  In the country, weather is as important as food and
sometimes means the difference between life and death.  Discussions of
it can branch out into all sorts of interesting directions, such as
Mrs. Exeter's baby which was almost born on the beach because of the
storm that took out the dolphins (those bruised bunches of pilings at
the end of docks without which the ferries cannot nuzzle into the slip)
so the ferry couldn't land, and a call to the Coast Guard delayed
because of a prune upside-down-cake recipe dictated over an
eighteen-party telephone line, or that summer we didn't have any rain
from May until September.

In the twelve years since we moved to Vashon Island we have experienced
the most rain, the driest summer (that wonderful one), the coldest
winter, the most snow, the severest earthquake, the worst slides, the
highest tide, the lowest tide, the strongest winds, the longest
unceasing period of rain, the densest fog, the hottest day, the
earliest spring, the latest spring, the coldest summer, the warmest
fall, the dreariest winter (this one), the wettest Christmas, in
addition to a total eclipse of the moon, a total eclipse of the sun,
and a flying saucer on the Oregon coast.

We have also come to expect, in times of great emergency, no
co-operation from the elements.

There was that time, after weeks of agonized waiting (which included
withering looks if we dared to use the telephone in the evening for
fear "he" might want to call), when Anne was finally asked to the
Junior Prom (attended by even freshmen on Vashon) by the right boy.
She had a beautiful pale blue net party dress (borrowed from friend of
Aunt Alison) and Roger, _the_ boy, worked after school in Beall's
Greenhouses (here on Vashon and the third largest orchid growers in the
United States) and he had promised her an orchid, her first.  He
assured her it would be "still good."  Everything was wonderful!  With
a tremendous sigh of relief the family settled back to normalcy, at
least our version of it.  There were a few tense moments the night of
the prom when Anne couldn't decide whether to hide Don and me and
pretend she and Joan lived on the beach alone or whether, in tuxedo and
formal, we were to be just lounging around in the background, ready to
run down to the beach and get a log or two if the fire got low.

Finally Joan, always realistic, said, "I don't know where you get such
dumb ideas, Anne.  Why should _we_ dress up for Roger?  _We're_ not
going out with him.  Say, there's a girl in school, Betty, who gets all
her clothes off the city dump.  Last week she got a keen pleated skirt
with only a few moth holes in it."  Anne told her not to be disgusting,
_if_ she could help it.  Anne's last admonition when she went to dress
was, "Now, when I come downstairs, _don't_ tell me I look nice."

"We won't have to because you won't," Joan said.

"You shut up!" Anne shrieked.

"You make me sick, old false pride," Joan said.

"Can't we ever have any peace?" Don said.  So I turned up the radio.

Anne did look beautiful.  The pale blue was perfect for her red hair
and turquoise-blue eyes, but we all kept a stony silence as she stamped
down the stairs, walked over and jerked the orchid away from Roger who,
for such a "big wheel," seemed unusually frail and apprehensive.  After
they had gone Joan got out her homework (mere gesture) and I got out
the ironing board.  Then they were back, Anne bawling, Roger looking
miserable.

"The tide!" Anne wailed.  "It's high!  Roger got his shoes all wet just
_getting_ here.  Can't you do _something_?"

"Why don't you walk the trail?" Joan asked.

"You mind your own business," Anne screamed, because for some strange
adolescent reason walking the trail was a shameful thing to her, like
picking up coal off the railroad tracks.

Finally we quieted her and she wore her loafers and carried her shoes
and Roger borrowed a pair of Don's shoes (mine would have been a better
fit, but pride, both Roger's and mine, prevented my suggesting it) and
carried his own and they waded through the tide.  Anne had a wonderful
time at the prom, but she said that she despised living on an island
and how would I feel if I was going to the Junior Prom and a ship went
by and got my party dress all wet and seaweedy.

Then came Halloween.  Anne and Joan were invited to a party at the
Falcon's Nest, a very grand place (since burned down) reputed to have
been built by a Chicago millionaire for his daughter.  It was a massive
house with iron gates and stone pillars.  The fireplace was so enormous
the andirons let down and the eight-foot logs were rolled in with a
peavey.  There was a balcony, festooned with real leopard, tiger, puma
and zebra skins, that went all around the eighty-foot living room.  The
bathrooms were supplied with salt and fresh water, and the living room
chandelier was a real Indian canoe, full size, with light bulbs around
the edge and a petrified Indian paddling it.  The Falcon's Nest was on
the hill back of us within easy walking distance.

"Oh, you _are_ lucky!" I told the girls.  "I'd love to see that house.
I hear the garage in the basement will hold _thirty_ cars."

Anne said, "I wish we didn't have to walk though.  Do you think we'll
ever have a Cadillac?"

Joan said, "Everybody walks on Halloween, dopey.  Don't you remember
last year we trick-and-treated for twenty-two blocks?"

"I wish we were back in the city," Anne said.  "I wish we still lived
with Margar."

I said, "Look at that beautiful moon, girls.  It's just perfect for
Halloween."

Joan said, "Oh, boy, tomorrow night's Halloween!"

Anne said, "Moonlight on the water makes me feel lonely."

I said heartily, "Halloween in the country will be _wonderful_!"

When we woke up the next morning we were having one of our better
storms.  Winds of fifty miles an hour, drenching rains, enormous waves
that thundered on the beach like big guns.  As I fixed Don's lunch and
set the table I watched the rain beading the kitchen windows and the
wind knocking the geraniums around in the window box, and my heart
ached.  This was not too unusual, as I have never been exactly
hilarious in the early hours, often going through an entire divorce and
marrying Howard Hughes while I am waiting for the coffee to boil.  But
this morning my sorrow was for my children.  My poor little
disappointed children so cruelly imprisoned on this desolate island by
my hardhearted husband.

Old Hard Heart came whistling in at that point and said cheerfully,
"Another hot day, I see."

I said, "I could just cry for Anne and Joan.  Tonight's Halloween and
they are invited to a party at the Falcon's Nest."

Looking out the window, Don said, "They'll sure have to wear their
raincoats."

"That isn't the point," I said furiously.  "It's walking the trail in
the rain and their costumes getting all soggy and oh, just everything!"
I glared out the window at the storm.

Don said, "Betty, you're a sentimentalist.  Children are realists.
Anne and Joan probably won't be nearly as disappointed in the weather
as you are."

"But they will," I said.  "They were counting on the moonlight."

"And it's raining and it can't be helped, so they will have to face
it," Don said, lighting a cigarette.  "Have you ever heard of anybody
who amounted to anything who didn't have a few hardships in his life?"

This brings up a point.  All books on "Child--the Training of,"
"Home--Making It Happy," and so on, agree that the parents should
_always_ be in _absolute accord_ on matters of discipline.  This is a
lovely thought and would certainly make any home happier, but from my
experience and observation it could only be possible if the mother and
father were deaf mutes or identical twins.  Take Don and me, for
instance.  We loved the children.  We loved each other.  But when a
crisis involving discipline arose in our happy little home and it was
necessary for us, as reasonable understanding parents, to hark back to
our childhoods and try to recall how we felt about the same situation
at the same age so we could be fair, we were as far apart as an Eskimo
and a Maori.  Don comes from a stern, unrelenting Scotch (both mother
and father MacDonalds), Free Methodist ("free" certainly misnomer)
family of twelve children.  The stories of his childhood had to do with
oatmeal, working twelve hours a day for Western Union when he was ten
or perhaps it was seven years old, hauling ashes to earn school
clothes, church five days a week and hour-long prayers on bony knees
every single night.  Up to the time of my father's death when I was
twelve, my three sisters, my brother and I had experienced discipline
of a sort.  I say "of a sort" because Daddy, though very strict when he
was home, was a mining engineer and away most of the time and when he
was gone Mother was her usual fun-loving, easygoing self and we did as
we pleased.  After Daddy died we really did as we pleased.  Exactly.
If we didn't want to go to school we didn't (we usually did though and
a couple of us even had 4. averages)--if we felt like studying we did,
if we didn't, we didn't--if we wanted to stay with friends for two or
three weeks we did, sometimes not even calling up to give our
whereabouts--if we wanted to spend our Sunday School (Episcopal) money
for candy, we did.  About the only laws of behavior, aside from nice
manners, laid down by Mother were that we couldn't sulk and we were
expected to tell the truth, no matter how appalling.  Also, even when
Daddy was alive we were encouraged to bring all of our friends home
with us, as many as we liked for as long as we liked.

Don wanted to be "notified" well in advance of guests.  He never got
used to the nocturnal shrieks and giggles and trips to the icebox and
lending of _his_ pajamas occasioned by Millie's or Ruthie's or Jeanie's
or Molly's staying all night.  He just was not used to adolescents, but
is anybody?

So the girls, bundled up in yellow slickers, sou'westers and galoshes,
went to the Halloween party.  The tide was high so we escorted them
along the trail but Don did promise to come and get them in the car at
eleven-thirty.  We thought the tide would be out a little by then.
There was a tree down across the trail, a big alder, and the water in
the flume by the "big tree" sounded like a waterfall.  It was a wild
night.  We left Anne and Joan at the gate to the Falcon's Nest at
Anne's request, even though the drive was about a mile long.  Don
wanted to start back right away but I insisted on waiting until I could
see Anne and Joan's bobbing flashlights up by the door.  Through the
lashing trees the house, lighted from top to bottom, looked like
something out of _Jane Eyre_.

When Don and I got home we built up the fire, put _Pinafore_ on the
record player and had a Scotch and soda.  At eleven-thirty I thought we
should go up and get them.  Don told me to relax and he'd play some
Burl Ives.  At midnight Anne called.  She said not to come for them for
a half an hour as they were eating and having a _wonderful_ time.  "She
sounded excited and happy," I told Don almost tearfully.

He said, "Why shouldn't she have a good time--it's a party," which
remark of course opened such an enormous chasm between us that I didn't
even see any point in attempting to bridge it with conversation.
Especially as it involved the basic difference between men and women
and goes way back to date of birth when the doctor (male) informs the
father (male) that he has a son (male), and the passing out of cigars
and rejoicing can be heard for sixty miles.  Then if it is a girl there
is a great deal of smiling _anyway_, of being a good sport and talking
about next time.

Thanksgiving was fun.  Most of my family came out.  There were fifteen
of us, we had two turkeys (one provided by Mary) and the day was
beautiful and everybody loved our house and thought we were so lucky to
live on an island that my sister Alison and her husband bought a big
old house with five acres and the roof on backward (owner-built) within
easy commuting of us if you happened to be a goat, and my brother Cleve
bought a small old house with three acres and the icebox on the back
porch (local carpenter) within easy commuting if you happened to be a
goat with a car.

Then came Christmas.  Oh, I was _glad_ we lived in the country where we
wouldn't run any risks of being tainted by the gross commercialism so
rampant in the city.  We were going to have a real Christmas, pure in
spirit, old-fashioned in execution.

"We will make _all_ of our presents and we will have the _biggest_
Christmas tree we have ever had and we will cut it on _our own_
property," I told my noticeably unenthusiastic little family.  As I
spoke I could hear the ringing of the axe in the crisp winter air,
could see the children standing by, eyes shining, faces wreathed with
old-fashioned smiles, while I perhaps hummed a carol or two.  Mentally
I added popcorn balls, strings of cranberries and gilded walnuts to the
festivities.

Anne wailed, "Oh, aren't we going to the city for Christmas?  I told
everybody at school we were."

Joan said, "What do you mean, make our own presents?  You mean like
those ugly little calendars we used to make in the third grade?"

"_I_ certainly don't want one," Anne said.

Don said, "Are you dead set on getting our Christmas tree on our own
property?"

"I certainly am," I said.  "That's one of the _main_ advantages in
living in the country.  I'd feel like a fool telling any of the people
at the office that we _bought_ our Christmas tree."

"Well, then you'd better get busy on some ideas for decorating a
leafless alder," Don said.

"What about those great big firs right up there?" I said pointing up
back of the house.

"Four feet in diameter is a little big even for your taste, isn't it?"
Don said.

"Oh, I don't mean using one of them for the tree," I said.  "I mean,
aren't there some seedlings around.  Up on the Olympic Peninsula all
the trees had little trees by the millions."

"But those weren't virgin trees," Don said.  Both girls laughed loudly.

I said, "I'll bet you five dollars I can find a pretty Christmas tree
on our own property."

"By flashlight?" Joan asked.  "It's dark when you leave and dark when
you get home."

"I'll look on weekends," I said.

The next weekend it rained.  Also the next.  But as Christmas was the
following Friday we went out anyway.  We walked along the beach until
we could see Tacoma.  We found miles and miles of vacant property all
solidly overgrown with alder, madroa, blackberries, syringa, buddleia,
elderberry and maple.  Sometimes firs or cedars loomed black against
the sky but, sans a helicopter, we couldn't get at them.  Sunday we
tried the hillsides near us.  We found a few fir trees but they were
anaemic sallow little things jammed in between alders, syringa,
elderberry, madroas and maples.

"Now are you satisfied?" Don asked, as we stumbled along in the dark
and rain toward home.

Anne said, "Marilyn's mother always has a blue Christmas tree with pink
balls.  Last Christmas she got a mink coat and Marilyn got a blue
peignoir."

"Painwar!  What's that?" Joan asked.

"Something much too old for Marilyn," I said crossly.

"You mean like Kotex?" Joan asked.

From the Sanders' sea wall Don called out, "Tide's high."  It seemed to
me he sounded glad.

Monday morning, Mr. Harvey, a banker who lived around the point from us
and with whom I sometimes got a ride to town, if he was early and I was
late and I saw him on the ferry, asked me if we had gotten our
Christmas tree yet.  I told him in amusing detail, but leaving out most
of the fighting and all my crabbiness, of our fruitless search.
Whereupon he told me that he had some enormous balsam firs on his
place, all perfectly symmetrical, and he would be delighted to let us
have one.  I said that Don and I would be down that night after work.
He said he would have the tree ready for us.  He did, cut and packaged.
It was perfectly beautiful with cones on its thick branches, thirty-one
feet tall (the distance I had told him it was from our living room
floor to the peak of the roof--I was only about ten feet off), and the
largest tree in the history of the family.  We floated it home.

A ferry acquaintance of Don's, who had been a high rigger in the
logging camps, helped us put it up.  The family Christmas tree
ornaments which I had inherited were not quite sufficient, especially
after Don had decorated the upper branches by balancing on one of the
beams, snagging a branch with the poker, attaching an ornament and
letting the branch snap back and smash the ornament against the wall.
We strung popcorn, made stars out of tinfoil, gilded walnuts, added
three more strings of lights and two dozen of the largest candy canes
(Vashon purchase) and the tree was lovely.

Christmas eve we went in to my sister Mary's as we always do.  It was
raining hard, but we were very gay with our carload of presents (mostly
bought at the Vashon drugstore)--anyway in the city rain is merely
shiny black pavement, blurry street lights and using the windshield
swipes.

The entire family was at Mary's--at that time only eighteen--now
thirty-two and rapidly increasing.  Mary's house looked beautiful and
very Christmasy and there was a delicious supper and magnificent
Christmas spirit.  We had a wonderful time.  Then as we sang "Silent
Night" for the last time Don announced suddenly that we had only
twenty-seven minutes to get the last ferry.

By taking back streets and going through Chinatown, we made it and the
next thing we knew we were on the Sanders' sea wall looking down at the
tide which was slapping playfully at the _top_ step.  The trail was
dark with an impenetrable darkness like oily smoke, wet and very
slippery.  By the time we got home it was two-thirty and our Christmas
presents and our spirits (even mine so homemade and old-fashioned) were
like yesterday's dumplings.

Don cheerfully built the fires while I put Christmas carols on the
record player and made oyster stew.  The girls' reaction was tepid.

Christmas morning, rain was still lashing the windows and gurgling in
the downspouts, but we managed a semblance of gaiety as we opened our
partially dried-out presents in front of a roaring fire.  The sagging
atmosphere was leavened still further by the girls' getting just what
they wanted (I believe it was men's sweaters, deep purple lipstick and
a reasonable facsimile of a peignoir that year) _and_ Mother and Alison
and her husband, who had been invited to dinner, loyally appearing.

Then came January and the big snow.  We are not used to snow in this
country, are never prepared for it and, even when it is actually
flittering down and lying on the ground and the sky is leaden and the
weatherman predicts twelve inches, we keep talking gamely about those
winters when the nasturtiums bloomed straight through.

I remember how surprised I was at ten o'clock that morning when I left
my office building to go across the street for coffee and found that it
was snowing hard--small dry flakes that powdered my hair and were still
unmelted when I looked in the mirror behind the coffee urns.

By noon the snow was three or four inches deep on the downtown
sidewalks and the radio reported six inches and more in the residential
districts.  Everyone in the office began calling home and excitedly
relaying reports of six, eight, even twelve inches of snow, stuck cars,
and no bus service.  I tried to call the Russells, the only other
year-rounders on the beach, to ask them to look out for Anne and Joan
and keep them at their house until Don got home at four or thereabouts.
The operator said the lines to Vashon were temporarily out of order.
Every once in a while I went to the window and looked out.  In spite of
the wind, a thick white curtain of Lux flakes had turned the early
afternoon into dusk and made the street lights wan and ineffectual.
The roofs of the parked cars on the street below were heaped with snow
which was pulled by the wind into peaks like seven-minute icing.

About three o'clock the "big boss" announced reluctantly that he was
closing the office.  He said that most of the city busses had stopped
running and many of us would have to walk.  There was a portentous
germ-warfare atmosphere about the place.  Even those most ardent
"get-in-good-with-the-companys" (the ones who had _asked_ to work on
Thanksgiving) were hustling into their coats and hurrying out.  I tried
to call Vashon again but the lines were still out.  I put on my
raincoat (white poplin and stylish but no warmer than cellophane) and
galoshes and started for the Vashon bus stop five blocks away.  The
wind, apparently fresh off a glacier, had gathered great momentum on
the north-and-south streets and came whining down between the buildings
with an armload of snow that made each crossing a little nightmare of
streaming eyes and frozen legs.  Everybody was walking huddled with
their heads down, their coats pulled around them like bathrobes.

When I got to the Vashon bus stop, an unprotected corner by a furniture
store, I found most of the commuters already there.  Apparently every
office in Seattle had closed early.  While we crowded in the small
doorway waiting for the bus, I heard that the lights always went off on
Vashon during a snow--the telephone was already out and probably would
be for weeks--the ferries probably wouldn't be running--this looked
like a _big snow_--big snows always caused terrible slides--a wind like
this would certainly take out a lot of sea walls--they hoped the local
grocers (five all told--two very small) had plenty of food on hand
because it certainly looked as if we were going to be marooned for a
long time.

I became almost frantic with worry.  What if I couldn't get to the
island?  Poor little Anne and Joan would be there all alone.  I tried
to inventory the supplies we had on hand.  All I could accurately
remember was a new case of Frisky dog food, part of a case of Puss'n
Boots cat food, and three cartons of Camels.  I remembered stories
Gammy, my grandmother, had told us when we were children and wouldn't
eat something she had cooked (wise precaution), of the starving
Armenian children who were grateful for willow twigs and cow dung.  I
thought of pictures I had seen of Swiss people digging the bodies of
their loved ones out of avalanches.  I wondered if smoking was really
harmful for children.  All those cigarettes and nothing to do day after
long dark day.  I wondered where Don was.  I thought of our huge virgin
firs, so black and majestic against a summer sky, now loaded with snow,
leaning, leaning and finally crashing down on the house where two tiny
matchstick figures shivered by a fire made out of the last chair.

Then the bus came.  We all squeezed on board and drove to the dock,
where we were informed the ferry, in the clutches of the wild north
wind, had crashed into the dolphins and knocked them down.  The ferry
was now leaving from another dock in downtown Seattle.  We drove back
to Seattle and down onto the dock.  There was a long line of waiting
cars, but the bus had priority and went right to the front.  There was
no Vashon ferry in the slip nor in sight on the troubled waters.  I got
out of the bus and walked up and down the line of cars, talking to
people I knew and even ones I didn't know because disaster does much to
break down the barriers of reticence.

Going from car to car I learned that the lights always went off on
Vashon during a snow--the telephone was already out and probably would
be for weeks--the ferries probably wouldn't be running after this trip
_if_ they made it--this looked like a _big snow_--big snows always
caused terrible slides--a wind like this would certainly take out a lot
of sea walls--they hoped the local grocers had plenty of food on hand
because it certainly looked as if we were going to be marooned for a
_long long_ time--had I seen the size of the waves--they were
_enormous_ and would be much much _more enormous_ out in the middle of
the passage--certainly made a person wonder if these boats were really
seaworthy--after all they were old to begin with--had been discarded by
San Francisco....

The ferry finally left at eight o'clock.  The waves _were_ enormous,
the ferry creaked and groaned and writhed in pain.  In the restaurant
where I sat out the trip, the coffee cups slid off the counter and one
quite sensible-looking woman pushed away her apple pie and sobbed,
"We'll never make it.  We'll all be drowned!"

We landed at the Vashon dock about nine-thirty.  At the store, Bob
Russell and I were told the trail was impassable and we would have to
go by the beach.  The tide, for some strange co-operative reason, was
out.  We started out.  The wind was at our backs, but the rocky beach
was like walking on frosty billiard balls and our flashlights were
futile against the driving snow.  It took us almost an hour to reach
the point where Bob lived.  He wanted me to come in and warm up a
little before going on, but I was too worried about the children.  I
stumped on.  My nylon-clad legs were numb.  My face felt as if it had
been sandpapered.  I recognized our sea wall, but the path from the
beach to the house was completely obliterated.

On my hands and knees I crawled where I thought the path should be.  I
reached the kitchen door just as Don and the children came down the
steps.  They helped me to my feet, dragged me into the kitchen and gave
me a big drink of whisky by candlelight.

"The lights are off, the telephone won't work, and the pipes are all
frozen," Don told me cheerfully.

"The school's closed," Anne caroled.  "It'll probably be closed all
winter."

"Isn't this snow keen?" Joan said.

We were snowed in for two weeks.  At first I was happy because I
couldn't go to work and could be with my family.  Anne was hysterical
because of no school, Joan loved the snow and Don was very cheerful
about hauling water from the spring and wood from the beach.

Then came the _second_ day and cooking on the trash burner without an
oven, by candlelight, lost a little of its hilarity; Don didn't leap to
his feet eagerly when I called WOOD, and the girls began quarreling the
minute they opened their eyes.  At night I dozed off to something
murmured by Joan and answered by Anne's shriek, "Mommy, Joan's caught a
mouse" (or a fly or a spider) "and she's going to put it in my room!
Stop her!"--to Don's, "Peace!  All I want is a little peace!  Do
something, Betty!"

By the sixth day I began to wonder what all those delightful things
were that I had been planning to do when I stopped working.  By
delightful I didn't mean cooking, washing dishes, scrubbing, washing
clothes, mending, making beds, refereeing quarrels, carrying wood or
sweeping.  I had faint recollections of dreams of long country evenings
spent in front of a roaring fire reading Shakespeare, each of us taking
a part, the way we used to do when Daddy was alive, listening to
symphonies on the record player, braiding rugs.

Of course, the first drawback was the fire and Don's attitude toward
the woodpile which had become that of a mother puma guarding her young.
If I had more than two matches and a sliver going at once, I had to
listen to moans about waste and lectures on not looking ahead.
Naturally, during this period the beach was as clean as a plate--the
tide didn't even bring in seaweed.

Another thing was the matter of light.  We had one kerosene lamp and
one kerosene lantern but we had no kerosene.  We had quite a few
candles but we learned that a wick is a wick even if a candle is three
feet tall and bayberry.  We couldn't play the record player because it
was electric--I hadn't learned how to braid rugs--the Shakespeare was
in one of the hundreds of boxes in the back hall (the house had only
three small bookcases) and the last thing I wanted to do was to look
for it.

We played bridge--this was not too much fun for me as I was the only
one who knew how and my pupils refused to take my word for anything,
one of them kept falling asleep and the other two slapped across the
table.  Finally our life boiled down to reading, eating, sleeping,
getting wood and getting on each other's nerves.  Even eating lacked
its customary fillip, and when I was asked what I was fixing for lunch
or dinner and I told them, I was almost certain to hear at least one
"Ugh!"  This was partly induced by ennui and partly by the fact that
our only really ample supplies were the dog food, the cat food and
noodles, of which we seemed to have about a thousand pounds.

One bleak morning toward the end of the siege, I was shuffling around
the kitchen contemplating a casserole of noodles, Puss'n Boots and
candle stubs, when Don announced, "My God, we have run out of
_whisky_!" and offered to mush up to Vashon and get some supplies.

I said I would make a list, but he told me not to bother as he knew
what we needed and he was the judge of what his knapsack would hold and
what his tired bony shoulders could carry.  Of course at this point the
girls rushed in with demands for absolutely vital things such as
hormone cream, movie magazines, Firecracker Red nail polish and bobby
pins.  After a great deal of discussion and a few tears, Don said
firmly he would not forget the kerosene.  He _would_ get some candy and
gum.  He _would_ get bobby pins.  He would _not_ get movie magazines,
hormone cream or nail polish.  He _would_ get the mail.  He would _not_
forget the matches.

We bundled him up and waved him off and, as he crunched down the beach
past the spring which was a frozen waterfall and the big logs in their
white fur scarves, I could almost hear the enclosing howl of the wolves
and smell the cow dung burning in our sod hut.

While Don was gone there was a fine bark tide and for hours and hours
Anne and Joan and I filled gunny sacks with bark, dragged them along
the beach and heaved them up onto the sea wall.  Then we each hauled
one sackful up the path to the house.  When the fire in the fireplace
was burning hot and bright, the way only bark soaked in salt water can
burn, I made a pot of coffee and we each had a cup.

While we drank our coffee, Joan told (with noticeable envy) of her
friend Evelyn who got her clothes off the city dump and had dirt floors
in her house which _never_ had to be swept, and Anne described in exact
detail her next formal which she thought should be of black velvet,
strapless and very tight.

Joan said that Evelyn's father used to have a very good job but he
didn't agree with the policy of any company so he couldn't work any
more.  Anne said that two of the girls in her class at school smoked.
Joan said that Evelyn's Indian girlfriend, who came down from Canada
every summer to pick fruit, had a baby in the Swansons' chicken house,
a darling little boy.  Wasn't she lucky?  Anne said that she thought
that thirteen was really old enough to smoke if you used a holder.  I
asked her if she would like a cigarette and she accepted eagerly, as
did Joan.  They coughed and choked their way through two apiece.  I
noted with interest that Joan was by far the more experienced smoker of
the two.

When the last tear had been wiped away and the last stub crushed out,
Mamsie Pepper MacDonald said to her little daughters, "Now, girls, if
you feel that you must smoke, please smoke in front of me."

"Why?" Joan asked.  "Do you like to watch us?"

"It's not that," I said hurriedly.  "It's just that I want you to
discuss things like smoking with Don and me.  I really don't think you
are old enough to smoke, but if you must try it, and I guess all girls
do" (I did my early smoking behind the greenhouse in Volunteer Park
when I was eleven--Benedarettes silk-tipped which tasted like burning
gunny sacks--but were the only thing available at Jane's house) "I'd
prefer to have you do it in front of us.  I don't want you to feel you
have to sneak."

Whereupon both girls looked so sneaky I was embarrassed for them and
left the room.

Don came back at dusk with the kerosene, several cans of beef stew,
very heavy and tasting like dog food, candy, gum, movie magazines, nail
polish, mail, whisky, steaks, bacon, eggs, canned milk, matches,
lettuce, coffee and noodles.

He brought the noodles, he said, because, although I hadn't said
anything, he noticed the supply was getting low.  He had been driven
both to and from Vashon by an Army jeep--the Army had also brought oil
to Beall's Greenhouses and saved several million dollars' worth of
orchids.  The reason he had taken so long was because the liquor store,
filled with customers, was locked.  The real proprietor was home sick
and a very well-oiled friend had taken over and decided for some
well-oiled reason that the customers were unruly and should be locked
_in_ the store.  He wouldn't let anybody in or out for several hours.

"A liquor store wouldn't be a bad place to be locked in during a big
snow," Don said dreamily.

Anne said, "It says right here in _Photoplay_ that Lana Turner didn't
go to college and _she's_ certainly successful."




CHAPTER VI

WE MADE IT OURSELVES

There were times during that first long, dreary, wet, dark winter when
I wondered what I had ever seen in this nasty little island.  When I
longed to pitch a tent in, say, the lobby of a downtown movie
theatre--a stifling hot downtown movie theatre.

The fireplace in our living room is very large.  Its maw will hold,
without crowding, eight large logs or three sacks of bark or ten big
cartons squashed or three orange crates whole or sixty-two big
magazines rolled up.  Before we moved in, when we were just visiting, I
noticed that the Hendersons had tiny fires in only one corner of this
great friendly fireplace.  I thought this niggardly and uncozy of the
Hendersons and I called any little fire an "Emmy fire" after Mrs.
Henderson.  That was when we first moved in, before we realized that
_wood_, the getting and burning of, was going to dominate our entire
existence.

At first, getting wood seemed fun.  An excursion.  A gay family
enterprise.  And it was free.  No fourteen dollars a cord any more.
All we had to do was to go down to the beach in front of the house and
pick it up, or go to the woods in back of the house and roll it down.
We had alder and fir and cedar just for the cutting or picking up and
we were lavish with it.  We kept great big eight-log MacDonald fires
burning in both fireplaces and the stove (no "Emmy fires" for us) from
early morning until late at night and the house became warmed all the
way through.  If we had been less enthusiastic and more observant we
might have noticed the cracking and snapping of the pine walls and
beams warning us that such heat was unaccustomed.

But we were so happy in our new life and it was still October and there
were many bright days and many bark tides and we considered a
six-by-twelve-foot woodpile on the sea wall a big supply and kept the
fires roaring until the chimneys were hot and we could eat in comfort
at the dining room table with only one sweater and without heating the
plates until they had to be passed with tongs.  Then the days began
getting shorter.  At the same time the bark tides were fewer and the
weather wetter and colder.  Don and Joan, our wood-getters, began to
speak of Emmy Henderson as a pretty smart little lady.  Three
toothpicks, a broomstraw and a rolled-up copy of _Quick_ centered on
one firebrick became their idea of a dinner fire.  Anne and I took to
heating the dinner plates until they turned brown and the food sizzled
on them.  We all wore two or three or four sweaters all the time.  We
filled hot water bottles with boiling water right out of the teakettle
and put them in our beds before dinner.  We never had colds, but we
didn't have much fun either.  It was like living in a mine.  Dark and
damp and cold when we got up.  Dark and damp and cold when we went to
bed.  We let the animals sleep on all the couches and chairs because
they warmed them.

Then one morning it was spring.  The willows blew in the sunshine like
freshly washed golden hair.  The white hyacinths bloomed.  The cherry
trees were frothy with blossoms.  We had our first steamed clams and
fell in love with Vashon all over again.

Digging clams on your own beach is a special thing.  An unexpected
dividend, like having a beautiful daughter who can also divine water.
I remember that first Saturday morning in April when we were awakened
by the sun pouring in the window and lying on our bedroom floor in
golden pools.  I remember the sea gulls playing tag against a
delphinium-blue sky and the Sound glittering in the sun like a broken
mirror.  The tide was far out, past the eel grass, and the sand steamed
in the sunlight and was warm on our bare feet.

"Wait until they squirt," Don cautioned Anne and me, but we couldn't.
We dug huge holes in the wrong places and found only cockles or "Indian
clams" as they are called around here.  Don and Joan wisely waited for
squirts and got big sweet butter clams.  Dotting the sand at intervals
like open mouths were sea anemones which obligingly sprayed our feet
when we stepped on them but infuriated us by pretending to be clams.

Occasionally, while I was digging and Anne was picking up, long worms
hunched their way out of the sand.  Some of these were cream colored,
flat and corrugated like grosgrain ribbon; some were thin and springy
and red like copper wire; some were pale and smooth and slimy and
almost three feet long like intestines.  Don and Joan thought they were
interesting and callously picked them up and examined them, Anne
shrieked and shuddered and covered her eyes and I gulped and turned
away.  Some of them, I believe the clam worm is one, leave their
delicate little white lime houses like stems of clay pipes, behind them
on the sand.  Over the years Don and Joan tried these worms for fishing
but said they weren't very satisfactory.

While we were digging the butter clams we found a few jackknife clams
which are the exact size and shape of a jackknife and have a smooth
shell covered with a firm, glistening golden brown skin like tortoise
shell; also several enormous horse clams, one of them weighing about
three pounds.  We discarded these because we wanted the jackknife clams
to multiply and we knew from experience the horse clams were slimy and
strong.  When we had our bucket half full of butter clams we walked
down past the old dock where the beach is rocky and the Little Neck
clams flourish.

The main difference in appearance between the butter or Washington clam
and the Little Neck is the marking on the shell.  The butter clam's
thick heavy shell is pale and smooth except for the circular ridges of
growth.  The shell of the Little Neck clam is smaller and thinner, is
dark gray or brown, and has in addition to the growth ridges, distinct
grooves that radiate from the beak of the shell.  The meat of the
butter clam is thick and pink and slightly tough.  The Little Neck is
small and plump and white and tender.  Little necks are near the
surface and close to the tide line.  To get at them we had first to
move several tons of surface rocks, then with a potato hook, claw among
the buried rocks.  Each time we lifted a rock we exposed a nest of
little purple shore crabs who panicked in the sunlight and ran around
in circles and into each other like people during an earthquake.

After we had removed the crabs and Joan had picked up one and chased
Anne with it and Anne had obligingly shrieked, we scratched in the
rocks until we uncovered the Little Necks which seemed to grow in
clusters of four and five.  For steaming we preferred them small so we
reburied any larger than an inch and a half.

One of the troubles with clam digging is that you can't stop.  There is
always one more place you must try.  When we had our bucket full Joanie
said, "Before we go let's try just one dig over by that big rock."  So
we filled our pockets.  Then Andy wanted to try down close to the water
"just once."  Then Don saw a lot of squirts right by the dock and
pretty soon we had not only the bucket but a small wooden box full and
were so tired we had to rest on a log before starting home.

That's another thing about clam digging.  In the excitement of the
chase you usually dig up more territory than if you were spading up a
large vegetable garden, to say nothing of lifting tons of rocks.  The
tiredness doesn't really set in until you start the walk home carrying
the clams, then you feel as if you had forgotten to take off your
diving shoes.

I believe that steamed clams should be served hot with melted butter
and only melted butter.  The flavor of freshly dug clams is very
delicate and is ruined by the addition of Worcestershire Sauce, garlic
or vinegar.  With steamed clams we like only hot buttered toast and
adults.  It takes an almost fanatical affection for children or clams
to put up with the "What's this little green thing, Mommy?  Do we eat
this ugly black part?  Do you think this is a worm?" that always
accompanies any child's eating of clams.  In addition to the company of
adults we advocate plenty of clams--at least half a gallon per person.

By the way, the way to get the sand out of clams is to let them stand
in sea water for an hour or so.  For years I was told to "put them in
fresh water and cornmeal."  All clams have ever done for me in this
concoction is to stick out their tongues and hold on to all their sand.

A good recipe for a quick delicious _Clam Chowder_ which we have
evolved over the years is:

At least four cups of butter clams cut out of the shell and washed
thoroughly.

Grind with the clams:

  1 green pepper
  1 bunch green onions
  6 slices of bacon
  2 large peeled potatoes
  1 bunch parsley


Put everything in a large kettle, add one cube of butter and enough
water to cover.  Cook slowly until the potatoes are done.  Add two or
three large cans of milk, salt and coarse ground pepper to taste.
Serve, as soon as the milk is hot, with buttered toast.

Another good thing to do with clams, especially butter clams is--_Clam
Fritters_:

Peel and grate and let soak in cold water overnight--3 large potatoes.
The next morning drain the potatoes, put in a large bowl and add:

  3 well beaten eggs
  4 tbsps flour--more if they don't hold together--a
    lot depends on the potatoes
  1 grated onion
  1/2 tsp or so of salt
  coarse ground pepper
  2 cups ground clams
  1/2 cup finely chopped parsley


Cook on a griddle in bacon fat.  Serve with butter and crisp bacon.

We were proud that we had the best clam beach in this small community
and were delighted to share it with our neighbors, even with occasional
strangers.  One summer morning two prim little old maiden ladies,
carrying a shoebox lunch, knocked on the kitchen door, explained shyly
that they had walked the trail from the dock and asked permission to
have a picnic on our beach.  "We won't leave a scrap of rubbish," they
promised.  "We don't smoke or drink and we will not start a fire."  A
little later one of them knocked again and said that she had seen some
clams squirting and would I allow her to buy three if she dug them.  I
told her we would love to give her the clams and loaned her a bucket
and a shovel.  Some hours later she and her friend, quite red-faced and
wet around the hems, proudly showed us the eight clams they had dug.

The next day on the ferry I was telling a man who lives at the other
end of the island about these quaint old ladies.  He said, "By God,
nobody is going to dig clams on _my_ beach.  I bought the property and
I pay taxes on it and I've got a shotgun to protect it.  Last Sunday
they had some sort of church picnic next door and the kids kept coming
over on _my_ beach and, by God, I went up to the house and got my gun
and I said, 'This is _my_ property and I'll shoot any trespassers!'
Believe me those kids got off in a hurry."

I said, "But I feel so sorry for people who live in the city and don't
have a beach and clams."

"Sorry nothing," he said.  "If they're so crazy about the beach, let
them buy a piece of property.  I bought mine and I pay taxes...."

I am happy to say that I have met very few islanders with this man's
miserable viewpoint.  He belongs to a small coterie who at one time
made an abortive attempt to keep Vashon Island a "rich man's paradise,"
which term has always seemed to my poverty-ridden ears to be extremely
paradoxical.

During the time when the ferry company was raising the rates every half
hour or so and we were all complaining, another member of this
public-spirited group said, "Glad to see the rates going up.  Hope they
make it so damned expensive all the rabble will have to move off."  By
rabble I assumed he meant us unfortunates with mortgages and without
Cadillacs.

In addition to clams, our beach offers us on occasion geoducks, sea
cucumbers, squid, crabs, piddocks, cockles and mussels.  There are also
scallops and shrimps but they are so far out it is easier to buy them
from the scallop and shrimp boats for a dollar a bucket.  Geoducks are
found only at the lowest tide, are scarce, and digging them requires
quick action and enormous tenacity.  There is a game limit on
geoducks--so many per person per season--I don't know what it is but
I'm no more worried about exceeding it than I am about getting too many
dinosaurs.

One June morning during the lowest tides of the year, Anne and Joan and
Don and I were moseying along the edge of the water looking for Mossy
Chitons--funny little things about the size of and color of field mice,
that cling to rocks and with dorsal plates shaped like butterflies and
in wonderful colors of turquoise-blue, pale yellow, chestnut-brown and
white--and Giant Chitons which are bright red, look like apples, used
to be eaten by the Indians and Don wanted to try one.  Suddenly Joanie
who was in the lead yelled, "Geoduck!  Hurry!"

We ran, but on tiptoe so as not to warn the geoduck who had his huge
siphon or neck sticking out of the sand like a periscope.  As soon as
we reached the spot, Joanie knelt down and got a good grip on the
geoduck's neck, Don and I started digging with our hands and Anne ran
home for the shovel.  The geoduck was close to the edge of the water
and the sand was mushy and not too difficult to dig with bare hands if
you discount the fact that our fingernails were up to our wrists by the
time Anne brought the shovel.  You can't ever rest when you are digging
a geoduck so Anne relieved Joan at the neck, Don began to dig with the
shovel and Joan and I with our hands, followed the neck down into the
sand and water digging with our fingers as we tried to find the shell.

The hole in which Joan and Anne and I were kneeling was about six feet
in diameter, at least three feet deep and filled with water, when I
finally felt the edge of the shell.  I shouted at Don who rushed to my
side, slipped his hand along the siphon which the geoduck had been
drawing farther and farther down into the sand, until he felt the
shell, then he took up where I had left off.  My job then was to shovel
as fast as I could around the edge of the hole while Anne held on to
the neck.  Joan bailed with an old coffee can and the tide hurried in
with billions of gallons more water.  We were all fully dressed in
jeans and sweatshirts and all wet to our armpits, and covered with mud
and sand.  Some neighbor children came by in a rowboat, saw that we
were working on a geoduck and spread the word along the beach.  People
began coming up to watch, until we had an audience of fifteen or so.
We spoke but didn't dare stop because of the tide.  We kept taking
turns holding on to the neck.  The hole was the size of a crater and it
was almost noon when at last with a terrific sucking noise, Don pulled
out the geoduck.

It was a big one.  The oblong shell, covered with a dirty, yellow,
wrinkled skin, was about seven inches long and five inches wide.  It
must have weighed at least five pounds.  After everyone in our audience
had examined it and told us how they cooked geoduck, how their Aunt
Eunice cooked geoduck, why they didn't like geoduck, etc., we took it
home, cut it out of the shell, skinned the neck and removed the
stomach.  Then I put the geoduck meat along with a dozen soda crackers
and a handful of parsley through the food chopper using the fine blade,
added a couple of well-beaten eggs and some coarse ground pepper and
made the result into patties which I sauted in butter.  They were
heavenly, with a sweet nutty flavor somewhere between scallop and
abalone.

I speak very lightly of squid being part of our obtainable sea food.
Actually the only squid I have eaten have been bought in the Farmer's
Market in Seattle.  Several times when we were down by the old dock
trolling for perch we hooked small octopus and squid (the difference is
that the octopus has eight arms and the squid ten) but nobody including
Don ever had the sadistic impulse to bring it into the boat with me.
When I buy squid they have already been peeled and gutted and are limp
and white.  Sauted in butter for not more than one minute on each
side, they are tender and have a delicate flavor akin to a scallop.
Cooked too long they assume the exact flavor and texture of a sauted
rubber glove.

In spite of having heard several sea-food fanatics claim they are
"absolutely divine," no one in our family has ever eaten sea cucumbers.
Our trouble seems to be that we can't hurdle their appearance which is
_not_ like a cucumber, but is like an enormous red spiny slug.

Piddocks are clams with some sort of neurosis that makes them afraid to
face life.  Instead they burrow into the hard clay or sandstone along
our shores.  As the deeply imbedded anterior end of their shell is
larger than the posterior (copied from the clam book), once in they are
entombed for life unless some innocent armed with a mattock happens
along and thinks he has found a geoduck the way Don and the girls and I
did.  We chipped for hours in the hot June sun before we finally
unearthed the piddock, medium-sized and smashed.  We were so
disappointed we didn't even bring it home.  Don's opinion is that if
they tasted like a combination of truffles and hundred-year-old brandy,
piddocks could not be worth the effort.

Crabs are plentiful and good-sized but our crab traps either get bogged
down with starfish or, having been set by glackity adolescents who
don't know how to tie knots, are carried away by the tide.  In the
middle of the summer, the medium-sized crabs come close enough to shore
to be netted from a rowboat, but we only do this for fun, because
eating them is too much like putting mayonnaise on a spider for my
taste.

I believe that we are the only ones on this beach who eat the delicious
cockles.  Mussels are abundant but like mushrooms, _some_ are poisonous
and _some_ are not, and I'm not enough of a zoologist or sport to take
a chance.

Our local shrimps are small and tough and in no way compare to either
Alaska or Gulf shrimp.  Our scallops are smaller than the eastern
variety but are very delicious and certainly much cheaper.

By going out in the rowboat we get sole, blackmouth (baby King salmon),
silver salmon, cod, Spanish mackerel, red snapper and perch.  In the
fall for a dollar, or sometimes two if they are very large, we can row
out and buy big salmon from the fishing boats.

When we first moved here we were told by some expert fisherman that by
spinning on the incoming tide, we could catch silvers.  What with one
thing and another we didn't get around to testing this theory until a
year or so ago when I was having some publicity pictures taken.  As
usual, we were vainly trying to think of some pose a little more
arresting than the usual arms grasping opposite elbows and toothy smile
so dear to the book jackets of female authors, when I remembered about
spinning for silvers.  The photographer was overjoyed but Don said,
"It's no use.  The tide is going out and they won't bite."

I said, "Oh, what difference does that make!  The fact that I'm casting
is the important thing."

Don said, "You'll just look ridiculous because it will be obvious to
everybody that the tide is going out."  Also that I don't know how to
cast.

But the photographer, who was tired, said he didn't think it mattered
that much, so we went down to the beach and I made one cast and caught
a silver about twelve inches long.  Since then we have spun and spun
(if that is the expression) at exactly the moment when the tide is
changing, but we have never had a bite.

Also edible, and for nothing, on our own property are blackberries,
salmon berries, huckleberries, both blue and red, watercress, Chinese
pheasants and mushrooms.  The mushrooms, the delicious, easily
identified Shaggy-Manes, are plentiful, but one time I decided to try a
new kind.  The new kind, also plentiful, were a soft innocent gray,
bell-shaped, thick and meaty.  I gathered a big basket of them,
carefully choosing one of each stage of development from tiny button to
rotting adult, brought them up to the house, sat down with our mushroom
book and attempted to match them to the book's vacillating descriptions
and uncolored indistinct photographs.

After several hours of research I was at least reasonably sure that I
had neither the Death Cup (_Amanita phalloides_): "There is no known
antidote," or Fly Amanita (_Amanita muscaria_): "It is said that it is
cooked and eaten by the Russians yet is known to have caused much
sickness and many deaths."  But without colored plates I couldn't
decide whether I had the Inky Coprinus (_Coprinus atramentarius_),
"edible"; or the Dog Cortinarius (_Cortinarius caninus_) on the
deadlines or edibility of which the book disdained to comment.

Being in a reckless mood I put an iron skillet on the fire, tossed in a
big lump of butter and began washing and slicing the mushrooms.  They
had a nice even firm texture and a pleasant unpoisonous smell so I
filled the skillet full.  When I thought they were done I heaped some
invitingly on crisp toast and offered them to Anne and Joan and Don who
were sitting at the kitchen table contentedly eating vegetable soup
and, as Don said, "Not at all enthusiastic about changing to poisonous
mushrooms, no matter how crisp the toast."  I told them they were being
pretty ridiculous and reminded them how well Daddy had trained his
children in mushroom gathering.  Don said, "No doubt," and continued
with his soup.

Rather defiantly I ate all the mushrooms, even flouncing up and getting
a second helping.  They tasted a tiny bit like Shaggy-Manes and a great
deal like cardboard soaked in Mercurochrome.  I said to Don and the
girls, "The flavor is not exciting but it is so mild and inoffensive
and the mushrooms are so plentiful and keep their shape so beautifully
when cooked, that I'm going to use nothing else from now on.  I'm not
even going to bother to pick the Shaggy-Manes."

"Do you want a piece of fresh applesauce cake?" Anne asked.

"Oh, no," I said coolly, "the mushrooms were very filling."

I was drinking my second cup of coffee when suddenly without any
warning at all, everything went black.  I said, "Oh, my God, the
mushrooms!" and tried vainly to remember whether mushroom poisoning is
acid or alkali and what the drugstore calendar had said to do in either
case.  All that I could dredge up was that peat moss is acid--wood
ashes are alkali.

Anne said, calmly, "Stick your finger down your throat."

Don said, "Drink olive oil but don't do anything until I call the
doctor."  He rushed to the phone which is ever a futile gesture as the
line is always in use, then rushed back to the kitchen and asked
anxiously, "How do you feel?"

"Like somebody is holding a black pillow over my face," I said.  "What
about drinking mustard and water?"

"Stick your finger down your throat," Joan said.

"Drink olive oil," Don said.

So I drank the olive oil and then stuck my finger down my throat and
immediately felt quite well.  Don tried to call the doctor again, but
the phone was still busy.  Three rooted camellia cuttings and one
recipe for icebox cookies later, he got the line and the doctor, who
told him to bring me up to his office.  Once on the way up to the
office things got very dark gray and perspiration ran into my eyes.

The doctor kept me waiting an hour, then looked at my eyes, took my
blood pressure and gave me a lecture on the dangers of gathering your
own mushrooms.  As I went out the door he called out gaily, "If you
lose consciousness within the next eight hours, call me, but it will
probably be too late."

The druggist told me that I should have drunk mineral oil as olive oil
is absorbed by the system and mineral oil isn't.

An Italian farmer friend of Don's whom we met in the hardware store
said, "Them mushrooms wasn't poison.  Fall mushrooms are never poison.
It's in the spring you gotta watch out.  My wife almost die from
mushrooms, two, three times but always in the spring.  Now before she
eats mushrooms she drink big glass of olive oil.  Never has any more
trouble."

In addition to the food which grows naturally on our place, we get
occasional bonanzas by beachcombing.  The best was that first winter
during the war when coffee was the big problem and cigarettes were
often unobtainable.

We had had a fierce storm with high waves, driving winds and lashing
rain.  The morning after the storm, being Sunday, we all went down to
the beach to, as Don always says, "see what God hath wrought."  There,
scattered along the tide line, were at least a dozen wooden boxes.  We
gathered them up and stacked them on the sea wall.  When pried open
they revealed army rations of several kinds--a sort of hash which
tasted just like Pard and made us feel even sorrier for our boys
overseas; hard tack which we fed to the ducks and sea gulls; and cans
containing a few pieces of hard candy, three cigarettes, some powdered
lemon juice, and a little can of powdered coffee.  We heard that
families farther down the beach got hams and sacks of flour, none the
worse for the ducking.  We didn't know whether this was true or just
one of those instances where people have to make their story the best.

We often get rowboats but honesty, the knowledge that ours also
occasionally goes adrift, and large printed license numbers on the
side, prevent our keeping them.  However, there is an unwritten
agreement that finders are keepers on pike poles, rafts, shovels, toy
boats, buckets, and so on.

Beachcombing is fun even when your only reward is a pretty piece of
driftwood or an agate.  Going down to the beach after a storm is the
only time in my adult life when I experience that wonderful, joyous,
childhood feeling of expectancy.  "After all," I used to tell Anne and
Joan (referring only occasionally to the encyclopaedia) "the Pacific
Ocean stretches from the Arctic to the Antarctic, covers approximately
seventy million square miles, and is as old as the earth.  It might
bring us _anything_!"

Don and I have a strong feeling that residents should, as far as they
are able, patronize the island's industries.  For most of us this means
the Saturday shopping spree in the village of Vashon, supplemented by
the milkman, the laundryman, the telephone shopping service of the big
Seattle department stores and occasional jaunts to buy eggs or chickens
from a farmer.  That first October I made inquiries at the store about
a place to buy fresh eggs and was told about a small chicken farm close
by.  The next Saturday afternoon, Anne and Joan and Don and I walked up
there.  It was a nice, neat little place with a white picket fence and
a small white house.  I knocked and the door was opened by a
pleasant-looking woman in a clean blue-and-white-checked apron.  I
said, "We would like to buy some eggs."

She said, "Who are you?"

I said, "We are the MacDonalds."

She said, "MacDonalds?  Then you must have bought Dr. Morrow's house."

I said, "We did buy Dr. Morrow's house."

She said, "Then you must be the MacDonalds."

I said, "We are the MacDonalds."

She said, "But the MacDonalds bought Dr. Morrow's house."

I said, "We did.  We bought Dr. Morrow's house.  We are the MacDonalds.
We live at Dolphin Point."

She said, "Well, come right in."

I said, "We came to buy eggs.  Do you have any?"

She said, "I only sell to my neighbors."

I said, "We are your neighbors.  We bought Dr. Morrow's house on the
beach."

She said, "But I thought the MacDonalds bought Dr. Morrow's house."

We gave up and bought our eggs from the store.

For a long time we bought butter from the mother of a friend of Don's
at Boeing.  It was dark yellow and tasted like cheese, but she left it
in the mailbox which was convenient for Don and sometimes she _gave_ me
a quart of sour cream.

From his Italian farmer friend Don got, for three dollars a gallon,
first pressing California olive oil marked, "Extra, extra virgin"; big
boxes of red currants, each currant the size of a marble and the color
of blood; gooseberries like fat green grapes; and faba, the big flat
horse beans which cooked Italian style with olive oil and pepper, taste
almost but not exactly like Ivory soap boiled in quinine.

From a friend of a friend of the man who put new rings in our car, we
bought for our freezer what he referred to many many times as "a
springer" but which turned out to be old, tough, strong, resentful ram
that managed to triumph over stewing in basil and garlic or any
marinade.  We also bought a local pig which was white, as big as a cow
and tasted like human flesh even when smoked.  Sometimes in desperation
because of unexpected company, I would bring out a package of "humey,"
but even in split pea soup it was unmistakable and Anne and Joan said
it made them feel as if they should have rings in their noses and be
dancing around the stove.

After a while we bought ten acres on the hill above us and raised our
own pigs, lambs, turkeys, geese, cows, chickens, milk, eggs, steers,
peaches, cherries and mallard ducks.  Our livestock was all beset by
strange parasites and impulses which required hundreds of gallons of
sulpha and many calls to the veterinary.  One cow ate nuts and bolts
and baling wire and had to have all four of her stomachs opened up.
One of our pigs ate all of her babies.  One of our steers breathed in
most of a sack of calf meal and exploded.  All of our turkeys died
every year and the raccoons always ate the baby ducks.  And Don bought
me a churn.  He said, "You always complain so much about Mrs. Evinlips'
butter, I thought you'd like to make your own."

"I certainly would," I told him.  "From now on we will have some _good_
butter."

The butter making went very rapidly and I made a great deal.  But after
a day or so it turned dark yellow and tasted like cheese.  Secretly, I
sent for the government bulletin on making butter.  The government
bulletin, when it finally came, said, in effect, "Some people make
better butter than others."  So I bought a farm magazine with an
article on butter making and it said, "Some people make better butter
than others."  I made inquiries of neighbors, local farmers, former
farmers, gentlemen farmers and learned that some people make butter out
of sweet cream and some people make butter out of sour cream but some
people make better butter than others.

I tried both sweet and sour.  I washed my butter so much I almost wore
it out.  I changed the temperature of the cream about twenty times and
I switched churns three times.  For a few days after I made it the
butter was fine.  Then it turned dark yellow and tasted like cheese.
Now I buy my butter from my milkman and it is always pale yellow and
sweet.

Either some people do make better butter than others or this _is_ the
age of plastics.




CHAPTER VII

THE PROBLEM IS TO HOLD IT BACK

Sometime in early November during my lunch half hour, I happened into a
ten cent store to buy some pot holders and came across a display of
bulbs marked SPECIAL TODAY--89 PER DOZEN.  There were bins and bins
and bins full.  Clipped to the top of each bin was a large lavishly
colored picture of what the bulbs would produce.  Daffodils with
magnificent golden trumpets like Gabriel's Horn, tulips with stiff
Kelly green stems supporting blossoms larger than brandy snifters,
hyacinths the size and shape of bridesmaids' muffs, ranunculus like
cabbages.

Quickly I took out my wallet and counted the grocery money.  That night
when I came in the door with two shopping bags, the girls said,
"Hooray, apples at last!"  I said no.  They said "Cokes?"  I said no.
Don said hopefully, "I thought you said you wouldn't have time to go to
the cheese stall in the public market?"  I said, "There's no use
guessing.  I've got something perfectly wonderful for all of us and
it's a surprise but I'm not going to show you until after dinner."

After dinner while the girls were argumentatively washing and chipping
the dishes, I spread newspapers on the dining room table and dumped out
the shopping bags.  The bulbs were in small brown paper sacks rather
illegibly marked "Hycth-bl--Dfdl-emp--Chndxa," etc.  I called to the
family to come and see Mommy's surprise.

After carefully balancing a greasy skillet on top of a glass, then
adding some soapy silverware and a muffin tin with half of a wet muffin
still in it (it was her night to wash), Joan came to the kitchen door,
looked at the heaps of little paper bags and said brightly, "Oh, boy,
dried apricots?"

"Guess again," I said.

Anne picked up "Chndxa," spelled it out loud and said accusingly,
"You've been to that health store again!"

Don put down _Time_, picked up "Ran-gnt" and said, "You know I never
_could_ read your writing."

I said, "I didn't write that."

Rather gingerly he opened the bag and took out what looked like a tiny
brown withered hand.  With a cry of delight, he said, "Italian
mushrooms!"

I grabbed the bag away from him, studied "Ran-gnt" for a minute or two
fruitlessly, then said, "You're all pigs.  All you think about is food.
Thank goodness for _me_, with _my_ love for beauty.  These are bulbs!
I bought them in the ten cent store this noon.  They were on sale for
almost nothing.  There are hyacinths and daffodils and tulips and all
kinds of beautiful things."  I studied "Ran-gnt" again.

Joan said, "Gosh, I wish you'd _ever_ remember to get some dried
apricots."

Anne said, "Mommy, look at the way Joan is washing the dishes.  The
water is ice cold and greasy and the dishes are filthy."

Joan said, "Oh, you're just mad because it's my week to wash."

Anne said, "And she's got Tudor's pan and the cat's dish in with our
dishes and she never rinses anything.  Look at this muffin pan she
expects me to dry.  It's got almost a whole muffin in it."

By the time I had given Joan her ten thousandth lesson in correct
dishwashing, had explained to Anne for the billionth time why she
should study Latin, why I studied Latin, why Don studied Latin, why
Joan was going to study Latin, had rinsed out a petticoat, ironed a
blouse and put up my hair, it was time for the ten o'clock news.  While
we listened to the news, I brushed the little bags of bulbs back into
the shopping bag.  Then Don said, "I think we should plant all those
bulbs in the woods and let them naturalize.  I don't like gardens that
look planted.  I think all flowers should grow naturally."

I said, "I like flowers to look natural too, but not so natural that
they are all eaten by slugs and killed by nettles and wild cucumber.  I
plan to put the tulips and daffodils at the top of the rockery in the
big patio, the other things in the rockeries, the ranunculuses in that
bed by the kitchen and crocuses in the moss between the cedar blocks in
the patios."

Don said, "You'd better not dig in that moss, you might kill it.  I'll
put the crocuses and daffodils in the woods by the spring.  They'll
look more natural."

I said, "What pleasure would we get out of flowers growing way up by
the spring, we never go up there."

Don said, "It wouldn't take much work to widen that trail."

I said, "Well you widen the trail and then we'll see about planting
bulbs, only it should be iris because they like water."

"Iris," Don said.  "That's what I was thinking of.  Did you get any?"

"No," I said.

"What about bluebells?"

"You mean scillas?"

"No, I mean bluebells.  My grandmother used to have them in her
orchard.  They grew under the trees in big masses.  They looked so
natural."

We were in bed reading and smoking one last cigarette when Don suddenly
thrust the _House Beautiful_ under my nose and said, "See, that's what
I mean."  He had the magazine folded back to a colored plate of a
forty-room stone house surrounded by gigantic oak trees and at least
one hundred and fifty acres of lawn.  Flowing from oak tree to oak tree
and on off into the distance was a golden river of daffodils, about
eight billion of them.  "Naturalized," Don said.  "That's the way all
bulbs should be planted."

Even though we weren't able to reach a compromise as to where the bulbs
should be planted, we decided that we would do something about them
that weekend, perhaps divide them equally between us.

But Friday afternoon Anne's and Joan's friends Marilyn and Joanne
arrived to stay until Sunday night and Saturday morning early Don and I
were awakened by the four little girls standing at the foot of our bed,
making gagging noises and holding their noses.

"Sobethig sbells awful!" Joan said.

"Sobethig has died under the house," Anne said.

"We are all gettig sick," Joan said.  "Hurry ad get up, it's awful."

Anne wailed, "Why does sobethig like this always have to happed whed we
have company?"  (Especially Marilyn whose mother had a green Cadillac
and a Filipino houseboy but whose little girl I was pleased to note had
a very dirty neck and no buttons on her pajamas.)

So Don spent all day Saturday and all day Sunday easing himself
headfirst over the hot water tank which had been carefully set up in
the only entrance to the underneath part of the house, then crawling
unenthusiastically around in the dirt, rubble and extra building
materials trying to find the rat.  I held the flashlight and handed him
the poker and helped him move the lumber, while the girls said, "Ugh,
it smells awful!  Haven't you found it yet?  Haven't you found it yet?"

In between times I cooked, tidied up, washed, ironed, made fudge,
listened to long recitals of "then I said and she said and he said and
the dumb teacher said," refereed quarrels, gave my opinions on the
subjects of Betty Grable, Tyrone Power, Lana Turner, Van Johnson, Frank
Sinatra, pink lipstick, purple toenail polish, peignoirs, speed boats,
trips to Florida and smoking, and withheld my opinion on the subject of
Marilyn's beautiful mother and her strapless dresses and green
Cadillac, about whom we heard far too much.

The more I heard about Marilyn's beautiful, luxury-saturated mother the
more I noticed how thin--well, really emaciated--Marilyn her only child
was; how her little gray petticoat straps were fastened with rusty
safety pins; how much tartar she had on her crooked little teeth.

Finally it was Sunday night.  Marilyn and Joanne had been driven to the
ferry; Don had located the rat in the motor of the refrigerator right
by the fan; nobody had been able to find Joan's geography book; I was
washing my hair with cake soap because of having such a strong sense of
beauty and substituting Anem-St. Brg. for shampoo, Don was helping Anne
with a theme on "My Happy Weekend"; the bulbs were still in their
little bags.

"We'll plant the bulbs next weekend for sure," I told Don later as he
mournfully brushed his teeth with salt and soda because I had spent the
money for Psdnt-wht or Chndxa-bl.

The next weekend we had a terrific storm.  The sort of storm where the
wind grabbed the cedar tree (diameter of trunk one foot) right outside
the kitchen window and bent it over like a croquet wicket, made the
great virgin firs back of the house describe such tremendous arcs that
Don and I took turns nervously trying to measure them from the living
room window, and tossed big branches with cones on them over the
countryside like bouquets.  The Sound, whipped into muddy waves fifteen
feet high, thundered against the shore with so much fury and power the
whole island trembled.  It was not raining in the conventional drop or
pitter-patter sense.  Water was just dumped on us like someone emptying
a hot water bottle.  The eaves, troughs and gutters were completely
defeated and water ran from the edges of the roof in shiny isinglass
sheets.

Don and Joan put on oilskins and sou'westers and went down to the sea
wall and brought up creosote logs which made such a fierce fire we had
to move the furniture to the ends of the living room, and even then
there was a strong smell of hot varnish.  We had a cozy time though
popping corn, reading aloud and making records of the girls singing
"Tangerine" in high nervous voices and Don singing "Rock of Ages"
confidently off key, but the bulbs stayed in the little bags.

Then it was February and I had been fired from my job and was staying
home and one day the sun came out and it was warm and I began working
in the garden and saw small green spikes and humps where there were
almost small green spikes and I remembered about the bulbs still in
their little sacks marked "Tlps-Ctge-pnk."  Being entirely
inexperienced and to date a very unsuccessful gardener, I called Mother
and asked her if I could plant the bulbs anyway or did I have to wait
until next year.

Mother said, "Stick them in.  They will be late but it can't be helped.
Be sure and put some bone meal under each bulb."

I also told her about the green spikes and asked her to identify them.

She said, "Daffodils and narcissus, probably.  I'll come out one of
these days and take a look.  I love to poke around in an old garden and
see what is coming up."

So I planted the bulbs in masses and in spite of the fact that every
place I dug I ran into other bulbs and morning-glory roots and planted
the ranunculuses upside down, they all grew, were almost as big as the
pictures and, for the first time in my life, I could pick an armful of
blue hyacinths.

I learned that first spring that gardening is for very small children
and adults.  The inbetweeners', especially young females', only
interest in the garden is picking flowers for their hair.  From the day
of the first camellia, which was some time in January, Anne and Joan
left for school looking from the front like natives about to attend a
fiesta, from the back, with their dishtowel bandannas, wooden shoes and
long boy's coats, like sad old peasants going out to gather faggots.

After the hyacinths had finished blooming, Don, who is under the
illusion that he knows more about gardening than Burbank but actually
doesn't know a _Pachysandra terminalis_ from an aspirin tablet, strode
out one Sunday morning in a spurt of neatness, clipped off all the
hyacinth leaves close to the ground and tossed them on the compost
heap.  The next year where I had had my masses of hyacinths, I had only
two or three spindly little stalks with a few scattered blooms like
scillas.

I also learned that first spring how riotously things grow here on
Vashon.  We cleared land in January and by June it was a jungle again.
I sent away for a dwarf white buddleia because it was unconditionally
guaranteed not to exceed thirty inches, stuck it in what we considered
a very poor spot at the top of the rockery in the white garden and it
grew ten feet that first year and bore blossoms eight inches long.
Right now it is twenty feet high and I cut it to the ground every time
I go past it.  There are also millions of little dwarf (hah) white
buddleias flourishing around the mother plant for a radius of one
hundred feet.  The blossoms are a pure white, lilac-shaped and lovely
if you can see them without tipping over backwards.

Then there are the Empress trees I bought that first spring.  "Very
rare!" the nurseryman told me, pretending in the crafty sure-fire way
all nurserymen do that he didn't really want to sell them, that he was
only letting me buy them because his wife was at her sister Cora's.  As
he dug me up _five_ he told me that they were so terribly rare, "Sacred
tree of the Empress of China," that there were only two in Seattle.
Don and I planted the Empress trees and I hovered over them and stroked
them and was awed by their rareness and wondered how they were going to
display it.

They then started to grow.  Wow!  The one by the kitchen door is over
forty feet high and by Empress tree standards is still only a little
tiny baby.  Empress trees have lovely, sweet-scented, periwinkle-blue
blossoms in spikes like foxglove.  The buds, formed at the ends of the
branches in the fall, stand up against the winter sky like brown velvet
buttons unless Don happens along with his pruning saw and decides to
"shape the trees" by cutting off a limb four inches in diameter.

Empress trees have enormous, loosely attached leaves which drop off all
summer long and lie around on the patios and flower beds like palm-leaf
fans.  We have found that the best, well really the only, way to enjoy
the Empress tree blossoms is to go out in the rowboat and look in at
them against the sky.

That is really the best way to view all of my gardening.  One hundred
yards from shore in the rowboat it looks marvelous.  Up close there is
the embarrassing sight of horsetail, wild morning-glory, dock, wild
cucumber, blackberries and nettles, busily choking out the tender
planted things.

I suppose our original mistake was in trying to take in the entire
seven acres with only Mother as gardener.  I mean true gardener, the
kind who goes quietly along day after day, transplanting, spraying,
pruning, weeding, picking, a little here, a little there.  I rush out
seasonally and put in long hours for a short time.  Don waits until the
wild cucumbers are shamelessly bearing little cucumbers right in front
of us on the paths, then takes a sharp scythe and goes out to "clear
things up," which in my language means slashing off azaleas, ripping
out blue ball thistles, mowing down heathers and other acts of
vandalism.

Don always prunes things that should never be pruned, digs tiny holes
and rams in huge balls of roots, divides by brute force and lifts with
a yank.  It is very irritating to have the things he plants so
mannishly, grow.

The best vegetable garden we ever had was our first, planted in an old
cesspool.  An old cesspool that didn't work exactly right, the
Hendersons told us with a chuckle, intimating that the not working was
a temporary thing like rheumatism caused by the damp weather but would
clear up in the spring.

When spring came it was not necessary for us to go down to the sea wall
to see how the old cesspool was not working.  We could tell by just
opening any door.  Joan said with some pride, "Gosh, you can smell our
cesspool clear up at the bus stop."  So one Saturday morning Don and I
went purposefully down and began poking around.  It took us about five
minutes to deduce that for years and years the cesspool had not been
emptying into the sump, or whatever was planned, but had been viciously
seeping into an area about fifty feet long and fifteen feet wide along
the sea wall.  Don drilled drainage holes in the sea wall, cleaned out
the intake and outgo pipes, remarking bitterly that standing in an old
cesspool was not his idea of a day off, dug up the sump when the tide
was right and he could get at it, and finally had the whole system
working again.

Though all the seepage had been drained off and that part of the sea
wall smelled better, it looked forsaken and untidy.  Don suggested
buying clover seed and scattering it around, but as this is his stock
remedy for anything not curable by whisky in hot milk, I decided
instead to plant a vegetable garden there.  I cleared out all the
syringa and horsetail and wild blackberry vines, Don dug up the ground
and, as it was pure clay, I drafted the girls into helping us scoop up
and dump on about fifty (they still say a thousand) buckets of beach
sand.  For the next two weeks I raked and smashed clay lumps until my
hands were reduced to flapping blisters with fingers but I had a fairly
friable soil.

I made neat, short, north-and-south rows and we all planted radishes,
romaine, carrots, ruby Swiss chard, New Zealand spinach, salsify,
cucumbers, summer squash, zucchini, garlic, onions and tomatoes.  I
marked all the rows carefully with the seed packages stuck on little
sticks, but I needn't have bothered.  Those vegetables shot out of the
ground like rockets and grew so enormous that even near-sighted Anne
and I could look north from the old dock and tell our salsify from our
carrots.

Because of the fast growth, some of the things were hollow like gourds,
but we had enough for the whole Northwest.  I was terribly proud and
planned on sharing, until the afternoon when Anne and Joan came
breathlessly in and told me with relish that the whole beach was
talking about my garden and waiting hopefully for us all to get
hookworm or Shigella.  "Does hookworm start with a sort of pain in your
ribs?" Joan asked.

"No," I said shortly, "that is the direct result of seven peanut butter
sandwiches and three Cokes before lunch and not making your bed."

Then I called Mary's husband who is a doctor and asked him if we were
doing a dangerous thing.  He said wistfully that he certainly wished he
had some of that fine fertilizer for his garden.  He had gone in
strongly for coffee grounds that year.  In fact had commandeered the
entire output from the Naval Hospital and was dumping them on their
vegetable garden to loosen the clay soil.  The results had not been too
satisfactory.  Really more like a giant percolator than a garden and
certainly did not compare to clay loosened with beach sand and cess.

I planted the tomato plants the Italian way of bending up three or four
inches at the top for the plant and burying the rest.  I also kept them
pruned to one stalk.  They grew into small trees and bore bushels of
tomatoes.  That was the same year I lined all the sea wall with parsley
and for the first time in my life had enough.

Heady with the success of that first small garden which _I_ cared for,
Don read aloud to me an article from the _Gardener's Monthly_ entitled
"Weeding Is a Waste of Time."  The big liar who wrote it (a man) said
that he spaded up his very large garden, planted his seeds and that was
that until harvesttime.  "Nature does not expect us to weed--weeds
provide the plants with much needed oxygen"--and so on, and so on.  I
noticed that there were no pictures of the man's garden, no record of
his crop, nor any comments from his wife.

The upshot of this was that the next spring Don had a five acre field,
on the farm above us, plowed just a little, bought his seeds by the
pound and left the rest up to God and old Weeding-is-a-waste-of-time.
We raised about six spindly carrots, a few wrinkled peas which the
pheasants ate and the biggest crop of quack grass this side of Wyoming.

Don loves trees--I suspect sometimes that he had a dryad ancestor,
because he will never willingly part with any tree and suffers actual
physical pain when I chop one down--even the wild cherry that was
choking out his favorite weeping pussy-willow.  When we began
landscaping he rushed feverishly to town and bought out the entire
evergreen output of a small nursery.  It was fine when they were
itty-bitty.  Now they have taken hold and though Mother and I secretly
slash them back all the time, it doesn't even show and you should see
the Sequoias which were about six inches high when Don brought them
home.  "Zowie!" they said, after he had turned them out of their tiny
pots and tucked them into our black leaf mold.  "This is a place we
like!" and they began beating their chests and springing toward heaven
in dark green leaps and bounds.

It is satisfactory, though, to plant things and have them thrive.  To
celebrate our first Valentine's Day on Vashon, Anne and Joan brought me
a pale pink single camellia in a little pink pot.  It was a sallow
trembly little thing about four inches high with one bloom.  I stuck it
in the bed with the espaliered apricot tree, even then apparently
dedicated to pushing in the south wall of the house.  The little
camellia grew very well and the next year had four blossoms.  After a
while we put in a gas furnace.  "The exhaust has to come out here"
(right by the camellia), the furnaceman said sternly.  I was worried.
"Shall I move it?" I asked Mother.

"Move that damn wisteria first," Mother said.  She hates wisteria
because it is vigorous and heedless and its little clutching hands had
choked the life out of a rare French lilac before it had time to settle
its roots or learn the English for "Cut that out!"

So I moved the wisteria over by the guesthouse where there were no
foreigners and where we wanted it to clutch and choke, and forgot about
the camellia.  I just went out and looked at it to make sure I was not
dreaming and the camellia is taller than I am, five feet, six and
three-quarters inches in my stocking feet and I have on shoes (just for
a lark, of course), it is well branched and loaded with blossoms.
Either it likes gas fumes or this is Shangrila.

One of the plants or rather shrubs we bought for the rockery by the
small patio is called _Pittosporum tobira_, honestly that is the only
name it has.  It has shiny evergreen leaves, small waxy white blossoms
that look like orange blossoms and smell like hyacinths and are
supposed to appear only in semi-tropical climates.  I bought it because
of its delightful fragrance, because it was small and compact and
seemed such a _little_ evergreen for the rockery, and also of course
because the nurseryman said he didn't really want to sell it but as
long as his wife was at her sister Ethel's....  When I showed it to
several of my gardening friends they liked it because it had such a
hard name but shook their heads sadly and said, "You won't have it
long.  It will never survive our winters."  Well, it is now as big
around as our umbrella table, about four feet tall and Mother and I
have been pruning it for three years.

All this vigor has nothing at all to do with me.  Mother can take as
much credit as she wants but I was really a very unsuccessful gardener
until we moved to Vashon.  Here we have an unbeatable combination of
salt air, the Japanese Current, continual rain, hundreds of years of
leaf mold washed down every winter, and cool summers.  This is the
perfect climate for rhododendrons, camellias and azaleas, not so good
for people.  My Fabia rhododendrons, which have tubular orange-apricot
blossoms and are labeled by the garden book, "rare and delicate," bloom
in May and again in September.  Butterfly, a pale yellow hybrid, noted
for being both sulky and leggy, has a blossom on every branchlet and
has the contours of a teapot.  This morning, just for fun, I counted
the blossoms on one of our Unknown Warrior rhododendrons--the one the
nurseryman said was so spindly we could have it for half price--it has
seventy-eight blossoms.  The blossoms average seven inches in
diameter--the individual flowerets three inches.  Mother was worried
about these rhododendrons because they began showing color in December
and some of the blossoms were frozen.

I should really stop right here while you have the impression that we
are living in the Du Pont conservatories.  But honesty demands that I
go on and say that it is not to be overlooked that such remarkable
climatic and soil conditions affect weeds the way they affect
non-weeds.  What do you think of horsetail that pushes its head right
through asphalt paving?  What about seedling alders that invade the
rockery en masse and grow four feet a season--wild cucumber that climbs
to the top of maples--docks with roots two feet long rammed straight
down into the ground like spikes, but spikes cemented in--syringa and
elderberry that completely healed the raw wound of a landslide down the
beach in one season--wild morning-glory sneaking across the guesthouse
porch, in the door and around the leg of the Benjamin Franklin stove
during the week we were painting?

There is also the little matter of things taking hold--ajuga, for
instance--I love its true blue blossoms and lovely copper-colored
leaves and it is a good groundcover so I put a clump here and there in
the rockeries--on banks--along the road.  Before I could say
"atropurpurea" it was pushing the lithospermum and perennial candytuft
out of the rockery and into the kitchen, had completely obliterated the
guest-house path, killed all the rock roses, and was spitting on its
hands getting ready to rip the shakes off the roof.  Mother and I
yanked it out and moved it clear up into the deep woods, about ten
acres away.  Yesterday Don took me up to show me the exact location of
a surveyor's stake (usual vital last-minute information before leaving
on a trip--he had already explained the difference between heavy duty
and light duty wiring--how to lower cutting blade on lawn mower) and I
was attracted by a brilliant patch of blue at the edge of the wood's
road.  It was the ajuga in full brilliant battle dress, standing tall,
heads erect, marching toward home.  I noticed also that it has made a
full recovery in the rockeries and is fighting it out with the coral
bells for possession of the azaleas.

Another slight disadvantage observed by gardeners in this mild damp
country is the size and ferocity of the slugs.  We have black, red,
yellow, olive-green and gray slugs.  We have them up to six inches
long, impervious to all baits and fond of Frisky dog food.  One time I
climbed laboriously down the face of a bank to pick some lovely
apricot-colored broom.  I had gathered a large armload and was almost
up to the house with it before I noticed that on all the branches black
slugs were hanging like Bing cherries.

We also have tent caterpillars--worse some years than others.  Last
summer, a bad year, we had all of our property sprayed but, because of
no road, the rest of the beach sprayed only their gardens and didn't do
anything about the hills back of them.  In the evening when we ate
dinner in the patio we had the cozy accompaniment of millions of
caterpillars crunching their way through millions of alder leaves.  It
was a crisp noise like walking in spilled sugar.  Very penetrating.

We have no aphis, Japanese beetles or ordinary biting mosquitoes, but
when the tent caterpillars hatch we have millions of moths that flutter
around the porch and patio lights like torn paper.  We have tried all
kinds of moth-catching devices, all of which always make a worse mess
than the moths and get my windows dirty.  That first summer Don rigged
up a powerful spotlight focused into a bucket of water with kerosene in
it.  The moths swarmed around the light, took dips in the kerosene and
then insane and dripping, hurled themselves against the living room and
kitchen windows, then on to the patios.  Moths are heedless fools with
fat juicy bodies and I don't relish them batting around but I was never
prepared for the girls' hysterical outbursts.  We would be peacefully
eating dinner when suddenly one (or both) of them would leap to her
feet, usually knocking over her milk and her chair, and rush from the
table shrieking.  If they had company, which they usually did, this
would be a signal for them all to begin to yelp and shudder and tip
over things.

Even worse than moths are the WooWoos, those mosquito-like creatures
with a wing spread of about four inches, a body like a B-29 and inside
my nightgown their goal.  It has always distressed Don, who is a
peaceful man of studied actions, to be suddenly interrupted in his
reading of some morbid atomic bit in _Time_ by a bloodcurdling shriek
and me diving under the covers down by his feet.  Each time, after he
has disposed of the attacker and is settling himself, he says, "You
know, I hate those hysterical outbursts of yours, Betty.  If you would
only warn me."

And I reply, "But the WooWoo didn't warn _me_."

"That's because you insist on having the window open."

That goes back to our long-enduring argument about night air.  Don has
always insisted we get enough air from the fireplace.  I like a gale
blowing in the window.  We have compromised on the windows open,
screens down, the draperies drawn, which trick is old stuff to the
moths and WooWoos who don't like night air either and long ago got hold
of the plans of the house and took note of every flaw and crack between
screen and windowsill.  This year I am thinking of one of those huge
tropical mosquito nets soaked in DDT and draped from the ceiling like a
tent over me.

In spite of the slugs, moths and WooWoos, I have found nothing that
gives me such a sense of accomplishment or peace as gardening--no
matter how vigorously I attack it.  I'm sure I couldn't have survived
either literary success or Anne and Joan's adolescence without it.  My
favorite time to garden is in early April during one of the feathery
warm spring rains when weeds are easy to uproot and the earth has a
rich leafy mushroomy smell.

Of course the minute I showed interest in gardening I ran into the
Garden-Club-Latin-Namers.  "Gosh, what pretty red nasturtiums," I said.

"Oh, you must mean my _Tropaeoleum majus_?" the Latin-Namer answered
with a condescending little laugh.

The secret thing I have found out about the Latin-Namers is that very
few of them have gardens.  "Too busy with my Garden Clubs," one told me
last spring when she came up to borrow some flowers for their meeting.




CHAPTER VIII

CIRRIPEDS NOT WANTED

Before embarking on it, my conception of life on an island was much the
same as my conception of life in a submarine.  I imagined that
everybody did everything together all the time.  I had visions of
jelly-making bees, community suppers, wild blackberry expeditions,
sharing the woodcutting and so on.  All erroneous.  At least for us
year-rounders.  The summer people, those mothlike creatures with their
unreal attitude toward winter and their urban love of urban pursuits,
such as having fun, are exceptions.  They see a great deal of each
other; in fact, as one woman put it, "are in each other's armpits
twenty-four hours a day."  The rest of us go along for weeks, months,
even years, thinking of each other, intending to get together but not
quite making it unless we happen to board the same ferry.

The other day I ran into what I consider a close friend on the ferry.
I said, "Oh, and you have the new baby with you.  I've been dying to
see her," and she said, "You must mean Marilyn, Betty.  She started to
school yesterday.  This is Johnny and I guess you missed Larry
altogether.  Too bad I left him home with Mother."  She knew that I
have been busy and obviously she has too.

This is not due to any unfriendliness at all.  It is due to unseen
forces such as the bark tide which kept Don and me from making our
semi-yearly visit to the house of charming neighbors who live way down
the beach--nine houses.  Boiling over with friendliness and good
intentions we left the house one sunny October afternoon.

"I understand that Julia's chrysanthemums are simply magnificent this
year," I said to Don as we started down the path.  "I wonder how George
is coming with his gold mine," Don said.  George had begun on the mine
six years before and it never occurred to either of us that the vein
could have run out since we had seen him last.  Anyway we got as far as
the sea wall, then we saw it.  The most magnificent bark tide of the
year.  From Dolphin Point clear past the old dock, huge brown slabs of
bark lay along the water's edge in the sunshine, like seals.  Even
people invited to dinner don't pass up bark tides like that one, so we
rushed back to the house for our canvas bark bags and gloves and got to
work.  Hours later our beach was clean, the sea wall was piled high and
we were too tired to go anywhere but home.  However, as we worked we
did stop occasionally to wave at our neighbors who like sandpipers
could be seen darting around on their beaches gathering up the bonanza.
A doctor, an insurance man, a lawyer, a shipbuilder, a banker, a
newspaper publisher, all enjoying for an hour or two the same goal.

Vashon Island's population is spread over its surface in small clusters
like fly eggs.  Each small community has a name, Robinwood Beach,
Tahlequah, Burton, Dilworth Point, Cove, Paradise Cove, Shawnee,
Magnolia Beach, Portage, Glen Acres, Ellisport, Lisabeula, Colvos,
Vashon Heights, Paradise Valley, Luana Beach, Sylvan Beach, Bethel
Park, Klahanie Beach, Docton, Sunrise Ridge, Cedarhurst, Dolphin Point
(ours), Scales Corner (all I can remember at this time) and the town of
Vashon itself.  Quite naturally each community believes that its
residents are the most refined, most intelligent, most desirable, its
beach the finest, its view of Mount Rainier or the Olympics the most
spectacular, its clams the sweetest.  Such illusions sponsor
contentment, are harmless and will no doubt persist until the floating
bridge from Seattle is built and the whole world can see that Dolphin
Point is the loveliest spot on Vashon Island, which explains why it has
been settled by such a brilliant, talented, enchanting group of people.

For the first few years after we moved to the beach, we had only one
year-round neighbor, the Russells.  They bought their house the same
year we did, and also, as we did, worked and commuted.  During those
first years we were drawn together by mutual hardships--the snow, no
lights, no road, the terrible telephone service, getting enough wood,
storms, walking the trail--and mutual enjoyments--Anne and Joan (they
have no children), gardening, cooking, eating, the beach, clams,
knitting, driftwood, reading, and living on an island.

The Russells were neighbors in the true, old-fashioned, almost
forgotten, calf's-foot-jelly sense of the word.  A plate never returned
empty.  Tea and cucumber sandwiches in the afternoon.  Half of a fresh
cake left on the kitchen table.  Hand-knitted Angora socks for the
girls.  Help with a creosote log, chicken broth for the ailing.  "I'm
rowing to the store, what can I get you?"  It is a sad thing that the
pace of today's living has done so much to eliminate this graceful way
of life.  To us the word "neighbor" is a warm tangible thing instead of
merely nomenclature for the house next door.

As time went on and their children finished school, other summer people
girded up their loins and became year-rounders.  Now, even on the
stormiest nights, nights when the wind grabs the giant firs and shakes
them until their cones rattle on the roof like pebbles, the clouds
explode with rain and the waves attack the sea walls like charging
bulls, we can look along our curve of beach and count seven lighted
houses, seven beacons of friendship.

As I have said, it takes a certain native hardiness to enjoy living on
an island.  This hardiness is not always evident but comes to the
surface during crises.  Take the case of our neighbor with four large
grown married sons.  She is small and dainty and looks younger than her
daughters-in-law but has been known to move a half-ton rock or haul
manure three miles when necessary for her garden.  She is also noted
for not resorting to the barrel of a shotgun in her mouth or any other
coward's way out, that time during the war and rationing when her
youngest son brought the entire high school football team out for the
weekend, supplemented only by a box of candy which they immediately
ate.  And what do you think of a woman who can entertain an entire
Campfire Group for a long rainy weekend in a small servantless house
and somebody left the bag containing the weenies and marshmallows on
the dock?  This same woman, who is my favorite neighbor, asked for and
got six grandchildren under six years old for two weeks.  Her magic
formula for dealing with children is ignoring all faults and accenting
tiny virtues.  She says, "Instead of telling Tommy day in and day out
that he is the naughtiest boy in the United States of America, which
could very well be true, take an aspirin and comment on his neatly tied
shoes.  Almost anybody would rather be known for expert shoe-tying than
for kicking the cat."  She always tells whiners how charming they
are--bullies how brave--bad sports how good--sneaks how honest!  This
formula also works on husbands but often requires in addition to the
blind eye something stronger than aspirin.

For several summers our beach rang with the laughter and other noises
of twenty-eight children under twelve.  Now most of those are grown but
a large new generation is gaining ground rapidly.  Next summer in this
house alone we should have six under five, and by adding nephews and
nieces, ten or eleven of which I can produce at the drop of a hat or
the bars, it is a certainty we can hold up our end.

Down by the point there is a fine big family with nine children, most
of whom are married and have children of their own.  The fourth from
the top or from the bottom, I am not sure which, with her husband and
three children has recently become a year-rounder.  She has deep
dimples and many talents, not the least of which is the ability to
smile when thirty-eight relatives with children arrive for the weekend.

Island men are really hardier than island women, especially those
enduring the daily grind of commuting, supplemented by walking a small
narrow slippery trail in the rain.  On occasion, particularly after an
earthquake or wild storm, walking the trail is an adventure.  Sometimes
when you round a curve you find the trail has slid off the face of the
hill and is crouched at the bottom of a ravine twenty or thirty feet
below, and you have to make your precarious way across the face of an
oozing clay bank.  Other times you suddenly come on mudslides,
collapsed bridges or big trees across the path.  Once when I was
working in town and running the trail in the early morning, an enormous
alder fell between me and a neighbor about ten feet ahead of me.  We
might both have been killed.  I remember feeling only surprise because,
though it was raining, a fine misty rain, there wasn't a breath of
wind.  I also remember that the tree, which was over two feet in
diameter at the butt, didn't make a sound until it hit the ground.
Then it merely sighed and rustled like a rheumatic old lady stretching
out on the couch.

On weekends an island man cuts wood, goes fishing, paints his name on
his sea wall, mends the downspouts, shoots at bottles, gathers bark,
prunes the apple trees, baits the rat traps, tends the outboard motor,
calks the rowboat, puts out the crab trap, makes a pitcher of martinis,
sits in his car in front of the grocery store reading _Popular
Mechanics_ while his wife does the weekly shopping, gets a haircut,
discusses politics and the weather.  The percentage who do nothing but
get drunk and hit their wives is slightly smaller than in Seattle
across the way.  This is attributable to the invigorating yet sobering
effect of salt air.

We didn't meet all of the regular inhabitants of our beach for several
years as all the boys, one of the girls, and many of the men were in
the service.  During this period some of the houses were rented.  Most
of the renters were transient, both in location, occupation and
attitude, and though we were moderately friendly, I cannot easily
recall their faces or their names.  I remember a few scattered
incidents.

The time Joan and Anne baby-sat for a woman with three small children
and she called me, sobbing hysterically, and said they had eaten up
thirteen red points.  When grilled they admitted to cocoa, Spam
sandwiches with sweet pickles and a plate of fudge.  Their defense was
that they were hungry, had shared this bacchanalia with Mrs.
Hemingway's children, and she had only given them twenty-five cents for
hours and hours of tremendous physical labor--carrying those sandwiches
to and from the couch.  I replaced the Spam, butter, sweet pickles,
cocoa, sugar, chocolate and nuts, and contemplated also giving Mrs.
Hemingway, obviously a virgin in this respect, a few facts of life
regarding baby-sitters.  But as she was rather ungracious about the
supplies, I held back on the baby-sitting advice, reasoning that she
deserved to learn the hard way that all baby-sitters are part boa
constrictor and anything you don't want eaten should be studded with
mouse traps or locked up.

I also remember beautiful little dark-eyed Mary who lived (well, really
rested) on the beach for a month or two.  She was frail, she said, and
her chest hurt if she carried anything heavy.  One rainy evening she
and her husband, Wesley, and Don and I came home on the same ferry.  We
stopped at the store, and I bought two _enormous_ shopping bags of
groceries.  In addition we picked up the laundry, the mail, which was
filled with stout magazines, and the milk.  I had a shopping bag which
must have weighed fifty pounds, my green office bag, the mail, and a
bundle of laundry.  Don had the other heavier shopping bag, his lunch
box and the milk.  Wesley had a shopping bag, his lunch bucket and
their milk.  Mary had her purse and a small loaf of white bread,
sliced.  When we stopped to rest at the "big tree," my hands, which
were a deep purple, wouldn't let go of my bags and Don had to pry them
loose, like separating a suicide from his pistol.

When we had all had a cigarette and were ready to go again, Mary said,
"Wesley, honey, you'll have to carry my purse and the bread, my chest
hurts."

Wesley said, "I can't, honey, my hands are full."

Then Don said, and his voice oozed concern and tenderness, "Here let me
take your stuff.  I'll put it in my shopping bag."

I said, "My chest hurts too and so do my hands and my legs and my
stomach and my head."

Mary and Wesley laughed but Don gave me a disappointed look, which just
goes to show that the hurty chests of this world are the smart ones and
us good sports deserve the big shopping bags we always get.

When I say I cannot remember the war renters I am excepting Lesley
Arnold, who, in addition to a husband in the Navy and thirty-one coats,
including one lined with real leopard and a full-back wild mink, had
large purple eyes which she seemed to keep focused on Don.

It was our first spring on the island I was painting the porch
furniture and humming and being happy and trying not to care that I
worked harder than anyone in the whole world and was apparently also
going to be buried in my tan knitted suit.  I love to do things like
painting porch furniture on a spring day, or licking bookplates on a
rainy day.  I am a true homebody, a domestic woman who will fight like
a tiger for her children, her man or the last leg of lamb in the
butcher shop.  My favorite song is "You're Mine, You."

I had just made the discovery that the word "folding," stamped on the
bottom of the captain's chairs I was painting, meant "with a hammer"
when Anne and Joan came bounding in and announced breathlessly that
some new people named Arnold had moved to Vashon and "Mrs. Arnold is
about your age only _awfully pretty_ with _beautiful_ clothes," Anne
said.  "She gave us a Coke and they are just moving and her husband is
in California so I invited her to dinner.  Her name is Lesley and she
said we could call her it.  She's adorable, Betty, and she's brown and
has a perfect figure."

A strange chilly premonition, like one of those small unexplained
riffles on smooth water, swept over me.  However, I said, "How nice.
What time did you tell her to come?"

"I didn't tell her any time," Anne said.  "I just said dinner.  What
smells so awful, dinner?"

"Turpentine," I said.  "I'll call Mrs. Arnold."

A gust of wind slipped under the newspapers I had spread on the porch,
lifted them up and began folding them around the freshly painted chairs
like wrappings.  "Oh, damn!" I said, slapping furiously at the papers.

"You've got white paint in your hair," Joan said.

Anne said, "What are you going to wear tonight, Mommy?"

"I hadn't thought," I said.  "But undoubtedly my tan knitted suit."

"What are we going to have to eat?" Joan asked.

"Oxtails," I said.  "I've already got them in."

"Oxtails!" Anne wailed.  "Why don't we have fried chicken?  Marilyn's
mother always has fried chicken when she has company."

"Because," I said rather crossly, "I've got oxtails already in the
oven.  Anyway, they are delicious and I cook them better than anybody."

"But oxtails sound so _cheap_," Anne said.  "And they're so gluey."

"That's the best part," Joan said.

"What else are we going to have?" Anne asked.

"I was planning on having oxtails with carrots and mushrooms, mashed
potatoes because the gravy is so good, green salad with olive oil and
lemon juice and that fruit stuff made with bananas and oranges and
pineapple and coconut."

"I'll make an angel food cake," Anne said.

"You can't.  Not enough eggs," I said.  "Anyway we won't need cake.
Oxtails are filling and fruit is all we will want for dessert."

"Please, Betty, let me make a cake," Anne said.

"Go on, Betty, let her," Joan said.  "Only make a devil's food with
four layers, Anne."

"If you want to cook, why don't you bake some oatmeal cookies," I said
to Anne.  "I think we have both raisins and nuts."

"Sure," Joan said.  "I'll help."

"Eat them, you mean," Anne said.

"What time is it?" I asked.  "Joanie, run in and look at the kitchen
clock."

From the kitchen Joan called out, "Quarter to five."

I stood up and stretched.  Anne said, "Maybe I'd better just fix the
fruit.  I wish we had a _fresh_ pineapple and a _real_ coconut."

"It'll be just as good without," I said.  "Put some fresh mint in it.
I'm going in and call Mrs. Arnold."

Lesley Arnold's voice was husky to that fascinating point just short of
asthma.  She was easy and absolutely sure of herself.  She said she'd
love to come to dinner and couldn't she come early and help.  With that
tiny laugh with which women indicate that they are so well organized
they have had everything done since four that morning, I said no, but
to come early and have a martini.

She said, "Anne and Joan are so adorable.  I do hope they'll be home."

"They will," I said.  "They think you are beautiful and glamorous and
can hardly wait to see you."

"The lambs," she said.  "I'll be over in a while."

I went upstairs, took a bath, mostly with turpentine to get the white
paint off my legs and arms and hair and neck, put on my tan knitted
suit, lots of perfume, heavy gold jewelry and heavy makeup.  When I
came into the kitchen Joan said, "Wow, your eyebrows are dark!"

Anne said, "I think you look glamorous but I wish you'd wear more
eyeshadow.  _Charm_ magazine says that everybody should wear eyeshadow
even in the daytime."

"Even on the beach?" I asked.

"Of course," Anne said.  "I'm going to wear eyeshadow with my bathing
suit this summer."

"I'm not," Joan said.

"No, you'll probably wear filth and blackberry stains," Anne said.

I said quickly, "Joanie, you set the table, while I make the martinis."

Anne said, "I'll set the table; Joan, you make the living room fire."

"Oh, sure," Joan said, "'I'll light the candles; Joanie, you carry up a
thousand-pound log.'"

"What's all this loose talk about logs?" Don said from the doorway.

Lesley Arnold was so beautiful she made me slightly sick at my stomach.
She had large purple, really purple, eyes, small regular features,
glistening white teeth, and hair, the color of unbleached muslin,
pulled severely back and held with a large tortoise-shell barrette.
Her skin was the color of good bourbon.  She had on a goldy brown,
sleeveless, glazed-chintz dress, cut very low, a gold cashmere sweater,
huge topaz-and-diamond earrings and three heavy topaz-and-diamond
bracelets.  Her slender brown feet were wrapped in natural leather
thongs.  She made me feel just like a hygiene teacher.  A hot hygiene
teacher in an ugly tan knitted suit, the wrong shoes and no husband.

Don, my honest, blunt Scotsman, was so dashing (drooling?) that even
the girls were impressed.  After dinner some of the beach people came
up and we drank highballs, played records, recorded our own squeaky
voices and were terribly gay until after three o'clock.  Lesley was
certainly very very attractive.  At least I thought so until she pushed
me up against the icebox and said, "I've asked your big handsome
husband to walk me home--do you mind?"

"Help yourself--take two," I said, my eyes on the dripping ice tray I
was holding.

"Can I have a kiss, too?" she said.

"Why don't you ask _him_?" I said.

By the time Don got home I had washed the dishes, emptied all the
ashtrays, even vacuumed.  (I didn't want anybody getting up in court
and saying I hadn't done my share.) Don said, "I hurried as fast as I
could."

"Those things take time," I said.

"What things?" he asked.

"Things like kissing Lesley," I said.

"Oh, that," Don said.  "She asked me to kiss her so I pecked her on the
cheek."

We were all supposed to go to Lesley's for breakfast the next morning
and then to someone else's house for sandwiches.  But somehow or
another I was making clam fritters at eleven in the morning and
hamburgers at four in the afternoon and, in between, Lesley took
everybody, especially the men, down to her house while I cleaned up the
mess and made things attractive again.  I was spreading relish on a bun
when they came back the second time, Don carrying a bottle of Scotch
which Lesley said was a consolation prize for me.  I may have been a
little curt because she said, "Why, Betty, I believe you're jealous."

"Jealous?" I said.  "Of course I'm not."

Anne, who had been helping me said, "But she is jealous.  She's mad
because you asked Don to kiss you and Joan and I are too."  Her eyes
were blazing.

Lesley put her arm around Anne and said, "Why, baby, Betty and I were
just joking.  She's not jealous of me.  You and Joanie bring your
hamburgers and come sit by me."  And lucky old unjealous Mommy got to
cook them.

Then there is the night Anne and Joan were staying all night in town
and Don and I planned to have dinner at the Alibi, the Vashon
restaurant, and go to the Vashon movie show.  We were sitting in the
kitchen having an old-fashioned and discussing this fabulous outing
when Lesley called and said she was all alone and wouldn't we come
down.  I said that we were going out to dinner.  She said come down for
a drink then as she was all alone.  I said we were already having a
drink.  She said she was all alone and Johnny wasn't coming home until
the next Wednesday and wouldn't we please.  It was a nasty rainy night
and I felt sorry for her all alone so, like a fool, I asked her to have
dinner and go to the show with us.  She said she would, but only if we
would come down to her house and have a drink.  So we went and she had
on black velvet slacks and a black cashmere sweater and diamonds and
French perfume and the minute we walked in she told Don how tired he
looked, how terribly tired, how absolutely worn out.  Of course Don was
glad to lie down on the couch, especially when she put a bottle of
House of Lords Scotch within easy reach.  This time she made me feel
like a great big botany teacher in tweeds and without a husband.

After she had been gay, Don had been tired and I'd been uncomfortable
for about an hour, I said, "Come on, let's go.  I'm starving and the
show starts at eight-ten."

"Show?" Lesley said.  "What show?"

"The movie show at Vashon," I said.  "I told you on the phone we were
going."

She said, "But, Betty, it's a terrible night and Don is so tired."

I said, "Don promised to take me to the show."

"What's playing?" she asked.

"I don't know," I said sulkily.

"Now, Betty," she said, "be reasonable.  Don is _tired, terribly_
tired.  You don't want to drag him out into the rain and cold just to
see any old movie."

"I do too," I said.

Lesley laughed and said, "Oh, Betty, you're priceless."  Then she got
up and went out into the kitchen.

Old Dead Tired was gazing into the fire.

I went upstairs and splashed cold water on my forehead until I was
reasonably sure I wouldn't have a stroke.  When I came down Lesley in a
ruffledy puffledy apron was setting up a cardtable in front of the fire.

I said, "We're going out to dinner."

She said, "You have another drink and relax.  I've got dinner all
ready."

She brought in one of those revolting ripe olive, macaroni, Brussels
sprouts, chestnut casseroles so dear to the heart of the bum cook.
However, if it had been English Lark in Madeira I couldn't have eaten a
bite, I was so furious.

Don managed to dredge up enough strength to sit at the table, but I
could tell he wasn't too enthusiastic about either the casserole or the
raisin-stuffed prune salad.  At least he still preferred my cooking.

When we were walking up the beach on our way home I said, "Don, how
could you let her do that to me?"

"Do what?" Don asked.  "Didn't you have a good time?"

I said, "We planned to go out and she didn't want to go, so we didn't."
Out there on the beach it sounded senseless.

Don said, "Look, the stars are out.  We might have a clear day for a
change.  Say, you'd better teach Lesley how to cook."

"I couldn't teach that woman _anything_," I said through gritted teeth.

And so the summer went on and on and on and on and on.  Lesley took sun
baths all day and wore different real jewels and a different new dress
(all cut to the navel) every night.  Every afternoon at about
five-thirty she would call to have Don help her pull up her boat, open
her whisky, carry her groceries, saw up her logs (this sounds like one
of those songs--"He threads my needle and he chops my wood"), fix her
stove, check her wiring and she was clever enough to make it sound
natural.

Don liked her and Anne and Joan still adored her and they all made me
feel like Typhoid Mary if I criticized her even the tiniest bit.  I had
terrible dreams of frustration every night and woke up every morning
even nastier than usual.

"Lesley has me on the head of a pin and she is enjoying every minute of
it," I told Don.

He said, "Why are you so stinking about Lesley?  She's a nice gal and
she's lonely."

"Yes, lonely for _my_ husband," I said.

"You're being ridiculous," Don said, but I think we were both relieved
when she moved to San Francisco in October.  Anne and Joan were
inconsolable.

"She had thirty-one coats," Anne told one of her friends, "and three
Dior dresses."

"And real diamonds and rubies," Joan said.

"And she had a perfect figure, thirty-six-inch bust, twenty-four-inch
waist and thirty-four-inch hips," Anne said.

"And she had a gold-color convertible and fourteen cashmere sweaters,"
Joan said.

"Gosh, she was beautiful," Anne said.  "Her hair was platinum and she
had great big violet eyes, and whenever her tan faded even a little she
took an airplane to _Hawaii_!"

"And she didn't have _any_ hair on her legs," Joan said.  "She told me
she never had to shave them the way Betty does."

"Somebody set the table," I shouted rudely.  "It's almost seven."

"Gosh, you're crabby!" Anne and Joan said together.




CHAPTER IX

OTHER FRIENDS AND ENEMIES

There is no doubt about it.  Dog loving is closely related to the
pounding-yourself-on-the-head-with-a-hammer-because-
it-is-so-pleasant-when-you-stop school of masochism.  But there are a
great many of us dog lovers on Vashon Island.  In this small beach
community alone, since we have lived here, there have been a Dalmatian,
a big black mixed, a collie, a boxer, a great Dane, a Kerry blue, a big
yellow mixed, two Irish setters, two wire-haired terriers, a Malemute,
a Boston bull, a dachshund, several of those fat, rheumy-eyed,
long-haired, indeterminate creatures known as "the old dog," and
several part-Tudor part-Trixie (a wanton who lives on the hill above
us) puppies known as Trudors.  Tudor, part Welsh terrier, part beagle,
part rattlesnake and part mule but leaning toward beagle in looks, has
fought them all.  His bitterest enemies are Tiger, the boxer, and
Trigger, a small rusty black, somewhat Scotty, who looks as if he might
own a pawnshop.  Tudor and Trigger are very evenly matched in size, age
and bad temper, but when the going gets tough Trigger is apt to call in
the Marines in the form of Timmy, a young vigorous Kerry blue member of
Trigger's family.  I guess it was after he lost most of his tail and
part of one ear that Tudor decided to put into practice a few tricks he
had learned from the raccoons he had been chasing for five years.

It was a summer morning of a very low tide, a sun pleasantly muted by
mist, the Sound dark and rippleless as a pool of yesterday's rain water
and nasturtiums licking the edge of the silvery sea wall like flames.
Anne and Joan and friends in bathing suits and oily as sardines were
stretched out on striped beach towels on the sand.  A small battery
radio poured out King Cole singing "Embraceable You."  The air was
spicy with seaweed and sand steaming in the sun.  All along the curve
of the beach small children bobbed about in the flat water like corks,
or crouched on their haunches on the sand, intent on some small
project.  I had come down to pick some nasturtiums for the table on the
porch.  I had picked perhaps half a dozen when Trigger's mistress
wandered up to say hello and have a cigarette.  Arranging ourselves
comfortably on a huge, satiny, bone-colored log near the girls, we lit
our cigarettes.

Down by the water Tudor was engaged in his favorite pastime of chasing
sea gull shadows on the sand.  As the sea gulls dipped and swooped he
dipped and swooped, often turning a somersault in the air.  Through
eyes squinted against the sun we watched him amused.  King Cole changed
to "Sweet Lorraine."  It was very peaceful.  Then Trigger who had been
quietly sitting on his mistress' feet, suddenly decided to go down and
help Tudor.  In spite of entreaties from all of us, he sauntered down
to the edge of the wet sand where Tudor was playing and stood there a
peaceful bystander.

"Don't say anything," I warned the girls.  "Sometimes if you don't say
anything, dogs won't fight."

"No rule that applies to normal dogs applies to Tudor," Anne said
bitterly.

For a minute or two Tudor was unaware of Trigger's infuriating
presence.  Then, right in the middle of one of his backflips, he
apparently saw him because he changed direction in the air and landed
astraddle Trigger's shoulders.  The girls began to shriek, "Do
something!  Stop them, Mommy.  Get the hose.  Get a club."  Trigger's
mistress and I, who had that summer already separated our doggies about
eighty-six times, decided coolly that the time had come at last to let
them fight it out.  "Get it out of their systems," we told each other
as we lit new cigarettes off the old ones.

For almost an hour we tried to interest ourselves in music, smoking,
gathering shells and picking nasturtiums while our dogs lunged and
snarled and swore at each other on the pretty sand by the blue blue
water.  It was uncomfortable, like trying to play bridge while an old
aunt is choking to death on a fishbone in the same room.  Especially as
first Anne and Joan and friends, then our neighbors one by one
ostentatiously herding their innocent little children, gathered up
their paraphernalia and moved from the beach to the high safety of the
sea wall, where they huddled watching.

The battle finally stopped, as it had started, suddenly all at once.
Where there had been the dreadful, bone-chilling noises of a dog fight
there were now only the peaceful soup-eating noises of the tide and
_one_ dog.  We looked again.  That was it, _one_ dog.  Tudor up to his
stomach in salt water, was wearing a suspiciously triumphant
expression.  Trigger had disappeared.  Trigger's mistress and I tossed
away our cigarettes and ran down to the edge of the water.  We found
that Tudor was standing on Trigger, holding him under water.  I yelled
at Tudor.  She waded out and retrieved Trigger and we both gave him
artificial respiration, hampered somewhat by many sporting attempts on
Tudor's part to kill him while he was semi-conscious.  Trigger came out
of the valley of the shadow very quickly, in fact snarling, and he and
Tudor started another fight which I finally stopped with the bamboo
lawn rake.

Tiger, the boxer, looks very large and powerful but he spent one
evening sitting on my lap eating gumdrops, watching Mr. Peepers on
television and proving that appearances are deceiving.  At the time,
Tudor was at my sister Alison's, supposedly guarding her against
burglars while her husband was in Spokane, but actually killing her
cats, sleeping on the boys' pillows and eating the duck food.  Tudor
brags of eating nothing but meat and canned dog food, but he will gulp
down wild rice almondine with sour cream gravy or peanut butter and
pickle sandwiches if it is meant for somebody else.  Tudor was at my
sister Alison's a week, which seemed like a second to me and like two
years to Alison.  During that time Tiger visited me every day.
Sometimes just dropping in for a gumdrop or a drink of water.
Sometimes stopping by to reassure me of his affection by putting his
paws on my shoulders and licking my scalp.  Often arriving
uncomfortably early, say five-thirty in the morning, and staying all
day.

We grew very fond of each other, Tiger and I.  Then Tudor came home.  I
had called Tiger's owner and told her that Tudor was coming and she
promised to keep Tiger at home, but something went wrong.  I was
sitting by the dining room window, writing, when I looked up and saw
Tiger's dripping black muzzle pressed tight against the glass, his eyes
pleading for a caress.  I sprang to my feet and shrieked at Mother who
was reading Angela Thirkell in the kitchen, "Mother-Tiger!  Tudor!  Do
something!"  Mother, who has great presence of mind but refuses to face
the unalterable fact that Tudor doesn't, hasn't, won't mind, called in
her gentle voice, "Come here, Tudor."  Tudor came all right.  He rushed
between her legs almost knocking her down and hurled himself at the
dining room door which is glass, shrieking, "Hand me my gun--gimme my
switchblade--lemme out of here--lemme at him!"  Tiger who was
peacefully sniffing the camellias, at first either didn't hear Tudor or
chose to ignore him.  Then Tudor obviously called him some terrible
thing, something even a television-loving boxer couldn't take, and
Tiger, with a roar, came right through the glass.  Mother who had come
out of the kitchen but was still wearing her glasses and carrying
_Before Lunch_, reached down calmly and picked up Tudor and carried him
kicking and screaming into her bedroom at the other end of the house.
I sent Tiger, who looked extremely apologetic, home and Don came up
from the beach and began grimly measuring for a new window.  A rather
monotonous task, he said wearily.  It was about the eighth pane of
glass he had put in that same location because Tudor always goes in or
out of the house like a policeman answering a cry for help through a
locked door under which gas is seeping.

In spite of the fact that he has never learned _anything_, Tudor is
really very smart and actually could understand us if he wanted to.
All dog lovers say this, I know, but we have proof because Tudor
learned Japanese.  When we took a trip to New York we were able to farm
the girls out with relatives, but we couldn't find anybody who would
take Tudor and whom we could trust to be nice to him, so we had to
leave him and Murra (our then cat) with Warner Yamamoto and family, who
assured us they "loved ahnimahl and will feed."

When we returned Murra had not changed.  She was still living on the
mantelpiece and looking down on everybody with complete disdain.  Tudor
didn't even look like the same dog.  He kept his head down close to the
ground and didn't speak English.

"Oh, Tudor, baby, we're home," I caroled to him as I got out of the car.

With a sidelong unfathomable "wisdom of the East" look, he sidled up to
Mrs. Yamamoto.  She spoke to him in Japanese and he licked her hand.

"Come here, old boy," Don called heartily.

Tudor turned his head away and lowered his eyes which seemed darker and
more almond-shaped.  Warner said something to him in Japanese and Tudor
slithered over to him.

Later on when we went up for the mail, we discovered that Tudor had
also taken to hanging around with a cheap crowd of mongrels who lived
down by the dock.

For over a month he picked at his food and ignored us when we spoke to
him.  Mother of course suggested that we learn Japanese and speak to
him in his native tongue but we refused and, gradually, especially
after a summer spent fighting American dogs, he returned to normal, and
when we called "Here, boy," at least turned his head and glanced at us
before running in the opposite direction.

If I am sick, Tudor takes up a vigil by my bed, whining, shivering,
looking sad and occasionally, without warning, leaping up, pawing my
bust and spilling my coffee.  How loyal, how sweet! people say.  But I
know that these demonstrations are not made out of sympathy.  He is
afraid I might die and then who would take him to the beach.

Tudor has his own nice little smelly doggy bed, but he prefers to risk
a daily beating with the hearthbroom and sleep on any bed, chair,
couch, love seat or chaise longue not barricaded with spiky objects.
He growls at babies.  He snarls at all milkmen, laundrymen and
neighbors.  He can be depended on to leap against the back of your
knees and try to knock you down when you are going down the path to the
beach, especially in winter when it is slippery.  When his water bowl
is empty he takes it in his teeth and pounds it furiously on the
kitchen floor.

His favorite resting places are in any doorway you intend to go through
with a loaded tray, or pressed flat against a step in the middle of the
stairway on the nights he is reasonably sure we will get a late
telephone call.  He has no gallantry and prefers to fight female
puppies.  He enjoys a swim or two in the icy Sound every day, even in
winter.  He is fifteen years which is 105 in dog years, but age has
neither aged nor softened him.  He is as lean and vigorous as Bernarr
MacFadden, as devious as Molotov and as determined as Dewey.  Mother
remarked throatily the other day, "Poor Tudor, he is getting so deaf."
What she means is that he is stone deaf to any command or request by
us, but can hear a plate being scraped in Sitka, Alaska.

Speaking of Alaska, about six years ago, somebody gave Anne a baby
female Malemute flown down from Alaska.  Mala was the most engaging
puppy I have ever seen.  Cuddly and loving and with many enchanting
attitudes, one of which was sleeping with Anne with her head on the
pillow.  It was unfortunate that Mala was a moron.  A complete moron.
She never even learned her name.  And when she was a great big
two-year-old wolf, she was still coyly chewing up shoes and cashmere
sweaters and pounds of butter.  We have a swinging half door between
the dining room and living room which Tudor has always been able to go
through with facility.  He merely lunges against it and on the third
swing slips through.  We tried for two years to teach Mala to push the
door but she preferred to chew her way through.  She was more
successful chewing her way through the French doors, two sheep and a
flock of Mallard ducks so we had to give her away.

Mrs. Miniver, our first cat, was a shy, affectionate, very fertile
tortoise-shell, who was part Persian and part Angora.  She used to walk
the trail with me every morning and wait by the "big tree" for me at
night.  She had about forty-two kittens, off and on, four to a batch
and was remarkably obliging about always having one yellow one for
Mother who has a great weakness for yellow kittens.

Mrs. Miniver was a skillful ratter and caught at least one every day of
her life, always displaying her catch at meal-times.  She died of
ratfish poisoning, as had many of her kittens.

Then a neighbor gave us Murra ("chimney sweep" in Swedish we were
told), who lived on the mantel.  She, also part Persian, part Angora,
was a lovely dark brown with green-grape eyes.  She had six or seven
batches of gray kittens in Mother's closet, then one day we found her
on the path, dead, from ratfish poisoning I suppose.  The ratfish, I
was told by old Mr. Blue, a caretaker for the beach, are caught and
cast aside by the mud shark liver fishermen.  When they are washed up
on the beach by the tide, the cats eat them and die.  Whether this is
fact or fable I cannot say as I have never seen a ratfish but I have
buried several beloved cats after a brief violent sickness.

I love cats.  In spite of notions to the contrary, they are
affectionate and loyal.  The last time I came back from a trip,
Marigold, our present cat, put her arms around my neck and rubbed her
cheek against mine.  Also, in spite of prevalent fallacies, cats do not
have an easy time bearing kittens.  All of our cats have demanded that
one of us stay with them during labor and Mrs. Miniver had such a hard
time and cried so piteously that I always gave her some warm milk with
brandy in it when she had the first pain.

Marigold, a beautiful orange kitty, was pregnant and had been badly
treated by some children before we got her.  She was in labor for three
terrible days and finally had to be rushed to the veterinary, who told
us that all of her kittens were dead, one was crosswise, and if she was
to survive she must have an immediate operation.  Her Caesarean section
and hysterectomy were successful and now, though seven years old, she
is very playful and a superb mouser.

Tudor has always chased our cats, but it was by mutual agreement and
merely a gesture because dogs are supposed to chase cats.  He would
rush out the dining room door, yipping, and the cat would run up the
cedar tree.  Marigold would never tolerate this nonsense.  From the
first day we got her, thin, frightened and abused, she stood her ground
with Tudor and slapped him hard on the nose when he ran at her.

Marigold enjoys walking on the beach, darting like a golden arrow from
bleached log to bleached log, and loves picnic suppers and singing
around the campfire.  Her favorite spot is on the top of a huge old
stump by the picnic table.  Eyes blazing with mischief, tail switching
anticipatorily, she crouches flat at the edge of the stump and grabs at
the hair of any passer-by.  When we sing she sits up straight and gazes
mournfully across the water.  When we throw scraps to the ducks she
suddenly leaps off the sea wall into the middle of them and sends them
squawking.  Tudor often joins her at this game but invariably carries
it too far and gobbles up all the duck food, once eating a paper cup.

Graybar, a mangy old Maltese cat left on the beach to go wild, came to
us when he was desperately sick with some sort of dysentery.  I
doctored him with whisky, raw eggs, rice and boiled milk, but he grew
steadily worse.  I felt so sorry for him I couldn't bear it and one day
in desperation mashed up five Nembutal capsules, mixed them with a raw
egg and fed them to him.  He looked at me trustingly and lapped it up.
When he had finished he dragged himself over to the edge of the rockery
by the rose bed and stretched out in the sunshine.  I went into the
kitchen and cried.  Graybar lay by the rose bed all day.  Once I went
out and tearfully felt for a heartbeat.  There seemed to be one.  About
sundown he disappeared.  Anne and Joan and I cried and Don said sadly
it was for the best.  We all went to bed with heavy hearts--mine the
heaviest because I was the murderer.  The next morning Graybar showed
up for breakfast, looking fine.  The girls stroked him and cooed over
him and he moved away from them disdainfully, flicking a little
dandruff off his shoulders.  I gave him hot oatmeal and cream and he
drank about a pint.  He has never had a sick day since.

Several years ago a raccoon decided to be our friend.  We saw her first
on the patio by the kitchen eating Tudor's food.  The next night,
naturally, Tudor didn't leave any food so Raccy came to the window and
explained the situation.  I mixed up a pan of Frisky meal, a bowl of
left-over gravy, four old muffins and a rock hard piece of fruit cake.
While I was fixing her supper Mrs. Raccy waited for me discreetly but
appropriately behind the Unknown Warrior rhododendron.  I set the pan
in the rose bed in a spot clearly visible from both the kitchen and
service room windows.  As soon as I had gone indoors Mrs. Raccy waddled
over to the rose bed and began eating.  She chose the fruitcake first
and finding it delightful held it in both her little hands and nibbled
around it the way a child nibbles around the edge of a cookie.
Watching her, Mother said that I should have also put out a pan of
water as raccoons prefer to dip their food in water.  I didn't put
water out that night because I didn't want to frighten our new friend,
but the next night when she announced her presence by sitting under a
camellia and peering in the dining room window, I took out both supper
(corn on the cob, mashed potatoes, chicken gravy and bones and a green
salad) and a pan of water.  She did appreciate the water, dipping each
bite, but she showed us she didn't care for the green salad, by tossing
it into the primroses.

The next spring when Mrs. Raccy returned she brought along either a
close friend or a husband and two half-grown children.  We were of
course very glad to see them and I mixed up a big batch of dog meal
(which we now buy in hundred-pound sacks), bacon grease, mashed
potatoes, stale bread and stale cookies, dumped it into two large
baking pans and set them up by the rhododendrons.  Then I put a pan of
water and a basket of left-over candy Easter eggs out on the patio by
the dining room window.  As soon as they had finished the entre the
Raccy family came around to the patio for dessert.  Mr. and Mrs. Raccy,
though dainty at the table and splendid about sharing, were very shy
and ducked behind a camellia or rhododendron when we opened the door.
The babies were quarrelsome and piggish about the candy but would eat
out of our hands and showed strong leanings toward coming in the house
and living with us.  Sometimes the Raccys brought along neighbors but
they were awfully nasty to them and wouldn't let them have a single
Easter egg (we now buy these direct from the factory forty-pounds at a
time) until they and their children were so full they were gagging.
Mrs. Raccy is really more friendly than her husband and yesterday came
down from the woods in the daytime and watched Mother prune the
grapevine.  I don't know whether she has a grapevine of her own at home
and wanted pointers or whether she feels that women should occasionally
seek the company of other women.  No matter how friendly the raccoons
become, no matter how often he sees them, Tudor, perhaps because of
their black masks, insists they are robbers and goes shrieking after
them every single night.  So far they have treated him with amused,
undeserved tolerance, unhurriedly climbing to the first branch of the
cedar tree just out of his reach, but I really hope that some time, one
of them, perhaps one of the quarrelsome babies, will give him a good
scare.  They are fierce fighters.  We are now feeding six and all but
two eat out of our hands.

Bucky, the deer, was our friend for over six years.  Often in the very
early morning, we could hear his footsteps like tack hammers on the
front porch.  Once I looked out of our bedroom window in that
indistinct smudgy time when there is only a thread of silver across the
darkness in the east, the lights of Seattle across the way are like
tiny holes in a black kettle, but we can tell it is morning by the thin
scratchy sound of birds' feet on the roof and swoopy shrill
early-morning noises of the sea gulls.  The air was soft and smelled
like seaweed and marigolds.  I was breathing deeply and wondering if
there would be a good clam tide when I saw something moving by the
wisteria tree.  Something rather large.  I watched and waited and
pretty soon Bucky came up the steps from the lower terrace onto the
patio.  He walked around, nibbling daintily at the flowers.  Finally
surfeited with snapdragons and zinnias, he slowly, majestically climbed
the steps through the upper rockery to the guesthouse.

One early morning he brought his doe and fawn down for a swim.  Once we
saw him running along the beach with vines in his antlers.  We have
seen him many times in the orchard, standing under a cherry tree as
still as the mist around his knees.  He disappeared the year they
opened season for deer on the island.  The sport who shot Bucky
deserves the same badge of courage as the duck hunter who last fall
rowed up in front of our sea wall and, when our flock of pet ducks
hurried out to greet him, shot and killed all but four.

Joan and Anne brought Sheldon and Camille from the circus.  Sheldon was
a small green turtle and Camille a chameleon.  Sheldon was no fun at
all and spent his entire short life under the refrigerator.  Camille
lives in the blue garden where she darts around not changing color but
apparently enjoying herself.

I do not like rats, but once one made me cry.  It was when we first
bought the house, before we built the new kitchen.  There was a
cupboard next to the stove which had at one time held a hot water tank.
It had shelves in it and I kept cereals and crackers there because the
warmth from the stove kept them crisp.

One morning, Anne and Joan, who were still in that charming
not-enough-publicized stage of childhood where all food, no matter how
beautifully served, is given a thorough microscopic examination for
foreign matter, announced in shrill horrified accusing voices that "the
top of the PEP box _you_ put on the table has been _gnawed_ by _rats_!"

"Nonsense," I said from my corner by the stove where I was gulping hot
coffee, staring at the wall, and wondering why I had chosen writing, of
all things, as a means of satisfying my creative urge.  What was wrong
with those easy pursuits like dry-point etching or rhododendron
hybridizing?

Anne said, "Look, Betty, tooth marks!  Ugh, I don't want any breakfast!"

Joan said happily, "I think I see a little piece of fur sticking to the
box."

With the eagerness and grace of a loaded burro I made my way to the
breakfast table and looked at the box.  The red Kellogg's on the
left-hand corner showed a few but unmistakable signs of nibbling.  I
could see no large tooth marks or hunks of hair.  I said, "Probably a
little mouse.  I'll set a trap.  Now finish your breakfast.  Nothing
has been gnawing the toast or bacon."

Anne said, "Yes, but I think I see an ant in the jam."

"Where?" Joan said eagerly.  "Show it to me."

I went back to my corner, poured out another cup of coffee, and changed
my thinking to tidelands, striking oil, servants and breakfast in bed.

The next morning when I opened the door to the cupboard to get out the
Cornflakes a large gray rat dived through a hole in the ceiling but
left his tail hanging down like a bell cord.  "I'll set a trap," I said
to myself, but like most things I say to myself in the early morning it
too passed away.  I moved the cereals to the cupboard over the sink but
I saw the tail every day because I put the soap powder in the rat
cupboard.  Then Don saw the tail and set a trap.  A great big strong
rat trap, cleverly handled with gloves and diabolically baited with
young leathery cheese smeared with very smelly Camembert.  The next
morning while I was waiting for the coffee I eased open the door and
peeked at the trap.  It was empty and I was glad.  Later that same
morning I was huddled by the stove, writing, when I heard in the
cupboard beside me a noise like a blast from a Luger followed by an
anguished scream.  I knew instantly what had happened and I felt like
somebody who has beaten a tiny crippled old lady with her own crutches.
Tears running down my cheeks I opened the cupboard door....

Another time I saw tails but didn't feel any sorrow.  That was also
before we remodeled, and the dark hallway leading to the service room
had exposed beams.  It was one of my excess energy, uncreative days and
I had already dusted the fireplace chimney, blacked the andirons and
waxed the hearth and was wondering what vital task to attack next when
I saw this nest snuggled in the joining place of two beams.  I marched
into the living room, grabbed the poker, a good long one, and from the
safe retreat of the doorway gave the nest a big poke.  Immediately
right above my head like a moving fringe appeared twelve tails.  I
screamed and slammed the door.  Don set the traps.  That was during the
time Murra lived on the mantel and, though she was deft and alert, not
too many rats or mice ventured into her rather confined hunting
preserve.

One summer some "plaidjackets" (family name for yellow jackets) set up
housekeeping just beside the path going to the beach.  Plaidjackets are
not friendly little fellows and after we had all been stung on bare
places we decided something had to be done.  Don went purposefully up
to Vashon and came proudly home with an expensive plaidjacket
demolishing machine.  "No matter how vicious or well entrenched, George
said that this will get 'em," he told me confidently as he mixed up his
poison.  When the machine was loaded he strapped it on and strode down
the path to the beach.

I heaved a huge sigh of relief because making the dash past the
plaidjackets had already resulted in several skinned knees and twisted
ankles, as well as the stings.  Anne and Joan and my sister Alison's
little boys, Darsie and Bard, were crowded by the railing of the front
porch watching.  Suddenly they began to shout, "Look out, Don, run!"
and I could hear a noise like the whine of a distant saw.  Then Don
came pounding up the path, still strapped in his big machine, roaring,
"Help, they're all over me!"

We all smacked and swatted and dejacketed him but he had more than a
dozen stings.

It was my turn next.  I waited for a day or so until Don's attack was
just a memory in the plaidjacket home, then filled my fly sprayer with
double strength DDT, sneaked down the path, put the nozzle of the
sprayer clear into the hole and worked the plunger until the sprayer
was empty.  As I removed the nozzle several plaidjackets staggered out
of the hole, shook themselves, then took off like jet planes,
fortunately in the direction of the beach.  A few more appeared at the
entrance, then more, and then from back inside came the ominous whine,
the sound of the distant saw.  I ran all the way up to the house, angry
plaidjackets breathing down the back of my neck, but I was only stung
once because the ones that followed me attacked younger more succulent
Joan and Bard.

Anne said she had noticed that all plaidjackets went into their house
at night and didn't fly around.  So that evening after dark, she and I
crept down the path and again filled the plaidjacket home with DDT.  We
pumped two sprayersful into it.  The next day the plaidjackets were
still on their feet but definitely groggy.

Every night for a week we pumped their house full of DDT and finally
one day we saw a for sale sign.  "Whee!  They're gone!" we shouted
happily running to the beach.

"DDT will kill anything," I said smugly to Don, "and it is certainly a
lot cheaper than that big useless machine you bought."  I still don't
know if the plaidjacket nest he showed me on the old stump by the
picnic table is the same family or a new one.  I do know they are just
as unneighborly and twenty times as DDT-resistant.




CHAPTER X

MASTER OF NONE

If you live on the salt water, I am informed by the old-timers, you can
expect everything you own, even a great big stone fireplace, to break
down eventually.  This, they say, has something to do with the
corrosive effect of salt air.  My private opinion, solidified by
experience, is that it has more to do with the corrosive effect of the
eight million house-guests attracted by the salt air.  Anyway, in
addition to the icebox, beds, stove, etc., that were in the house when
we bought it, we added, as fast as we could gather up the down
payments, dishwashers, automatic washers, dryers, freezers, gas
heaters, electric heaters on thermostats, chafing dishes, plant
sprayers, septic tanks and more toilets with bowls eager for charm
bracelets and little celluloid ducks, and with handles that must be
juggled _ad infinitum_ unless we want the toilets to run ditto.  At
inconvenient intervals each of these machines has stopped doing the
thing it was hired to do and by means of smoke signals, grinding noises
and pungent smells of burning rubber has indicated that it desired the
evil eye of the local handyman.

The local handyman, always referred to as "Nipper" or "Gimpy" or "Mrs.
Walters' Harry," will fix anything but, like a room that is tidy except
for the underwear hanging out of the bureau drawers, the repair job is
invariably left with tag ends.  "The dishwasher's okay, now, Betty,"
Mrs. Walters' Harry told me the time the dishwasher insisted on using
only dirty cold water which it was apparently sucking up from the
septic tank, instead of the nice clean hot water so handily piped into
its abdomen.  "But remember _no soap_ and keep that big screwdriver of
Don's handy to pry the lid up."

In my early island days I cuddled a cozy little notion that our country
repairmen might not be as dextrous or have as big tool kits as their
city brothers but they were a _lot_ more willing and _much_ cheaper.
The willing part is true enough.  Nipper, when you can find him (which
he has not made easy by marrying an Estonian girl who speaks only one
word of English, "hello," which she screams into the telephone before
immediately hanging up), will attempt anything.  Need your rowboat
calked, your _Pittisporum tobira_ transplanted, your Stradivarius
tuned?  Nipper will gladly take on the assignment, but _first_, and I
mean before one broken fingernail or big rusty tool touches the job, he
must send to Seattle for the most recent rate schedule for boat
calkers, landscape gardeners or Stradivarius repairment.  Your
alternative is portal to portal pay from Seattle and maybe the lights
are off and they are grinding the ramp of the dock down by hand.

Island repairmen also expect immediate payment.  "Be sure and send the
check tomorrow morning, Betty--I'm real short of cash and Elva's
gittin' her new china clippers," New Motor Marvin told me after
examining my steam iron the time it boiled and boiled but wouldn't let
out any steam and so I set it out in the patio to blow up and Mother
said, "Why don't you call Marvin?  At least he can't say _that_ needs a
new motor."  But he did, only he called it a "heat control unit and it
will run you maybe twenty-twenty-five dollars."

Of course the pipes froze during the big snow and of course as soon as
the weather warmed up we intended to put in new pipe.  However, while
the snow was still on the ground a delegation from the Spring Committee
called on us.  They were our neighbors on the beach, mostly summer
people whom we had not met as yet, all male, the delegation, that is.

"The spring," they told us with great seriousness as they stamped the
snow off their boots at the back door, "is on your property, but it is
a community thing.  We _all_ have water rights.  We _all_ work
together.  We will _all_ fix the frozen pipe.  _Do not do anything
yourself!_"

"What darling people," I said to Don after we had all had coffee and
they had admired the way we had arranged the furniture and I had wished
fervently I had washed the windows.  "I just love community spirit.  I
adore people working together.  I am so glad we live on an island."

Don said, "Did they say _when_ we were _all_ going to fix the pipe?
I'm not exactly dedicated to carrying water?"

"I don't think they said when exactly," I said, "but I imagine it will
be this afternoon.  After all, nobody else has any water either."

But it wasn't that afternoon or the next or the next.  Finally Don and
Anne and Joan went back to the spring (I regret to say I protested this
breach of community spirit and would take no part in the undertaking)
wound rags and friction tape around the worst places in the pipe and
that is the way it stayed until late spring when Don got hold of
Zachary Millard Potts (colored) who wore tropical shorts and a sun
helmet even on rainy days, sang calypso songs in French and signed his
work, especially concrete variety: "Mended by Zachary M. Potts,
4/3/43."  Zachary had no tools but he was very strong and could rip the
threads off any diameter of pipe.  Don bought the necessary pipe and
wrenches and Zachary, between cups of coffee (he had a very nervous
stomach which could not stand being empty even a minute) and cigarettes
which he borrowed from me, removed the broken pipe, as I say usually
removing the threads from the good piece, and put in new.  Zachary was
very artistic and instead of burying the pipe in the humdrum fashion of
the former plumber, he allowed it to swoop in big natural curves,
propping the lowest places with small forked willow twigs which rooted
and eventually grew into little willow trees.

While he drank coffee with me, Zachary related incidents from his full
life.  The only one I can recall offhand, is the story of a lady friend
of his who tripped over a broken place in the sidewalk in Chicago and
fractured her ankle.  "She sue the city," Zachary told me, "but she
don't get a penny.  She can't understand why.  'The big mistake you
made,' I tell her, 'is havin' your girl friend drive you to the
hospital.  What you should have did is lay on the sidewalk and wait for
the avalanche.'"

When Zachary had finished and signed the pipe work, Don put him to work
on the county trail.  We were able to follow Zachary's remarkably slow
progress on the trail by his singing which, though in a foreign tongue,
had great volume and bounced off the hillside and rolled across the
water with sonorous magnificence.  When he had finished, Don and I
walked the trail to check the results and found an ugly litter of paper
bags, sandwich wrappers and Coke bottles, mingled with and following
the course of the wilting nettles and slashed blackberry runners.  Don
told Zachary to clean up this mess but he was reluctant and without his
usual zest.

"Waste of time," he told me when he knocked at the door for his
seventeenth Coke.  "Just trash along that trail anyways, what harm a
few ole Coke bottles goin' to do?  Mr. MacDonald's just wastin' money."

The next morning, Sunday, at five Don had a call from Zachary, who was
in jail and needed bail.  Don provided it that time and several others.
Zachary explained that it was his weak stomach that always got him in
trouble.  "Two double sherrys and I'm a wild man," he explained sadly.
When hot weather came and Don put Zachary to work on our new road, he
quit.  "My weak stomach won't stand that shovelin'," he told me.  "I'll
have to git me some sort of overseein' job.  My last boss tell me I
should be in charge of people.  I'm a natural executor he tell me."

After Zachary came a pale artist named Egular Earhart who was studying
oil painting by mail but for a dollar and twenty-five cents an hour
offered to "put the place in shape."  I had visions of weedless beds
deep in peat moss, trimmed hedges, beautifully espaliered trees,
slugless rockeries, wild morning-gloryless hillsides and everything
very artistic.  I told Don about Egular with a great deal of enthusiasm
and he said evenly, "Is he very strong?"

I thought of Egular's shoulders like a bent coathanger under his
threadbare tweed jacket, of his waxy face, his spindly arms, but I
said, "He's not exactly husky but he's certainly willing."

"Well, try him out," Don said.  "I guess he's better than nothing."

But he wasn't.

He came every morning at eight o'clock, checking in and collecting his
tools courteously at the back door.  Then he disappeared.  I was
writing, my typewriter on the small blue table by the kitchen window
and I suppose I didn't pay as much attention as I should either to what
Egular was doing or where.

I do remember going to the beach for bark occasionally (there was a
strong feeling in our house at that time that writers didn't have to be
warm) and wondering irritably as I fought my way through the syringa
and blackberries on the path what exactly _was_ Egular's idea of
"putting the place in shape."  Then one beautiful April Sunday, when
the sky behind the black firs was the color of a milk of magnesia
bottle, the peach tree was covered with pink tissue-paper rosettes, the
wind had veered to the north which meant clear weather and the Sound
was wrinkled green silk sprinkled with white ostrich plumes, Anne and
Joan and Don and I decided to cook supper on the beach.

We were hunting for good marshmallow sticks when we found Egular's
project--the project on which he had already spent eleven full
twelve-dollar-days and on which I am sure he had intended to spend the
entire summer.  It was a lovely little design about three by four feet,
made of beer bottles pounded into the hillside in the shade of an
enormous wild blackberry vine.  In between the beer bottle bottoms,
Egular had transplanted some of my choicest alpines, some azaleas and
two baby nettles.  I do not know whether he intended eventually to pave
the entire hillside with beer bottles or whether he intended to scatter
these gems here and there in the garden, but Don said he didn't want to
find out.  Egular had to go.

Monday morning when he knocked at the back door I was ready with an
evasive lie about Don's father, a landscape gardener from Scotland,
coming to live with us and so, although we were just crazy about Egular
and his work, we wouldn't need him any more, but perhaps I could get
him some other jobs on the beach....

Egular said, "Oh, that's all right, Mrs. MacDonald.  I was going to
quit anyway because I'm making pottery full time now."

Time is a great healer but I still remember the summer morning when
Gimpy Hodgkins, hired to clean out the spring tank, told me he wouldn't
be able to come until Saturday because he had "back door trouble."

The spring had a cement tank into which it flowed and from which the
houses on the beach got their water supply.  This tank was supposed to
be cleaned once a year.  "Don't you touch it," the Spring Committee had
warned us.  "Community project.  We _all_ get together and clean it."
The tank was not mentioned again until one Sunday afternoon two summers
later after a grueling weekend of fourteen adolescents, seven boys and
seven girls, since Friday.  It was about five-thirty in the afternoon
and the houseparty had been up and eating (four more stacks of hotcakes
and some more sausages, please Mrs. MacDonald) since dawn (more
hamburgers--one without lettuce and lots of relish on mine but Mary
Jean says she doesn't like onions) but were at long last on their way
to the ferry and Don and I were wearily sitting down to a pitcher of
martinis and some fried chicken, served on a cardtable on the front
porch.

Don said, "I don't understand kids these days.  When I was fourteen or
fifteen if I had had a chance to spend a weekend at the beach I
wouldn't have spent the whole time lolling around in the house giggling
and listening to records.  _I_ would have been out in the boat fishing
or hiking through the woods or digging clams."

I said weakly, "Oh, it's just that Anne and Joan seem to have so many
good records.  Have another martini.  I'm on my third."

Then Tudor began to bark, which is a mild way of saying that he rushed
between our legs, hurled himself off the porch and ran shrieking down
the path to the beach.  After an interval a neighbor appeared.

"Say, Don," he said ignoring the chicken cooling on our plates and our
haggard faces, "we don't have any water.  Haven't had any all day.
Let's go up and take a look at the tank.  Must be something wrong."

With an accusing look at me, Don got to his feet and followed Neighbor
up the path to the spring.  Tudor and Neighbor's dog came up from the
beach and followed them.  I gazed across the horizon and thought
longingly of the Deep South where girls marry at fourteen.  Don and
Neighbor returned.

Neighbor said, "Tank needs cleaning.  I'll get a bunch together and
we'll all pitch in.  Now, don't you touch it, Don.  The spring's a
community project.  We all take care of it."

Don said, "Have a martini."

Just then Tudor and Neighbor's dog started a fight under the cardtable.
I will say that the fight was undoubtedly started by Tudor who even now
at fifteen still attacks great Danes and small females.  I jumped up
and Don and I both yelled at Tudor to "stop--stop it--stop it you
naughty dog--stop it you little bastard!"  As always Tudor ignored us
and continued to hurl himself at Neighbor's dog's throat until the
cardtable tipped over and our martinis and chicken were tossed over the
railing and down the bank.

As I scrambled down after the silverware and pieces of plates, I heard
Neighbor calling from the path, "Remember, Don, community project.
We'll all get together."

So through another neighbor on the other side, not using the spring and
not hampered by community spirit, we heard about Gimpy, and after his
"back door trouble" had cleared up he came to work or rather came to
the house and told me his dreams, read me some short stories he had
written, looked up _my_ dreams in _his_ dream book, told me the exact
number of germs in a cup of spring water and finally, I guess, cleaned
out the tank.  He also showed me how to sharpen old victrola needles,
how to make papier-mch out of newspapers, and the correct way to fry
an egg.  "Add a teaspoon of water to the bacon grease--no more no
less--just one teaspoon.  Keeps the white soft and smooth instead of
all bubbly and starched like."

I loved Gimpy but like so many of the local artisans he was continually
involved in some sort of factional dispute with the competition.  "I
seen him put sand in my motor but I couldn't prove nothin' especially
with his dad bein' on the Chamber of Commerce."  He finally left Vashon
and went to Alaska.

For a while after we moved to the island the Puget Sound Power and
Light Company had an electrician who knew what he was doing and did it.
When the roaster lid got caught in a little spring in the oven element
and filled the kitchen with lightning, when the pump was clogged with
silt, when we had no water pressure and somebody was hammering inside
the hot water tank, when I tried to unplug the vacuum cleaner and one
prong came off and stuck in the wall socket--any of those little
womanly emergencies--I called the Puget Sound Power and Light and they
sent this nice man who located the trouble and also knew lots of
interesting stories of buddies who grabbed live wires without their
gloves.

Then for some reason the power company stopped this fine unselfish
service and we were left with Orville Kronenburg who hated everybody in
the whole world and whose wife wore her bedroom slippers downtown.
Orville knew about electricity I guess, but he didn't consider looks
important and, unless you stopped him, he would run wires across
doorways and over pictures.  Also he didn't measure when he cut holes
for wall plugs and when he had finished putting the new wall plug in
our bedroom, Don said bitterly, "It looks like a small raft in a large
quarry."  Orville also had a special kind of wall plug that even when
just installed wiggled dangerously and made the lights flash on and off
like beacons.

The time my Bendix shrieked and jumped up and down when I put anything
bigger than a washrag in it, I called Orville and he came sullenly down
and told me there was sand in our hot water tank.  I told him to take
the sand out and he did but after he had gone I tried out the Bendix
and it didn't scream but it whirled like a transport propeller and
threw a geyser of water out the soap hole.  I called Orville and he
said, "That's just the fledamora plankstaff.  It will slow down after a
while."  It didn't, but I got used to it.  Then after a time Orville
went back to South Dakota and the Bendix began shrieking again and
jumping up and down when I put anything bigger than a handkerchief in
it so I called New-motor Marvin, and guess what the trouble was?

Anybody who has girl children over the age of ten knows the necessity
of either having two bathrooms or learning to comb your hair and put on
your lipstick by looking in the dog's pan.

Don and I decided to make the small bedroom next to our room into a
combination dressing room and bath for us and to put a tub in the other
bathroom and give it to the girls--which was certainly locking the barn
after....

This was still during the war and basins and bathtubs were impossible
to get, to say nothing of carpenters and plumbers.  We had a friend
around the Point who was a good amateur carpenter and who offered to do
that part of the work for us in the evening and on the weekends.
Through the ferry-commuters' grapevine we heard that there was a
plumber living at the other end of the island who also sold plumbing
supplies and could get us the fixtures and install them.  Don
immediately contacted this phenomenon, a Mr. Curtis, and one evening he
came to the house and we showed him the bathrooms and he drank brandy,
and the deal was made including a large septic tank which Mr. Curtis
was going to install in the south patio with a sump down on the beach.
We were also at that time putting in a road which was at the deep-cut,
knee-deep-mud stage but which, Mr. Curtis assured us, after some
brandy, would make bringing in the pipe and fixtures a cinch.  Just a
cinch!

The carpentering of the bathrooms went along very rapidly.  We bought
hand-wrought black strap hinges and knotty pine and in no time at all
our friend turned them into closets and drawers and shelves.

The plumbing seemed to be at a standstill.  Don called Mr. Curtis and
called Mr. Curtis and called Mr. Curtis, and Mr. Curtis said his back
hurt, he couldn't work in the rain, he was using his secret powerful
influence to get the fixtures, was the road paved yet (it was barely
bulldozed), he would let us know.

Weeks later, about eight o'clock one evening, Mr. Curtis and his wife
appeared.  Mr. Curtis wore a light polo coat and a brown Fedora.  His
wife had on jeans and a mackinaw.  This was not too unusual a
combination in a place where husbands go to the city while wives dig
clams and get wood, but in the case of the Curtises it had a special
significance, we learned.  We offered them a drink which he readily
accepted in the cause of his back and she refused, rather wistfully I
thought.  Don threw another log on the fire and we prepared to settle
down and discuss the current ferry strike.  To our amazement Mr. Curtis
downed his drink in one gulp, leapt to his feet and said, "Sorry, Don,
but we must get to work."  Firmly he took his wife's arm, led her into
the service room and handed her a pick.  She chipped where he pointed.

They worked pretty steadily after that.  She did all the heavy work,
chipping cement, digging the hole for the septic tank, laying the sewer
pipe, and so on, not done by Don and his carpenter friend who also
dragged all the pipe and the fixtures down the road and set them in
place.  Mr. Curtis, who never once removed his polo coat or Fedora, in
addition to directing the job, did a little screwing on of different
things.  He performed this rite delicately with his tapering fingers.

We had quite a celebration when the job was finished.  Two bathrooms,
wheeee!  Then the girls reported that if they wanted to take a bath in
their new tub they had to fill it with the shower because the faucets
wouldn't turn on.  Don said, "Nonsense!" and went masterfully upstairs
with his pipe wrenches.  He came out in a minute soaking wet and told
me to call that "fellow Curtis."

There was no answer at the Curtises' house.  I called every day for a
week but there was never anyone home.

Then one very rainy morning Don and I were getting dressed to go to
town.  I finished first and was downstairs drinking a cup of coffee
when I heard an agonized howl from upstairs.  I ran up and found Don on
his knees by the wash-basin, his forefinger in a hole in the floor
shouting, "The shutoff--find the shutoff!"

"What's the matter?" I asked.

Don said, "I was shaving and suddenly my shoes were full of water and
the pipe came apart and dropped down below the floor and water was
spurting up.  I finally found the pipe and put my finger in it but for
God's sake hurry and shut the water off."

"Where is the shutoff?" I asked reasonably.

"How in hell should I know," Don shouted.  "Curtis put it in."

Then, Joanie who was home from school with a sore throat and/or history
test, said, "I think it is outside my window.  I'll go and see."

In a few minutes she announced that it was the shutoff and she had
turned the water off.  Don took his finger out of the dike and stormed
down to call Curtis.  Mrs. Curtis answered the phone and apparently
told Don that Mr. Curtis was lying down.  Don yelled, "Get him up.  Get
him to the phone."  Apparently she told Don it was Mr. Curtis' back
because Don yelled, "His back'll hurt a lot worse after I get hold of
him."  So Mrs. Curtis finally said she'd have him come right up.

Don and I explained to Mother, who was visiting us but had as yet not
experienced all of the pleasures of island living, about Mr. Curtis,
his weak back, need for brandy, loose connections, and so on.  I
actually believed that Mother thought we were exaggerating, but she
promised to see to everything.  That night when we got home Mother
said, "Well, Mr. Curtis came.  He limped in, introduced himself and
asked me if I had any brandy.  I said no so he said he'd have to go to
Vashon and get some as his back was hurting.  He came back after a
while with a strong breath and two pints.  I took him upstairs, pointed
out the trouble in both bathrooms and went downstairs.  In about three
minutes he came down and told me everything was fixed.  I said, 'How
about that pipe in Betty and Don's bathroom?'  He said, 'All fixed.
But say, Mrs. Bard, tell them not to _brush_ against it.'"

Mother asked him if he had fixed the shower in the girls' bathroom and
he said yes and so Mother asked him to test it.  He said sure so he and
Mother went into the girls' bathroom and he pointed at the bathtub and
said, "See, everything's okay here now."

Mother said, "Turn on the faucets, I want to see if they work."

"Well, sure," said Mr. Curtis, sitting down on the edge of the tub in
his polo coat and Fedora.  "But it's not necessary.  I put in bell top
crossers and street elbows."  (I think those are the terms, but of
course it might have been California trap crosses or flow flanges.)

Mother said, "Turn on the faucets."

"Well, okay," said Mr. Curtis reaching over and turning on both the hot
and cold water full force, "but it's not necessary."  Just then the
shower, on fine spray, went sssssssssssss all over Mr. Curtis' polo
coat and Fedora.

Mother said Mr. Curtis looked very hurt.  "I can't understand it," he
said.  "Everything is tight as a drum.  Maybe it's the sissom joints."
He took a drink of brandy out of the bottle he had in his right coat
pocket.

Mother said, "I'm going to stay right here in this bathroom while you
fix those faucets."

Mr. Curtis said, "My coat's all wet, I might catch cold and I've got a
bad back."

Mother said, "It must be the valve that releases the shower."

"Say, you got something, Mother," Mr. Curtis said, taking another drink
of brandy for his bad back.

Mother said, "Fix it," and he did finally so that anybody equipped with
a wrench could have a shower or a tub as they wished.

Then came the trouble with the septic tank.  We were made aware of the
fact that there was trouble in rather a harsh fashion.  It was on a
weekend with eight houseguests, two of them under two.  Saturday
afternoon we (that is all of us who weren't chained to the sink) were
lounging around in the living room watching the fire and listening to
(it was nap time) a Brahms symphony, Toscanini conducting.  The record
player was turned to full volume so every instrument came through very
clearly.  Especially one that made a strange gurgling sound, like an
oboe filled with spit.

After a while I noticed that the gurgling sound was accompanied by a
distinct splatting noise.  Then both noises were supplemented by the
remarkably penetrating sound of a toilet running over.

I yelled for Don who came unhurriedly upstairs, lifted the copper ball
in the back of the toilet and stopped the water.  Then everybody was
upstairs and somebody confessed to flushing a didy down the toilet.

Several people said, "Call a plumber."

Don said, "Don't call Curtis.  Look in the phone book."

I looked in the Vashon phone book, but the yellow section under P
produced only Paint Dealers, Painting Contractors, Photographers,
Physicians, Plasterers, Plastics, Printers and Pumps.

I called a neighbor.  She gave me the number of h plumber.  I called
him but his wife said he was at church and wouldn't work on weekends
anyway.  I asked her if she knew the name of any plumber who would work
on weekends.  She said, "Yes, call Mrs. Grisert at 3478 and ask her if
Henry has came home from war."

I did and he hadn't, but Mrs. Grisert gave me the number of her
plumber.  I called him.  His number didn't answer.  I asked the
operator if she knew where he was.  She said yes, he was in Mexico, but
she gave me the number of her plumber.  I called him.  He said he would
come Monday if he could squeeze me in.  I told him that this was
Saturday and water was running down the front stairs but he said he
couldn't come until Monday, adding cheerfully, "Don't use the toilet
until I get there."

Mr. Olsen came at seven-thirty Monday morning and by six-thirty Monday
night he had chipped away all Mr. Curtis' wife's cement and exposed the
sewer pipe clear to the septic tank.  Tuesday he lifted the blocks in
the patio and exposed the septic tank.  He removed the blocking
didy--then recovered the septic tank and pipe to the accompaniment of
constant admiring demands that Don and I "yust look at dem tees, yust
look at dem yoints, yust look at dem nipples--I never seen so many,"
but that was the last we ever saw of him.  Moved away I guess.

Now when we want plumbing we call the television man who relays the
information to a friend of his who is reputed to do odd jobs including
plumbing, but I wouldn't vouch for this as I have left him at least a
hundred calls which he hasn't answered and anyway Don gave me my own
plumber's snake for a valentine.

Next we had the sprinkler system installed.  Up to the time we got ours
(unconsciously apt expression), my conception of a sprinkler system was
a lady in a lavender voile dress lying on a chaise longue on the cover
of The Small Home Owner's Weekly.  The lady's left hand was wrapped
around a glass of lemonade and/or gin--her right around a small brass
handle protruding shyly from the floor beside her.  Surrounding the
lady's chaise longue in every direction was a Kelly green mohair lawn,
roughly about thirty acres of it.  At about three-foot intervals all
over the lawn, sprinkler heads were tossing crystal showers of water
into the sunshine.

We got Bubby Hadlock of North Beach to install our sprinkler system.  I
showed him the picture of the lady but he said, as we had hardly any
lawn and lived on a hill besides, our problem had to be handled
differently.  It certainly did.  Bubby put copper pipe and sprinklers
all over the place but arranged for each one to be operated
independently if you are able to find them.  Also the little handles
are very close to the ground, well really in the ground, so you cannot
take hold of them, and they must be hammered on and off.  Also so
located that when the lady in the lavender dress has crawled up the
hillside, scrambled under the lilac, pushed aside the azaleas and found
the ---- ---- valve, she is in for a surprise because good old Bubby
placed all the sprinkler heads just above the valves and when they are
turned on they soak first the operator, then the wisteria tree, the
arborvitae, etc.

It is really not fair to lump Warner Yamamoto in with the island
handymen because he was not really an islander nor handy.  We got hold
of him through the United States Relocation Center, a sort of clearing
house for the Japanese who had been interned.  This was just before we
left for our trip to New York.  Don and I felt very sorry for the
returning Japanese who could not find places to stay and so we offered
our house for the six months we would be gone.  We offered the house
and a dollar an hour for any work Warner did while we were gone.

As I remember time was very short, as Warner did not show up until half
an hour before we were to leave, but I did manage to give him a few
instructions such as: "You might divide this enormous clump of Siberian
iris and clear off that hillside."  Of course I meant clear off the
weeds.

We were in New Mexico when we got a rather frantic letter from Mother
saying, "Are you planning to cement the bank in front of the house?
Warner has cleared off every living thing and is smoothing the dirt
with a trowel."  The next report was received in Dallas, Texas.  "No
need to cement the bank," Mother wrote.  "Warner has divided the iris
and is setting it out, spear by spear in neat rows over the entire
bank.  The place is beginning to look like a rice paddy."

Our first card from Warner came in Los Angeles.  It said,


Am thanking God for opportunity to stay in this beautiful place.
Earthquake did not do too much damage.

    Your friend,
        WARNER YAMAMOTO


Wildly we called home.  What earthquake, they asked?  We haven't had
any.  Don said it must have been the wash from an aircraft carrier
pounding the beach.

The next card was received in Tampa, Florida.  It said,


Am thanking God for opportunity to be in this beautiful country.  Still
raining.  Big slides not too near house yet.

    Your friend,
        WARNER YAMAMOTO


We called home.  Mother said, "An old snag fell across the road.  It
brought down a little dirt but Cleve has cleared everything away.  The
place really looks like a rice paddy now.  Warner has now taken
everything out of all the rockeries, including those heathers from
Scotland, and thrown them away.  He has almost finished filling the
crevices with iris spears."

But Warner Yamamoto did have a green thumb and now we have more
Siberian iris than Wayside Gardens.  He also had a very pretty wife who
spoke little English, had obviously never held a broom in her mothlike
hands, but wished to help me with the housework, so Warner informed me,
after we had come home and cleaned the house and they had settled
elsewhere on the island.

As the female counterpart of the handyman is much more difficult to
come by--island people being very proud and housework being considered
menial, which it certainly is--take it from a menial who knows--I
naturally snapped up Fumiko with no questions asked but several
answered such as--How much pay an hour?  Not do windows?  Eight o'clock
morning okay?  Scrubbing floors too hard, yes?  Not expect in rain?
When important company come, Fumiko dahnse?  She do both crassikar and
moderne--take twenty minute, okay?

The first morning Fumiko staggered in with an armload of Japanese
records and old photographs.  For several hours we sat on the couch and
looked at faded pictures of indistinct people who all looked exactly
alike.  Occasionally Fumiko would say, "Mama," and point at one tiny
figure in an enormous group of tiny figures in front of a temple.
"Mama beautiful," I would say politely, pronouncing each syllable
loudly and clearly and pointing at what I thought was Mama.  Fumiko
would burst into giggles.  "That Papa."  "Well," I'd say, standing up,
"I guess we had better get started."  "More picture," Fumiko would say,
quickly turning the page.  "See, brozzer."

When we finally finished that batch of photographs she took out the
records and her fans.  To "Oh Beautiful Hiroshima in Cherry Blossom
Time" (I think) she performed a long long series of small steps and
angular postures.  Then it was lunchtime.  While she watched, I set a
place at the kitchen table, heated some soup, made a tuna fish sandwich
and opened a can of peaches.  While she was eating, I sneaked out the
back door and went down to the beach.  Japanese people are notably
polite and I thought that Fumiko thought that as long as I was in the
house she must entertain me.  About two o'clock I looked up from the
beach and saw all the living room rugs hanging over the railing of the
porch.  "Ah, that's more like it," I said to Tudor.

At five-thirty when I came up from the beach the rugs were still on the
railing, the living room chairs were all lined up in rows as if we were
expecting Billy Graham, the floor had not been swept, the lunch dishes
were on the table, and from our bathroom upstairs I could hear a voice
humming "Oh Beautiful Hiroshima in Cherry Blossom Time."

At six-thirty, Warner came for Fumiko.  She was still upstairs--the
rugs were still on the railing.  He called to her in Japanese and she
came tripping down and began gathering up her photographs and records.
Warner said to me, "Le's see--eight o'clock to six-thirty--that ten
dollah fifty cent plus one dollah cah fah."

After they had gone I went upstairs--none of the beds had been touched,
crumpled towels still littered the bathrooms, the mirrors were
splattered with toothpaste, but the brass fixtures on our bathtub had
been polished until they looked like gold.

That night I sat down at my typewriter and typed out a long list of
things I expected Fumiko to do.  The next morning I gave it to Warner
and told him to read it to Fumiko in Japanese.

He did and all the time he was reading she giggled hysterically.  I did
not think that "Take ashes out of living room fireplace--Bring in the
rugs--Wash and wax kitchen floor," and so on, was very funny but
perhaps it gained something in translation.

Fumiko worked for me for five months or rather I worked and she
performed.  I finally did teach her to make beds, wash dishes, mop
floors and wash windows after a fashion, but I couldn't make her bring
in the rugs.  I finally resigned myself to the fact that I was up
against sort of an oriental superstition.

Marlene wore striped mechanics coveralls and used water and ammonia on
everything.  Don complained because the couches and rugs were always
damp and the girls said the house smelled like the bus-terminal toilet
but I couldn't let Marlene go because there wasn't anybody else and,
anyway, her two sons were in the service and her husband was in a
mental hospital.  As she put it, "Boris's real sick in the head."  She
finally left to work at Boeing and as soon as the house had dried out a
little I got Margaret, who was very pretty but had a low I.Q.

Margaret demanded long handles on all tools and used a gallon of wax a
week.  One day I found her waxing around a slice of bread on the
drainboard.  What was worse she was using the floor applicator with the
long handle.  "Margaret," I said sternly, "I've told you again and
again that when you wax around a slice of bread you should use a
_cloth_."

Each Monday, Wednesday and Friday as Margaret ate her lunch, she told
me about her boy friends.  She had hundreds.  One day she said, "Mrs.
MacDonald, you wanta know why I got so many boy friends?"

I said, "I imagine it is because you're so pretty."  (It certainly
couldn't have been her brain.)

"Uh-uh," she said, taking a reflective bite of oatmeal cookie.  "It's
because I _like_ 'em to git fresh with me."

I told her that with an attitude like that she was wasting her time on
Vashon Island.  She should go to Hollywood.

She laughed but she quit soon after that without notice or any reason,
just failed to appear ever again.  I heard that she had left the
island.  I am still checking the movie magazines' new faces departments
for a picture of Margaret captioned probably, "Cecile
Lamont--fascinating new French import."  Cecile says, "I have leetle
Eenglish but many many boy friends."  (Hollywood version of "I _like_
'em to git fresh with me.")




CHAPTER XI

BRINGING IN THE SHEAVES

According to tidbits I have picked up from my reading over the past
twenty-five years, it seems to be an accepted fact that the _happy_
woman is the woman who has some interest other than bearing children
and the subsequent washing and ironing and cooking and sweeping.  These
backbreaking tasks, thrust upon her with her wedding ring, are her lot
and she is expected to perform them with willingness, dispatch and
quiet efficiency, but, we are told, the discussion of them is not
interesting to the husband--that lucky pup who goes downtown every day
to meet new people and eat in restaurants.

If you want to keep your husband's love, so say the instructions, you
should _always_ look pretty, be _fun_, keep your house _immaculate_,
get up and cook your husband's breakfast, _and_ have outside interests.
There is one thing to be said for this state of affairs--it offers a
challenge--a challenge about as easy as getting along with Russia.

When we moved to Vashon Island my outside interest was working for that
contractor.

It was an outside interest, though, and I could fill up the evenings
telling my husband and children how tired I was, how incompetent
everybody else in our organization was and how much cabbage was selling
for in Alaska.  Then in February my sister Mary decided that I should
become a writer and introduced me to an editor who told me to bring him
a five-thousand-word outline of my book.  Never having dreamed of
writing a book I was not as quick with the outline as I might have
been.  In fact, I had to stay home from work to write it and some pal
in the office told the boss what I was doing and I was instantly fired
and thus became rather unwittingly an author.  The job of being a lady
writer not substantiated by any regular salary has always been regarded
by my family with the same tolerant amusement they accord my efforts
toward making my own Christmas cards.  "All I ask," I tell them, "is
one quiet spot where I can write."  (This is a lie, of course, and they
know it.  What I really want is a million dollars so I won't ever have
to write another word.)

When I am writing I itch and hate my family, especially during that
painful period known as "getting into the book," when I am trying to
decide whether I shall be Marcella Proust or Thomasina Wolfe and know I
shall end up being Betty MacDonald and sobbing over nasty reviews.
Thank goodness, I am not alone in this, because I read _The Cost of a
Best Seller_ by Frances Parkinson Keyes and another book about writing
by Kenneth Roberts and they had their feelings hurt--in Europe too.
Apparently the only writer who is never sorry for himself is Ernest
Hemingway and according to a recent article by his wife, he is not only
well adjusted but usually stripped to the waist.  I have tried writing
in the kitchen, the dining room, the living room, our bedroom, the
guesthouse, the porch, the patio--it is always the same.  I am first
last and always a wife and mother and must stop whatever I am doing
to--"try and remember where you left the big screwdriver"--"I am up in
Vashon and I lost the list--what was it you wanted?"--"read the
directions and see if Weevil Bait can be used for slugs"--"give me the
recipe for chicken in olive oil and wine"--"I'm bringing the children
over for the weekend." ...

Late in the spring of our second year on the island, a week or so
before school was to let out, I moved my typewriter out to the umbrella
table and Don and I decided that if I was ever to have a minute's
uninterrupted quiet Anne and Joan should also have an outside interest
and earn at least part of their school clothes.  The girls, who had
already planned a summer of sleeping late, swimming, talking about boys
and not helping, did not greet this decision with hand-clapping.  In
fact for days and days we ate our meat and potatoes to the broken
rhythm of--all the children on Vashon earn money by picking berries--I
always worked when I was a boy--I always worked when I was a girl--we
do too like you--you can go swimming when you get home, anyway berry
picking is not steady work--we do _not_ want your money for whisky--it
is _not_ against the law for children to pick berries--of course we
don't expect you to walk ten miles, the farmers call for the
pickers--because nobody wants to adopt two great big girls, that's
why....

The berry picking was not much of a success.  Late rains had almost
ruined the strawberry crop, not enough rain had withered the
raspberries, the currants had blight, the mean old man who had the
cherry orchard made tiny crippled children climb clear to the top of
huge trees just for three wormy cherries, and have you ever seen the
thorns on gooseberry bushes?--well, picking nettles would be more fun.

Every morning I injected the girls with maxims--the idle man does not
know what it is to enjoy rest--all work, even cotton spinning, is
noble--fixed them hearty lunches and shoved them out the door.  When
they came dragging home in the late afternoon I looked hopefully for
signs of self-reliance and found only boiling resentment and berry
stains which almost looked as if they might have been smeared on
purposely and wouldn't come out even with Chlorox.

In July Mary telephoned and offered Anne a job as messenger for her
husband's laboratories.  Anne was delighted.  At last she was returning
to her rightful place in the _city_, and she was going to earn lots and
lots of money and perhaps, this was a secret hope, Don and I might
become so dependent on her earnings we wouldn't let _her_ go back to
school.

Joanie, who to date had earned exactly $3.87, heaved a sigh of relief
because certainly we wouldn't expect her to pick berries alone, and got
into the rowboat where she intended to spend the rest of the summer.

Then Anne received her first week's pay and came staggering home under
a dazzling load of skirt material, new white socks, panties with
ruffles, a new blouse, paprika lipstick and nail polish and blue
eyeshadow.  Joan said, "Old First-Born always gets everything.  She
_is_ your favorite.  She always has been."

Anne said, "Favorite!  That's very amusing.  All you do is lie around
on the beach getting brown while I run all over downtown in the boiling
sun carrying terribly valuable reports.  When I'm not running, I'm
washing test tubes and how would you like to eat your lunch in a place
that smells like boiling urine?"

"Do they really boil urine?" Joan asked.

"Of course _we_ do," Anne said importantly.  "And we kill rabbits by
injecting air in their veins.  It's for the pregnancy tests."

"Yeah, but look at all the money you make."

"I earn every cent of it," Anne said.  "Those laboratory technicians
work me like a slave.  I don't even get to sit down, all day long."

"I wouldn't care if I sat down or not if I had all that money," Joan
said.  "I sure wish I had a job like yours."

"Perhaps next year," Anne said grandly.  "When you're older.  Now
you're considered a child and nobody will hire you except the berry
farmers and that's just because they're such big cheaters and don't
want to pay anything."

I said, "I feel sorry for the berry farmers.  From what you have told
me all you and your little friends did was drink Cokes and throw
berries at each other."

"That was only when we were too tired to pick any more," Joan said.
"You should just be out in that boiling sun, crawling around in the
dirt trying to find those wizened-up little strawberries."

With her next paycheck Anne bought a new bathing suit and some
huaraches.  Joan examined them enviously but continued to spend her
days in the rowboat, spearing sole and chasing crabs with her friend
Bobby.

With her next paycheck Anne bought two men's sweaters--one pale blue
and one yellow.  As she laid out her purchases she said to Joan, "Labor
Day is only two weeks away you know."

Joan said, "Oh, you just think you're smarter than anybody in the whole
world."  But Monday morning after she had washed the breakfast dishes,
she made a telephone call.  Then with elaborate casualness she
approached the umbrella table where I was miserably huddled being
creative.  She said, "Mommy dear, would you do me the biggest favor in
the whole world?"

"Of course," I said heedlessly thinking in terms of another request for
macaroni and cheese, or perhaps some new huaraches.

"Well," said Joanie, "I just called Karen and she says that maybe I can
get a job picking peaches at Hawkins' orchards.  They pay sixty-five
cents an hour but if you stay all season you get eighty-five cents.
Karen says it's not hard and last year she earned eighty-two dollars.
Will you call the Hawkinses for me, Mommy?"

"Of course," I said getting up.  "Do you want to start tomorrow?"

"Yes," Joan said, "and tell them they can pick me up on the road by the
Falcon's Nest."

So I gave the Hawkins number to the operator and after a while a female
voice that had been tempered in a forge yelled, "Yeah?" and I said
timidly, "Are you hiring peach pickers?" and the voice said, "Any
experience?"

"Oh, my yes," I said.

"Where you live?" the voice asked.

"At Vashon Heights," I said.  "Right near the Falcon's Nest."

"Way down there?" the voice said.  "Golly, I don' know.  How many of
you?"

"Four," I said, making a mental note that this was not a lie as there
were four in our family.

"Okay, then," said the voice.  "We couldn't come way down there for
less.  Be on the road at seven-thirty tomorrow morning."

I hung up the phone.  Joan said, "What'd they say?  Will they take us?"

"Us is right," I said grimly.  "They won't come down here for less than
four.  Can you get anybody else?  What about those little girls that
live down by the store?"

"You mean the Hansens?" Joan said.  "I'll call them but I think they
are visiting their grandmother.  _They_ have fun in the summer.
_Their_ mother says picking berries is for Indians."

I said, "In wartime everybody works.  In England countesses are milking
cows and shoveling manure."

"Why don't they let their servants do it?" Joan asked.

"Because the servants are working in war plants and all the men are at
war," I said.  "Now call the Hansens."

But the Hansens were at their grandmother's not working.  "See," Joan
said hanging up the phone and sighing heavily.

"Try somebody else," I said briskly.

"Who?" she asked.

"Your school friends," I said.

"I don't know any of their telephone numbers," Joan said.

"Look them up," I said.

Finally, after a great deal of urging, she called the few of her
schoolmates whose names she could remember and learned that they were
all either already working at Hawkins' or in some other peach orchard.

"Oh, ho," I said spitefully.  "I thought you and Anne were the only
children in the whole wide world who had to work in the summer."

Joan said, "Well, I can't work because you said Hawkins won't come down
here for only one."  I knew then what was coming as I had known from
the minute Mrs. Hawkins said hello.

Joan said, "Why don't you come, Mommy?  You're not doing _anything_ and
that would be two."

That night when Anne came home she announced that she had quit her job
because Aunty Mary thought she should have some vacation and, anyway,
she had all her school clothes but her shoes and a new coat and Aunty
Mary didn't think that even Don and I were mean enough to expect little
children to earn their own coats.  She also said, "It's certainly going
to be too bad for you when school starts, Joan, unless you can persuade
your friend who gets her clothes off the city dump to take you along on
her next trip."

Joan said, "You don't have to worry about me, Miss Barbara Hutton;
Mommy and I are going to pick peaches."

"That's not fair," Anne said.  "Betty, you didn't help me with my job."

"It's just for one day," I said.  "The Hawkinses wouldn't come down for
only one picker.  Tomorrow Joan will arrange with some of her school
friends to take my place."

Don said, "I thought the girls were to learn self-reliance and
independence.  Why can't Joan make her own arrangements?"

"Nobody could make arrangements with that voice," I said.  "It even
scared me.  Anyway it is only for one day."

"Be sure and fix plenty of sandwiches," Joan told me the next morning
when we were getting ready.  "Picking makes you awfully hungry.  What
have you got for dessert?"

"What's the matter with peaches?" I said.  "We'll be in a whole orchard
of them."

"Mr. Hawkins doesn't let you eat the peaches when you're picking," Joan
said.

It was a hazy morning, with a long white plume where the Seattle shore
should be, but the sky behind the big firs was already a clear glassy
blue and showed it was going to be a hot day.  I put on shorts but when
I came out to the kitchen Joan said, "Mrs. Hawkins won't let the ladies
wear shorts, Mommy.  She says they're indecent."

"Who does this Mrs. Hawkins think she is?" I said crossly.  "Everybody
wears shorts in summer, even old ladies like me."

"Wear them if you want to," Joan said, "but she won't let you pick.
Karen said she sent Ethel and Mary Everts home because they were
wearing cut-off jeans and they're only fifteen and sixteen."

So I changed into jeans and a white sweatshirt and wooden shoes, which
we wear on the beach.  Joan wore jeans and a red sweatshirt and
huaraches.

As we crunched along the beach at seven-fifteen, Joanie said, "Lucky
old Anne, still asleep."

I said, "She's been getting up early for weeks and weeks while you've
been sleeping."

"But she didn't have to be at work until ten o'clock," Joan said.
"Look, deer tracks.  I bet Bucky has been down taking a swim.  Next
year I'm going to get a job in town."

The Hawkins truck stopped for us promptly at seven-thirty but before he
would let us in Mr. Hawkins yelled, "Where are the others?"

"Home, sick," I said.

"Whatsa matter with them?" he asked suspiciously.

"Flu," I said.  "Sort of intestinal flu with nausea and dizziness."

"Will they be okay tomorrow?" he asked.

"Sure," I said, "that flu never lasts long."

"Okay," he said.  "Climb in."

The tailgate of the truck was as high as my chest but I managed, with
the help of the ten or eleven children, to scramble in, just as Mr.
Hawkins with a roar and a lurch started off.  There wasn't straw or
gunny sacks or anything for us to sit on and Mr. Hawkins immediately
turned off the paved highway and drove like double greased lightning
over what appeared to be partially cleared land.  By the time we got to
their ranch, Joan said she felt like a milk shake.

After he had unloaded us, Mr. Hawkins said, "Can't start pickin' until
the mist gits off the trees.  You can set around and wait.  But the pay
don't start until you start pickin'."

The pickers put their lunches and jackets in a heap, then lined up on
the porch of the packing shed to watch the mist on the trees and look
woebegone.  Joan, her friend Karen, a pixy-ish little girl with black
pigtails and freckles, and I wandered down into the orchard and ate
slightly green peaches while Karen gave us the lowdown on picking.

"Pick them with the palm of your hand, like this," she showed us.  "If
you use your fingers you get bruise marks and they count against you.
We all have numbers so they know who picked what boxes.  Mrs. Swensen
is the forelady and she's the meanest old crab you ever saw: 'No
talking in the orchard, girls.'  'Faster, girls!  Work faster, girls!'
'You're leaving finger marks, Karen!'  'Number seventeen report to the
packing shed, I've tattled on you!'"

"Which one is she?" I asked.

"She wears a big green straw hat," Karen said, "but she's still in the
house, drinking coffee and tattling to Mrs. Hawkins.  When you get
tired, and you sure do in the afternoon, climb up to the top of your
ladder and sit and eat peaches.  You can see the old crab before she
sees you and pretend to be picking like sixty.  Yesterday she sneaked
up to where I was picking, but I saw her coming and when she was right
beside the ladder I dropped a great big rotten peach on her head.  'Oh,
excuse me, Mrs. Swensen,' I said, then busted out laughing.  She was
awful mad but she couldn't do anything because I picked the most boxes
yesterday.  We picked till nine last night and didn't get home until
after eleven."

"After eleven!" I said.  "How awful!"

"Yeah, it is," Karen said, "but Mr. Hawkins won't drive the pickers
home until they are all through in the packing shed."

"What about dinner?" Joan asked.  "We only brought lunch."

"Oh, they give you sandwiches and Cokes," Karen said.  "Two halves of a
sandwich and one Coke.  I could have eaten twenty.  I ate about a
hundred peaches but they aren't very filling."

It was ten o'clock before Mr. Hawkins gave us our tickets and told us
to start.  I was number twenty-seven--Joanie was twenty-six.  Karen had
already showed us where the best trees were, so we went down to the
other end of the orchard about a mile from the packing shed.  The land
between and under the trees had been plowed and disked thoroughly and
recently, and walking in it was like walking over sand dunes.  Joan's
huaraches filled with dirt immediately so she took them off and went
barefoot, like Karen.  My wooden shoes also filled with dirt and I kept
stopping and dumping them.

Karen said, "It would be better if you could take your shoes off too,
Mrs. MacDonald, but Mrs. Swensen won't let the older ladies go
barefoot.  She says it makes them look tough."

I was pretty slow filling my first two or three boxes because I
couldn't tell which peaches were ripe enough to pick and was very
conscientious about not putting finger marks on them.  Joan and Karen
filled five boxes to my one, ate peaches by the dozen, threw the rotten
ones at each other, skittered up and down their ladders like squirrels
and by noon were so far ahead of me I couldn't even hear their giggles.

The trees were so loaded with fruit, almost every branch had to be
supported with a stake.  The peaches were very large, a deep golden
yellow with flagrantly painted cheeks.  Their color was a lovely
contrast to the bottle-blue sky, the pointed drooping silky green
leaves.  As I stood on my ladder and with the heel of my hand gently
twisted off a plump golden peach and tucked it in the box beside other
plump golden peaches, I decided that this was the life.  Beauty,
independence and a feeling of harvest.  This would be my chosen work.
I could see our car loaded with camping equipment, Anne and Joan and
Don and me crowded happily inside, singing as we spun along the
highways heading for the hop fields, or the orange groves or the apple
orchards.  What a life!  To say nothing of seven or eight dollars
apiece per day--let's see--eight times four is thirty-two dollars a
day!  Heavens!  It _was_ the life.  I reached way above my head and
picked a small ripe red peach, bit into its sun-warmed juicy-ness and
then nearly fell off the ladder as a nasal voice zinged up at me, "You
have two finger marks, Number twenty-seven, and you are not cleaning
the trees properly."

Quickly tucking the small bitten peach into my box, bite-side down, and
choking down what was in my mouth, I said, "You mean I am leaving ripe
ones, Mrs. Swensen?"

"I certainly do," she said.  "Come here."

I climbed down.  Peering at my wooden shoes through her steel-rimmed
spectacles, she said, "What on earth do you have on your feet?"

"Wooden shoes," I said.  "We wear them on the beach."

"Well, they may be all right for the beach but they are certainly
inappropriate for picking peaches," she said.  "Look here, this peach
is ripe," deftly she twisted it off.  "And so is this one, and this and
this.  Where is your flat, Mrs. MacDonald?"

"Up on the ladder," I said.  "I'll get it."

When I brought it down she immediately reached in and grabbed the small
peach I had been eating.  "That one is too small," she said, then
seeing the bitten pieces she added, "Eating the fruit is not
encouraged, Mrs. MacDonald.  After all, this fruit belongs to the
Hawkinses.  It represents money to them.  Helping ourselves to their
fruit is like helping ourselves to their money."

She handed me the bitten peach and I accepted it humbly with hanging
head.  "Now," she said briskly, "you are very slow.  Let me see how you
are picking."

I reached over my head and got hold of a peach that looked ripe but was
as hard as a stone and apparently cemented to the tree.  I twisted and
twisted and yanked and twisted and it stayed on the tree.

Mrs. Swensen said, "Here, let me show you."  She reached up and snapped
the peach off and laid it in the box.

I felt like telling her that if somebody would loosen them up for me I
wouldn't have any trouble either, but instead I tried another and it
did come off finally, after I had wrung it like a dishrag.

Mrs. Swensen had on great big mustard-colored culottes, a long-sleeved
Kelly green silk blouse, brown Red Cross oxfords with medium heels and
the big green straw garden hat.  I said, "Isn't this a lovely day?"

She said, "It has been a very disappointing day for the Hawkinses.
Those early mists make picking so late."

I said, "On the beach where we live the mist was almost gone at seven
o'clock."

"That's impossible," she said.  "I could hardly see to drive at seven."

"It was, though," I said.  "We are on the southeast side.  Perhaps the
wind blew it away."

"It seems very unlikely that it would be foggy at Hawkins' and clear at
your place.  That's a green peach you just picked."

"I'm sorry," I said.  "What shall I do with it--throw it away?"

"Of course not," she said.  "It will pack, but be more careful in the
future.  You must work faster too.  You're way behind the others.
Perhaps if you had on sensible shoes like these you could go up and
down the ladders faster."

"I could go barefoot," I said eagerly.

"Mrs. Hawkins doesn't approve of the women going barefoot," she said.
"It makes them look tough."

I saw that the sun was directly overhead.  "What time is it?" I asked.

"I don't wear a watch," she said.  "I can tell the day is over when my
work is finished."

Just then there was a loud banging, like somebody pounding on a wash
boiler with a hammer.

"There's the lunch gong," she said, still picking.

I kept picking, too, because I was afraid to stop.  After ten minutes
or so I heard Joan and Karen calling to me, "Betty, come on!  Where are
you?"

"Down here," I answered.  "Aren't you going to eat lunch?" I asked Mrs.
Swensen.

"I'm not hungry," she said, drawing her lips into a small lavender
rosette.  "I've been having a little upset.  Anyway I want to finish
this tree."

"I'll help you," I said weakly.

Then Joan and Karen came running down between the trees, carrying the
lunch bags.  "Come on, Mommy," Joan said.  "We only get a half hour and
half of it's gone already."

"Well, I guess I'd better eat my lunch now," I said to Mrs. Swensen.

"As you wish," she said, not looking up.

Long before we were out of earshot, Karen said, "How come you were
stuck with the old Crab Patch?"

"She was teaching me," I said, adding sadly: "She said I'm slow and
don't pick right."

"Oh, she tells that to everybody," Karen said.  "She thinks she's the
only person in the whole world that can pick those darn peaches.  If
they'd let her, she'd pick the whole crop all by herself."

It was very hot and dusty between the rows of trees, but under each
tree was a circle of cool dark green dappled shade.  I suggested going
under a tree to eat our lunch but Karen said no, because of the yellow
jackets swarming over the peaches on the ground.  We finally ate on the
porch of the packing shed along with the other pickers.  The sun had
swung around and was shining directly on the heap of jackets and lunch
and our sandwiches and milk were warm.  After we had gulped down our
food I said I wanted a drink of water.  Karen said we had to drink out
of the faucet in the yard.  The water was warm and tasted like it had
been standing in a tin can.

As I stood up and wiped off my lips, Joanie said, "Gosh you look hot,
Mommy!  Your face is as red as a beet."

"I am hot," I said, "I wish I'd worn a thin blouse."

"Karen and I are going to take off our sweatshirts," Joan said.  "We've
got halter tops on underneath.  I wish I'd worn my short jeans."

"Let's cut 'em off," Karen said.  "Here, I've got a pocket knife."  She
jabbed the blade of the knife through the material of her jeans at the
inside seam, gave a yank and ripped off one leg.  Then she cut off the
other.  Joan asked her to cut off hers.  When they went back to work a
few minutes later they had shed their sweatshirts and in their bare
feet, halters and very short jeans, appeared as cool and carefree as
pearl divers.  I clumped hotly along behind them through the orchard.

About two o'clock my wooden shoes felt like they were made of iron and
my throat was so dry it crackled.  The tractor, hauling a sled that
picked up the peaches and left empty boxes, went roaring by leaving a
cloud of chokey tan dust.  I climbed down from my tree and went in
search of water.  Ten or twelve trees away I found Karen and Joan.  I
asked Karen if there was any water nearer than the packing house.  She
said, "Ask the Crab Patch, she's supposed to have it hauled down to the
orchard."  I finally found Mrs. Swensen whispering to one of her lady
friends behind the packing shed.

"Could we please have some water in the orchard?" I asked her.

She said, "Didn't you get a drink at noon?"

I said, "Of course I did, but it's awfully hot and the dust from the
tractor is terrible."

She said, "Well, I'll take it up with Mrs. Hawkins."  She looked very
disapproving of the whole idea.

I went defiantly over to the faucet in the yard, took a long lukewarm
drink, washed out and filled Joan's and my milk bottles and started
back to work.  Once I looked back and saw Mrs. Swensen pointing me out
to Mrs. Hawkins.  Joan and Karen were grateful for the water but
instead of drinking it, poured it on their heads.

"Makes you cooler," Karen said and I wished I had wet my hair when I
was up at the faucet.

About four o'clock the tractor hauled down a ten-gallon can of water
and a tin dipper to a place about in the middle of the pickers.  The
word went through the orchard with a whoosh.  "Water!" the pickers
called from tree to tree and we all hurried up to the sled.  Mrs.
Swensen was disbursing it as if it were vintage champagne.

"Don't waste it," she kept warning us.  "Don't crowd--don't
loiter--don't be piggish--don't push--be careful!"  When my turn came I
deliberately poured two dippersful over my head, then drank one.

Mrs. Swensen watched me with horror, then said, "I think we should all
be very grateful to the Hawkinses for this nice water, Mrs. MacDonald.
Mr. Hawkins filled the can and hauled it himself.  I don't think we
should waste it.  Mr. Hawkins is a very busy man."

My hair was apparently thick with dust because the rivulets that ran
down my face and neck were muddy.  Joan and Karen giggled and said
comfortingly, "Golly, you should see yourself, you look awful!"  I
didn't care.  I wanted to look awful.  I was tired and hot and my legs
ached and I had bleeding blisters on both heels and I hated peach
picking more than anything in the whole world.

About five o'clock Mrs. Swensen announced that we would pick until
dark, which was not until about ten as we were on double daylight
saving at that time.  I told her that I would have to call home and she
said, "Well, I don't know.  Mrs. Hawkins doesn't like the pickers to
use the phone."

"I don't care what Mrs. Hawkins likes," I shouted.  "My husband won't
know where I am and unless you want the sheriff coming down here I'd
better telephone."

"Well, all right," she said.  "But I think arrangements should be made
before you come to work."

"How, by ouija board?" I said.  "When I telephoned yesterday nobody
told me that we were going to work until dark.  I naturally assumed
that we would quit at five or five-thirty.  Where is the telephone?"

"I'll show you," she said.

"And tattle on you to Mrs. Hawkins," Karen said to Joan audibly.

"You watch yourself, young lady," said Mrs. Swensen turning around to
Karen.

"Yes, ma'am," said Karen, hurrying up her ladder.

The telephone was in the packing shed where about twenty women were
sorting and packing peaches and screaming pleasantries to each other.
It sounded like a hen house invaded by a weasel.  I couldn't even hear
by own voice when I gave the number to the operator.  I thought I heard
Anne say that she and Don were going to my sister Alison's for dinner
but I wasn't sure.  Anyway, I was quite certain she understood that
Joan and I would be late.

Mrs. Hawkins, a small sturdy brown woman with bright blue eyes, stopped
her packing and came over to me.  "How you getting along?" she asked.

"Fine," I said, "but I'm awfully hot.  I wish I could wear shorts."

"Why don't you?" she asked.

"I thought the women weren't allowed to," I said.

"Nonsense," she said.  "Wear your bathing suit if you want.  We don't
care.  Just so you don't mark the peaches."

I looked at Mrs. Swensen and she had her lips drawn into the lavender
rosette.

We stopped for supper at six.  Mrs. Swensen brought the sandwiches and
Cokes to us.  The sandwiches were egg and peanut butter and there were
only two halves apiece.  I could have eaten twenty and judging by
Joan's forlorn expression, she could have eaten sixty.  Mrs. Swensen
didn't eat any.  She said she was still upset and she didn't like
peanut butter anyway.

"Can I have yours, then?" Joan and Karen asked together.

"I suppose so," said Mrs. Swensen ungraciously.

The long shadows of evening, with the soft bird sounds and a breeze
from the Sound, gave us all a second wind.  I was barefoot and even the
earth between the trees, which had been as hot as a griddle during the
afternoon, felt cool and cushiony to my tired feet.  As we straggled
finally up to the packing house I worried about Joanie.  She was only
thirteen, and seemed so small and slight to be doing such hard work.  I
asked her how she felt and she said, "Keen!  I earned seven dollars and
eighty cents at the very least and if they pay me eighty-five cents an
hour like they are supposed to if you work the whole season but Karen
says they never do because Mrs. Swensen chooses the ones that get
eight-five cents, I earned ten dollars and twenty cents.  Isn't that
keen, Mommy?  You earned that much too," she added generously.

I didn't answer and she tucked her arm in mine and said, "It won't be
so hard tomorrow, Mommy.  Karen says the first day is always hard."

I had absolutely no intention of seeing what the second day was going
to be like but didn't want to bring it up at this time.

I sat down rather dispiritedly on the edge of the packing house porch
and watched other packers, even two very old ladies, bustle gaily,
untiredly around gathering up shawls and jackets and lunch buckets.  I
decided that if I did have to work the next day I would bring a big
thermos of coffee--I also realized I hadn't had a single cigarette all
day.  I took one out and lit it and immediately Mrs. Swensen
materialized in the darkness beside me and said, "Mrs. Hawkins doesn't
allow smoking on the premises."

"Okay, then I'll let _her_ tell me to stop smoking," I said.

Mrs. Swensen flounced away.  Joan and Karen giggled but Joan said,
"Please don't smoke, Mommy.  None of the ladies here do and it makes
you look funny."

"You mean tough," I said, "like wearing shorts or going barefoot?"

"Oh, Mommy," Joan said.  "You know what I mean."

"I do, sweetheart," I said, "but I'm so tired I don't care.  I need a
cigarette right now and I'd like a martini."

"Shush," Joan said.  "Don't talk like that.  Somebody might hear you."

"I could sure go for a can of cold beer," a pleasantly loud voice said
behind me.

"Make it two," another answered.

"What about them?" I asked Joan.

"Yes, but they're not mothers," Joan said.

Wearily I stamped out my cigarette and accepted half of Joan's lukewarm
Coke in its place.  Mr. Hawkins didn't finish cleaning up and locking
the packing shed until after eleven.  It was eleven-thirty when he
slowed up the truck just a little and Joan and I tumbled out at the top
of the Sanders' road.  My blisters were so painful I couldn't wear my
shoes, so I carried them and walked in my sock feet.  The road had
recently been graded and covered with crushed rock, which was like
walking over broken glass.  It was also very dark as the road followed
a wooded ravine sheltered from the moonlight by the steep hills, and we
couldn't see the larger rocks until we either stepped on them or banged
them with our toes.  We were stumbling along complaining about how
tired we were when we saw the lights of Don's car at the top of the
hill back of us.

Joan said, "Mommy, don't let's tell Anne how awful it was.  Let's tell
her it was fun and all we did was sit under the trees and eat peaches
for eighty-five cents an hour."

It seemed a reasonable request, so when Don slowed up and we climbed
in, I tried to leap a little and appear sprightly.

"How was it?" Anne asked immediately.

"The most fun I ever had," Joan said.  "The peaches are enormous and
delicious and you can eat all you want and all Karen and I did was sit
under the trees and eat peaches and giggle and I earned ten dollars and
twenty cents."

"Ten dollars and twenty cents!" Anne said.  "My gosh, I only got
fifteen dollars for a whole week on my job."

"Well, come on and pick peaches," Joan said.  "They need more pickers."

"Do they really?" Anne asked.

"Yes, they do," I said.  "You know I had to promise Mrs. Hawkins we'd
have four or she wouldn't have come down for us."

"Well, I'm going tomorrow," Anne said.  "Ten dollars and twenty cents!
I could get new saddle shoes and loafers."

The great advantage of having Anne along was that she became friends
with the Hawkinses' daughter and learned that we could have as much
water as we wanted and as many sandwiches as we could eat for supper.
The tiny portions had been Mrs. Swensen's idea.  Also Anne stayed
loyally behind with me and let Karen and Joan scamper ahead and be
champions.  I wore shorts and tennis shoes and a thin blouse the next
day and was much less tired.  Mrs. Swensen sniffed when she saw me and
hovered around my trees like a yellow jacket but didn't say anything.

We didn't work late every night and after a while I wasn't so terribly
tired when I got home.  We were all paid off at eighty-five cents, a
pleasant surprise.  We went to town the Saturday before Labor Day and
had a rich, well-earned spree.  The girls spent all their money for
clothes and records and charms for their bracelets, but I got a new
typewriter ribbon, some new pots and pans, and a large white Lotus
camellia bush.

Don was very proud of all of us and Joan said that next year maybe he'd
like to pick.

Anne said, "Oh, no, Mrs. Swensen doesn't like men pickers.  She says
men smoke and use dirty language."

"Description fits me like a glove," Don said.  "Guess I'll have to dig
clams."




CHAPTER XII

TRIPLE THAT RECIPE

It was a baby shower for a neighbor and we were all invited.  Don, who
does not approve of women's clubs or women's luncheons or women's
bridge parties, or sororities or even two women talking together on the
phone, elected to stay home alone with Tudor and Mrs. Miniver.  When
Anne and Joan and I came downstairs in our ironed dresses and perfume,
carrying our presents and our good shoes, he was sitting by the radio,
looking sad.

"How do we look?" I asked him.

"I thought you told me you didn't like women's clubs," he said, his
voice dripping disappointment.

"This isn't a women's club," I said.  "It's a baby shower for Elspeth
Carlyle.  All the other husbands are coming."

"Do the men bring baby presents?" Joan asked.

"Of course not," I said.  "They just stay in the den and drink and play
poker, the lucky dogs."

"Come on, Don," Anne said.  "You'll have a good time and it's scary
walking the trail in the dark."

"If you want me to, I'll walk you down," Don said.  "But I won't go in.
A baby shower!"  He spoke with great resentment.  "Who ever thought
that up?"

"I think it's very nice," I said.  "And I think it was very considerate
of Mrs. Adams to ask the husbands and Anne and Joan."

"Say, it's almost eight o'clock," Anne said.  "We'd better get started."

"Are you coming?" I asked Don.

"No," he said.  "But I will walk the trail with you."

"You don't have to," I said.  "We've each got a flashlight.  Just keep
up the fire."  I gestured with contempt at the four pieces of bark
about the size and thickness of slices of meatloaf, the burning of
which would leave the copper boiler we use as a wood box, entirely
empty.  "You don't expect that to last all evening, do you?"

"You tend to your women's clubs and I'll tend to my wood," Don said,
turning the bad news on the radio up louder.  "What time will you be
home?"

"About eleven, I expect," I said.

"Do you think you'd like a sandwich?" he asked.

"Oh, no," Anne said.  "This is a party.  We'll probably have tons to
eat."

Hopefully Joan asked, "Do they have weenies and buns at baby showers?"

"Oh, heavens, no," Anne who had never to my certain knowledge been to
one, answered confidently.  "They have things like chicken salad and
hot rolls and ice cream and cake, don't they, Mommy?"

"I hope so," I said, adding to Don, "But if you're planning on any kind
of an extra-good sandwich, like peanut butter on dry bread, save me
one."

When the guest of honor had picked up the last package, admired the
stork paper and the rattle tied to the bow, squealed, for the
twenty-third time that evening, "What a darling card!" and as she undid
the wrappings, "Just what I needed!", handed the box to the woman on
her left who said, "Oh, how darling!  Just what you needed!", passed
the box to the woman on her left ditto, until the box had gone all the
way around the room, the hostess appeared and said, "And now, ladies,
if you will follow me."

We all got quickly to our feet, no mean accomplishment for those of us
in the stranglehold of African camp chairs, lounging in which always
brings back vivid unpleasant memories of waiting for the obstetrician,
and, like all women following their hostess into the dining room,
afraid to appear either too eager or too reluctant, we began backing
and filling and lurching ahead very much like freight cars trying to
follow an engine onto a siding.

The refreshments, laid out on the dining room table buffet style around
the pink candles, stork centerpiece and little pink and blue candy
baskets in the shape of folded didies, consisted of a large lumpy salad
in lettuce cups, home-made banana bread, black olives and lukewarm very
weak coffee.  After we had helped ourselves, moving left to right
around the table and ending up with the sugar and cream, and I had made
Joan put back six olives and told Anne for the eighth time she could
not have coffee, we carried our plates and cups and saucers back to the
living room.  I hurried just enough to avoid getting stuck in one of
the African camp chairs again, but not enough to spill the coffee.

After I had arranged myself on the floor beside the coffee table with
the girls beside me, I looked and looked at my salad trying to guess
what it was.  When it could not be avoided any longer I took a bite and
it was tuna fish and marshmallows and walnuts and pimento (just for the
pretty color, our hostess explained later when she was giving us the
recipe) and chunks of pure white lettuce and boiled dressing.  I almost
gagged, both Anne and Joan nudged me and giggled, but most of the other
ladies shrieked, "Delicious!" "Heavenly!" and "So different!" (that I
could go along with) and so the beaming hostess gave us the recipe and
we all wrote it down, using the same pencils and pads we had used to
guess rivers beginning with B--cities with A--authors with B and
historical events with Y, and Anne had won the crocheted coasters.

It was at another baby shower that I first encountered a ring mold of
mushroom soup, hard-boiled eggs, canned shrimps (that special brand
that taste like Lysol) and lime Jello, the center heaped with chopped
sweet pickles, the whole topped with a mustardy, sweet salad dressing.

An evening party during elections produced casual refreshments of large
cold slightly sweet hamburger buns spread with relish, sweet salad
dressing, dried beef and cheese, then whisked under the broiler just
long enough to make the cheese gummy and the relish warm.

At another shower (wedding, I believe) we were served _tuna fish_ chow
mein with rancid noodles.  A garden club meeting, creamed tuna fish and
peanuts over canned asparagus.  A hospital group dredged up a salad of
elbow macaroni, pineapple chunks, Spanish peanuts, chopped cabbage,
chopped marshmallows, ripe olives and salad dressing.

I could go on and on _ad nauseam_ and not even scratch the surface of
the desserts which veer toward you "just take a devil's food cake, make
a filling of whipped cream, peanut brittle, chocolate chips and custard
... and freeze."  I don't know what is happening to the women of
America but it ought to be stopped.

Another thing, why do terrible cooks always have their houses so hot,
their coffee so cold?

The other day as I ironed I listened idly to a radio program for
housewives.  I was immediately irritated by the commentator, or
whatever she calls herself, because she said "prolly" for "probably."
I was further irritated when, with a great deal of self-confidence and
speaking slowly so that the listeners could get it all down, she gave a
perfectly ghastly recipe for one of my favorite foods, pot roast.  As
nearly as I can remember she said, "This being spring you are prolly at
the end of your ropes as far as meal planning is concerned and would
prolly just love to know about an easy delicious meal to surprise your
family.  Well, here it is.  Individual pot roasts.  All you do is take
a pot roast and cut it up into pieces, so that each member of the
family has one, put them in individual casseroles, cover with plenty of
water, add a couple of carrots and a turnip and bake until done.  What
a surprise for the family!  Everybody with his own little pot roast!"
From her recipe I would say, "Everybody with his own little chunk of
boiled army blanket."

Another female household-hinter gave a recipe for a big hearty main
dish of elbow macaroni, mint jelly, lima beans, mayonnaise and cheese
baked until "hot and yummy."  Unless my taste buds are paralyzed, this
dish could be baked until hell freezes over and it might get hot but
never "yummy."

These women are also strong for what they term "tossed" salad and into
which they tell their gullible listeners to "toss everything you have
in the refrigerator."

It is pretty obvious to me that they, as well as most of the cooks in
the women's magazines, operate on my grandmother's old theory of "Don't
make it so awful good--men, the pigs, will eat anything."

The only really good cook I have encountered via the women's magazines
is Ann Batchelder of the _Ladies' Home Journal_.  She has managed to
retain a taste for simple food with good flavor and she obviously likes
to eat, two infallible rules for a good cook.

Men's magazines have much better recipes than women's magazines, but
are apt to go to the other extreme and demand "six tiny bitter oranges
from the island of Crete, one-fourth litre of St. Emilion, Chateau
Ausone, pounded into two pounds of fresh truffles."

Everyone in our family likes to cook.  My sister Mary, if she can be
controlled on her occasional flights into "turnips stuffed with grated
orange and old brandy," is a marvelous cook.  Anne and Joan are divine
cooks.  I am sometimes a very good cook but my weakness is "if a little
is good a whole lot is better" and my leftovers are often carried from
the table in tubs.  My mother seldom varies from her goal of good food,
simply prepared, well seasoned and beautifully served.

Most of the time when I am cooking I feel that I have been more than
usually fortunate in my choice of a mate, because Don is a true gourmet
and a delight to cook for.  He has only one tiny flaw in this
department--he would like Beef Stroganoff for every meal.  I like Beef
Stroganoff but it is quite a bore to make with its "strips of beef the
size of a lead pencil," should be served as soon as it is made and does
not combine well with guests who prolong the cocktail hour until eleven
P.M.

Every time I make Beef Stroganoff I think of the first time we
entertained my managing editor.  It was one of those unexpectedly raw
spring days we specialize in up here.  A day when your flesh seems all
huddled around your neck and you feel as if the wind were blowing
directly on your bare bones.

We met George at the two-thirty ferry and, though he was wearing a thin
raincoat and looked blue, he didn't protest when Don suggested a drive
around the island.  I sat in the back, and he sat hunched in the front
and nobody said much as Don drove seventy-five miles an hour past
cemeteries, the Vashon dump, the big patch of burned-off land on Maury
Island, mud flats, abandoned farms, farms which should have been
abandoned because the well was obviously dry, the old brick yard.  It
was pretty depressing, made more so by the fact that I was shy, George
was shy, Don was shy and the heater was broken.

At four o'clock we came home.  Don said, "Betty is going to make Beef
Stroganoff for dinner."

George said, "That's fine."

I said, "I love Hollywood.  In fact my secret vice is reading movie
magazines."

George said, "Oh, no!"

Then I remembered that he had been editor of the _Saturday Review_, and
I was just going to change the subject to a book by Andr Gide, when
Don handed us each a martini and said, "Betty certainly does like movie
magazines.  Last week she spent two dollars and seventy-one cents on
them--the week before three dollars and eighty-seven cents--the week
before three dollars and forty-five cents--the week before..."

The upshot of the whole thing was that I had the Beef Stroganoff done
and on the table at four forty-five and we were all yawning by seven
five.

I invited Maggie Cousins, the Managing Editor of _Good Housekeeping_,
to dinner during my first early innocent days of being a writer--before
we remodeled the kitchen.  Anne and Joan and I planned the menu of
baked ham, stuffed peppers, scalloped potatoes, hot rolls, green salad
and wild blackberry pie.  Everything to be baked, but the salad, and we
had only one small oven.  As a result the ham was raw, the potatoes
curdled, the green peppers burned, the rolls hard and the pie runny but
Maggie was darling.

One thing about Good Old Don, his drinks are always frequent and
strong, and even without a signal of distress from me, he can be
counted on to have those not already under, crawling to the table or at
least softened past the point where they might be pettish about
scorched string beans.

Don likes to cook too, but like most males in the kitchen even the
making of a fried-egg sandwich produces the attitude of a
Vienna-trained surgeon repairing the trachea of a new-born baby.  "Hand
me that pan!  Where is the butter?  Now some coarse ground pepper,
careful not too much.  Is the bread buttered?  Heat the plates!  Have
you made the coffee?  Hand me the spatula, no, the big one.  Move
faster, things are getting cold."  He demands much of his staff as he
busies himself turning the clean kitchen into something that looks as
if it had been attacked by a gang of dope-crazed teen-aged vandals.

One of Don's culinary specialties is Monte Cristo sandwiches, a
concoction of ham, Swiss cheese, turkey between two slices of white
bread, the whole dipped in egg and fried in butter.  He will make them
any time for anybody but prefers serving them to favorite friends
around three A.M.  Came our second New Year's Eve on Vashon and we had
invited some of our dearest friends to celebrate.  The morning of New
Year's Eve dawned and I realized that I had what was unmistakably the
flu.  I was hot and my chest hurt and I didn't even want to read.  Don
brought me a cup of coffee and two aspirin tablets and then later
another cup of coffee and two more aspirin.  Each time he asked me
wistfully if I didn't feel well enough "to get up now?"  I drank the
coffee, took the aspirin, got up and washed my face and then got right
back in bed again.  I felt awful.  Like bulbar polio with double
pneumonia and a touch of cholera.

At lunchtime Anne brought me a bowl of heavenly vegetable soup she had
made especially and asked me hopefully if I didn't feel all right?
"Like getting up now?"  I ate the soup, took two more aspirin, got up
and washed my face then fell back in bed.  Later on, Joanie built a
fire in the bedroom fireplace and Anne brought me a pot of tea.

"Now do you feel like getting up?" they asked anxiously.

"I feel rotten," I said.  "Terrible.  I guess you'll have to be the
hostesses for the party tonight."

Don came in with some coal for the fire (we were beginning to learn
something about fuel by that time) and said, "Oh, you'll be all right
by tonight.  Just stay quiet this afternoon and you'll feel fine by
tonight."

But I didn't.  I felt worse if anything and finally reminded the
family, who were still urging me to my feet and post at the helm, that
after all I had had t.b. and it was time they realized that I was not
as big and strong as I apparently looked.  I added faintly that my
sight was dimming and I ached all over.  Anne called Mother, who came
out on the next ferry and all I can say is that I know that there have
been great strides made in psychiatry and I realize that analysis is a
fine thing, but just let somebody try to cut my umbilical cord.  Mother
merely walks into the house and there is peace.  Peace, comfort and
smoke.

"I feel horrible," I told her tearfully, "and I'm feverish and all Don
and the girls do is try and prod me to my feet, like a sick horse.
They're worried about that damn party."

"I don't know why anyone should worry about the party," Mother said,
lighting what was undoubtedly her ninetieth cigarette for that day.
"The house looks lovely, there is plenty of food and liquor and wood,
and unless the people are bores they should have a good time.  It's not
your fault you're sick and the party will be good experience for the
girls.  I'm going to move you into my room away from the noise.  I've
got two hot water bottles in the bed.  Mary sent you out these sleeping
pills and here's an Angela Thirkell you haven't read."

About two A.M. I was awakened from a deep sleep by Don switching on the
light and slapping a plate down on my chest.  "Look what I brought
you," he said proudly.  "Eat it quick, while it's hot."

I knew it was a Monte Cristo sandwich, a big, greasy, hot Monte Cristo
sandwich and next to a spinal puncture, it was the very last thing in
the world I wanted.  I still felt horrible and in addition was half
drugged.  Weakly but kindly, I said, "I'm really not a bit hungry,
dear."

"Of course, you are," Don said heartily, turning on two more
hundred-watt lights.  "The trouble with you is that you haven't eaten
all day.  Anyway, this is the very first sandwich I have made tonight
and I want you to taste it."

I said, "Why don't you taste it while I wake up?"

"Okay," Don said cheerfully picking up the sandwich and taking a huge
bite.  Immediately with his mouth open wide he began to howl,
"'Oothpicks, 'atch out for 'oothpicks."  He began pulling halves of
toothpicks out of the roof of his mouth like quills from a porcupine.

While he was occupied, Anne and Joan came in with a cup of coffee for
me.  Anne said, "I told you not to break those toothpicks in two and
hide them in the sandwiches, Don."

Joan said, "You had better get back to your cooking, Don, the whole
house is filled with smoke."

As soon as Don had gone, they both began to laugh hysterically.
"What's so funny?" I asked sleepily.

Joan said, "Well, I came out in the kitchen and Don was breaking eggs
into a bowl.  Squashing them in his hands and letting the egg run
through his fingers the way he says chefs do.  I noticed a couple of
feathers and an awful lot of pepper in the bowl but I didn't say
anything until he finished cracking the eggs and began grinding in more
pepper.  Then I said, 'Aren't you putting an awful lot of pepper in
that batter?'  He said, 'I haven't put _any_ in yet.'  I said, 'You did
too.  I saw it.  Look.'  I showed him the billions of black specks and
he said, 'That isn't pepper.'  I asked him what it was then and he
said, 'Probably just a little old chicken manure.'  Then I looked at
the eggs and they were the ones he always gets from that crazy Mrs.
Elchin and of course they were covered with feathers and chicken
manure.  I told Don he'd better throw the eggs out and start over and
he said, 'Vitamin B-12 is very healthful.  Anyway nobody will know the
difference' and kept right on grinding the pepper."

Anne said, "And I told him everybody would puncture the roofs of their
mouths on those broken toothpicks but he wouldn't pay any attention.
He's using about a pound of butter for each sandwich and he has grease
splattered clear up on those high windows."

"How is the party going?" I asked.

"Oh, it's all right," Anne said.  "Everybody is talking loud and
laughing, Harriet Crawford's drunk, but she was when she came, Mary
Arden is acting like a goo-goo over Bob Crawford and Mrs. Roanoke is
giving Joan and me hard eyes because we aren't in bed."

Joan said, "Don's been adorable.  He only let the fire go out twice."

"What's Margar doing?" I asked.

"Smoking and talking to people," Joan said.  "She offered to help Don
with the sandwiches but he said he wanted to do the _whole thing
himself_."

"Do you think we should tell Margar about the chicken manure?" Anne
asked.

"Let Don tell her," I said, laughing.  "After all he's the chef."

"Wow, it's almost two-thirty," Joan said, looking at my clock.  "Gee, I
love to stay up late."

"Don't you think you'd better go to bed?" I asked anxiously.

"You said we could stay up as late as we wanted on New Year's Eve,"
Anne said, yawning.

"I know," I said, "but aren't you tired?"

"Kind of," Anne said.  "But we don't want to go to bed until we watch
the people eat those awful sandwiches.  Do you feel better, Mommy?"

"Lots better," I said.

"Well, then we'd better flush this sandwich down the toilet before you
get sick again," she said, beginning to giggle.  They were both
laughing hysterically as they left.

One of the nicest things Don ever did for the girls was to find the
"Turkey Squasher" in a small obscure cutlery shop.  One fall day when
he picked me up at the dentist's, he said with the ecstatic look of a
man who has just come upon a ten-pound chunk of ambergris, "I've got
something to show you.  Something wonderful!"

We drove downtown and after he had parked the car, he took my arm and
led me into the cutlery shop.  The foxy little man who owned it said,
"Ah, ha, you brought her," and disappeared behind a dark green portire
at the back of the shop.  In a few minutes he came staggering out with
a plank about the size of a door, attached to one side of which was a
large shiny machine.  Setting it down carefully on the counter, he
said, "Now, what do you think of that?"

"What is it?" I asked unenthusiastically.

"What is it?" the man repeated scornfully.  "What is it?  Why it's a
carving board.  All you do is put the bird here, lower the prongs, set
the vise, adjust this screw, loosen this spring nut and the bird is
secure, ready to carve."

Don's face bore the enraptured glaze of the true gadget lover.  "Isn't
it a dandy?" he said.  "Just what we needed?"

Taking my clean handkerchief out of my purse, I removed a heavy coating
of dust from the machine part, then said evenly to the foxy little man,
"Not too much in demand, are they?"

"Very scarce item," he countered quickly.  "All hand-made."

"Looks awfully complicated for just carving a turkey," I said.

"Complicated!" Don and the cutlery man said together.  "It's not
complicated, it's simple."

"How much is it?" I asked suspiciously.

"Only twenty-five dollars," the cutleryman said smoothly, the
implication being that twenty-five dollars was a mere coin in the
fountain.

"Twenty-five dollars!" I shrieked.  "It would be cheaper to send our
turkeys to France and have them carved."

"It is expensive," Don said seriously, as he stroked the carving board,
"but it is very well made and will last a lifetime."

"It would last a lifetime if it was made out of crepe paper," I said
scornfully, "because nobody would ever use it.  Anyway we can't afford
it."

"I know it," Don said sadly.  "I just wanted you to see it."

When, with a triumphant smile I said goodbye to the little cutleryman
and thanked him for his trouble, I had a feeling he looked smug.

I didn't give another thought to the carving board until Christmas
morning when I came downstairs and saw under the tree, at my place, a
box as big as a coffin that could only, and of course did, contain a
Turkey Squasher.

Owing to about forty unexpected guests and at least twenty expected
ones, the Christmas turkey even though the approximate size and weight
of an ostrich, was forgotten and cooked to death.  It took Anne and
Joan and me, all armed with spatulas, to maneuver it onto the Turkey
Squasher's board in one piece.  After we had propped it up here and
there and garnished it with parsley, we summoned Don to carry it to the
table.  He came eagerly, grasped the handles and started proudly for
the dining room.  His entrance was spoiled somewhat by the fact that
the Turkey Squasher would not go through the door frontward and he had
to sidle through.  Fortunately we had arranged for the turkey to be
carved on a serving table by the window.  When he had lowered it to its
carving position Don called everyone to come and see the wonderful new
appliance.  When all had assembled, he ground a little handle until the
machine and prongs were as high as they would go and well above the
turkey's breast bone.  Then he adjusted a flange, took a reading for
weather, checked the oil, twirled a knob or two and nothing happened.

"Where are the directions?" he asked me.

"What directions?" I asked.  "You mean instructions on carving?"

"I mean the directions that came with this turkey board," Don said,
adding plaintively.  "If you were interested you would know."

"I am interested," I said.  "In fact I'm starving but you threw away
the box the board came in.  You probably burned them."

Cleve said, "Say, Mac, there are two wing nuts on this side you haven't
loosened and it looks to me like your carburetor's dirty."

Dede's husband said, "Rev her up, Mac, she's still on the ground."

Don said, "Anne and Joan, did you see the directions?"

Joan said, "What do they look like?"

Anne said, "Just keep turning things.  It'll work, Don."

Don smiled at her gratefully and pressed a little lever.  Instantly the
whole machine came down on top of the turkey, squashing it flat.  Juice
and goblets of stuffing sprayed generously over the onlookers and the
window.  A big hunk of dark meat skidded off the table right into
Tudor's waiting mouth, which surprised him so he could hardly swallow.
Anne and Joan began to laugh.  Finally everybody, even Don, joined in.
For the rest of the Christmas holidays the sight of the turkey carcass,
finally in the soup kettle, occasioned great mirth.  We still use the
Turkey Squasher but only as a carving board, sans the machine.

I remember that when Anne and Joan were quite small one of their
favorite expressions was "You want to know somebody I hate?"  Well, you
want to know somebody I hate?  I hate Katherine Reynolds who has no
help and invites you to dinner and when you get there she looks
beautiful and her house looks beautiful and her husband looks happy and
not once does she leave her guests during the cocktail period yet at
eight o'clock she summons you to the dining room and there is dinner
complete even to hollandaise sauce on the asparagus and Yorkshire
pudding around the roast beef and last but worst, if you force her to
let you help carry out the plates, you find the sink empty and the
kitchen looking as if it had just been painted.  There has to be a
secret--either she throws her dirty pots and pans down cellar, she has
the food sent in from the Olympic Hotel, or she is a hypnotist.  My
sister Mary is the most well-organized woman I know and entertains
constantly, in spite of three adolescents and a doctor husband which is
like saying she entertains constantly in spite of advanced
arteriosclerosis, but she always has someone in the kitchen.  Here on
Vashon there ain't no such animal.  What I mean to say is that you
don't have somebody "in the kitchen."  You have another member of the
family who shares your table, your problems, and your pleasures and is
usually just as unenthusiastic as the family about housework, or you
have nobody.  In the long haul, I have found it less harassing to make
do with a hoer-outer brought in once, twice or thrice a week.

So I am still left with the problem of getting the gravy made without
abandoning my part in the colloquy on the real purpose of the United
Nations.

"I do everything in the early morning," Mary says blandly.  That is all
very well as far as peeling the potatoes, washing the romaine and
making the cheese dip is concerned.  It would also be fine for hot
weather dishes, such as jellied chicken, or cold boiled salmon, if we
had any hot weather.

The home economist's answer to the problem is the one-dish meal, and
she hands out recipes for some ghastly hazelnut, sardine, chocolate
chip, lima bean, avocado casserole.

My answer is a large kitchen with a fireplace and comfortable chairs.
My next house isn't going to have a living room, or drawing room or
parlor at all.  Just an enormous kitchen with two dishwashers, two
fireplaces, one for me and one for the guests, several couches, one for
me, a big bar, four ovens, twelve burners, perhaps television and a
record player, and scattered here and there among the couches and
chairs, little vending machines filled with peanuts, popcorn and potato
chips.




CHAPTER XIII

WHY DON'T YOU JUST RELAX, BETTY?

When I contemplate my own household and our way of life with fountain
pens washed in the Bendix, candy bought for the raccoons, the small
fireplace tongs burning up in the cedar tree, my greenhouse devoted to
little sailboats, big plastic alligators and suntan oil, twenty-four
sheets to the laundry on Mondays, and $183.50 long distance phone
bills, I think longingly of a neighbor who always has her cuticle
pushed back and buys her ground roundsteak one pound at a time.

"Well, one reason I'm glad we have this house," Anne said, "is because
now I can invite all my friends to visit me."

Joan said, "Who am I going to invite?  I don't have any friends."

Don said, "I think before anybody invites anybody we should talk things
over."

Anne said, "Of course I'm not sure any of my friends would care to come
_way_ out here?"

Joan said, "Who'll I invite?  I don't have any friends."

I said, "Anne and Joan, you can invite your friends, Don can invite his
friends, I can invite my friends and if we feel like singing 'The
Star-Spangled Banner' at three in the morning we can."

Don said, "I think we should talk things over.  I think I should be
consulted."

Anne said, "Of course I'm not sure any of my friends..."

But as it turned out everybody had friends and relatives and they were
all glad to visit, especially in good weather and nobody ever talked
things over until the guests had gone and then often in loud voices,
and I learned right away that the big difference between island
entertaining and any other kind is that on an island guests stay all
night or for two weeks or a couple of years.  Even the few rare good
sports who try to go home usually miss the last ferry or the ferry
company hears you are having people to dinner and knocks down the
dolphins or stops running the ferries just for the hell of it.

The point being, if you are not an "I always defrost on Wednesday" kind
of housekeeper, but still enjoy having people in for dinner, you can
stuff that four gallons of half-finished and a little scorched currant
jelly under the sink; tuck the large stack of _Popular Mechanics_, _The
Farm_, and _Country Gentlemans_, which Don insists on keeping on the
kitchen window sill so that he can get at them easily, in with the
ironing; toss the beach coats, the dog dishes and my manuscripts in the
back hall with the vacuum cleaner; light the candles; put some good
music on the record player; mix up a pitcher of very dry martinis and
you are ready.

But when people stay all night too, such slap-dash methods will not
pass muster and there are the items of the so-revealing morning
sunlight, the medicine cabinets, and the jam cupboards in the back hall
where we also keep old magazines, the Christmas candles, the coloring
books and the weed killer.

Of course, there is the thing about staying up until two or three or
four A.M.  If we have congenial people and they are having a good time,
it is easy to stay up most of the night, especially when it is a
houseparty and some of the guests are slightly hysterical at being out
of their traps, away from clawing little sticky hands for a change.  I
like to stay up late too and I like to have a good time, but four
o'clock in the morning is not a time to make decisions.  Shall I clean
up before I go to bed and perhaps not get to bed until dawn or let it
go and probably be just as tired in the morning and the house will
still look like a saloon.

In the meantime, all the guests have popped off as has Don, who keeps
calling hoarsely, "Betty, come to bed.  Why don't you come to bed,
Betty?"  Another thing, I love children and almost always have some
tiny friend with me.  Some tiny friend who goes to bed at seven and
gets in my bed at six.  Oh well, sleep is just a habit, the
psychologists say.

There are all kinds of guests.  Fun, no-fun, hard, bores, nasty, crazy,
alcoholic, religious-fanatic, old pals who have gotten fat and dull,
old pals who have gotten rich and dull, old pals who haven't succeeded
and are on the defensive, relatives, babies, foreign friends who know
no English dumped on you by Mary, adolescents who play the record
player from 7 A.M. to 3 A.M. and paint their toenails while I wash the
dishes, bright young friends of Anne and Joan's who are fun, bright
young friends of Anne and Joan's who are no fun and don't help, foreign
men who light my cigarettes lingeringly and tell me "Youth is so
gauche, so raw," then try to lure Anne or Joan out on the porch, and
FBI agents who should open a school.

One summer we rented our town house, which we had bought to lessen the
domestic shame while the girls were in their last years of school, to
five FBI agents with whom we naturally became friends and whom we
naturally invited to spend their weekends on Vashon and one of whom
Joan later married.  Now _that_ was a summer I enjoyed.

They helped, in fact, did all the work, portioning it out in a most
businesslike way and not accepting any excuses.  They were good cooks,
they were bright, they sang, they never got drunk, they liked children,
they made the beds (there is a housewifely differentiation here between
"made" and "spread up warm over the newspapers") and they loved the
country.  As far as I am concerned J. Edgar Hoover can billet his whole
staff on me any old time, for as long as he wants.

My idea of heaven would be an enormous house, preferably one with
twenty-four bedrooms and twenty-four bathrooms, thousands of guests,
mostly FBI agents and foreign men, a great many excellent unobtrusive
servants, and no work to do.  As my alternative is a house with four
bedrooms, a guesthouse, three davenports, a lawn swing, three chaise
longues and the floor, thousands of guests, many of them under four
years old, and no servants, I often go six months without getting to
the beach.  Don says that my problem is that I don't relax.  He usually
says this to me early in the morning after I have been up until three
o'clock anyway and then gotten up again with somebody small who has
thrown up in the upper bunk.

I prefer to believe that I am not abnormally tense--that all over the
world there are wives who, under similar circumstances, are not
relaxing.  How could I relax, for instance, when Anne invited her
friend "Okay Honey" to spend the summer and that was the year we were
building a big kitchen with a fireplace and I was making do in the
service room with orange crates for cupboards and no drainboards on the
sink?  Okay Honey was very small, with enormous blue eyes, long golden
brown hair, almost black lipstick, wine-colored fingernails an inch
long, and an I.Q. which I estimated to be about twenty.  I guess the
reason Anne and Joan liked her so much was that she was not pressing
with her opinions and she knew so many boys.  I say I guess, because,
though she was here for over a month, I never heard her say one thing
but "Okay, honey."

Don kept growling, "Who invited her?  Why am I never consulted about
anything any more?" as Anne and Joan and Okay Honey spent hours
covering themselves with sun-tan oil and lying motionless on the chaise
longues on the porch, painting their toe- and fingernails, listening to
records, pinning up their hair and eating.  I used to wonder if Anne
and Joan mightn't have bought Okay Honey in a drugstore.  She certainly
looked as if she could have come wrapped in cellophane and she was
unfamiliar with even the simplest forms of housekeeping, such as
putting two pieces of bread in the toaster and pushing down the big
hard lever.

Anne and Joan were willing, even eager, to cook for her, serve her,
wash and iron her clothes, row her in the boat, light her cigarettes,
drive her to the movies, make her bed, but if I asked them to empty the
ashtrays or pass the cookies, they roared like wounded bison and said,
"Work, work, work, that's all we ever do around here!  I thought this
was _summer vacation_!"

They were also wearing their hair long and limp, their fingernails
painted deep maroon, their lips almost black.  It was very trying and
seemed to be alarmingly permanent.  Then one day somebody named Buzz
telephoned from Seattle and Okay Honey went to the phone and said,
"Okay, honey" and took the next ferry home.

"Buzz is her steady, home on leave from the Navy," Anne and Joan told
me, after they had packed her things and driven her to the ferry.

"_Steady!_" I laughed loudly.  "And just who were all those millions of
other Charlies and Phils and Tommies and Donnies--friends of her
mother?"

"Do you always have to be so critical of our friends?" Anne said
wearily as she settled herself at the kitchen table with a box of
Kleenex, a bottle of polish remover and a new bottle of Deep Plum nail
polish.

Of course I'll _never_ forget the summer I took care of my sister
Alison's three- and five-year-old boys because she was expecting a new
baby, and Joanie invited her steady to stay with us because she was so
sorry for him because she didn't love him; I invited a dear friend who
was an alcoholic but didn't feel that she was quite ready for
psychiatry; a couple whom I had met somewhere in the Southwest and
carelessly asked to "come and see us any time--we have plenty of room"
took me at my word and dropped in for the month of August; my Norwegian
cleaning woman's husband had a heart attack; and Anne, who was leading
her own life in town being a model, kept bringing home for the weekends
and recuperation another model who looked like a Madonna but whose
husband was everlastingly blacking her eyes and knocking her against
"our new twenty-seven inch T.V. set" because she was so attractive to
other men.

The weather was fair and by that I mean gray and cold, but I forced
everyone to eat supper on the beach every night--paper plates, no
dishes.  Things might have worked out after a fashion if my alcoholic
friend had not been deeply suspicious of the woman from Arizona, who
had one of the first chic short haircuts, and if the woman from Arizona
had just once gotten up before three in the afternoon.  Her husband was
disgustingly hearty and arose and went swimming in the icy Sound at
five-thirty A.M. and was lathering around in the kitchen ready for a
_big_ breakfast at six.

When the woman from Arizona did finally appear, she demanded that I sit
with her while she ate her breakfast, which I was glad to do because it
was sitting.  However, we would no more than get settled at the table
and she, with a few raspberry seeds between her teeth, would be
outlining in detail the biography of Ivan Fegenscu she was readying
herself to write, when my alcoholic friend, by this time on her
eighteenth bourbon on rocks, would weave out and hiss in my ear, "Wash
out lil' lady, tha's the ole build-up"; or Don would telephone from the
dock in Seattle (sometimes he can't wait to bring the bad news all the
way home) that we were $598 overdrawn and he had forgotten the meat; or
one of Alison's little boys would come sloshing up from the beach to
tell me that he had fallen out of the rowboat in his last clean
clothes; or in a low throbbing voice Joan would plead with me to do
something about her steady who was contemplating suicide in the porch
swing; or my sister Mary would call up and tell me that she was on her
way out with Mrs. Ellis and her three children or "Arenthau Salavochic
and his adorable wife, actually a count and countess but working for
the Ellises just to learn American ways and they don't speak a word of
English but you will love them and they want to meet you more than
anything in the world and I am bringing a salmon and what else do you
need?"  As I write this the thought occurs that it is a very strange
thing that the ferry has never broken down bringing people--only when
it is supposed to be taking them away.

Then of course there was the Saturday afternoon when Don and the girls
and I came staggering along the beach with our loads of groceries and a
male voice yelled "Yoohoo!" at us from the _roof_ of our house and it
was Don's old buddy, the very same old buddy who, refusing to believe
that "ole Don" had finally taken the step, spent our weekend honeymoon
in Don's apartment _with_ us.

Although he did not come down off the roof, we drew closer to home and
finally could see clearly that Old Buddy's face was suspiciously
flushed and that he was crawling around loosening the shakes in none
too steady a fashion.  I sent Don out to "talk" to him while the girls
and I put the groceries away.  Mary and some Navy people were expected
on the next ferry and I still had a great deal of rapid stuffing and
tidying and flower arranging to do and I didn't intend to be hampered
by Old Buddy.

I set Anne to making clam and cream cheese dip and Joan to filling
little dishes with nuts and sunflower seeds and olives.  When I had
finished my tidying I opened the back door and called to Don to start
the fire.  Don didn't answer, but Buddy peered at me over the edge of
the roof on the steep water side and said, "Heigh-ho!" I slammed back
into the house and into Don who was making two drinks.

"You've got to get him out of here," I said, wiping the soda water out
of my eyes.

"Why?" Don asked mildly.  "He's up on the roof out of the way."

"I don't think you're funny," I said.  "Mary and those Navy people are
coming on the next ferry and anyway think of the girls."

"Yes, think of us," the girls said.

"Why don't you all relax?" Don said.  "Everything will work out.  Let's
all be sweet."

He went out the door carrying the two drinks.

Leaving Anne and Joan with the hors d'oeuvres I dashed upstairs, washed
my face, put on my tight black slacks and a white sweater and was
splashing on perfume when from my open bedroom window I heard Mary and
the Navy people crunching along in the sand, and then from overhead I
heard Buddy calling out to them "Heigh-ho!"

Anne, who had come in to inspect my makeup and borrow a handful of
perfume, said, "Oh, Mommy, honestly, I think he's perfectly disgusting.
Can't Don get rid of him?"

I said, "He's Don's oldest friend, Andy, we'll just have to be
understanding."

It really wasn't too hard as Mary and her friends were fun and Old
Buddy stayed on the roof all evening only asking for occasional favors
in the way of drinks and the binoculars so he could examine the
crevasses on the moon.

One of the Navy officers (there were three) had brought a guitar and
after dinner we went out on the porch in the moonlight and he played
sad songs and sang to us.  It must have been after three when I was
stumbling around emptying ashtrays and brushing potato chips off the
mantel while Don hissed at me from the upper hall, "Why don't you come
to bed?" that I remembered about Buddy and realized that we had not
heard from him for some time.

"What are you going to do about Old Buddy?" I whispered hoarsely.
"He's still out on the roof."

"Nothing," Don said.  "His responsibility.  Now come to bed."

"I'll be along in a minute," I said, sweeping the hearth.

As I put the glasses in the dishwasher and put away the liquor and the
enormous amount of equipment Don uses for fried-egg sandwiches, I
thought again about Buddy out there on the roof in the cold night air.
What if he rolled off and broke his neck?  What if the raccoons, who
favor our roof as a playfield, clawed him?

Humming happily, I went up to bed.

The next thing I knew there was sunlight dappling the rug, Don was
handing me a silver fizz and up from the patio floated the cheerful
thrumming of a guitar.

"What happened to Old Buddy?" I asked Don as I patted the silver fizz
off my lips with the sheet.  "I was so worried about him last night I
couldn't sleep."

Giving the cord that pulled back the draperies a yank, Don said, "Take
a look."

Draining my gin fizz, I got warily out of bed, walked to the window and
looked out.  Below me, spread-eagled in the lawn swing, a white
goatskin rug clutched around his throat, was Old Buddy.  One of the
Navy officers was kneeling beside him strumming his guitar, the other
was propping up his head, feeding him a gin fizz.

Anne and Joan and Mary came in with coffee.  Anne said, "You'd better
hurry and drink this, Mommy, that Lieutenant Commander and I have
breakfast almost ready.  We are making buttermilk hotcakes and
sausages."

Joan said, "What's that one's name with the guitar, Aunty Mary?"

"Johnny," Mary said.

"Well, Johnny and I are going out sole spearing right after breakfast."

Lighting a cigarette, Mary said, "It's heavenly out here, Betty.  So
relaxing."




CHAPTER XIV

ADVICE, ANYBODY?

I dislike telephoning and have never been able to approach the
telephone with the easy nonchalance of most people.  My sister Mary,
for instance, who embarks upon any telephone conversation with the zest
of a person carrying new ice skates happening on a huge frozen lake and
can glide effortlessly from the stupidity of publishers to cooking
pheasant in sour cream to the dangers of cortone to the peccadillos of
her recent maid, for two hours without even changing hands.  One of my
sister Dede's favorite stories is about Mary and the telephone.  It
seems that Dede's little boy, the second one, had an attack of asthma
and so Dede, as we all do, called Mary for sympathy and unofficial
medical advice.  Mary took the call in her bedroom where she holds many
of her medical and psychiatric clinics.  Before Dede had half finished
the symptoms Mary had made her diagnosis and prescribed the treatment.
She said, "There is only one way to handle asthma.  You must:

  1. Remove all wool from the room.
  2. Remove all dust from the room.
  3. Wash down all the walls and woodwork.
  4. Put an allergy cover on the mattress.
  5. Put an allergy cover on the pillow.
  6. Remove all toys which might contain allergic materials.
  7. See that the child has plenty of rest.
  8. Bring the child down to the laboratory for interdermals.
  9. What little stinker put shrimps in my wastebasket?


Lifting up the telephone receiver gives me immediate constipation of
the brain and long distance calls also affect my vocal cords so that
who ever I'm talking to thinks he has been mistakenly connected with
the porch rocker.  Even so, every single time I am on the telephone Don
materializes at my side and gives me long accusing looks indicating
that _my_ frivolity is delaying _his_ call to the coroner.  As soon as
I spot Don I try to finish up any conversation but he seldom wants to
use the phone, just wants me to know that he disapproves of women
telephoning to other women.  This is rather common among husbands, I am
told, especially Elizabeth Gage Wheaton's husband, Everett, who one day
grabbed their telephone by the throat, yanked it out by the roots and
threw it through a window that was not open.

I do not remember just how I first got entangled with Elizabeth Gage
Wheaton and Everett and Little Donny and Little Gail and Little P.J.
("Percival Jarod after Everett's father because Everett insisted but it
is such an ugly name we only use the initials") and Baby (Little
Elizabeth Gage).  I think it was through my sister Mary and the
telephone.  Anyway Elizabeth Gage was terribly nervous and run-down and
cried a great deal and her children all wet their beds and their
panties and her husband had a great big boat even though Elizabeth Gage
didn't even have a washing machine and Mary thought that if I could
find them a place on our beach they would all sort of dry out and cheer
up.  Mary thought also I could help Elizabeth Gage fix herself up and
show her how to clean a house and discipline her children.  She was
terribly intelligent but not very well organized.

Fortunately, I could not find them a place on our beach because there
weren't any for rent, but I did find, at the other end of the island,
an attractive beach house with two sets of double bunks, another bed in
the living room, knotty pine walls, a big fireplace and a Bendix.  By
that time I had met Elizabeth Gage who had big damp blue eyes, hair
like sphagnum moss, and didn't wear a brassiere.

I was quite excited about the house--it was attractive--the beach was
sandy, the rent was only seventy-five a month and there was that
washing machine.  I called Mary so that she could tell Elizabeth Gage
and I wouldn't have to telephone, but Mary had gone fishing in Canada
so I had finally to call Elizabeth Gage myself.  Elizabeth Gage's
telephone voice was low and sad like a receptionist in a funeral parlor
and when she said, "Hello there, honey," I almost began to cry myself
she sounded so beaten and woebegone.  I told her about the marvelous
house I had found and she said well, she'd look at it but she was
thinkin' more of a little farm.  I said that I didn't know of any farms
for rent, in fact I didn't know of anything else for rent.  She said,
"It was darlin' of you to look, honey, but I'm not sure Everett will
approve.  He has been so mean lately suckin' up liquor like a hog and
sleepin' in the guestroom and all, but we'll come over to-morrow.
Isn't there a ferry about ten?"

Elizabeth Gage was a graduate of Smith College and her father was a
prominent attorney somewhere in Texas and she was really beautiful, but
when she and Little Donny and Little Gail and Little P.J. and Baby got
out of the Buick station wagon the next morning I felt like a
California fruit grower in _The Grapes of Wrath_.  Nobody's hair was
combed, all faces were dirty in a grubby long-standing way,
supplemented by chocolate, doughnut crumbs, and suckers, and all but
Elizabeth Gage, Sr., had on wet panties.

Elizabeth Gage was wearing a pair of faded jeans with enormous legs and
a broken zipper, a dirty white T-shirt of Everett's, no brassiere and
red satin mules.  The children had on wet dirty coveralls with at least
one strap pinned with big rusty safety pins, dirty T-shirts and scuffed
brown shoes with broken knotty laces.  Like Elizabeth Gage, the
children had good features and lovely blue eyes and could have been
attractive if they had been clean or dry.  Their thin, limp, light hair
hung in bangs below their eyebrows and their scalps were crusty with
oil and dirt.

When she was with her children Elizabeth Gage seemed in a kind of
coma--a coma produced by the millions of little attendant interruptions
and confusions with which children, especially completely untrained
ones, delight in surrounding themselves.  She also seemed tired to the
point of collapse and on the brink of tears.  I suggested a cup of
coffee and she accepted gratefully, sinking down into one of the
kitchen chairs like a sack of meal.  While we drank our coffee at the
kitchen table, the children raced through and in and out of the house
like a pack of hounds after a fox.  Doors slammed, windows rattled,
vases quivered, Tudor barked, Baby, who was only two, fell down and
bellowed.  Elizabeth Gage didn't even glance at them.  She put four
lumps of sugar and plenty of cream in her coffee, stirred it sadly and
said, "I know I'm too fat and should be reducin' but I'm so darn tired
all the time I just have to take sugar and cream to keep up my energy."

"Maybe you need iron," I said, flinching a little as the children
streaked past, joggled my elbow and spilled my coffee on the clean
tablecloth.

"Oh, no," Elizabeth Gage said, lighting a cigarette.  "I just had a
physical and the doctor said I'm in perfect health.  He said it's all
mental 'cause I'm so worried about Everett.  I just told him
everything--I told him how Everett drank and didn't come home to dinner
and slept in the guest-room...."  The children galloped past again and
sent one of the braided rugs skidding into the fireplace.  "The doctor
was real sweet.  He said I needed a vacation.  I told Everett and he
said why don't we go to San Francisco and I said I couldn't because
Little P.J. hasn't finished his allergy shots, he has terrible asthma
you know, and Everett said, 'Well my God, I didn't expect to take the
kids.  I thought you and I were going to have a vacation' and I just
told him that even if he didn't like his own children, I did, and they
would go wherever I went and if he didn't want them along then perhaps
he didn't want me either.  Oh, we had an awful row.  I cried for two
weeks straight."

The children had paused in their marathon to ask Elizabeth Gage for
something to eat.  While awaiting her reply they pushed the heavy oak
captain's chairs back and forth on the brick floors with a raw scraping
sound that was very disturbing.  Ignoring the children's requests for
food and the scraping noise, Elizabeth Gage went on, "On Thursday night
I just called Mama in Texas and I was cryin' so hard she could hardly
understand me and Little P.J. pinched Baby's fingers in the desk drawer
and she was bawlin' and honestly Mama was scared to death and wanted me
to come right home but I told her that I couldn't go anywhere until
Little P.J. finished his allergy shots and she said she would fly up
and I told her not to bother as I didn't know where I would be but I
did tell her how wonderful Mary has been to me and she was tryin' to
get me a house on the beach and she said to let her know and Donny,
honey, did you make that big puddle on Betty's clean floor--shame on
you a big boy of six!  Where was I ... oh, yes and so I told her that
you were lookin' for a beach house for us and she said to let her know
where and she would fly up and was there anything that she and Daddy
could get for me and I said no nothin' because last Christmas they sent
me a sable scarf and I've never had it on because you certainly can't
wear sables with jeans and that's all I ever wear--No, sister, don't
play with the barometer ... where was I..."

My cleaning woman was there that day and I tried tactfully to suggest
leaving the children with her but Elizabeth Gage said, "Love me, love
my dog and anyway Baby won't stay with anybody but me."  Then I
suggested giving the children something to eat but she said, "Oh no,
they've been just stuffin' on the boat.  Candy, pop, ice cream and
Little P.J. insisted on eatin' a chocolate bar and he knows he's
allergic to it and will probably have asthma all night long."

Fortunately the real estate man was busy with some people who wanted to
buy a farm and asked me if I would take the key and show my friend the
house.  As we drove away I saw him come to the doorway and peer after
us.  I resolved to remember to tell him that Mr. Wheaton was a
prominent attorney with a big boat.  The minute we got to the house the
children climbed in the bunks and bounced on the davenport in their wet
panties while Elizabeth Gage looked vaguely around and told me about
another mean thing Everett did and how she cried for four weeks when he
bought the boat and of course would never go out in it because the
children might fall overboard--after all they were so little with Donny
the oldest only six and Baby just a baby....

I asked her how she liked the house, making a big fuss over the Bendix,
and she said, "Well I really wanted a little farm--you know so the
children could have a pony and it does seem rather cramped--I'll
see...."

I told her she'd have to make up her mind right then, as there were
lots of people looking for places to rent on Vashon, and she finally
said, "I did have my heart set on a little old farm but I guess this
will have to do...."

From that day forward Elizabeth Gage called me every single day and
talked for at least an hour telling me how mean Everett was and how
tired she was and how she had really counted on a little farm and if I
heard of anything to let her know....

Two weeks later Little P.J. finished his allergy shots and Elizabeth
Gage and the children moved in and I invited them to dinner that night
and almost fainted when I saw mean ole Everett who looked just like a
harassed edition of Gregory Peck.  Elizabeth Gage had on the same
jeans, another dirty T-shirt and nurse's white oxfords.  The children
were as wet and dirty and boisterous but when they began to race
through the house Everett shouted, "GO DOWN TO THE BEACH, ALL OF YOU!"
and they went quite quickly and Elizabeth Gage moved over beside me at
the sink and said in a low conspiratorial voice, "See how mean he is.
That's what liquor does to him."  As Don had not even finished making
the martinis I reasoned that maybe Everett had been drinking before
they came.  But when Don handed him one a minute or so later, he said,
"I've been waiting all day for this."

I had intended to have the children eat in the kitchen or at the
umbrella table while we ate in the dining room, but Elizabeth Gage got
tears in her eyes and said that not eating with their parents made
children feel left out and her children were never going to feel left
out and so we ate dinner to the constant scraping of the chairs,
interruptions in the form of "Don't cry, darling, Betty didn't know
that none of us like peas."  "Just push that to one side, Gail, honey,
Mommy'll fix you a peanut butter sandwich later on."  "Don't hit
sister, P.J."  "Oh, look, Baby spilled her milk on the nice clean
tablecloth, naughty baby."  "Children, don't throw your food on the
floor--the doggy doesn't want your potatoes, Donny...."

Everett looked defeated and embarrassed and Don gave the details of his
plan for a children's wing which he intends to build some day--plans
involving steel bars, cement floors, noiseproof walls--all very
unsubtle.  After dinner, which seemed interminable, I suggested that
Elizabeth Gage might like to put the children down for naps.  She said,
"Oh, no, they don't like to nap in strange houses.  They will just run
around.  Food does seem to give children a great deal of energy,
doesn't it?"

Don and Everett retired to the porch to drink brandy and every time one
of the children put a toenail on the porch, Everett shouted, "GO DOWN
TO THE BEACH!" even after it was dark.

At one A.M. all the children except the baby, who had fallen asleep on
the living room floor, were in the kitchen scraping the chairs and
whining, Elizabeth Gage was sitting at the kitchen table drinking
bourbon and water and telling me how mean Everett was and how she
couldn't wash her hair oftener than once every two months because her
scalp was so sensitive.  Don and Everett had moved indoors in front of
the fire.  Everett was still drinking brandy and he was quite drunk.
When they finally left, about ten minutes of two, Elizabeth Gage paused
dramatically at the kitchen door with Baby in her arms and Little P.J.
clinging to her knees and said, "Pray for us, honey.  Everett's too
drunk to drive, but he will anyway."

The next morning about eleven she telephoned to tell me how sorry she
was that they had stayed so late, but I was such a darlin' and so
understandin' she just wasn't aware of the time when I was around and
the drive home was just horrible but they made it and she was so
exhausted from it all she had just waked up but Everett was still
asleep.  I asked her how the children were and she said they had torn
the house to pieces and nobody would take the blame, but one of them
had broken Daddy's telescope and he was just goin' to be wild.

She called every day the next week talking about an hour each time, to
tell me how small the house was, how cramped the kitchen, how they had
really wanted a farm, how she wouldn't let the children go near the
beach because of the poison jellyfish (there aren't any) and the
undertow (the house was on a small very quiet harbor) and how she was
thinkin' of having the Bendix taken out she was so terrified one of the
children might get ground up in it.  Each time she telephoned Don
materialized beside me and looked pained and after I had finally
disengaged myself from her, I would tell him how sorry I felt for her
but how infuriating she was and he said, "My God, let's chop it off.
She's like a barnacle."

Friday she called and asked if Don and I wouldn't like to go on their
boat with them.  I hurriedly advised her of the telephone number of a
very capable mature baby-sitter but she said, "Oh, I think I'll just
take the children, they love the water so much."  I said, "I wouldn't
risk it, if I were you.  They are _so_ active and they might fall
overboard."  She said, "I'm going to buy them all life jackets."  So I
said I'd talk to Don and call her back.

Don said he liked Everett immensely, but he couldn't stand another
session with those brats and did I know that the last time they were at
the house one of them had broken the record player and somebody had
been playing with the barometer and one of them put the hearthbroom in
the fire and there was Fig Newton ground into the wing chair and wet
panty marks on both davenports.  I kept putting off calling Elizabeth
Gage and finally, about ten that night, Everett called and said that he
had engaged the baby-sitter and they would come by for us the next
morning and would Anne and Joan like to come along too?  I told him
that Anne and Joan were going away for the weekend, but Don and I would
be ready.

Saturday turned out to be a perfect boating day with a clear faraway
pale blue sky, a stiff breeze from the north and water well wrinkled
but not too choppy.  Don and I had new dark blue top siders and I had a
new long high-necked striped shirt supposedly worn by Basque fishermen,
but which Don surveyed critically and finally said made me look exactly
like a hornet.  However, I felt nautical and Vogue-ish and, anyway, one
nice thing about Elizabeth Gage even if I wore my old bathrobe with one
sleeve torn out and rubbers I knew I would be better dressed than she
would be.

At about ten o'clock, as Don was fixing his emergency sailing kit of
Scotch and Scotch and Scotch, there was a honking out in front and I
looked out the window and a boat just a tiny bit smaller than the
_Queen Mary_ with sails was easing up.  "Good God," I said to Don, "do
you suppose this is Everett's boat?"

"Could very well be," Don said without emotion.  "Everett said
something about taking college boys along as crew."

"Well, no wonder Elizabeth Gage has no washing machine," I said
heatedly.  "I'm surprised they have _food_.  That boat must have cost
at least fifty thousand dollars and imagine the upkeep."

"Speaking of food," said Don, "are we supposed to be bringing any?"

"No," I said.  "I offered but Elizabeth Gage said she had everything."

One of the crew rowed in for us in the dinghy and Everett immediately
said that I looked terribly chic and where did I get the shirt.  He
looked wistfully at Elizabeth Gage who had on red pedal pushers with
enormous legs, an over-all jacket, the kind plumbers wear, and
high-heeled straw sandals.  She was different though, without the
children.  Not at all sad, very witty and a superb cook.  As is always
the case on a boat, hunger was a constant thing but Elizabeth Gage
produced marvelous food at intervals until one o'clock in the morning
when we finally dropped anchor in the bay by our house, and there were
several other couples besides the Wheatons and Don and me aboard and
the galley left much to be desired.  When Elizabeth Gage wasn't handing
around loaves of hot fresh French bread hollowed out and packed with
fried chicken, she was baking strawberry shortcake or brioches or
stirring tiny hot meatballs to be speared with toothpicks.  I was
amazed and even Don heaped lavish compliments on her.  She only said in
her sad little voice, "It's nothin'--I like to cook, it's easy for me."

That night when we were brushing our teeth, I said to Don, "There must
be more to that marriage than meets the eye.  Elizabeth Gage was
charming today, and she is certainly an inspired cook.  She couldn't be
as inefficient as she seems."

Don said, "Connie Pegler is certainly attractive."

Connie Pegler had jet-black curly hair, deep blue eyes, dimples,
weighed less than a hundred pounds and bought her clothes in the
children's department.  She had given me these statistics just as I was
asking for a third piece of chicken and accepting a second ear of corn.
Elizabeth Gage had said, "Now you hush up, Connie, just because you're
no bigger than a gnat you have no call to make the rest of us feel like
hippopotami."

Like many little women, Connie Pegler liked to curl up on big things
like davenports or other people's husbands' laps.

Her own husband was nice in a pale factual way.  He wore glasses, had
plump pink arms sprinkled with tan freckles and little stiff red hairs,
and he knew more about plankton than the Bureau of Fisheries.  It was
while he was telling me about plankton in southern waters that I
noticed Connie and Don heading for the prow with a blanket.  The moon
had just come up and we were in Admiralty Inlet just off Marrowstone
Island.  Everything was silvery and very romantic.  I looked hopefully
for Everett but he was occupied, I was happy to see, with Elizabeth
Gage.  They were lying back on a coil of rope looking at the stars.
Her head was on his shoulder and he was giving her drags of his
cigarette.  I had found it very frustrating to sit in a pool of
moonlight and listen to Paul Pegler drone on about protozoa and
entomostracans.  Also it had gotten quite chilly.

I said, "For anybody as adorable as Connie Pegler keeps telling
everybody she is, she certainly nabbed herself a dull husband."

Don said, "You should know, you spent enough time with him."

I said, "What else could I do with you sneaking off in dark corners
with Connie and a blanket."

Don said, "Oh, for heaven's sake.  Connie had forgotten to bring a
jacket.  She was cold."

"I'll bet," I said.

The next morning when Elizabeth Gage called me up she said, "Say, lil
ole Connie was sure makin' time with Don, wasn't she?"

"I despise little women," I said bitterly.  "Especially ones with
naturally curly hair and eyelashes seven inches long."

"I thought you'd feel that way," Elizabeth Gage said, "and really,
honey, there's no point because she's just crazy about that weevil
she's married to.  Always has been and he's so dull he even bores P.J.
It's sure hard to realize though that Connie has four children.  She is
a whiz, her house is always slick as a whistle, she always looks pretty
and she is one of those mean little things that keeps their figures no
matter how many children they have.  She is always after me to reduce,
but I just can't.  I'm too tired all the time."

"How was the baby-sitter?" I asked.

"Oh, that poor woman," Elizabeth Gage said mournfully.  "When we got
home all the kids were up runnin' around and bawlin' and she was almost
out of her mind.  I'll never leave them again, I told Everett."

"Maybe that's the trouble, maybe you don't leave them enough," I said.

"Be that as it may," Elizabeth Gage said levelly, "that woman certainly
doesn't know the first thing about handling children.  I don't know who
recommended her to you, but she's no good at all."

"I'm awfully sorry," I said.  "Lots of people on the beach have used
her and they think she is fine.  Anyway, you and Everett seemed to be
having a wonderful time last night."

"Oh, we were," Elizabeth Gage said without enthusiasm.  "He is always
as sweet as peaches in front of people, but when we got in the house he
hit the ceiling.  He said we have the worst-behaved brats in the world
and I cried and the children cried and it was real embarrassin' for the
sitter."

Poor Elizabeth Gage, she was really so sweet but she was letting her
children ruin her marriage.  I said, "Why don't you all come to supper.
We'll have it on the beach."

"Oh, that would be fun," she said, "but Everett's got to take the boat
back to the yacht club.  He wanted me to come along but I can't leave
the poor little children with a sitter again.  I sure wish I could
think of somebody.  It would mean so much to Everett.  Of course I
don't know a soul on the island but you.  Oh, well, I'll just have to
tell Everett."

"Leave them with me," I said, wondering as the words left my mouth what
I would tell Don and wasn't I just trading places with Elizabeth Gage
and ruining my marriage with her children.

"Oh, honey, you really mean it?" she said.  "You aren't just foolin'?"

"Of course I'm not," I said bravely, looking around to see if Don was
within hearing distance.

"Oh, Betty, you're wonderful!" she said.  "The sweetest person in the
whole world and the children will be so thrilled, they adore you."

At this point Don materialized beside me and so I said quickly, "Don
wants the phone, I'll see you in a little while."

"Who were you talking to?" Don asked.  "Elizabeth Gage?"

"Yes," I said.

"Do they want us to go out in the boat again?" he asked eagerly.

"Well, no," I said.  "Everett has to take the boat in to the yacht club
and Elizabeth Gage was just telling me how much she'd like to go along."

"Why doesn't she?" Don asked.

"She's going to," I said and went upstairs to put rubber sheets on all
the beds.  Mercifully Elizabeth Gage was in a great hurry when she
delivered the children and drove away before I herded them into the
kitchen and Don yelled, "Good God, what's this?"

I said, "We're going to have a good time, aren't we, children?"  Baby
began to scream.  I picked her up and she screamed louder.  "Do you
know what's the matter with her?" I yelled at Little Donny.

"Uh, uh," he said, his forefinger in his nose up to the second joint.

Little Gail said, "Yesterday Baby cried from early in the morning until
way late last night when Mommy came home."

Little P.J. said, "I'm hungry."

I said, "I'll make some sandwiches and we'll all go down to the beach."
I put Baby down and she stretched out on the floor and began pounding
her heels in time to her screaming.  Leaning over I yelled, "Want a
cookie, Baby?"  No answer.  "Want some candy, Baby?"

Little Donny said, "She's sleepy.  Mommy said so when she brought her
over."

I picked up Baby, carried her kicking and shrieking upstairs and into
our bathroom, ran a full tub of water, peeled off her gray, wet clothes
and dumped her in.  She stopped screaming and began to play.  The other
children who had crowded in with us said, "We want a bath too."  I told
them to start undressing but they said they didn't know how.  I told
Little Donny who was six and Little Gail who was five that they were
big enough to be undressing themselves and now was a good time to
learn.  When I had them all in the tub I poured in a whole box of
bubble bath, tossed in some little plastic boats I keep for just such
emergency and went downstairs for the shampoo, some dishtowels, a huge
piece of oiled silk I kept sprinkled clothes in and some scissors.

I washed all the hair to the accompaniment of blood-curdling howls and
great flailing of arms and legs, scrubbed them all thoroughly, rinsed
everybody off in the shower, then took them out one by one.  After I
had dried them, I sprinkled them plentifully with bath powder, swathed
them in dishtowel diapers covered with oilsilk and one of Don's pajama
tops pinned over.  Then I combed their hair, cut the girls' bangs,
brought them down to the kitchen, gave them peanut butter sandwiches,
milk and ice cream and put them all down for naps.  After I had scoured
out the bathtub I put all of their clothes in the Bendix.  I felt very
noble, like a Red Cross worker in a flood area.

When Don came in for lunch, he asked suspiciously, "What have you done
with them?"

"Bathed them and put them down for naps," I said virtuously.

"Why do you get yourself into these traps?" Don said.

"Because I'm unselfish," I said.  "I try to do nice things for other
people.  I don't just sit around thinking about myself all the time."

"You're not unselfish," Don said.  "You're just a sucker.  I'll bet you
ten to one Elizabeth Gage has had somebody taking care of those brats
of hers ever since she had them.  Anyway why does she need help so
much?  Everett makes lots of money and he told me that Elizabeth Gage
could have a nurse and a maid if she wanted."

"A likely story," I said.  "She didn't even have a washing machine but
I notice that Everett has a fifty thousand dollar yacht."

Don said, "I think Elizabeth Gage is one of those women who likes to be
pitiful.  She gives me a pain."

Just then Connie and Paul Pegler came in.  Connie was wearing the
tiniest pair of white shorts I'd ever seen and a hand-knit,
burnt-orange, turtle-necked sweater.  She looked beautiful.  Don fixed
drinks and headed for the living room.  I quickly suggested that we all
go out on the porch because the children were asleep in the bedrooms
off the balcony.

"What children?" Connie asked.

"Oh, I'm taking care of Little Donny and Little Gail and Little P.J.
and Baby," I said airily.

"So that Elizabeth Gage can have dinner with Everett and try to make
the mean ole thing happy?" Connie said, laughing.

"That's the picture," Don said.

Connie curled up on the white chaise longue, the largest and most
becoming spot on the porch, and said, "Listen, Betty.  I've known
Elizabeth Gage and Everett Wheaton for years and years.  I have also
taken care of Little Donny and Little Gail and Little P.J. and Baby so
that poor little Elizabeth Gage could have dinner with mean ole Everett
and try to make him happy.  Would you like to know what the next step
is?--you get the children for two days, then for two weeks and then for
the summer.  You hose them down, cut their hair and try to housebreak
them.  The minute Elizabeth Gage gets them home she undoes all your
good work--nobody is goin' to tell her how to bring up her children.
Then you get Elizabeth Gage and the children because Everett is
drinkin' and he can't stand the children and he is so mean and once he
even told Elizabeth Gage she was sloppy and he was sick of livin' in a
hog wallow.  They will stay with you for a week or two--in the meantime
of course your own husband moves out because Elizabeth Gage immediately
makes any household into a rabbit warren.  If you are really a sucker
you try to clean up Elizabeth Gage--put her on a diet perhaps, even cut
her hair and give her a Toni.  Then one fine day Everett appears--drunk
because he has been so lonely--Elizabeth Gage runs into his arms--he
says what have you done to yourself--she says that mean old Betty cut
my hair and made me diet--he says where are the children--she says that
mean old Betty has them all takin' naps all the time (this is all
whispered, of course, with Everett giving you dirty looks over her
shoulder).  So they scoop up the children and leave and all the way
home Elizabeth Gage entertains Everett with all the mean things she has
said about him, only she puts them in your mouth and the next time you
see Everett he either doesn't speak or barely chips off one small icy
hello.  Of course you and Elizabeth Gage know the same people and
you're bound to run into each other and she can be cute and funny and
before you know it another summer has rolled around and she has another
baby--the others are still wetting their panties and their
beds--Everett is still drinkin' and bein' mean and, if you're a softie
like me, you're off to the races again."

I knew that Connie was probably telling the truth but it was hard to
give up my Red Cross work so suddenly--to part with my picture of
Elizabeth Gage, thin and tastefully dressed with her hair combed and
wearing a brassiere, standing in the doorway of an immaculate house,
surrounded by clean dry children, waiting for Everett, who would have
gained a little weight and lost most of the deep furrows in his cheeks.
After the reconciliation, of course, they would all come down to my
house to thank me, with tears streaming down their faces, for saving
their marriage.

Then Anne and Joan came home and after they had been introduced Joan
said, "You look awful, Betty, what's the matter?  What have you been
doing?"  I noticed then that I was awfully rumpled and damp and
remembered also that I had not put the children's clothes in the dryer.
I jumped up and ran out to the service room, the girls following.  As I
took the things out of the Bendix, Anne said, "What are those grubby
little things?"

"Elizabeth Gage's children's clothes," I said.  "I gave them a bath.
They are upstairs taking naps."

"Not in our rooms," the girls shrieked.

"I'm afraid so," I said.  "But I put rubber sheets on the beds."

"Oh, Mommy," Anne said.  "Those children are just gruesome."

"No they aren't," I said stoutly.  "They are just pitiful and
neglected.  Now let's go out on the porch."

The children awakened from their naps about three.  Baby opened her
eyes and her mouth at the same time and shrieked and shrieked and
shrieked.  She didn't even stop for breath but like a singer pulled in
new air via her diaphragm while holding one high shrill note.  Then
Connie appeared in the bathroom and yelled at the top of her voice,
"BABY, STOP THAT NOISE!"  To my astonishment she did.  Leaning against
the basin, Connie said, "I had that for two weeks once, only it was
Little P.J.  Paul finally stopped him.  He yelled louder than P.J.
It's the only way."

After Paul and Connie had gone Anne and Joan helped me with the
children.  We had them all fed and in bed again at six-thirty--then
went out on the patio and I had a martini while the girls broiled
steaks.  It was very peaceful.  After the second martini I felt sorry
for Elizabeth Gage all over again.  I said, "Andy, couldn't you fix
Elizabeth Gage's hair?"

"Sure I could," Anne said, "but she'd have to wash it first.  Imagine
washing your hair only once every two months.  Ugh."

Don said, "Let's talk about something else."

Joan said, "You know, Betty, you're just asking for trouble when you
try to change Elizabeth Gage or her children.  She must like the way
she is or she wouldn't be like that."

Anne said, "Oh, that's not fair, Joanie.  She has four babies and she's
always tired."

Joan said, "Connie Pegler has four babies too, she told me.  Wow, she's
pretty."

Don said, "Can't we talk about something else?"

When Elizabeth Gage and Everett came for the children, about 1:45 A.M.,
they were both pretty high.  Elizabeth Gage was flushed and disheveled
and really looked awfully pretty even if she hadn't combed her hair,
had two runs in her stockings and a great many spots on her suit.  We
had a nightcap with them then Elizabeth Gage and I went upstairs to
retrieve the children.  On the way up Elizabeth Gage said, "Where are
Anne and Joan?"

"Oh, they're sleeping in the guesthouse," I said.  "They love it up
there."  This was not exactly true as Anne and Joan had finally been
driven to the guesthouse like sheep to the slaughter, reluctant and
bleating.

The minute Baby opened her eyes and saw Elizabeth Gage she began to
scream.  Elizabeth Gage picked her up and murmured into her neck, "Poor
little Baby.  Did Mommy leave her with mean ole Betty?  Did she miss
her Mommy?"  As Elizabeth Gage murmured and cooed Baby stopped
screaming long enough to give me a triumphant look over her mother's
shoulder.  Then we gathered up the other children who were all wet and
sad and cross.  Elizabeth Gage made them sadder by telling them how
pitiful they were--how mean Mommy was to go off and leave them--how
mean Daddy was to make Mommy go off and leave them.  She asked me if
she could borrow the pajama tops and a blanket to take them home in and
I said yes and so she herded them downstairs and through the house and
up the backstairs and then Everett who was having another nightcap with
Don wouldn't come right away.  Elizabeth Gage cried, all the children
cried and I finally pushed Everett out the door.

The next morning Elizabeth Gage called me up and told me that she was
sorry that I had felt it necessary to give her children a bath.  She
tried to keep them clean but it was so hard, and she hadn't wanted the
girls' bangs cut as she was trying to grow them out so they could wear
pretty little ribbons and Little Donny had said that they had been in
bed most of the time and she was certainly sorry her children had been
so much trouble but after all I had asked to take care of them--it
certainly had not been her idea....

I found myself apologizing and explaining earnestly that the only
reason I had given Baby a bath was because that was the only way I
could stop her crying and the other children had asked to get in the
tub, and so on, and so on.  Elizabeth Gage listened politely then
crisply said goodbye.  I never saw the blanket or the pajama tops again.

Anne and Joan were very dramatic about their rooms and Anne threw all
the bedclothes, excluding the mattress only because she couldn't lift
it, out onto the patio and told me to have them "disinfected."  Joan
said her room "smelled."

I learned from Connie that a Mrs. Anderson and her husband moved in to
the cabin next to the Wheatons and for the rest of that summer she got
Little Donny and Little Gail and Little P.J.  and Baby and finally of
course Elizabeth Gage because Everett was drinkin' because "that cabin
Betty made us take is so cramped we all feel like animals."

When I saw Elizabeth Gage on the ferry the other day it was the first
time in five years.  She seemed very glad to see me and, as we drank
our coffee and she ate two doughnuts ("I should be reducin' but I'm so
nervous and tired"), she told me that she and Everett have bought an
old run-down farm on the west side of the island.  They don't have
lights or running water but the children have a pony, and there is a
nice dock for Everett's newer, much bigger boat.  They have six
children now--Little Mary Louise and Little Alexandra Dean (Baby) and
Elizabeth is very pregnant with a seventh.  She hopes it will be Little
Everett, Jr.  All the children had runny noses and most of them had wet
panties and hair hanging in their eyes.  Elizabeth Gage's hair still
looked like sphagnum moss and she had on maternity jeans, a dirty
T-shirt with no brassiere, what was almost certainly a corduroy
bathrobe and black ballet slippers.  She said that Everett is drinkin'
again and meaner than ever.  She says she bought all the children life
jackets and they always go out on the boat with them.  She said bein'
so pregnant she hadn't had time to stop at the store or she would ask
me to lunch, but all they had in the house were graham crackers and
honey.  What could I do but ask her to lunch and when lunch seemed to
be running into dinner I couldn't push her out, could I?  She called
Everett and told him to stop off here and he is as handsome as ever but
thinner, more nervous and drinks ten times as much.

When they left at one or two A.M., Elizabeth Gage said, "We don't have
lights or runnin' water and I still don't have a washing machine but we
do have a telephone.  I'll call you in the morning, honey.  It will be
just like old times."




CHAPTER XV

ADOLESCENCE, OR PLEASE KEEP IMOGENE UNTIL SHE IS THIRTY

The tricky thing to remember about adolescents is that they seem so
miserable doing what they are doing that you, their loving and
bewildered parents, assume that they would be happier doing something
else.  They wouldn't.  Adolescents are going to be miserable no matter
what they are doing but they would rather be miserable doing the things
_they_ choose.  This is all so easy for me now that Anne and Joan are
twenty-four and twenty-five, charming, intelligent, beautiful,
companionable, adult and married.  Don and I adore them and can't see
enough of them, even if Don did design a Christmas card showing him on
the roof shooting at the stork.

But during that long pull between fourteen and twenty (they were both
married at twenty) it came over us with a flash, well really more like
a punch in the stomach accompanied by the splash of tears, that the
English are truly more civilized than we are and they know what they
are doing when they send Imogene away to school--and by "away" I mean
from Rangoon to England or vice versa--at age seven and bring her home
reluctantly when she is thirty.

The summer Anne and Joan turned fourteen and fifteen and both bolted
themselves in the bathroom for hours at a stretch and wore lipstick to
bed, Don and I sent away for the catalogue of a fine school in Canada.
It had the splendid English approach, we could tell, because the
catalogue said, "No need for them to come home for any of the
holidays--we will keep them all summer."  Anne and Joan found the
catalogue and cried, not because we didn't want them home in the summer
but because the school demanded that all pupils have their hair chopped
off even with the ear lobes and wear black oxfords with Cuban heels.

Frankly I do not know any easy answer to adolescence.  About the only
thing to do is to try to hang on to your sanity and pray much as you
would if you were lost in a blizzard without a compass or were adrift
in a leaky canoe and could hear the roar of the falls just ahead.

While you are hanging on I will reach down into the black pit of my
experience and give you a few things to think about, in case they
aren't already glaringly apparent:


1. Adolescents do not hate their parents.  They merely feel absolute
contempt, occasionally coated with condescending pity for them, their
tiny brains, ridiculous ideas, unfair rules and obvious senility.  They
all refer to their father as "oh him" and their mother as "she": "_She_
won't let me go, naturally.  _She's_ scared to death I might have a
little fun for a change."  "Who was that on the phone?  _Oh him_!  What
did he want, his overcoat again?"

2. All adolescents are masters of the double- even triple-cross.  This
does not mean that they will grow up to be either Communists or
politicians--it is merely an indication that in adolescence, loyalty is
no long-term emotion, and best friends can turn brown quicker than
gardenias.

3. All adolescents "go steady."  Daughters with boys who appear to be
oily, weak-chinned and untrustworthy.  Sons with girls who appear
hard-eyed, brazen and, if not downright immoral, certainly not
wholesome sister types.  No parent gets anywhere combatting these great
romances.  How can anyone as stupid as "oh him" evaluate a big wheel
like Billy?  (A big wheel who lies on the couch more than the dog and
has a vocabulary of thirty words.)

"It just so happens that Billy is left half on the football team and
president of SqueeGees, _the_ high school fraternity."

What can "she" possibly know about a wonderful girl like Charlene (with
her skin-tight skirts, fuchsia lipstick apparently put on with a putty
knife, and scintillating conversation of "Gollee, Anne, Johnny may have
the mind of a boy but he sure has the _body_ of a _man_!").  _She_ is
just jealous because Charlene was voted sweetheart of the SqueeGee
_four times_ (no wonder).

The thing that is so difficult for fathers to remember is that very
few, if any, of the brilliant lawyers, bankers, doctors, architects or
statesmen, a facsimile of which they desire for a son-in-law, ever took
out girls when they were in high school.  They were too shy and too
busy studying to be brilliant lawyers, etc.  Big Wheels in high school
are, always have been, and undoubtedly always will be the smooth,
shifty-eyed, self-confident non-studiers.

The thing that comes as such a blow to the mothers is the fact that
little Conroy is not attracted to Ermingarde Allen, who "has such
pretty manners and will be very nice-looking when her skin clears up
and after all her mother was my classmate at Bryn Mawr."  Conroy, who
is shy and unsure, refers to Ermingarde, who is shy and unsure, as
"that pimply creep," and spends all his time trying to get a date with
Carmen Smith who is reputed to let the boys take off her sweater in a
parked car.  If it is any comfort, isn't it really better for Conroy to
satisfy his curiosity about Carmen Smith at sixteen rather than, say,
forty?

4. All adolescents telephone.  This is part of the cohesive quality
that makes them all eat in the same beanery, walk in bunches, knot up
in hallways, keep in constant touch.  United we stand--divided we might
learn something.  (You will not solve anything by having two
telephones, "Wow, _two_ telephones!" Anne and Joan's friends said, and
kept them both busy.)

5. All adolescents intend to have the family car all of the time.  To
accomplish this they resort to the gentle nag or water-on-stone method,
the smooth lie, or the cold tearful silence.  They will always win if
you try to reason or appeal.  They have the least resistance to the
cheerful impersonal "no."

6. Adolescents are not careful of their own possessions, but they are
absolutely reckless with anything belonging to their parents.  Don's
gray flannel slacks, Don's shoes, my small radio, my toast-colored
cashmere sweater, Don's bathing trunks (about four pairs), my jeans,
our sweatshirts, our beach towels, hit the adolescent trail and were
never seen again.

7. All adolescent girls would prefer to live in a bathroom.

8. All adolescent boys would prefer to live in a car.


Examining in retrospect that first long wet difficult winter when
daylight was only on weekends and keeping warm was the motivating
force, I am overcome by how wonderful Anne and Joan were.  How
co-operative and uncomplaining and hard working and dear.  Of course,
viewing things in retrospect does blunt corners and point up bright
places, but they were such little girls to be getting wood, cooking
dinner, making beds and smiling, and I repeat again they were such
little girls and they did smile.  I wondered if they were happy living
on an island and leaving for school in the dark.  After all, they were
used to my large family and our hordes of friends, I told Don.

He said cheerfully, "Look at the Bronts, Saki, Ruskin, Lincoln.  All
great people who thrived on isolation."

I said, "When I was a little girl I always came home to a house
smelling of gingerbread and filled with people."

Don said, "I always came home to a house smelling of funerals and
filled with Methodists.  I think Anne and Joan are lucky."

I said, "Perhaps we should have waited until they were older before
moving to the country."

He said, "Living in the city doesn't solve everything.  Think of all
the city children who are alone because their parents are in Palm
Springs or down at the Athletic Club getting pie-eyed or in New York
attending the National Convention of the Juvenile Delinquency
Prevention Society.  Anyway there weren't any houses for rent in the
city.  Remember?"

One stormy night Don met on the ferry and brought home to dinner a
widower who lived by himself on the other side of the island.  Anne,
home from school with one of her fleeting unlocalized ailments, had
stuffed and baked a salmon and made an apple pie.  The man couldn't get
over it.  "That little girl, that wonderful little girl!" he said over
and over again as he passed his plate for more salmon and watched Anne
swishing competently around making boiled coffee and cutting the cheese.

Joanie said, "I'm wonderful too, aren't I, Mommy?  I rowed out and
bought the salmon from the fishing boat and I carried up a root so big
Don can't get it in the fireplace."

"You don't know how fortunate you are," the old widower told Don and
me, with tears in his eyes.  "I've never seen anything like it."  Anne
and Joan glowed like little fireflies and in his honor after dinner,
when they were doing the dishes, kept their fighting down to quiet
slaps, hissed insults and one broken saucer.

Sunday morning the girls always climbed in our bed, Don lit the fire in
the fireplace and we took turns going down and getting coffee, orange
juice and the Sunday papers.  After we had read the papers, accompanied
by a great deal of shoving and spilling and jerking of the covers Anne
and I got up and cooked a big Sunday breakfast.  Kippered herring and
scrambled eggs or clam fritters and bacon or shad roe or eggs scrambled
with Olympia oysters no larger than a thumbnail.  While Anne and I
cooked, Joan and Don got wood and built the fires.  We never bothered
with Sunday dinner, preferring soup and sandwiches whenever we got
hungry.

Sunday afternoons we took walks, gathered bark, wrote and acted out
plays, popped corn, made fudge, sang into the recording machine, read
aloud, helped with homework, took trips in the rowboat with the
outboard motor, cleared land, fed the deer and played with the kittens.
In spite of my occasional misgivings, we were a very happy,
enthusiastic family and I was delighted that Anne and Joan had accepted
Don so easily as my husband and their friend.

Then Satan, in the form of adolescence, entered the Garden of Eden and
turned it overnight into a jungle.  A jungle filled with half-grown,
always hungry, noisy, emotional, quarrelsome, rude, boisterous,
snarling animals.

The first manifestation was the hair.  Anne had bright copper-colored
curly hair which she wore shining clean and hanging shoulder length.
Joan had pale blond curly hair which she wore shining clean, if I
caught her, and hanging shoulder length.  One early evening Anne began
rolling her pretty hair into small wet snails, about six hairs to a
snail, secured tightly with bobby pins crisscrossed like swords.

I said, "What are you doing to your hair?"

Sighing heavily she said, through a mouth filled with bobby pins, "Oh,
you wouldn't understand."

"Why shouldn't I?" I said.

"Because you don't know anything about style and anyway you want me to
look ugly."

"Your hair looks lovely just the way it is," I said unwisely.

"I knew you'd take that attitude," Anne said, beginning to cry.  "I
knew you'd get furious if I tried to fix my hair the way _everybody_ is
wearing it."

Joan said, "That's right, Mommy, _everybody_ puts their hair up in pin
curls.  They all think we look like hags."

"And bags."

"And scrags."

"I'm not furious," I said, getting a little furious.  "But I don't see
much point in curling curly hair."

"You don't see any point in _anything_!" Anne sobbed.  "You don't know
anything about anything!  You even like to live on this Godforsaken
island."

Joan said, "Say, Laurie told me that Helen told him that Bobby likes
you."

"When?" Anne said, sucking the tears back into her eye sockets and
brightening up.

"Yesterday," Joan said.  "I forgot to tell you."

"You stinker," hissed Anne.  "And now I promised Jimmy I'd go to the
Friday dance with him.  I could kill you."

"Go ahead," Joan said calmly, "but if I'm dead I won't be able to tell
you what else Laurie said."

"What?" Anne said.

"Say 'cross my heart I'm not going to kill you,'" Joan said.

"Don't be silly," Anne said.

Joan said, "All right then, promise you'll help me with my theme."

"I promise."

"Well," Joan said, "Laurie said that Helen said that Bobby is going to
ask you to the Seaview Boys School football dance.  What are you going
to wear?"

"Something ugly and childish and old," Anne said bitterly.  "And all
the other girls are rich and will smoke and have on strapless formals."

"Karen Hendricks isn't rich," Joan said, "and she goes steady with the
president of the sophomore class."

"Yes, but she doesn't live on a corny old island," Anne said.

"If I had red hair and a bust I wouldn't care where I lived," Joan said
wistfully.  "Say, the subject of my theme has to be Why I Want to Go to
College."

"Ugh, what a repulsive title," Anne said.

"You promised you'd help me."

"I know," Anne said, "but it will have to be all lies."

"I'll get my notebook," Joan said.

"Wait," Anne said.  "I have to finish pinning up my hair.  I'll do
yours too, if you want," she added generously.

"Oh, boy," Joan said rapturously.

From then on Anne and Joan and all their little female friends spent at
least one third of their lives rolling their hair into the small snail
curls.  Over the snails they tied bandannas of different kinds--one
year dishtowels, one year men's bandannas, one year woolen scarves, one
year enormous silk squares.  The strange thing was that except for
special occasions such as the Friday night dances, SqueeGee formals and
Junior Proms, we never ever saw these curls unfurled.  Their hair was
pinned up when they left for school, it was pinned up again the minute
they got home.

Saturday before last, my sister Mary's middle daughter, Sally, who is
sixteen, came to see me, bringing three of her school friends.  I
flinched when I saw their hair, wound into little snails, each snail
secured with the crisscrossed bobby pins.  I decided to ask Sally, who
is not my daughter and therefore doesn't feel called upon to give me
the "diamond drill eye" or to turn all my simple questions into
personal affronts, why adolescents keep their hair pinned up all the
time.  Stepping softly, I said, "Sally, would you answer a question for
me?"  Instantly she and her three friends exchanged looks and moved
closer together.

She said suspiciously, "What do you want to know?"

I said, "Why do you keep your lovely blond hair pinned up all the time?
In the past two years I've only seen it combed out twice."

She said, "Well, it comes out of curl."

"When?" I asked.

"At school," she said.  "I comb it out as soon as I get to school in
the morning."

"And you put it up again the minute you get home?"

"Of course," Sally said.  "Somebody might come over."

"What if somebody doesn't?"

"Then it's all ready for dinner."

"Do you comb it out before dinner?"

"Daddy won't let us come to the table in pin curls.  He's so darn
crabby I think he must be going through the menopause."

"Then you put it up right after dinner."

"Of course."

"Why?"

"Somebody might come over."

"Then you put it up again before you go to bed?"

"Of course."

"So it will be ready for school in the morning?"

"Uh, uh."

"Wouldn't it be easier to have a permanent?"

"Oh, no, permanents are corny."

I said, "What about riding back and forth on the ferry with those
little wet snails all over your head?"

She said, "Oh, we combed our hair while we were waiting in line."

"How did it get curled again?" I asked.  "The ferry ride only takes
twelve minutes."

"We rolled it up while we were waiting for the ferry to dock."

"Are you going to take it down again before you get back on the ferry?"

"Of course, you don't expect us to ride on the ferry with our hair in
pin curls do you?"  Accompanying scornful laughter.

Of course everybody knows that adolescents, in spite of a repulsively
overconfident manner, are basically unsure.  We read it in books.  It
is pointed out to us in lectures.  There are even articles about it in
the newspapers.  But you have to live with an adolescent to realize
that in this half-ripe, newly hatched, wet-feathered stage they are not
aware they are unsure.  They consider themselves wise, tolerant,
responsible adults.  Adults so mature they have a phobia against
anything childish.  Thus the pleasant Sunday mornings in our bed came
to a sudden end.  Instead Anne and Joan rushed down and got the papers,
fought over them shrilly for a while, then came into our room, sat on
the bed, drank the coffee which we had gotten ourselves, and
complained.  "Gosh, you look hideous in that nightgown, Betty," was one
form of greeting, followed quickly by, "Raining again!" heavy sigh.
"It seems like it has been raining for years and years."  Another heavy
sigh.  "Do you think Tyrone Power's going to marry Lana Turner, Mommy?"
They were both wearing Don's pajamas, their hair was of course in pin
curls, their faces smeared with calamine lotion, their fingernails were
long, ruby-colored and chipped, their eyes sad.

I said, "Let's get dressed, have breakfast, build a big fire in the
fireplace and play charades."

"Charades?  You mean that baby game where you act out words?" Anne said.

"It isn't a baby game," I said.  "You remember we played it last
summer."

"I don't want to play," Joan said.  "It's too much like school work."

"I wish I had a pink Angora sweater," Anne said.  "Marilyn has two.  A
pale blue one and a pale pink one."

"Two?" Joan said.  "Are you sure?  They're twenty-five dollars, you
know."

"Marilyn's rich," Anne said.  "She gets thirty-five dollars a month
just to spend on clothes."

Don said, "I can't understand why we let the Russians into Berlin."

Anne said, "Marilyn's going to spend Christmas in Palm Springs."

I said, "Palm Springs is the last place I would want to spend
Christmas.  Who wants hot weather and palm trees for Christmas?"

"I do," Anne said wistfully.  "I'm so sick of rain I could die."

"Me too," Joan said.  "Marilyn's going to get her own car when she's
sixteen."

Don said, "Of course Russia had the world bluffed and our policy of
appeasement, uncertainty and double-talk isn't fooling anybody but
ourselves."

I said, "Possessions don't bring happiness.  Happiness is something you
must find in your own self."

"Well, it would be a lot easier to find if I had a car of my own," Anne
said.

Joan said, "If we had a car of our very own we could drive to
California next summer."

"You could not," I said.

"Why?" they said together.

"Because I don't believe in young girls' driving around the country by
themselves.  It's not safe."

"Well, next summer we'd be fifteen and sixteen."

"That's not old enough to take a trip by yourselves."

"It certainly seems funny to me that we are always old enough to do
what _you_ want but never old enough to do anything _we_ want."

Don said, "Listen to this, 'Peace is largely beyond the control of
purpose.  It comes as a gift.  The deliberate aim at peace passes into
its bastard substitute, anesthesia.'"

I said, "Why don't you girls get dressed?"

Don said, "You never listen to anything I say."

I said, "I do too.  But it's hard to concentrate on Russia when the
girls are leaving for California in their own car."

Anne said, "Don't you think Joan and I are old enough to drive to
California, Don?"

"What about South America?" Don said.  "It's farther away."

"Who'll go down and get me a cigarette?" I asked.

"You go," Anne said.

"You go," Joan said.

Don said, "Here, smoke one of mine."

Anne said, "Gosh, I hate Sunday.  Nothing to do but damned old
homework."

"Don't swear," I said.

"Why not?" Anne said.  "You do."

"You swear all the time," Joan echoed.

"Let's get dressed," I said, getting out of bed.

To be sure they weren't missing out on any new vital beauty aid, Anne
and Joan studied _Glamour, Mademoiselle, Charm, Vogue, Harper's
Bazaar_, as well as all the movie magazines.  They knew instantly if
Burnt Sugar was the latest color in lipstick and they pled and bled
until they got it.  When they got it they wore it out in about two
hours because they put on a new complete makeup when they got home from
school (this one was for getting wood), another for eating dinner and
of course another before doing the dishes because "somebody might come
over."  On occasion they would experiment with different blemish
removers.

One night when they both came in to kiss us goodnight coated entirely
with some pure white stuff that smelled like creosote and made them
look like plaster casts, I said mildly, "Are you sure that is good for
your skin?"

Anne, her voice throbbing with bitterness, said, "If it's deadly poison
it's better than having to go to school with a face that is always just
one big running sore."

"Where are all these running sores?" I asked.

Bending down so that the lamp shone on her face, she said, "Look."

I looked, but all I could see was one small red lump on her chin.  I
said as much and she stamped up to bed.

Joan said, "Look at my face.  My pores are so enormous I look like a
cribbage board."

I examined her face as well as I could through the white paste and
said, "Your skin looks fine to me."

"Naturally you'd say that," Joan said.  "Because you don't care.  You
cook rich foods all the time because you want us to break out and look
ugly."

Don said, "What have you got on your hair?"

"Straightener," Joan said.  "It's not stylish to have curly hair.
Nobody has it any more.  It's corny."

"White stuff on your face, straightener on your hair, what are you
trying to do, pass over?" Don asked.

I thought it was very funny and laughed.  Joan flounced upstairs.

Leg shaving began the summer Anne was thirteen and before either of the
girls had so much as one picker on their skinny legs.  But leg shaving
was considered sophisticated and so they scraped their legs almost as
often as Don did his chin, and always with his razor.

After a while I got pretty foxy, and when I saw Anne and Joan come
limping out of our bathroom, their legs sporting bloody ribbons of
toilet paper like tails of kites, I would dash upstairs, wash out Don's
razor and put in a new blade.

Then there were the clothes.  So vitally important.  Everything long
and loose and pitiful.  Boys' coats.  Men's sweaters.  Don's shirts.
Boys' jeans and T-shirts.  Wooden shoes, loafers, dirty saddle shoes.
Exactly the right kind of white socks turned down an exact number of
inches.  The first high heels and the furious outburst in the
shoestore--"You're glad my feet are so big because you know it hurts my
feelings!"

No matter what garment I bought Anne and Joan the grass was always
greener in somebody else's closet.  They and their schoolmates
exchanged clothes constantly.  Anne and Joan would leave for school in
one outfit, come home in another.  It was hard for me to understand
this because all the skirts, blouses, sweaters and coats were exactly
alike and all made the girls look like figures in faded photographs of
long-ago picnics.

Next in importance to clothes were eating and dieting.  For weeks
everything would be so-so.  The girls would come home from school with
their accompanying wake of Jeanies, Lindas, Ruthies, Sandys, Bonnies,
Chuckies, Normies, Bills and Jims, go directly to the kitchen and the
icebox door would begin to thump rhythmically like the tail of a
friendly dog, as they devoured everything not marked with a skull and
crossbones or frozen.  During those intervals any old thing I cooked,
stew, spaghetti or deep-fried pot holders, was greeted with "Is that
all you made?  We're starving."

Then one morning I would decide to get up early and cook something very
nice for my growing girls and their long chain of Ruthies, Jeanies and
so on, who apparently didn't care if they slept six in a bed or in the
fireplace just so it was every night at our house.  "I'll make French
toast," I said fondly to Tudor as I flitted happily around getting out
the real maple syrup and crowding another place on the table each time
another gruesome little figure in a torn petticoat, bobby pins and
calamine lotion appeared and asked me where the iron was.

When I had a stack of golden French toast about two feet high,
ordinarily a mere hors d'oeuvre, I called loudly that breakfast was
ready and sat down in my corner with a cup of coffee and a cigarette.
After an interval the girls began straggling in, dripping with my
perfume and, of course, wearing each other's clothes.

"Hurry and drink your orange juice," I said proudly.  "I've made French
toast."

"I hope you didn't cook any for me," Anne said loftily, sitting down at
the table and unscrewing the top on a bottle of nail polish.  "I'm
dieting and all I want is one hard-boiled egg."

"Why do you always fix orange juice?" Joan said.  "Tomato juice only
has fifty calories."

The various Ruthies and Jeanies said to my offers of French toast,
"None for me, thanks, Mrs. MacDonald.  I'm just going to have black
coffee"--or warm water and lemon juice, or a hard-boiled egg.

After they had gone I grimly dumped the lovely golden brown French
toast into the raccoons' pan and decided that this was the last time I
would ever get up and cook breakfast for my disagreeable little
daughters and their ungrateful little friends.

After school the locusts arrived on schedule, but only the boys ate.
The girls sipped tea and smoked.  Then came dinner and no matter what I
cooked, rare roast beef, brook trout, ground roundsteak broiled, it was
never on their diet.  Also I could count on either Anne or Joan or both
of them saying, "So much!  Why do you always cook in such enormous
quantities?"

I don't know what diet they were on, but it was apparently the same one
Mary's daughters and friends are using today, a special high school
diet that calls for one plate of fudge, three Cokes and a pound of
cheese eaten in private and one small celery stalk and half a
grapefruit nibbled at the dinner table.  Mother used to infuriate Anne
and Joan by quoting:

  There was a young lady named Maud
  Famed both at home and abroad,
  She never was able to eat at the table
  But in the back pantry, my God!


Of course you can't examine adolescence without getting on the subject
of sex, the discussion of which occupied a prominent place in our
dinner table conversation during those years.  Don and I tried to be
very frank with Anne and Joan and encouraged them to be very frank with
us.  We answered their questions with medical terms, as many as we
knew, and, we hoped, the correct casualness.  The result was that no
matter who came to dinner, the conversation was dappled with rather
clinical discussions of sex in which Anne and Joan and their friends
seemed to be extremely interested.  Adolescents enjoy, in fact will go
to most any length to get, the center of attention.  In our quiet
little home this was accomplished rather easily.  We sat down to
dinner, Don began to carve, I took a bite of salad and Ruthie said,
"Did you know that Ellen broke up with Bob?"  There was an excited
chorus of No!  When!  Why!  Where!  Then Anne remarked in a very
conversational tone, "It was bound to come, after all they have been
having sexual intercourse every five minutes for years."

Dropping my lettuce into my lap, I said, "Anne MacDonald, what a
dreadful thing to say!"

Reaching for another biscuit, Joan said, "Don't get so worked up,
Betty.  It's common knowledge."

Putting down my salad fork I would launch my standard,
worn-to-the-fraying-point lecture on reputations, their preciousness,
their gossamer fragility and so on, and so on.  The girls waited
impatiently but politely for me to finish, then Anne said, speaking
patiently, slowly, the way you discourse with mental defectives, "But,
Betty, we're not hurting Ellen's reputation."

Ruthie broke in eagerly, "That's right, Mrs. MacDonald.  Yesterday she
told the whole botany class about Bob and her."

Sighing heavily Don said, "Can't we change the subject?"

Sitting up straight, I began an interesting discourse on the new book I
was reading.

I learned after a while, a long while, that if I displayed shock or any
other interesting reaction during these discussions they went on and on
and on.  So I became able finally to toss it off--to say casually,
"Please pass the gravy," right in the middle of the gory details of the
story about Murdene Plunkett, who didn't wear panties to the spring
formal....

I encouraged Anne and Joan to read from the time they first learned
how.  Our library is large and varied, and beyond casual suggestions I
made no attempt to monitor their selections.  One rainy school morning
Anne asked me for a piece of wrapping paper.  I asked her why she
wanted it, merely to determine the kind and size, and she said she
wanted to wrap up a book so it wouldn't get wet.  I offered to wrap the
book for her and she handed me _Lady Chatterley's Lover_.  I said,
trying very hard to speak casually, "Why are you taking this book to
school, Andy?"

"Because I'm going to give a book report on it," she said just as
casually as she adjusted her bandanna.

"Have you read it?" I asked.

"Part of it," she said.  "It's awfully dull, but D. H. Lawrence is
supposed to be a good writer, isn't he?"

I tactfully substituted _The Turn of the Screw_ by Henry James, as a
little more suitable for high school English, just as dull and a lot
easier to carry in the rain.

Of course the girls eventually came across and read _Ulysses_ quite
openly on the couch in the living room, but they didn't attempt to do a
book report on it.  They adored _Gone with the Wind_, but they thought
_Kitty Foyle_ was corny.  They loved _A Farewell to Arms_ but couldn't
decide about _The Grapes of Wrath_ because of "that absolutely
disgusting ending."  They loved _Tortilla Flat_, but were not
enthusiastic about _Invitation to the Waltz_ or _Alice Adams_, two of
my favorites.  Their favorites were Dickens, Thackeray, the Bronts
(Anne read _Wuthering Heights_ five times one winter) E. B. White and
Thurber.  They read _The New Yorker, The Saturday Evening Post, The
Ladies' Home Journal, Good Housekeeping, Time, Life_, as many movie
magazines as they could get hold of, and all the magazines exploiting
charm, glamour, beauty and so on.

They loved all movies except the ones depicting Hollywood's conception
of college life.  They were wildly enthusiastic about any stage play or
musical, but only Anne and I enjoyed the symphony or concerts.

Anne and Joan and their friends talked a great deal about
sophistication, tight strapless black evening dresses and long
cigarette holders, but when boys appeared they screamed like gulls,
laughed like hyenas and pushed one another and the boys rudely.  One
day I came into the living room and found Anne lifting a chair with two
great big boys in it.  I was horrified and that night I gave the girls
lectures #10874-598734 on Being a Lady--Nice
Manners--Charm--Womanliness.  They listened with half-closed cobra eyes
until I had finished, then yawned and stretched rudely, shoved and
pushed each other up the stairs, and locked themselves in our bathroom.
The thing that troubled me the most was that none of Anne and Joan's
friends was as rude as they were.

All the Ruthies and Jeanies, etc., said please and thank you, stood up
when I came in the room and wrote their bread-and-butter letters.  I
wondered what magic their mothers used and when, as they were at our
house most of the time.

Then one day Don and I were at a cocktail party and a strange man came
up to us and said, "So you're the parents of Anne and Joan.  They go
skiing with us quite often, you know, and Mrs. Alexander and I think
they are the _most charming_ girls we have ever met.  They are also
very witty and very bright but, right at this point, it is their
_manners_ that impress us the most.  You see, Carol," (I realized all
of a sudden that this was one of the mysterious parents of Carol,
quiet, exquisitely mannered Carol, who had been with us off and on,
mostly on, for over a year) "ever since she entered adolescence has
apparently been taking a behavior course from Al Capone."  Of course we
told him about Carol and how beautifully she behaved at our house and
he went on and on about Anne and Joan, and then he said, "I can't keep
this to myself," and rushed off and got Mrs. Alexander, and we went
over the whole thing again.  We all left the party looking years and
years younger.

Anne and Joan had always been to my prejudiced maternal eyes, normally
truthful children.  Joan told me when she broke the windshield of the
Alcotts' car.  Anne told me when she spilled nail polish on my new
bedspread.  Joan told me when she cut off her eyelashes.  Anne told me
when she drank the cherry wine.  They both told me when they took the
candy out of the ten-cent store.  Perhaps they each told me what the
other did, but anyway I got the truth one way or another, most of the
time.

Then came adolescence and the birth of the wilful, deliberate,
bold-faced lie.  The lie, told, I finally decided, to test parents out,
to see what kind of fools they really were.

It began with the lost wallet.  Anne and Joan were each given five
dollars a week allowance.  This was to cover carfare, school lunches,
Saturday movies and occasional shopping trips.  One Saturday Anne told
me that she had lost her wallet with her "whole allowance in it."  She
cried a little when she told me and I felt niggardly and probing when I
asked her for details.  She was remarkably definite.

"It was in Frederick and Nelson's at the hat bar on the first floor at
eleven in the morning last Saturday.  I put the wallet on the counter
right beside me while I tried on a hat and when I looked for it, it was
gone.  Probably taken by a shoplifter."  While she was telling her
story, Anne and Joan both fixed me with large innocent guileless blue
eyes.  Of course I believed them and gave Anne another five dollars.
She snatched it eagerly but I was not suspicious.

The next Saturday the same thing happened.  Almost the same story only
this time it was Joan and the Vashon drugstore and the culprit probably
"some poor starving farmer who needed the money."

I shelled out another five dollars.

Monday morning Velma, my cleaning woman, brought me Anne's green wallet
which she had found behind the bed.  In it were two one-dollar bills
and the stubs of four loge seats in the Fifth Avenue Theatre.

When Anne came home from school I showed her the wallet and the theatre
tickets and said sorrowfully, "You lied to me."

"I know it," Anne said cheerfully.

"Why?" I asked, my voice hoarse with emotion.

"I don't know," Anne said.  "I guess I just wanted to see if I could.
All the kids lie to their mothers."

"Very well," I said.  "You owe me five dollars.  You can pay me back
two dollars a month.  Did you lie to me too, Joan?"

Joan, who had her mouth full of apple, nodded brightly, vigorously.

"I'm very very disappointed in you," I said.

"Well, my gosh," Joan said, "Carol's been lying to _her_ mother for
months and months--she _never_ catches on."  She made it sound as if I
had taken unfair advantage.

"Then why does Carol always borrow money from me?" Anne said furiously.
"She owes me about a million dollars."

I said, "You can pay me back two dollars a month too, Joan."

Anne said, "I'm going to get my money back from Carol if I have to
choke her to death."

A few nights later, at dinner, Anne announced, "Gosh, we had a hard
geometry test today."

"We had an algebra test," Joan said, taking a tiny uninteresting sip of
her milk.

"The geometry test was hard but I think I got an awfully good grade,"
Anne said, as she pushed her peas into a string of green beads
encircling her mashed potatoes.

"How do you think you did in algebra, Joanie?" I asked.

"All right, I guess," Joan said.  "I despise Miss Gantron but she's so
senile she can't think up very hard tests."

"What did they have for lunch at school?" I asked conversationally.

Anne and Joan glanced at each other quickly, then said together,
"Spaghetti--macaroni and cheese."

"Make up your minds," I said levelly.  "Which was it--spaghetti or
macaroni and cheese--surely they wouldn't have both?"

"The food at school gets more revolting every day," Anne said, taking a
tiny bite of avocado.  "Absolutely tasteless and always cold."

"The macaroni and cheese tastes just like Kem-Tone," Joan said.

"It's better than their vegetable soup," Anne said.  "It tastes just
like perspiration."

I said, "Speaking of perspiration, Aunty Mary saw you coming out of the
Paramount Theatre this afternoon."

Ruthie said, "Oh, it couldn't have been us, Mrs. MacDonald.  We were
all at school.  Weren't we, Jeanie?"

Jeanie said, "Sure they were, Mrs. MacDonald.  Ask Kathy."

I said, "I don't have to ask anybody.  I _know_ you weren't at school
and I _know_ you aren't hungry for dinner because you have spent the
day stuffing down popcorn and ice cream and candy and Cokes.  Now CLEAR
THE TABLE, WASH THE DISHES, DO YOUR STUDYING AND GO TO BED!"

Later on when Don and I were lying in bed reading and trying to take
our minds off adolescence, I heard Ruthie say to Anne, who was of
course taking her bath in our bathroom, "Gee, Anne, your mom's sure
sweet.  I wouldn't dare tell my mom I skipped school.  She'd kill me."

Anne said, "Oh, _she's_ all right, I guess.  Do you think Bill really
likes me?"

There was also the music--the loud, blatting, tuneless music that
boomed out of the record player from the minute the girls opened their
eyes in the morning until they closed them at night.  Boops Bigwig,
Doggo Conray, Morks Ogle--or whatever their names were--all sounded
exactly alike to me and made "Walkin' My Baby Back Home"
indistinguishable from "Paper Moon" or Don's chain saw.  To Boops,
Doggo, etc., Anne and Joan and their friends danced the Avalon, a sort
of crippled drag performed with the fanny stuck out and a pained
expression on the face.  They listened to Frank Sinatra, Frankie Laine,
Billie Holliday and King Cole.  Listening required that they be draped
over some piece of furniture surrounded by a litter of Coke bottles,
apple cores, candy wrappers, cigarette stubs, cookie crumbs and shoes.
Nobody ever wore shoes except outside.  Even at formal dances the girls
kicked off their shoes and got holes in my nylons.

And perfume with names such as Aphrodisia, Quick Passion, Come Hither,
Lots of Sin--all with a heavy musk base.  I am not at all partial to
heavy perfume, preferring light flowery scents, but I'm particularly
not partial to heavy perfume slopped on by the handful at seven o'clock
in the morning when I'm tentatively taking my first sip of coffee.
Anne would come downstairs immaculate, pressed and perfect to the last
hair but with the husky scent of Quick Passion hovering over her like
smoke over a genie.  Once or twice I remarked mildly, "Andy, darling,
don't you think that perfume is awfully, uh, well, penetrating for
school?"  She and Joan, who by that time had also made an appearance
quite obviously pinned in many places but drenched in Aphrodisia,
exchanged long-suffering looks and sighed heavily.  Any further mention
of the stench in the kitchen I knew would bring forth a torrent of "You
don't _want_ us to smell nice.  You'd like it if we had _B.O._ or used
Lysol perfume.  _Everything_ we do is wrong.  _All_ you do is
criticize."  Keeping as far away from them as I could and drawing
heavily on cigarettes, I put their breakfast on the table and thought
with pity of the teachers who had to put up with perhaps thirty-five,
all smelling like that.

Of course Anne and Joan treated Don and me as if we were tottering on
the edge of senility.  We weren't even thirty-five but if we danced
(never exactly a spontaneous outburst of animal spirits on Don's part)
we became the immediate objects of a great deal of humorous comment.
"Oh, look at them!  Do you mean to say they really used to dance like
_that_?  He, he, he, ha, ha, ha, you look so funny!"  If I occasionally
came back at them and reminded them how funny _they_ looked when _they_
danced they wailed, "You're so crabby all the time.  You're never any
fun any more."

I don't know how or when Anne and Joan learned to drive, but I do know
that each one, on the day of her sixteenth birthday, demanded to be
taken to town so she could go through the ridiculous routine of a
driving test and be given a license to drive her steady's father's car
and to lend our car to any bonehead friend who wished to back it onto a
busy street without looking, run it into a tree, turn a corner without
seeing "that dumb truck," or put it in reverse by mistake when going
very fast.  After a time I became rather accustomed to answering the
phone and having a small quavering voice say, "Mrs. MacDonald, this is
Joanne and I've had a little trouble with the car, your car I mean, and
there's a policeman who wants to speak to you."

Once when we had been up very late listening to "then I said to Ted and
Ted said to me" and then were kept awake further by the music of Morks
and Doggo and further still by the pattering of big bare feet and
shrieks and giggles and the thump of the refrigerator door and finally
by my bedside light being switched on and Joan demanding, "Where have
you put my down quilt?  We're making up a bed for Evelyn and Ruthie on
the porch," Don remarked with feeling, "What are we running here, a
youth hostel?  That Ruthie hasn't been home for two years.  How come
nobody wants to go anywhere but here?  Why should we be the only ones
with Coke bottles and shoes on the mantel?  Where are the other
parents?  What are they doing?"

Yawning, I said, "Probably sitting around in their uncluttered houses
saying, 'What is all this talk about the problems of adolescents?  I
don't find them any trouble at all.'"

Anne burst in and said, "Do you care if Carol smokes?"

"I don't care if she bursts into flame," Don said.

"Very funny," Anne said witheringly, "and _very old_."  Taking our only
package of cigarettes she went out, slamming the door.

"Never mind," I said to Don, "someday they will marry and leave home."

"Are you sure?" Don said, as he sadly sorted over the butts on his
ashtray, finally selecting a pretty long one.  He examined it
critically for a minute or two then, with a sigh, struck a match and
lit it.




CHAPTER XVI

ONIONS IN THE STEW

I don't know why I ever entertained such a ridiculous idea, but it was
undoubtedly the fruit of misery and desperation--could even have been
nature's way of keeping me from becoming an alcoholic or cutting a main
artery or taking any other coward's way out.  As I remember, the dream
came to light first, the time I was called to school to learn that
Anne, who had almost finished three years of high school, had
accumulated exactly six and one third credits in required subjects.
All the others were cooking, sewing, basket weaving, leather punching,
mural painting and so on.  I didn't even know they had so many courses
for those "better with their hands," as the principal explained kindly.
I told him again about Anne's very high I.Q. and he said without
enthusiasm, "Yes, I've checked with her junior high school principal,
but the problem is that unless you want her to graduate with a
_certificate_ instead of a _diploma_ she will have to buckle down."
That night after dinner when we were having a discussion of Anne's
buckling down and Anne wasn't, Joan said finally, "Oh, why don't you
just send her to Opportunity School" (a local school for the retarded)
"that's where she belongs."

Anne said calmly, "I hate school.  I've always hated school.  I always
will hate school.  You'll never change me, so you might as well not
upset yourself trying."

"But, Andy," I said, "you won't be able to get into any college unless
you take science and languages and math."

"College!" Anne laughed derisively.  "I wouldn't go to college if you
slashed my wrists and beat me with a steel cable and cut off my
allowance.  I loathe school and I loathe all teachers."

"The feeling appears to be mutual," Don remarked dryly from behind
_Time_ magazine.

I said, "But, Andy, you don't know how different college is from high
school.  In college you're treated as an adult and the professors are
brilliant and stimulating and you realize for the first time the
importance of knowledge--the reason for studying."

Yawning elaborately, then inspecting her long red nails, Anne said,
"I'm sorry, Betty, but you are just wasting your time.  Anyway you seem
to forget that I've seen some college students.  Look at Evelyn Olwell.
She's a sophomore in college and she thinks Villa Lobos is a sport like
handball.  And Martha Jones--she's a junior in college and last summer
she told me her mother was 'alternating' her dress.  And Catherine
Morton--she's never read a book--not a single one--her family doesn't
even own a book and her mother and father are both college graduates."

After a time we reached a sort of agreement, or hard-eyed, shouted
compromise.  Anne would change her courses, go to summer school and
graduate with a _diploma_, but whether or not she went to college would
be her decision.

I had the dream next when Joan, who for two or three Sundays had been
singing at a local USO, suddenly decided that she was going to leave
school and sing with a band.  The first inkling Don and I had of this
splendid plan was when we went in to check on Anne and Joan who were in
town weekend baby-sitting with the two small children of a friend of
ours.  It was Sunday afternoon and we dropped by to see what time they
expected the parents and what time they wanted us to pick them up.

I remember the nice feeling of pride I had as I ran up the steps of the
Morrisons' house.  "Anne and Joan solicited this baby-sitting job all
by themselves," I told Don, who was morosely inspecting a broken
downspout.  "And I think it shows encouraging signs of maturity for
them to take care of two little children and stay in a house all by
themselves from Friday afternoon to Sunday night."

Stepping up on the porch railing so he could take a look at the eaves
trough, Don said, "We'll probably get a blast from Jim and Mary when
they get the grocery bill."

"The trouble with you is that you don't want to see any improvement in
the girls," I said crossly.

"Not at all," Don said, his chin on the roof.  "I just like to face
facts.  I'd better tell Jim this eaves trough is rotten."

I rang the doorbell.  There was no answer, but I thought I detected
giggling and scuffling from somewhere in the house.  Then Anne came to
the door, wearing a dishtowel tied low over her forehead like an Arab's
headdress.  She was flushed and nervous.  "How come you're so early?"
she asked, ungraciously barring the door.

"We came to visit," I said cheerfully.  "To see how you are getting
along."

"We're getting along all right," Anne said, trying to shut the door.

"Where's Joanie?" I asked.

"Oh, she's around," Anne said evasively.

"What do you mean," I said firmly, moving her out of the way and going
into the house.

"She's upstairs."

"Joanie," I called loudly.  "It's Mommy.  Where are you?"

"I'm up here," answered a muffled voice.

"You'd better not yell," Anne said.  "The baby's asleep.  Come out in
the kitchen and I'll make you a cup of coffee."

Patty, the Morrisons' four year old, came down the stairs, slowly one
step at a time.  The front of her dress was quite wet.

We all went out to the kitchen.  Patty settled herself in a chair by
the kitchen table with crayons and a coloring book.  Carefully choosing
a white crayon she announced companionably, "This is just the color
Joanie's hair is going to be when she finishes bleaching it!"

"You be quiet," Anne hissed at her.

"Why?" asked Patty, whose shoes were on the wrong feet.

"Because you promised," Anne said.

"I promised not to tell about your hair," Patty said.  "I didn't
promise about Joan's."

I got up, walked over to Anne and jerked the dishtowel off her hair.
She stood paralyzed, the coffee pot in one hand, the can of coffee in
the other.  Her hair exploded from under the dishtowel like a deep old
rose chrysanthemum.

"Anne MacDonald," I shrieked.  "What have you done?"

She began to cry, using the dishtowel as a handkerchief.  Through her
tears and the dishtowel, she said finally, "Well, Joan thought that her
hair would look better platinum if she was going to sing with a band
and so she bought a bottle of triple-strength peroxide and we both
tried it and if you think I look awful just wait till you see Joan."

Then Joan appeared pale and trembling.  Her head was swathed in a
bathtowel.  I told her the jig was up and jerked off the towel.  Her
normally ash-blond hair was the bright egg-yolk yellow of highway signs.

"We don't know what to do?" Anne sobbed.  "We can't go to school like
this."

"You could have your heads shaved," Don suggested helpfully.

"Or you can let it grow out," I added heartlessly.  "It will take at
least six months."

"It's all Joan's fault," Anne said.  "She's the one that wanted to sing
with a band."

"You're a double-crosser," Joan yelled.  "You're the very one that told
me to bleach my hair."

"But you bought the peroxide," Anne screamed.

"Only because you didn't have any money," Joan shrieked.

Don and I tiptoed out.  The girls were so busy fighting they didn't
even notice.  When we got out to the car we found Patty with us.  She
said, "I'm going for a ride with you."

I said, "No, dear, you're going to stay with Anne and Joan.  Run in the
house and tell them we'll pick them up at six o'clock."  We waited
until we heard the front door close.

When we retrieved the girls about six, Anne's hair was a pinkish brown
and Joan's a yellowish brown.  "Don't we look keen?" Joan asked
cheerfully as she squeezed past me into the back seat.

"Watch what you're doing with that suitcase," I said irritably as she
dragged it past my ear and clunked it down on Anne's foot.

"Ouch," Anne shrieked.  "You clumsy dope!"

"Don't call me a dope," Joan said calmly.  "Remember I'm the one that
figured out how to fix our hair."

"What did you do?" I asked, turning around and taking a closer look at
their dusty rose and ochre heads.

"I went up to the drugstore and bought a bottle of light brown dye,"
Joan said proudly.  "I dyed Anne's hair and she did mine.  Don't we
look keen?"

I said, "You don't look keen, but you don't look quite as awful as you
did."

Joan said, "Gosh, you're crabby.  I'll certainly be glad when I leave
home.  Everybody in this family is a big crab."

"Where are you going and when?" Don asked.

"Joe Charteris told me that if I quit school I could travel with his
band and I'm going to," Joan said.

I said firmly, loudly, "You're not going _anywhere_ and you are _not_
going to sing at that USO any more."

"Okay," Joan said cheerfully, "but you don't have to get so worked up.
Let's get Chinese food."

"Oh, please, Mommy," Anne said.  "Let's go to Won Ton's."

"What about your hair?" Don asked.

"Oh, the Chinese don't care about our hair, anyway we brought our
dishtowels," Anne said.

"I won't take you any place in those hideous dishtowels," I said.

"Oh, Betty, do you have to be so disagreeable all the time," both girls
said, sighing.  "You never say a civil word any more."

So we went to Won Ton's and while the girls argued about what they were
going to have and Don intently studied the Chinese side of the menu, I
lapsed into this familiar soothing daydream.  It was Anne's eighteenth
birthday and her presents were heaped by her place at the breakfast
table, and Don and Joan and I were in the kitchen waiting for her to
come downstairs.  Then she appeared, my little girl, my own dear little
serious-eyed Anne, all soft and sweet and loving, kissed us all,
including Joan (this part of the picture was really far-fetched), and
said, an amused smile tugging at the corners of her mouth, "Well, Betty
and Don, you can start living again.  One of us is out of adolescence."
The dream faded as Don announced happily, as he always does, that he
thought he'd just have the pressed duck and the waiter said as he
always does, "Press dock take two day.  Have to odah day befoh."

It was the night before Anne's nineteenth (I had adjusted my dream a
little--after all there is no point in being just plain ridiculous)
birthday, but as I sat on our bed wrapping her presents, a white
cashmere cardigan, an album of Bidu Sayao and a triple strand of pearls
(Japanese), I had an unhappy presentiment, bordering on certain
knowledge that there wasn't going to be any Santa Claus.  The morning
of the birthday confirmed it.  Anne and Joan had a furious quarrel over
who was going to get the car before they even got out of bed.  When she
finally came shuffling down to breakfast with a bad case of hay fever,
Anne tripped over Tudor who was lying in the kitchen doorway and when
she kicked him "with only my soft old bedroom slipper" he nipped her
ankle and Don heartlessly refused to drive her into Seattle for rabies
shots and so she stamped upstairs without opening her presents.

Oh, well, she had graduated from high school and she did have a job in
the advertising department of a large department store, even if the
only apparent changes wrought by her new adult status were that she
wore what she termed "high style" clothes (Don said she could call them
what she liked but they looked to him like Halloween costumes), more
and heavier perfume and eyeshadow in the daytime.  However, she didn't
seem to actively dislike Don and me as much as formerly.  She still
treated us like lepers, but good old lepers.  The faithful
non-irritating kind, who are so dumb they don't know they don't know
_anything_.  Her attitude toward Joan was that of a high caste Hindu
forced to associate with an untouchable.  Her friends were all models.
She went steady with a boy Don referred to as "that sneaky Bradley."

Joan was a senior in high school.  When she wasn't fighting with Anne
over clothes or the car, she was going to sorority meetings which were
every night in the week at our house, and going steady.  Going steady
meant that there were always two pairs of shoes on the mantel and twice
as many Coke bottles under the couch.  Joan didn't treat Don and me
like anything, because we still weren't anything--just "she" and "oh
him."

Then it was Joan's eighteenth birthday and I was sitting on my bed
wrapping presents--a pink cashmere cardigan, two new petticoats and a
single strand of pearls (Japanese).  (_Nobody_ wears triple strands of
pearls any more--because they're corny that's why.)  It was July and
Joan had her steady spending the summer with us because she felt so
sorry for him because she didn't love him, I was taking care of my
sister Alison's three- and five-year-old boys because she was expecting
a baby and Anne was in Seattle sharing an apartment with another girl
and "living my own life at last" which seemed to us lepers to consist
of drinking beer and not paying her bills.  The morning of Joanie's
birthday was cool and gray with rolls of dark clouds billowing in from
the south, like smoke from a locomotive.

Joan was glum when she came downstairs.  Before she opened her presents
she looked morbidly out the window and sighed, "Rain again.  What a
horrible summer."  Darsie and Bard, very excited about the birthday and
the presents they had "choosed" and wrapped at five-forty-five that
morning using one whole roll of Scotch tape and all my meagre supply of
self-control, hopped around her saying, "Open your presents, Joanie.
Mine smells good.  That's it, there--open it."  Joanie opened her
presents one by one, kissing Don, the children, me and Steady who
unfortunately had also bought pearls, then she took the cap off a Coke,
grabbed a handful of fudge and shuffled sadly off to the living room to
exercise her birthday prerogative of no work.

Then Joan was in college living at her sorority house but coming home
quite often because she was "starving to death."  College had wrought
no appreciable change in anything except her laugh which was now a
bleat accompanied by a wide open mouth and tightly squinted eyes.  Her
best friends all laughed the same way.  It seemed to be something they
were teaching at the university that year.  Don and I thought the new
laugh very unattractive and one day I tactlessly said so.  Joan blew up
like a defective hot water tank.  "I can't do _anything_ right," she
shrieked.  "You don't like my hair, you don't like my clothes, you
don't like my friends, you don't like the way I drive.  The real
trouble of course is that you haven't any sense of humor and you're
terribly neurotic."  She and her friends slammed out of the house--then
slammed back in for two quarts of garlic dill pickles and a large
bundle of ham sandwiches they had made earlier.

Stifling a strong unmotherly desire to pick up the refrigerator and
hurl it after them, I poured myself a cup of coffee, sat down at the
kitchen table and lit a cigarette.  What was wrong?  Where had I
failed?  Were all adolescents like Anne and Joan?  What had happened to
our happy home?  Who had erected this great big spiky impenetrable wall
between us and our children?  Would it always be like this?  Would
things be like this if we hadn't moved to the country?  It was Saturday
and I hadn't vacuumed the living room or thrown out the dead flowers or
changed the sheets on the bunkroom beds and I didn't care.  All I
wanted to do was to throw myself face down on the brick floor, beat my
heels and scream.  After two cigarettes I reached down beside me and
listlessly picked up the eighty-third book I had bought on Handling the
Adolescent.  Without any enthusiasm at all I opened it.  It would
probably be written in the usual, "I'm reaching way down there from
clear up here to hand you this crumb" vein and would undoubtedly go on
and on and on about the glandular change in the pitiful body of the
poor little misunderstood, maladjusted adolescent.  I knew all this and
I was tired of it.  What I wanted was a magic formula, a charm, or a
voodoo chant to help me cast out devils and restore my daughters to
normal.

Then something caught my eye--something about this doctor's sympathies
being with the _parents_.  I put on my glasses.  An hour later I still
hadn't vacuumed or thrown out the dead flowers, but I had certainly
cheered up.  This Dr. Wilburforce was wonderful!  He sounded as if he
had had adolescent children.  He said that adolescence was a difficult
period but entirely normal and his sympathies were with the parents,
not the adolescent.  He said that there was entirely too much
"understanding," actually excusing of the adolescent, his lack of
manners, selfishness, tantrums and so on.  He thought that the most
intelligent approach to the problem was to understand that the
adolescent, just by the nature of the beast, is going to chafe and
rebel and _he needs something specific to chafe and rebel against_.
Lay down strict rules of behavior and enforce them.  Rebelling against
nothing is very frustrating.  Demand that the adolescent go along with
the family routine.  Do not allow him to keep the household in a
continual uproar.  If he were away at school such actions would not be
tolerated.  Why are they at home?  He said there was entirely too much
talk about "giving an adolescent his head."  He said that this was
actually merely the shifting of the responsibility from the parent to
the child, because anybody knows that giving a sixteen year old his
head is like handing him a squash.  Instead of giving your child too
much freedom, too much money and all the responsibility for his
actions, try giving him limited freedom and money, a strict code of
behavior and oceans and gallons and mountains of love.  Not the
deep-hidden-river I-bore-you-so-I-will-have-to-like-you type of love,
but the visible, hug-and-kiss, lavish-compliment, interested-audience
kind.  Tell your adolescent he is brilliant, handsome, charming, witty
and lovable.  Tell him every day.  Tell him even when you are taking
away the keys of the car and would like to kick him.  Assure him and
reassure him and re-reassure him.  Love is the _most important_ element
in human relationships.  You can never give a child too much love.

I began to hum a little.  After a time I heard a car door slam.  I
jumped up guiltily.  I had almost forgotten that Anne and a model
friend were coming for the weekend.  I put the kettle on for a fresh
pot of coffee, brushed some toast crumbs off the table with Dr.
Wilburforce and went out to give Anne love.

Her appearance set me back just a little.  From the tone of his book I
was quite sure that Dr. Wilburforce had been speaking of ordinary
adolescents.  Girls in sweaters and skirts and saddle shoes.  Anne was
wearing a charcoal-gray _costume_, spats, a black-and-white-checked
man's cap and about twenty pounds of pearls.  I could smell her perfume
clear from the kitchen door to the wild cherry tree.  The model, who
had such little hips I didn't see how she was going to sit on them, was
all in black and heavy gold jewelry.  I was pretty sure I was going to
catch hell about my blue jeans (Vashon grocery store) and white blouse
(Sears, Roebuck).  "Really, Betty, you _are_ getting older--you do have
other clothes," and so on, and so on, and so on.  I could feel the old
familiar defensive wariness take over as I kissed Anne and said, "I'm
just going to make fresh coffee."

Anne said, "It's wonderful to be home.  It smells so good over here on
the island."

The model said, "No wonder you rave about this house so much, it's
dreamy."

Putting down her suitcase, taking off her man's cap and getting out a
long black cigarette holder into which she carefully inserted one of my
cigarettes, Anne said, "I love it here on the island.  Being here gives
me a different perspective.  The right things are important over here."
She smiled at me and then said briskly, to hide her moment of weakness,
"Here, you sit down and I'll make the coffee."

I did sit down, with a thump of astonishment, opposite the model who
smiled at me with her lips pulled out at the corners and her teeth all
touching each other.  She was very very pretty with the impersonal
perfection of a Swedish crystal pitcher.  I said, "You are certainly
pretty, Rene."

She said, "Thanks, but I don't think black does much for me.  I like
black, I think it's real chic, but white's really my color."

Anne, who was pouring the coffee, said, "As soon as we drink our
coffee, let's put on our jeans."

Rene said, "I didn't bring jeans, honey, I can't get them small enough
around the waist, my waist is only nineteen inches, but I brought my
leopard skin slacks.  Gee, they're dreamy.  Shall I go put them on now?"

"Yes, do," Anne said, winking at me.  "They sound terribly smart."

After Rene had taken her suitcase upstairs, Anne said, "I realize that
Rene's brain is the size of a proton, but I feel sorry for her--she's
really very sweet and her husband beats her to a pulp practically every
half hour.  She is always coming to work in dark glasses to cover a
black eye or in high collars to cover finger marks on her neck."

"Why does he beat her--is he insane?"

"Oh, no, just jealous and a drunk.  Last week he blacked both her eyes
and cracked a couple of ribs so she moved in with Janet and me.  As she
brought at least $150,000 worth of clothes, her husband may have some
reason for his jealousy.  Anyway she lets me borrow anything I want and
she's a wonderful cook."

As we drank our coffee Anne asked me about Joan and I told her and even
though I was all braced and ready for the usual "_Why_ won't you
realize Joan and I are grown up, _why_ do you always nag?" it wasn't
forthcoming.  Instead, Anne said, "Poor Mommy.  Never mind, she'll grow
out of it.  I did and nobody in the entire universe was ever such a
revolting adolescent."  I guess I must have lost consciousness for a
moment or two because, when I came to, Anne and Rene in her leopard
skin slacks were saying, "We've got to do something about your hair,
Betty.  The way you're wearing it isn't smart at all."  They both had
their hair peeled back from their faces and pinned with huge gold
barrettes.  I wore my hair in a medium bob with bangs.  After surveying
me for a while from all angles through squinted eyes and a cloud of
cigarette smoke, they decided I should wear my hair skinned up into a
sort of whale spout on top of my head, secured with the red elastic
band from the stalk of celery on the drain-board.  When they had
finished with me and I was very wet around the shoulders and felt as
though my eyebrows were up by my hairline, Anne said, "Now, you look
smart."  Rene said, "God, you're a doll, Mrs. MacDonald."

I went into the lavatory off the kitchen and looked in the spattered
mirror of the medicine cabinet.  I finally decided that the light must
be wrong.  When I came back into the kitchen, Anne said, "You don't
like it, I can tell."  She laughed, took off the elastic and combed my
hair back into its normal do.  Sunday night, as I kissed Anne goodbye,
I realized that her adolescence really was over, that she was an adult.
What is more important I felt I had a new friend.  One who was witty,
intelligent, loving, beautiful and _liked_ me.  My little Anne, my
serious-eyed little girl whom I had mourned and longed to bring back,
was gone as surely as yesterday's rainbow, but I was really happier
with my new friend.  The heavy perfume, high style clothes, eyeshadow
in the daytime that had been major irritations in my little girl, were
now just the small lovable eccentricities of a friend.

The following summer Joan got a job as a saleslady in an exclusive
dress shop.  The sorority laugh was gone, but she began wearing high
style clothes and the haunted look of the bill-ower.  However, she was
a tiny bit of fun sometimes and, anyway, Don and I had Anne to help us
understand her.  In January Anne was married--not to Sneaky
Bradley--and during the hectic preparations for the wedding, Joan
suddenly emerged as an easygoing witty slapdash affectionate
sympathetic adult.  Now they are both married and each has three
babies.  They are loving wives, marvelous mothers, divine cooks and
excellent housekeepers.  Don and I are very proud of them, but, more
important, they _like_ us.  Their husbands _like_ us.  We are
_friends_.  Sometimes we are such good friends I get all six of the
babies--the oldest is four--but I love it and it is awfully good for my
figure.  You see, I wear the high style clothes now.  Maternity clothes
are about the lowest style there is.

Some lines from Vachel Lindsay keep coming back to me:

  Gone were the skull-faced witch men lean....
  'Twas a land transfigured, 'twas a new creation....
  And on through the blackwoods clearing flew:
    "Mumbo-Jumbo is dead in the jungle,
  Never again will he hoo-doo you.  Never again will he hoo-doo you."


Though Anne and Joan are grown up and Don and I are in our forties and
grandparents six times over, Vashon Island hasn't changed a great deal.
There are a few more Halvorsen Houses, a few roadside signs (supposedly
not allowed), quite a few Cadillacs and foreign cars in town on
Saturdays, the movie theatre has changed hands three or four times, the
Falcon's Nest burned down, there were two houses for rent on this beach
this summer, there is talk of a floating bridge to the mainland, the
telephone service is a tiny bit better even though we still have
fourteen people on our line, and the electricity rates are much higher
with only about five minutes between the first bill and the shutoff
notice.  Ordinary living--eating, sleeping, keeping warm--is somewhat
easier than it used to be, but still has little in common with urban
life.  We continue to have summers that can be distinguished from
winter only by looking at the calendar.

Life is always a struggle, but on an island you at least have a feeling
of having entered into personal, physical combat with it.  Today for
instance.  Every once in a while I put on my old beach coat and slog
down the path to look at our sea wall being so mercilessly hammered by
the waves, many of them unfairly armed with logs which they use like
battering rams.  I can't do anything but pick up an occasional clam
tossed into the geraniums near the greenhouse, watch the spray being
flung fifty feet into the air and move the picnic table and benches a
little farther back from the edge.  But if the sea wall does come
through this storm unscathed, and I'm sure it will, I will experience a
great feeling of personal accomplishment, of having won another round
in our battle with the elements.  This is not just a peculiarity of
mine.  Don has it, too, and I have heard other island-dwellers speak of
"bringing her through another winter" as if they had stood in front of
their houses and personally defended them from the rain, the logs, the
forests and the waves.

Perhaps this is one of the reasons why people, even ones who have had
their houses pushed into the Sound by slides, remain here on Vashon, to
take the same chance again.  Of course another reason is the feeling we
islanders have that living in a hot apartment taking vitamin pills
instead of sunshine is pitifully like a broiler chicken in a battery.
There is also our dismay at the tenor of city life where parties are
business obligations and most of the people on the street look as if
they were wearing shoulder holsters.  Then of course we island-dwellers
get our papers a day late and when we snap open our morning
_Post-Intelligencers_ the droughts, killings, floods, lynchings, rapes,
dope smuggling to teen-agers, and avalanches are a day old.  A day-old
avalanche is still an avalanche but it isn't as bad as a fresh one--at
least we Vashon islanders are already a little used to it.  Even
communism can't hold its own on Vashon because practically everything
over here is subversive, i.e., "having a tendency to overthrow, upset
or destroy."  Puget Sound spends every winter trying to batter down our
sea walls and reclaim the land.  The rain tries to push us down where
the Sound can get at us easier.  Old logs lie hidden like unexploded
bombs on the hills above us waiting for enough rain so they can come
charging down and flick our houses off the beach like ashes off a
cigarette.  The ferry crews go on strike.  The ferries run aground,
leave five minutes early or knock down the dolphins.  Even our rats,
brought in years ago by a grocery boat, have become so dedicated to the
cause of overthrowing, upsetting and destroying that when gnawing from
within seems to be getting them nowhere, instead of being sensible and
writing a book or going to the FBI with a list of all the other rats
who have been gnawing with them, they crawl into the walls and die.

Of course there have been times when I have wondered if we did do the
right thing in moving to an island.  If it was fair to Anne and Joan.
If it was fair to me.  Once I asked Don and he said:

"Guiding children through adolescence is no joyride no matter where you
live.  At least here on Vashon we had something to take our minds off
it.  Fun things such as sawing wood or cleaning out the storm sewers."

Then I foolishly said, "And how do you think it has been for us?  For
instance, how do you think I compare to other women my age?"

Giving me a long, fond husbandly look, Don said, "Well, you don't look
as tired as you did yesterday."




[End of Onions in the Stew, by Betty MacDonald]
