1950s SMALL TOWN LIFE: BIRTHDAY GIRL

Today was the first day of summer. Susan told me so. It was also my birthday, and I was excited because it was the first time and probably the last time I would get to celebrate it in California and Mexico. Daddy was taking us out to eat tonight in Mexicali, across the border. I hoped to find an excuse to count to ten.....in Spanish, of course, during the course of the evening.
Mother was already cooking the poundcake; Jan was helping her, primarily so she could have first dibs on licking the beater. We would put strawberries and whipped cream on it this evening after supper when they sang Happy Birthday and gave me my present. We were having the Whites over this afternoon just for cupcakes and games. Vance had whispered to me yesterday that he and Andy bought me a present. I didn't expect much if Vance had anything to do with it.

Birthdays were always a family event, but not overdone. Sometimes we had parties and invited other kids, but not every year. Sometimes Susan and I had a joint birthday since our birthdays were only ten days apart.

I was a snooper. I usually found things, like presents, before special events, but even though we were in this tiny house with very few hiding places, I hadn't found anything. I had looked in all the built-in dresser drawers except the one Jan slept in, and I had found nothing.

No area was really off-limits in our house in Purdon, except a few drawers in Mother and Daddy's room. We all pretty much knew to stay out of the top drawers of the wide blonde dresser they shared. I still wanted to know what was in those drawers, but there had never been adequate time and opportunity to explore them when no one was around. There was always someone around in our house. I wondered if Neila would go through them with us gone since she'd probably have a lot of time to herself.

She wasn't nosy like me, though. I searched for things because I wanted to know what I was getting for Christmas and birthday, but more than that I sneaked around because finding out things relieved my anxiety. I worried about a lot of things. Mother told me I was a worrier like my dad, and she didn't mean it as a compliment.

For instance, if I were worried that Mother was going to go on a trip
without us (which we hardly allowed), I might start looking for a bus or train ticket. I had only seen one, and that was when she went to White Sands, New Mexico where Daddy was working in the off-season for ginning.

Finding the ticket could increase my anxiety, or it could decrease it. Finding it might give me immediate relief because now I knew the answer. But if it meant that Mother was leaving us, even for a day, I started worrying about that, so I had a new worry to replace the old. It was a difficult and troublesome existence for a five-year-old.

In our family, this unusual behavior had to be closely guarded; it was mine alone to figure out, nurture, or dispose of. If anyone saw me searching in such a frantic manner, they probably would not realize that my anxiety level was extremely high.

My brothers would have made fun of me or laughed it off if I had let them in on my secret. Susan would have found a book about it and told me what it was and how to overcome it. Jan was too young to understand although sometimes I enlisted her to help me snoop, but only a little, because she would tell.

Neila was the only one who might understand, but I didn't have the words to explain it. Anyway, she was too busy with all the activities of high school. Daddy was the wage earner, and he was not to be told about emotional issues. He just had no head for that. And Mother just wouldn't understand either. She never worried, never.
"Que sera, sera," she often sang, doing her best Doris Day impression. "Whatever will be, will be."
Neila said one time that Mother was Cleoopatra, the Queen of De Nile. I thought Mother seemed like a lovely queen, but I didn't know what the other part was, what Neila thought she was queen of. For me, queen of our family was enough for now. But once I heard Neila and Elton say mother was IN denial. I still couldn't figure out what they meant, and when I asked, they just told me I was too young to know.

Life was so busy we just had to keep moving. And my snooping and its obsessive origins had to remain covert. I couldn't risk the ridicule, especially from my brothers. It's not that they meant to be mean; they were just obtusely insensitive at times. I could never explain it to them. My older brother Elton had started acting a lot nicer to me now that Deanna was his girlfriend. I hoped she'd be a good influence on him. I loved it when he paid attention to me; I just didn't see him much right now between his dating and working at the gin and helping Nettie with her cows.

Well, either I wasn't getting a gift because they spent so much on the train tickets, or it was a very small gift. I had overheard my parents talking about the cost of the train tickets. Mother's had cost more than $80, while Susan and my tickets added together cost the same as Mother's. Jan rode for free. They didn't seem overly concerned, just discussing it like they talked about what they spent on groceries, the tone of their voices not hushed or strained as it sometimes was when they discussed money.

I couldn't think of anything I wanted that was small. Not one thing.

Deciding to go outside, I passed through the kitchen where Mother and Jan were putting the batter into a metal pan. Out the back door I went. I tried, but it wouldn't slam. It was too lightweight.

Just as I got outside, I saw a girl a little older than me near the laundry building.
"Hey, watch out. They killed a snake in there," I called. I didn't really want to say my mother did it because she was more of a city girl, and I didn't know how she'd feel about a mother who killed things, even snakes.
"Oh?" she said. "When?" She was holding a nice bunch of purple grapes, picking them off one at a time, studying them, and popping them in her mouth.
"Last week."
"Hmmm. You live here?"
"Yeah."
"Why?"
"We're just living here for the summer while my dad works in Mexicali."
"Oh."
"Where do you live?" I asked.
"Just up the street on Montalvo."
"Do you go to school here?"
"Yeah, I'm in third grade."
"Do you go to church here?"
"Yeah, I'm Catholic. We attend St. Mary's Church."
I suddenly felt very immature, naive, and incapable of asking her anything else. I had no idea what a Catholic was. I had no idea what they did in their dark churches and cathedrals or what they believed, although I did know what a nun was. I liked the black and white uniforms they wore, and most of them seemed kind, if stern.
The nuns didn't have children, so I thought right then I was glad my mother had not become a nun. I didn't think she had ever been a Catholic. I had seen priests on television, mostly in the westerns my dad favored. But I'd never seen one for real.

I kicked the gravel a little with the toe of my tennis shoe. She continued eating her grapes.
When she finished, she said "Well, I need to go home now."
"Okay," I said. I thought about inviting her to my birthday party, but it would be crowded with us and Andy, Vance and their mother.

I watched her long shimmering blonde hair swing side to side as she ran off down the street. I wondered if all Catholics ate grapes and then drank grapejuice when they got older. I'd just never known a Catholic before. She seemed mysterious and sophisticated to me, eating those grapes that way.
Everybody in Purdon was Baptist, Pentecostal, or Unknown, meaning they didn't go to church. It wasn't that we didn't allow Catholics. They just didn't move there. Maybe because we had no Catholic church for them. And just about everybody in Purdon, if you asked them, claimed some religion, but not Catholic.

I forgot the girl that evening as we crossed the border in our car and went to eat Mexican food at a Mexican restaurant in a Mexican town. I just loved saying this because of the repetition. Susan and I said it over and over and over all the way from the motel to the border when Daddy found a reason to stop us. He pretended he needed to say something to the border guard.
"Girls, be quiet here for a minute," he said, motioning with his hand toward us in the backseat.
Jan was standing in the front seat looking back at us.
"Guls, be kite," she said, putting one finger to her lips.
"Where's the border?" I asked.

"This is it," Daddy said, as we passed a little booth with a man in a uniform inside. Daddy waved, and the man waved him through.

Susan and I started up on our repetitive phrase again, but only for a second before Daddy shushed us. He didn't seem as nice about it this time, so we knew we needed to be quiet.
We drove a few blocks, turned a time or two, and there was the restaurant.
Two beautiful little children stood outside the door and begged for money as we went in. Mother dug in her purse. I hadn't ever seen children out by themselves at night. The boy looked a little older than me, but the little girl appeared to be only Jan's age.

"You need to go home. It's too late for you to be out here," she said, gently handing them some dollar bills.

The questions were forming, but Mother waved them away when we got inside. She knew we'd have to talk, not because she wanted to, but because I would obsess over it and ask her questions over and over until she had no choice but to answer some of them.

"Let's just enjoy our evening," she said to me in a way that let me know my questions would have to wait.

Daddy seemed to know several of the people who worked in the restaurant because he had been there to eat on numerous occasions with some of his friends from work. The staff were extra friendly and made a lot of fuss over all of us.

"Que bonita!" they said about Jan. Her blonde hair and blue eyes set her in stark contrast to most of the people on this side of the border.

They used their English on Susan and I. Several spoke fluent English, and those who only knew a little tried to ask us simple questions like, "Oh, you like California? You like Mexico?"
We said "yes", "yes", while I tried desperately to think of a way I could answer with "uno" or "dos". They would be mightily impressed, I imagined. A girl just turning six years old today and speaking Spanish.
The waitress brought us cokes.
"Don't drink the water," Daddy said quietly.
She brought us menus. Now was my chance.
"Uno for me," I said in my most polite voice.
"Oh, thees one know Spanish," she said.
Daddy laughed. "Thees one is trying to show off, I think."
It was dark inside, or at least it had a dark look, almost elegant, but the walls were painted a bright turquoise blue.
I hated turquoise since last year when Mother froze the turquoise and pink clown that had been on my birthday cake when I was four. It stayed in the freezer for several months, and on a day when I craved sugar, I climbed up on a chair, opened the freezer door and got it out. I took one taste and gagged.

It tasted like the ice that came off freezer coils, only with a sickening whang. So disappointed was I with the taste of what I got, in contrast to the taste I was expecting, that I immediately slammed the freezer door, let my upper body fall toward the sink, caught myself with both palms, and leaning over it spat all of the awful tasting sugary mess into the basin. Most of the clown's face fell out on the first "spit", but looking down into that pristine white iron sink, I saw that I was still drooling in the vivid turquoise color of the cake decoration.

Looking at it made me feel very sick, and I started spitting real fast until the whole clown lay on the white porcelain, melted and pathetic. His happy smile slid away into the drain, and I reached and turned on the faucet to wash away the rest of the foul mess. I tried not to look much at the walls because I was afraid I'd start gagging thinking of the clown and the way it tasted. I focused instead on the black iron sconces with their cylindrical amber glass covers.

We ate tamales, soft tortillas, enchiladas and rice and beans. We washed it down with sodas and enjoyed ourselves immensely listening to the odd-sounding conversation around us, trying to identify any word we knew. The staff came out and sang "Feliz Cumpleanos a Ti" to me with the same tune as "Happy Birthday to You".

On the way home, I thought about my present. I was beginning to wonder if I would get anything. Everyone was mum about it. After cake for everyone and another round of singing, Mother disappeared into their bedroom and came back into the room. She took a tiny gaily wrapped box out of her pocket and handed it to me. I peeled the paper slowly back and opened the box to find a beautiful purple agate birthstone ring. It fit perfectly on my finger. I felt a burst of joy and hugged each one of them individually.

The day was over, but it had been filled with new and unusual experiences. Wait till I told the kids at school next year that I spent my birthday in Mexico. That night I didn't kick Susan for territory. I fell asleep running my thumb over and over my bright new silver ring and, presuming that I would never see the blonde girl I met this morning again, wondering how we could get some Catholics to move to Purdon.Installed

1950s SMALL TOWN LIFE: WHEN YOU DON'T OBEY ZOO RULES

We were frenetically excited.  Today all five of us were headed to the San Diego Zoo,about a two hour drive away.  We piled in the car, which, like the housemotel had air conditioning,(I had never been so cool so much of the time in the summer in my life), and started out north, eventually turning west on Highway 80 which led through the Cleveland National Forest and Cuyamaca Mountains along a road that scared me to death.  I could hardly make myself look out the back window although I thought it was dangerously beautiful looking down a thousand feet or so of cliff to the forest below. 

Daddy was a really good driver, but I had to give myself a reprieve every now and then and just lie down in the seat, staring at the floorboard to make my eyes stop spinning from looking down from such a height.

Jan had fallen asleep in the front seat.  Susan had looked once or twice out the window, then immersed herself in The Secret in the Old Attic.

My dad was smoking a cigarette and every so often stubbed out the butt in the ashtray.  The smell didn't bother me too much, but if the tobacco stench got very strong, I just opened the window, stuck my nose out, and breathed deeply.  My parents would usually have a reaction, like, "oh my gosh, did a kid fall out?", but they'd quickly recover when they saw I was only hanging my head out the window.

I had actually fallen out of the car once when I was about three.  My mother was driving, and there were four of us kids  in the backseat, arguing about where we wanted to sit.  I wanted to sit by the door and finally persuaded my brother to let me.  When I moved there, I suppose my knee bumped the long metal door handle, pushing it up and unlocking the door, which swung open as my mother turned a corner.

I rolled right out, propelled by the force of the turn.  A man in a white triangular hat, probably a service station attendant on that corner, rushed out and was standing over me, his kind and concerned face giving me immediate comfort.

I wasn't hurt at all, but it caused a great stir in the extended family, and my mother almost had a heart attack. 
After stopping the car abruptly, and telling all the other kids to stay in there, she jumped out and rushed back to see if I was hurt.  Then I started crying just from the shock and embarrassment of falling out, but I knew I hadn't been injured.

I was afraid I'd get in trouble for insisting on having my way.  That lecture came later that day from my dad, but never from  my grateful mother.  She just kept saying "Oh, you're okay. I'm so relieved. You're okay." as she huggged me and carried me back to the car where the other five kids were all looking out the windows.
They looked more worried than curious, a fact which gave me some measure of reassurance.  They loved me-yes, they did. I had no special place in the family, being neither the youngest nor the oldest, nor the smartest, most talented, or prettiest. I knew my parents loved me. They really didn't show any favoritism. But every now and then it felt good to have it affirmed--I was loved, even by my siblings.

My mother hated my father's smoking and dogged him about it even though she knew he had been smoking since he started high school.  She must have felt some moral compunction to make her objections known.  We wished she'd let it go.  All it did was start a disagreement if my dad chose to engage.  Usually he puffed away and ignored her comments.Sometimes, though, if he'd had a bad day at work, her words could start a flashfire. I wondered if the fact of his temper igniting so fast was related in any way to why people said he had a hot temper. Anyway, today was to be a fun day, so she didn't pester him about the smoking.

We took the main road all the way to Alpine when my father decided he wanted to take the scenic route on the little roads that ran here and there to even smaller communities than we had been passing through. Towns smaller than Purdon, even. That was okay with us because he had a finely honed sense of direction. He seemed to never get lost, no matter where we were,how big the city, or how rural the roads. He would just keep talking about where we were going and turning, and turning, and soon, we would be there, like magic.

My mother's sense of direction was as poor as his was fine. Neila had told me that once Mother had been trying to get home from a basketball game in Blooming Grove with a load of kids in the car and had turned and turned and turned and ended up in the middle of a cotton field. It was about 11 o'clock at night, and all the kids were scared as she spun and spun her tires trying to get out of the deep rich blackland soil of the cotton row, but Mother just laughed.

She told the kids that if she couldn't get the car out, they'd all just walk to Purdon, and some of them started whimpering saying they would be too scared. Mother gunned the motor, and all of a sudden they were bumping over the cotton stalks, dry bolls scratching the sides of the car like hands clawing from the grave, and most of the kids were now sitting at attention, their eyes wide open in terror.

Neila said some of them told their mothers, but the parents told them they shouldn't have been such sissies. For her part, Neila knew Mother was telling the truth. She would have hiked home or found a way to get them there safely. She didn't seem to be afraid of anything at all.

Daddy took a few twists and turns on little roads, maybe for about 20 miles until I got sick and had to stop on the side of the road to throw up. After that, he decided he'd get back on the main road. It was more of a straightaway, he said, glancing back at me.

Daddy said he was going to take a "sashay", to see a different part of San Diego away from the zoo, and we crossed a big bridge and we could see the bay. We thought the ocean was beautiful, but today wouldn't be a day for swimming or building sand castles. We would see lots of animals that we had never seen. All of us loved animals, and the Lord knew we had them everywhere around our house, our animals or someone else's, but we had never seen wild ones, at least not any from Africa.

Once inside the zoo, we wandered from exhibit to exhibit, looking in awe at the elephants and giraffes. The elephants stood in the middle of a large concrete expanse eating hay and drinking water.

"They say elephants never forget," my mother said.
"Yeah, but how much do they have to remember?" I asked, noting the bare accomodations and lack of toys.

Daddy was already checking out the food vendors. He'd buy anything we wanted to eat. We all knew that, so we started looking at what was available. As far as the food, it was somewhat like the Dallas Fair, but with fewer choices. They had corny dogs, hotdogs, and hamburgers, cotton candy, caramel apples, ice cream, and candy bars.

When it got hotter, after lunch, I knew I'd want some lemonade and ice cream. But for now, I'd stick with a hamburger and cotton candy. I felt fine after getting sick to my stomach earlier. Mother kept telling me I should go easy on food, but it was too tempting.

I ate everything I wanted. I shared a little with Jan; I'd give her little pieces of the cotton candy, but she was really messy and had it all over her face after two bites. Sticky, pink sugar mixed with spit was all around her mouth. Mother had to wet a tissue in the water fountain to clean her face off.

I liked seeing the big cats, but it bothered me some that they were in their little caves with such a tiny yard in which to move about. Our cats were a lot smaller, but they liked to roam everywhere, all around Purdon. They visited the Rogers, then the Bittners, and sometimes they showed up over at the gin, across the railroad track, where they chased rats as big as they were. I was sure these big cats would rather roam around in the jungle. I was still glad to get to see them up close though.

My favorite was the orangutans, though they acted so much like humans it was creepy. They watched us for a while, smiling, showing off by playing on the bars, just like I did at home.

Then one of them used the bathroom in half of an orange rind from which he had just eaten the orange pulp. I was just thinking what a great trick they had taught him, to keep things neater around their cage, when he picked the cup-shaped rind up, pulled his arm back like a major league pitcher winding up for a throw, and let it fly forward. Twenty or so people watching him backed up simultaneously, some of them stumbling over one another. A man stepped on my foot and didn't even say he was sorry.

The rind came straight ahead like a fastball and hit hard-the missile spread its contents all over a four foot area of the glass enclosure. People laughed nervously realizing the invisible glass panel had protected them and moved on to the next exhibit. The orangutan watched all of us, scratching under his arm and looking pleased with himself.

We were all very interested in what we would be viewing next. Susan, Jan and I moved closer to the cyclone wire of the enclosure to get a good look at the huge bird. His black iridescent plumage shone in the sunlight, and he looked with curiosity at all of us staring at him. He gazed into our eyes, his white-feathered head tilted at an angle, like he had a question to ask us.

Mother, ever inquisitive, had walked right up to the substantial metal fence and put her fingers around two of the strong wires that formed the thousands of little squares composing the structure.

Susan pointed up silently to a sign posted above our heads.
"What?" I asked, my pride not allowing me to remind her that I still couldn't read. I was holding Jan's hand, tighter now, as I sensed a warning in Susan's tone.

"DANGER! Keep away from fence. Do not touch," she said, just as the huge bird accelerated from standing still to a sixty mile an hour run in under three seconds. The three of us stood rigid, eyes wide, screams frozen in our throats, looking at our mother, bent into the fence, her face almost touching the rigid metal.

He made it to the fence, sticking his large beak through the square right where Mother's face had been a second earlier. His rapid movement and obvious attempt to bite Mother stunned us. She looked back at the bird from about four feet away where my dad had pulled her to safety by the shoulders.
"Wow," she panted. "I didn't know ostriches were that aggressive."
"Did you see the sign?" Susan asked.
I looked around. People were staring. I wanted to fold in upon myself and momentarily disappear. Mother didn't seem to notice the crowd.

"Well, I did, but I just thought it was meant to scare people, not that you could really get hurt. I guess I'll have to read the signs from here on out."

"Now Lib," my daddy said, laughing. "Tell the girls the truth. You never think the rules are for you. Just for everyone else. Remember when the policeman nearly arrested you for pulling a flower out of the landscaping at the Dallas Fair?"

"It was just one," Mother pouted, unrepentant. "And it was so pretty."

"Girls, let this be a lesson to you," Daddy's standard teaching phrase. "Follow the rules, and read the rules for yourself. Well, that is, as soon as you can all read."

It had been an exciting day, but we were getting tired. The last exhibit housed the rhinos. A crowd stood in front of the stucco wall observing the enormous beast while he chewed on some grasses and lazily observed us with one eye. He looked bored.

Apparently the animals had a clandestine code of ways to get even with humans. After what we saw at the rhino compound, I became convinced that the orangutans were behind the covert plan, their screams a secret animal Morse code.

The rhino started slowly moving and lumbered around in the most inauspicious way imaginable until he was "facing" the crowd with his rear end. There was a strange sound like a popping noise, then excrement shot from his bottom end like seltzer spraying out of a bottle. People started running, expressing disgust, and trying to get out of the way. We were just to the left of the foul stream, in a tight little knot, and we didn't get dirty, but the man next to us was not so lucky. He exhibited a pretty good attitude as he vainly tried to brush the goo off his khaki pants.

"Well, guess that's the end of our zoo visit," he said, a little too jauntily, I thought. "Time to go home. I didn't know rhinos could do that."

"Me either," I thought to myself. "Wonder if it had the same sort of sick stomach I had earlier today. Or maybe the orangutans just put him up to it."

"Where do you kids want to eat supper?" Daddy asked as we moved toward the zoo exit.Installed

1950s SMALL TOWN LIFE: MEAN KIDS LIVE IN CALIFORNIA, TOO

Mother liked activity.  If anyone mentioned go, Mother jumped in the car.  She had an abundance of energy, liked being active, and most of all seemed to actually enjoy doing things with us. unlike some of my friends' mothers who seemed like they just had kids so they wouldn't have to spend so much time with their husbands. Within a week of being in Calexico, she located a church and arranged for us to go to Vacation Bible School.  She walked there with us every morning.  Only Susan and I were old enough to attend, so she and Jan walked the two blocks back to the motel, then walked back again around noon and retrieved us. 

In the meantime, at the church,we had made lovely plaster of paris jeweled paperweights and small boxes made of popsicle sticks. We had also learned new Bible verses by memory.  Susan already knew a lot of verses.  And she could say them and cite the verse and chapter of the Bible.  I doubted I'd ever be able to do that, but I had learned to say John 3:16 and once recited it for Brother Reames at our own Vacation Bible School the year before.  I wanted to make him happy with me.  We loved having him and his beautiful wife at our church.  I wanted to do my part to get them to stay.

We learned soon enough that other families with kids lived in the compound, as Mother called it.  One family, the Whites, had two boys.  They saw us outside and invited us over to their little house.  There wasn't a lot of space to visit in those house/rooms, so Mother suggested we all go to the public pool and go swimming. 

Vance was the oldest boy, and he was eight.  His brother was about my age, and we played pretty well together in the pool.  Susan stayed in the water about half an hour, then got out to read the rest of her Nancy Drew mystery, White Wolf at Icicle Creek. 

Mother was in the pool as she loved to swim, and anyway, she had to help Jan, who was too short to stand up much without someone to keep her head above water.  Vance's mother didn't like to swim, so she sat in a chair under a tin awning with her hat and sunglasses on..  Susan had gone and sat in the loungechair next to her.

Vance tried to play with his brother Andy and I, but we got tired of him because he was too rough.  We edged him out of our diving for pennies, so he moved over to where Mother and Jan were.  He started nicely enough, trying to entice Jan to play with him.
The way he was acting, Mother thought he understood how to treat a small child, especially since he had a younger brother.  Jan's head was barely above water, but Vance took her hand and wanted  to take her walking in the water.  But just out of Mother's reach,  he pushed Jan a little forward, causing her to swallow water.
Mother got to her quickly, lifted her out of the water, and consoled her as she coughed and caught her breath.  She said nothing to Vance then, thinking it might have been an accident.  After she had Jan in her arms, Vance began poking Mother, splashing Jan in the face, and pulling on her, trying to get her away from Mother.  Mother told him in a nice motherly voice to stop.  He ignored her and continued splashing Jan in the face and pulling and poking at her.  Mother asked him nicely once again, then told him firmly, then asked him to go away.   He would not.

Andy and I had tired of diving for pennies, and we were walking toward Mother, planning to ask her to carry us for rides on her back, when we saw Vance jump straight up in the air.  As he came down,  he took both hands and slapped as much water as he could directly in Jan's face. Next he ducked under the water, and moving deftly, Mother put her hand on his submerged head and held him under for about 3 seconds.  When he came up, little diamonds of water covering his black burred hair, he was sputtering, and a look of total surprise covered  his face.
Mother just looked straight at him impassively, without saying anything.  He looked up toward his mother; she was oblivious to the events in the pool, concentrating instead on From Here to Eternity.  His face contorted like he would cry, but instead it just got real red. 
We arrived at the spot where the three of them stood about that time, and I asked Mother if she would take Andy and I on rides on her back one at a time.  She nodded yes.  I let Andy go first, and when they got back, I jumped on.  We made a trip across the pool with Mother holding Jan in her arms.  On our return, Vance was still standing in the spot where Mother had dunked him.
"Can I have a ride?" he asked in the nicest voice.
"Yes you may!" Mother said cheerfully, and she took Vance a little farther riding than she had us.
No mention of the incident was made by anyone as far as I know.  If Vance ever told his mother, she didn't mention it.  She seemed overwhelmed by Vance at times. Andy was more mellow and much easier to control.   After that day, Vance spoke to my mother with the utmost courtesy.  
"Yes, Mrs. Skinner.  Whatever you say, Mrs. Skinner.  How is Jan today, Mrs. Skinner?"
Jan kept her distance from Vance after that, but she knew she didn't have to be afraid of him.  Mother was watching, and she knew how to put the brakes on smart alec boys with bad behavior.
Installed

1950s SMALL TOWN LIFE: SNAKES ALWAYS FIND ME

If people in Purdon thought it odd for my parents to leave three teenage kids alone for an entire summer, they must have talked about it in whispers. Only one criticism reached our family's ears and that was indirectly.  Someone said something slightly critical to Elton's girlfriend's mother, who was  a quiet, reclusive woman.  That day, she uncharacteristically spoke her mind, defending the older two children  as "extremely mature".  She figured Nettie would take care of Stephen.  It turned out that the summer would call for maturity beyond anything we could have anticipated.
 Elton worked at the gin all summer and looked after Nettie's cows over at her ranch in Corbet.  Neila kept everything done at the house, visited a lot with her friends, and tried to avoid cooking as much as she could.  She did not plan to become a domestic goddess over the summer.  Her interests lay not in cooking and cleaning, but in writing and journalism.  She was working hard on several public speaking projects to try to qualify her for the top 4-H award, Gold Star Girl. One of her best friends was working diligently in shrub identification, also for the 4-H club.  Neila certainly had no interest in trying for that award.
We settled into the motel, which was mostly for families of people who, like my dad, were staying for extended lengths of time. Our little motel house consisted of  two small  bedrooms, a bath, and a miniscule kitchen with a tiny table, one that looked like it might have been made for pygmies.
The bedrooms were separated by a small walkthrough that housed built-in chest of drawers on each side.  The drawers were so wide and deep that one of them became Jan's bed each night.  She was tucked in with thick blankets to cushion the bottom and a tiny pillow.  She liked the cozy feeling, and we would put the makeshift crib in the same room with Susan and me.  We shared a double bed which meant that we often had to kick our way into dreamland while establishing our territory.

The little compound of motelhouses, built on the corner of two busy streets, had about eight little houses set loosely in a large L pattern around the gravel parking area.  Green plants broke up the white stucco exterior.  The washing machines and dryers were housed in a screened-in building at the back of the compound. 

We spent several partial days there every week since Mother was washing for five of us.  Susan often stayed in the little motelhouse reading.  Sometimes Jan would be taking a nap, and she stayed inside with Susan.  I didn't want to take a nap, so I usually went outside with Mother and explored the area around the washroom. 
On one of those afternoons, I sat in the plastic chairs swinging my legs and kicking my feet.  Something caught my attention on the reddish wood of the wall.  A movement, something, I wasn't sure.  I stared toward the wall for a few seconds, but nothing happened.  I started swinging my legs again, looking down at my feet.  Mother stood at the washer, her back to me, loading clothes from the basket into the machine.  She picked up a box of Tide and set it on a table by the washer.
Just then, I caught a movement again. 
I looked at the cords from the machines.  There were three sets from the washers and three from the dryers.  They were configured so that all of them ran up the walls just above the machines where they were  plugged into large round outlets. 
"Do cords move?", I suddenly asked.
"What?"
"Do cords move?"
"No, I don't think so," she answered, not looking back at me, still  working on the laundry.
"Well, that one is moving," I said, pointing to a vertical two by four that had next to it what I thought was a black cord running from the machines almost  halfway to the the ceiling.
At that, she quickly looked up.  "Oh my," she said.  "Honey, leave and run in the house.  Right now."
I was frozen to the chair.  The snake's beady eyes seemed to be looking directly at me, and I was afraid to move past him to the door.  It seemed like he might hurl himself off the wall and wrap around my neck, simultaneously biting me with one deep venomous killing bite.   I was already paralyzed, arms and legs limp, immovable.
"Go in the house, Felisa!" Mother commanded.
"I'm too scared."
"Go!  And tell Susan to ask Mrs. Bivens in the office for a hoe."
Sheer terror finally propelled me off the chair.  My legs felt wobbly, and I kept my head down as I bounded for the screened door, hitting it full force, running through it and letting it slam, just like at home. A little piece of the screened wire stuck in my thumb and made it bleed, but I hardly felt it.
Susan usually didn't move fast, but she rushed to the motel office to get help as soon as I burst through the door with the news, and I sat inside the house,  worrying that the snake had attacked Mother or bitten her.  An eternity later, at least five minutes, Susan came in the house and told me the snake was gone. 
"Where?" I asked, suspicious.
"Snake heaven," she said.
"Is Mother okay?"
'That snake was no match for a mother protecting her kids," Susan laughed. "Mrs. Bivens helped her."
"Go on out there if you want.  She's finishing the laundry."
"No, I think I'll stay inside for a while.  It's hot out there anyway.  Have you got a book with pictures I can look at?"
"Here's one.  Eloise."
"Will you read it to me?"
"Yeah, I guess.  You've had a rough day, I guess."
Jan and I crawled up on the bed, Susan between us with the large book with its colorful pictures. 
"Eloise was a little girl who lived at The Plaza Hotel in New York," she began.
I wondered if Eloise would like living at Mrs. Biven's motelhouse  like we did.

Installed

1950s SMALL TOWN LIFE: HEADING WEST ON THE SUNSET LIMITED

Trains rumbled in and out of the Dallas station.  It was noisy, crowded, and the whole expanse across which we walked was concrete.  It didn't look anything like Purdon.  Except for the men in cowboy hats.  Women in pastel cotton dresses, some with their slips showing, white flats clicking on the pavement, seemed to all be moving in the same direction as we.  Men, women, children all moving inexorably toward the waiting trains.

 The closest I had been to a train was standing in our yard and watching the Southern Pacific trains whiz by 20 yards from our house.  We would hear them coming from a mile or so off and run outside to stand and watch them.  Excitement meant waving to the man in the caboose and having him wave back, smiling, his hand moving cheerfully in the wind, his "caboose" hat planted firmly on his head.  All of them seemed to wear the same hat.  We kids sometimes argued among ourselves whether  it was the same man each time, or just the same hat. 

Mother seemed confident and comfortable here.  Her dad was a chief dispatcher for Southern Pacific Railway, and she had ridden the train a lot in her lifetime, often from Ennis,  20 miles to Dallas, where she lived and worked when she graduated high school.

It was only 8 a.m. but the sun was rising in the June sky, and the heat told us summer had shown up again this year.  We looked forward to summer and doing all the fun things the season brought, but the heat was oppressive at times.  We were accustomed to it since we ran and played outside most days, and only one room in our house, my parents' room, was air conditioned.  But the addition of the massive amount of concrete here in Dallas made me feel like we were heating up like stones.
Mother was carrying Jan, who was three, and holding a sturdy traincase, black with offwhite leather trim stitched on its edges in fine, even stitches.

Susan and I walked immediately behind, as she had instructed us, her yellow cotton dress blowing softly back against us when the warm breeze lifted it slightly.   Every now and then, she stopped abruptly to avoid bumping into someone, and we ran right into her legs.  We had been instructed to hold hands, and  did, but I felt like I could walk without holding anyone's hand.  After all, I would be six in a few weeks.  Susan was only a few inches taller and three years older.  She held my hand tightly, even when I made token movements to free my right hand.  She was left-handed; I was right handed.  Mother had put me on Susan's left so that we held onto one another with the strong dominant hand.

We got in line behind a woman with a little boy about four years old.   She held his hand tightly.  He wore a miniature cowboy hat, western shirt, jeans,  and boots.   Mother motioned for Susan and me to move in front of her and Jan , and we responded rapidly.  We accidentally bumped the boy, who was about my size.  He turned, looked at us and said, "Didya want somethin'?"
"No," Susan said, "Sorry."
"It's fine, I'm sure," said the lady standing next to him.  Her blue eyes were kind and clear.
"Where yall goin',?" she turned toward my mother.
"Yuma, Arizona," my mother answered, smiling.
"Us too," she returned.
"Good, we'll have a while to get acquainted if we want.  It'll take over 24 hours to get there."
Just then, the conductor yelled, "All aboard!"
The line began moving, and we edged forward with everyone else.  A man just to the right of the door of the red traincar  held out his hand as Susan and I approached, smiled broadly, and touched Susan's elbow slightly to help her up the steps.  There were some white letters beneath the wide orange stripe on the side of the car, but I couldn't read them.  I would start first grade in September, and there was no kindergarten in our school.  The morning sun beat down on the black roof of the car, sending up heatwaves.
"Have a good trip, girls, ma'am," he said touching the brim of his black billed hat.
"We will, I'm sure," Mother smiled.
We stepped up the tall silver metal steps, their corrugated rubber covering firm beneath our feet. Inside the train.,  the airconditioned car provided quick relief from the heat outside.
"To the left," Mother said.
Susan and I tentatively moved toward the left.  At last, I could let go of her hand now that we had to walk singlefile down the aisle. 
"Right there," Mother said.  "Sit down, right there; you two take these seats, and Jan and I will sit  in front of you."
She set Jan down on the seat, and once Susan and I were both in our seats, she sat down beside Jan.   She scooted the traincase back to me so I could put my feet on it.  That was much more comfortable.  My feet had a place to rest, rather than dangle.   Susan pulled her legs up under her, turned toward the large window, took out her book as soon as we sat down and became absorbed in it, ignoring me for the most part. 

I felt excited to be on the train.  I had never ridden one before, just seen and heard them clack, clacking down the tracks in front of the house.Their mournful whistle at night scared me sometimes, and I would cover my head with the blankets and try to muffle the sound.  They shook the house gently when they passed.  Sometimes I  found it scary; other times oddly comforting.

 Daddy would meet us in Yuma, and we would then travel by car to Calexico, California where we would spend the summer.  The excitement was dulled a little by the fact that we left my older brother Elton, sister Neila and brother Stephen in Purdon.  Stephen was only 13, so my grandmother was supposed to have him stay with her most of the time.  Elton had just turned 17 in May and Neila would be 16 in July.  The thought hit me, and I felt a surge of sadness realizing that we would not be there to celebrate her birthday. 

Daddy was working for Murray Gin Company in Mexicali, but he lived in Calexico. I thought it was funny the way they mixed up the words to make the names of cities on each side of the border.  I had no idea what a border was , but I knew the people on the other side spoke a different language, one in which I could count to ten.  My dad had taught me that.  I secretly hoped I could show off my language knowledge while we were lived there this summer.

He had told a story to my mother about his work in which there was a huge piece of equipment suspended by a cable about 50 feet off the ground.  He wanted the worker, who was Mexican, to wait to lower the machine, so he yelled up, "Un momento, un momento," which daddy explained meant "just a minute, just a minute."  He was stunned to see the man lowering the equipment immediately anyway, which got my dad into an uproar, something he had perfected throughout his lifetime.  He could go from placid calm to hurricane force in 2 seconds or less.  "Don't you understand your own language?" he had shouted at the man, with a few more forceful words added for emphasis.
 
I hated thinking of that, his shouting at someone, even if it was in the man's own language.  Later, he probably gave him one of those bottles with the worms in them to patch things up.  I had seen him give bottles with a dark liquid and worms in them to the men who came to Texas to work in the gins.  We'd go to the shotgun shack that they stayed in for the 3 or 4 months they were there, and Daddy would present the bottles to them.  I hated worms; they scared me almost as much as snakes, but the men always seemed pleased to get them.

He worked for Murray during the off-season from ginning.  He helped build the gins from the concrete foundation up.  He could repair almost any piece of equipment that a gin needed to operate.

I turned around and watched the conductor working his way toward our seats.  He took a ticket from each person, punched it, thanked them and moved on.  I sure hoped Mother had our tickets.  My anxiety started to rise, a small fluttery feeling like thousands of hummingbirds flapping in my chest all at once.  It could take me over if it wasn't addressed. 

"Susan, Susan, does Mother have our tickets?"  I poked her arm once, then harder the second time.

Susan waved me away.  She was engrossed in reading a book called Angel Unaware by Dale Evans.  I didn't know Dale could write a book; I just liked watching her ride her horse Buttermilk on her television show with her husband Roy Rogers.  Susan said the book was sort of sad since their little girl died at the end of it.  I told her I didn't want to know any more about it, and she didn't talk about it anymore except to assure me the baby was in heaven.  That made me feel better, but I didn't want to think about it. Anyway, right now I was very concerned about staying on the train.

"Susan, did Mother bring the tickets?  Will they make us get off the train if she doesn't have them?  Or if she only has two, will they make some of us get off?  Or if she only left one of them at home, will I have to get off?" I started kicking Mother's seat, reaching through the space between the seats, waving my hand around wildly, all the while talking rapidly toward Susan who was frowning down at her book, trying to pretend I was not there.  "Or do you think Mother got the tickets?  Or do the tickets have a certain name on them?  The man is almost here!  We need our tickets !"

"Stop, Felisa!  Mother, please make her leave me alone."

Mother turned then, and leaned around the back of her seat. 

"What is it?  What's the matter?"

"The man is coming, and I was just wondering if you have all the tickets..  I'm afraid he might make us get off, or just one of us maybe," I said, sounding calm, my heart beating hard in my temples.

Mother reached back with her right hand and patted my leg.  "Stop worrying.  I have everything we need.  Now just settle back and enjoy looking out the window."

"Okay," I responded, but I knew I couldn't rest until the man had come up, punched our tickets, and I was assured we were legitimate passengers.

I didn't have to wait long.  In a few minutes, the kindly man came, got the tickets from Mother, and counted 1,2,3 as he punched them.  Oh no, only three.  I reached around the seat in front and poked Mother's arm. 

"Three," I said more shrilly than I intended.  "Three?" 

The man looked at me.  He pointed to Susan, then me, then Mother as he counted, "One, two, three and baby rides free, " he said, pointing to Jan.  We were legitimate,now, I thought, the hummingbirds flying off en masse from my chest. 

"How long to Yuma?" Mother asked the conductor.

"Ma'am, you 're riding the Sunset Limited, and when we get to El Paso, Texas you'll be on the Sunset Route, nd we plan to reach Yuma in about 26 hours.  We should get there about 11:35 Mountain Time."

About three hours after we boarded, I got hungry.  Mother told me my feet were on our lunch, and she got up out of her seat and pulled the traincase toward her, leaving my feet to  hang off the seat.  When she opened the case, the most lovely smell drifted up-fried chicken.  The case was absolutely full of fried chicken.  And apples. She gave each of us a piece of chicken, a slice of apple, and a paper towel to wipe the grease.  Nettie  had gotten up before dawn that morning to cut up and fry the birds.  We stopped and picked them up at her house on our way through Corsicana.  It was our favorite food although we loved most  everything our grandmother or mother cooked.

The lady with the little boy was sitting across the aisle, and Mother offered them chicken.  They agreed since they could see she had enough to feed most of the people on the train.  The lady insisted that she go and get drinks for everyone, and mother thanked her and insisted on giving her money. 

The train had initially moved slowly out of the station and picked up speed.  We saw grass and trees as we sped across the country, but the longer we were on the train, the more sand there seemed to be in Texas.  Susan told me that west Texas was more "arid", but I didn't really understand that word.   There wasn't a lot to do but color, drink stuff, and go to the bathroom.  I made a lot of trips to the bathroom because it was the only excuse Mother would let me use to get out of my seat.  I stuck my hands through the space between the seats and entertained Jan, but she got tired of that sooner than I did.  She slept a good part of the time, and Mother read books to her. 



Finally, at suppertime, Mother took all of us to the hamburger grill  to eat.  We sat in wooden chairs around the gray formica table.  We all ordered hamburgers and french fries, and Mother told us to drink water because it was better for us.  Jan had milk.  Susan and I didn't like milk, so we weren't jealous. 

We walked back to our seats, exaggerating our swaying back and forth with the movement of the train, bumping into one another front to back, and bumping into the seats in the chaircar, and giggling.  Passengers were beginning to get ready for bed. 
Those in the chaircar would be sleeping sitting up, but reclined.  There was a sleeping car, but I thought it was probably for rich people.  I didn't think we were rich, but I knew I had never gone without food, or had the sad lunches that some of my acquaintances at school brought.  Biscuits with mustard only.
  Those days when Earlene Beauchamp, a girl in my class brought that, I could barely eat the hot lunch the cafeteria ladies cooked.  The homemade rolls, hot buttered corn,  greenbeans and ham just seemed extravagant.  I didn't know how to share it without embarrassing Earlene.  She had a lot of pride, and she was real quiet.  On those days, my lunch didn't taste as good; I'd just eat a little, trying to identify with Earlene.   But I really couldn't.  I wanted to, but I really couldn't.

Mother gave some money to the conductor, and he brought us some pillows.  We reclined our chairs.  Susan had finished her book, so she was talking to me some.  I saw another book stashed in a little cloth bag, so I knew before bedtime, she'd start reading again.  Sure enough, she reached down, retrieved a Nancy Drew mystery from the bag and opened it.

I tried to curl up in my seat, but I needed a little more room, so I started pressing my feet on Susan's thigh to try to make her yield.  She inched toward the window a little ( I was in the aisle seat) without glancing away from her book.  Since that had worked so well, I pushed a little harder.  Again, she inched slightly over.  Emboldened by my strategic takeover of the space, I raised both feet and planted them in her lap, right on top of her book. 

That was enough.  She shoved my feet away and looked toward Mother, who had just dozed off to sleep, for help.  Jan was sound asleep beside Mother, leaning into her side. 

"Don't wake Mother up," I started.

"You get your feet off me," she said firmly.

"I need more space," I whined.

"You have enough space.  Just put your feet back in your own seat and go to sleep."

"Well, you're not sleeping anyway.  You're just going to stay up all night reading."

"No.  No, I am not.  In fact, I'm going to sleep right now," she said haughtily.  And she tilted her head back against the seat and placed her open book across her face.  "Now put your feet back in your own seat."

I turned completely away from her and squeezed into a tight ball with my feet under me.  The rhythmic clacking of the wheels on the track lulled me into a sound sleep.  In the morning, we ate donuts Mother had carried in her purse, and she let Susan and I buy milk for Jan and juice for us.  I noticed that Susan had read through about one-third of her book, but I didn't say anything in order to keep the morning peaceful.

Looking out the large window, everything looked  "cactusey" to me.  I mean, we had cactus, but this looked so desolate and forlorn.  No grass to be seen anywhere.  And the dirt was reddish brown sand as far as you could see. Susan said we were probably in the desert now.  We had, she explained, slept through most of New Mexico, and we were probably in the area just before we entered Arizona.  These were states, like Texas, she told me.  I had little comprehension of what she meant, but I knew they looked different than where we lived.


We would see Daddy later that day.  We hadn't seen him in about a month.  We missed him, sort of, but life at our house was so busy , loud, and chaotic all the time, you would probably have to be gone longer than a month to be badly missed.  He had travelled to Peru in the past to build gins and been gone about that long.  But we wouldn't let Mother be gone that long.  Oh no.  She could not be gone for more than a day or two without serious protests from us.

I distinctly remembered her going to White Sands, New Mexico to visit our father on a job  there.  She said it was beautiful, so I guess there were parts of New Mexico that didn't have cactus and sand.  The day she left, we, the younger sisters begged her not to go, and I hung onto her as she tried to go out the door and cried loudly, following her to the back door of my grandmother's house in Corsicana.  My poor grandmother, a widow, was charged with trying to take care of the three of us in her home and probably checking on the older kids, 20 miles away in Purdon, at the same time.  But Mother was firm.  She needed to go see Daddy, and we would be happy with Nettie, she said.  And then she left.  But this time, on this trip, we were going with her.  That's how I liked it.  That's how we all liked it.

If I thought New Mexico looked desolate and forlorn, it looked absolutely lush compared to Arizona.  Sand for miles and miles..  Everything was the same brown color, and even the buildings seemed to fade into the everlasting sand.  The train depot was brown, most of the people were brown, and I felt like I was on the set of one of the westerns we watched at home.  The sand was gritty and permeated everything.

When we came down the metal steps we had entered 26 hours earlier, the sun was so bright I thought it might pierce a hole in my eyes if I kept them fully open, so I squinted real hard.  I felt somebody hugging me tightly and laughing.  I opened my eyes from a tight squint to a loose squint and looked up to see Daddy kissing Mother like the movie stars did when they were real glad to see someone.  Then he gave Susan a kiss on the cheek, squeezed her warmly, and put Jan on his shoulders. 

We were on our way on the sandswept highway in fifteen minutes, once we had retrieved our bags  and Daddy loaded them into the trunk of the 56  Chevy Belaire.  This would be the grandest summer ever!  The car had air conditioning, and Daddy said the motel where we would live did too.  California was seeming more enticing than ever.  I could hardly wait to get there!
Installed

1950s SMALL TOWN LIFE: SATURDAY NIGHTS WITH THE FAM AT THE DRIVE-IN MOVIES

I was hanging upside down on the monkey bars, swinging back and forth. Jan sat in the swing next to me, swinging as high as she could. Susan sat in the second swing, mindlessly twirling, moving her feet slightly, and looking intently at the Bobbsey Twin book she was reading. Just then, we heard the back door slam (it always did), and Mother (even Mother slammed it?) called to us to come on and get in the car.

Susan simply put her foot down firmly in the little patch of dirt under the swing, stood up, and held her book at her side. She noticed that Jan needed help, so she stood behind her swing and caught it on its next arc. Grabbing the wooden swing firmly by each side, she then quickly wrapped her hands around the triangular metal supports at the base of the swing seat, ran a few steps forward, then slowed the swing to a stop on the third step backward.

I was watching all this from an upside down position, my knees locked firmly around the bar from which I swung like a spider monkey. I prided myself on my ability to swing hard, bring myself to a sitting position on the bar, then back down, hanging again from my knees. I sometimes tried to show off, pretending I was a circus star.

When Jan and Susan began to walk toward the backyard and the car, which I could see was sitting near the back door of the house, I lost my concentration. The car had already been backed out of the garage, and I could see my dad sitting in it. That could only mean one thing. We were going somewhere, and he was ready to go.

In my haste to get to the car, I forgot momentarily that I was upside down, and somehow just straightened my legs, unlocking my knees from the bar. The result was a fall full force onto my abdomen, legs straightened out behind me.

When I hit the hardened summer ground, it did not yield. My body had to give in to it, and it simply knocked every puff of air I planned to inhale for the next few hours out of me immediately.

I lay there, unable to breathe, but feeling that I must. About the time I started to try to draw in some oxygen, feeling that an anvil was sitting on my chest, someone was there hovering over me. It was Mother, asking if I was okay, reassuring me that I had just gotten the breath knocked out of me. I was beginning to wheeze in, if that is possible, trying to restore my lungs to their previous size.

Our dad had pulled the car slightly past the swingset, and Susan and Jan were hanging out the back window, genuine concern on their faces.

Mother helped me up, still gasping, and carried me to the car, where I was laid down in the seat between her and my father. My head lay in her lap and my feet near him. Jan and Susan now peered over the back of the frontseat and stared at me as I made weird "whuuuuuuuu" noises, trying to get air back into my lungs. I closed my eyes so I wouldn't see them. Mother was wiping dirt off my face with a tissue, and there was a small amount of blood where I had bitten the inside of my bottom lip when I fell.

"Wh.. uh...ere...are....wuh.....eee.....going?" I asked in the most strained voice imaginable.

"The drive-in." Daddy answered. "That okay with you?" He stubbed his cigarette out in the ashtray on the dashboard and closed it tightly, patting my foot with his other hand. Patsy Cline crooned softly from the radio, her mellifluous voice floating into my ears like warm cotton, soothing and soft.

He knew it was. We loved going there. We could sometimes play on the small playground before the movies started. Supper was anything we wanted that the snack bar sold. It was best not to eat a lot of chilidogs or barbecue before playing on the merry-go-round, but my dad enjoyed food, so he let us have anything we wanted. Sometimes it took two people to carry all the food and drinks: chili dogs, french fries, icy drinks, and candy bars for dessert.

Later, if we were still hungry, we'd get popcorn to munch on. Usually, there were five of us: Susan, Jan and I and our parents. The older kids were teenagers by that time, and they were on dates or at other events. Elton had married sooon after he graduated high school and lived in Corsicana with Deanna.
Most of the shows we saw were westerns or comedies.


But tonight, my parents had brought us to see the movie Elmer Gantry. I doubt they really knew what the content of the movie was, and there was no rating system, but when Gantry went to a room at the back of the tent where he had held a revival and met with a woman who was scantily clad, our parents decided we needed to go play on the merry go round. I don't know for sure that the room was at the back of the tent because I had been distracted poking and hitting Jan trying to get more room to stretch out in the back seat. But it seemed like one minute he was pounding his fist on the podium, and in a blink he was in the room with the lady.

Our parents knew once we were involved in our play, we would pay no attention whatsoever to the movie. They had probably figured we would be asleep by that time as often happened.

We didn't stay out long because the mosquitoes were thick in the air and bit us unless we were spinning fast on the merry go round. We soon ran back to the car, jumped in, and were glad for the smell of the little coil of Caracol that was burning in the car, keeping the mosquitoes at bay.

I was troubled by Elmer's behavior, but I didn't know what to think about it. When I tried to bring it up to Mother later, she dismissed my questions and I could tell that I did not need to continue my investigation into the matter, at least not with her. But I went over the things I couldn't understand about him repeatedly in my mind, like aerating a prized plant,turning the dirt over and over and over.

All I knew was that Elmer Gantry was much different than our beloved pastor, Chet Reames. Elmer was someone, somewhere else, and I didn't know the meaning of the word hypocrite yet.

On the way home, I wanted to get up in the area under the back windshield. I could fit comfortably in there, and then Susan and Jan could have lain down in the backseat, one against each locked door, feet passing at midline. Daddy wouldn't hear of it; I knew better than to mention that Mother let me do it when he wasn't in the car.

The three of us tried various configurations of our legs, arms, and bodies for the entire duration of the 20 minute ride home, but never got very comfortable.

When I started whining about wanting to ride up above the backseat, my dad almost forgot to remove the movie speaker from its clasp on the window. He started to pull out, then all three of us screamed "Daddy" simultaneously, causing him to slam on the brakes, avoiding jerking the speaker and wire from its parking meter type stand.

The next morning we got up early for Sunday School and church. Mother started to say something, caught herself, then decided to go ahead.

"Felisa," she said, "let's not ask any questions about the movie at church."

"Yeah," Susan said. "Remember when Gelene was talking about sin and asked what some sins were and Felisa said 'my daddy drinks beer and my mommy says s....?"

"Ok, Susan, that's all we need to hear of that," Mother said sharply. She hardly ever corrected Susan. Of course Susan didn't talk as much as I did, and she certainly didn't tell the family secrets as I did. I think by telling my Sunday School teacher, I was just trying to get someone who I felt sure had a closer relationship to God than I did to intercede on behalf of our family. Anxiety followed me then like a wild dog on a leash. I didn't really want to let go of it, yet I couldn't control it.

I remembered the day I had "confessed" those sins for my parents. Gelene had an odd reaction. She smiled, then almost laughed. I was dead serious, so I kept staring at her. Finally, she said we should pray about it, and all five of us in the class bowed our heads. Then she said it would be a silent prayer, so I just had to hope she discussed our family with God. I sure did.

When Sunday School was over that day, I played around outside a little, chasing Ricky and Marie before heading in to sit with Mother. She and Gelene were standing in the middle section of pews, the fifth pew from the front, and Mother had leaned over at the waist and was laughing, while Gelene wiped her own eyes with a tissue, the corners of her mouth turned up, not down like she was crying. As soon as I came down the aisle, they got real quiet, and Mother gave me a little squeeze and two pats as we sat down.

Today, though, my lips were a steel vault with a secret combination. Nothing would pass through them about the movie, not my questions about Elmer Gantry and the woman in fancy underwear, nor how he could seem so sincere and then act like a different person when the worshipers left.

During Sunday School, when they asked for prayer requests, I sat mute. Susan shot a look at me once, but I acted like I didn't see her. When we went out to the auditorium for the service, I sat as close as I could get to Mother. I could feel her hipbone agaist mine. Once she nudged me to scoot over a bit, and then Jan laid her head down in Mother's lap, so I concentrated on my coloring.

Brother Reames (we called our pastors brother so and so) preached and talked, and I believed he meant everything he said. In fact, I asked if I could put an extra quarter in when the offering plate came around. I think it was just to make me feel better about whatever it was Elmer Gantry was doing, hurting the name of good preachers everywhere.

Daddy didn't always come with us. Sometimes he did, but not today. I guessed he thought he had heard enough preaching by Elmer Gantry on Saturday night.
Installed