Best friends

Debbie and I were born four days apart and lived four houses away from each other. My older sisters played with her older sisters. We were best friends from the beginning.

On Saturday mornings, we walked downtown together. We headed straight for the pet department downstairs at Grant's and endlessly debated which of the fish was most beautiful. Then it was on to the paper dolls or to spend our precious allowance in the candy department there or at Green's Drugstore.

We loved our cats. Hers was Pandora--Pandy--a pretty, soft tuxedo cat who once gave birth to a litter of kittens on the skirt of Debbie's nightgown. Mine was a calico named Chi-Chi, who I found in the woods when she was just a few weeks old and nursed with a doll's bottle. We each had a slider turtle in a plastic dish with a plastic palm tree on our dresser, and we both had a rabbit. Together, we established a cemetery for the occasional dead bird or other critter we would find.

Debbie and I also had matching Suzette dolls. Suzette was a fashion doll like Barbie, but her figure was a bit less improbable. We would make clothes with scraps from Debbie's mother's sewing and enact great dramas. Debbie also had an elaborate set of plastic molded farm figures and structures she loved, and we would set them up on a chilly little enclosed porch at her house to play on rainy days. We had a sleepover every Friday night, alternating homes, and watch our favorite TV shows, which included “The Flintstones” and “77 Sunset Strip” (Kookie couldn't comb his hair enough!).

Another TV show, “The Roaring 20's,” inspired us to learn the Charleston, force our moms to make us flapper dresses, and sing and dance our way through a year or so. My lovely Aunt Marion invited us to give a memorable performance to her “girls night out” group from Dupont at a restaurant I think was named Lanza's. I was always a bit of a ham, but looking back, I am surprised that the shy Debbie was willing to do it.

Each May, Debbie's German grandparents arrived from New Jersey to help out during Memorial Season. Debbie's father owned a monument company—he made gravestones—and every family wanted their loved one's plot marked in time for Memorial Day. Both of her parents worked almost around the clock to make it happen; when they were at home, everyone was expected to be very quiet. But there was an upside. Grandmother Grund made the most amazing potato doughnuts. Grandfather loved to garden and would let us help him prepare the ground and plant seeds. I don't think either of them spoke English, but I always looked forward to their visits.

When I started junior high, Debbie and I went to the same school for the first time. We walked to school together every day, were in the same classes, and made the same friends. But junior high is a cruel time. Our friendship shattered, never to be revived in meaningful fashion.

Making Music

Walking across the yard, the breeze blowing crisp. My corduroys singing jjoop jjoop with every step . . . jjoop jjoop . .  Making up words to accompany this newfound music.  Red corduroys with flannel lining to go with my red orthopedic oxfords and red plaid flannel shirt.  Headed next door to see Mrs. Paul, who is teaching me to knit.  Her house smells like heaven, always, like cookies fresh from the oven.  I head home . . . jjoop jjoop . . . singing about the peanut butter cookies in my pocket.

Leaves, Glorious Leaves!

Trash removal has come a long way since the 1950s.  We had never heard of trash bags. As I recall, each household was allowed to put out only two galvanized cans of trash a week—hardly enough the accommodate the waste of a family of eight.  So we segregated stuff that burned, and my brother Dick did away with it in an outdoor incinerator. Food scraps and other garbage went in a pail that sat in a buried can with a heavy steel cover, its contents picked up periodically to use in the making of pig slop—and yes, there were still plenty of farms and pigs around Leominster in those days.  Grass clippings went into a heap to rot.  Not a compost heap, just a heap.

That left the only joyful activity in the trash cycle:  Leaves.  All during the fall, we would rake them from time to time and heap them under a tarp so they wouldn’t blow away. 

Then the great leaf removal weekend came, one of my favorite times of the year.

On the appointed weekend, we would rake all day Saturday, pushing the leaves near the curb.  After church on Sunday, everyone on the block would rake their leaves into the middle of the street, and that’s when the fun began.  Imagine:  an entire block stacked with layer upon glorious layer of leaves!  It was a kids’ paradise.  For an hour or two, we would run through them, throw them, and bury ourselves in them, having a fabulous time while stuffing our shoes, underwear, and orifices with leaf meal. 

Then the fire truck would come.  As it stood at the ready to take care of any mishaps, the masses of leaves were carefully burned, creating beautiful flames and great clouds of perfumed smoke that infused the neighborhood for days.  Air pollution?  We had never heard the term! 

I doubt that I will ever see a mass leaf burn again, and more’s the pity.