1950s SMALL TOWN LIFE/BEWARE OF STICKS

Susan, Jan and I often walked home from school with a group of kids that lived in town. Susan had two friends, Janice and Patricia, who were usually with us. Two boys named Larry and Robert, unrelated, but living near each other, also walked along. Sometimes there were as many as ten of us, and today that was true.

The girls wore dresses and penny loafers with bobby socks, the boys jeans and patterned cotton shirts. Jan, Larry, and I were the youngest. Most of the kids walking on this spring Tuesday afternoon were twelve years old. Larry was only eight, closer to my age of nine, but one year behind me in school. Jan was the youngest, only six.

Larry was an only child, and a little whiney for my taste, but still I liked to go to his house and play because they had chickens. It wasn't that I liked chickens so much, but I found it amusing that they got under the house with us when we crawled under there. The house sat on blocks and had no underpinning, so we were able to play in the dirt there by just ducking a little.

We could see all the way from the front to the back and side to side. Sitting under there, we dug dirt, played cars, and looked for worms and pillbugs. The chickens must have sensed what we were doing because they clucked and ducked their way under the house once we started playing, and then they moved ever closer, their tiny eyes focusing wickedly on the dirt piling up beside us.

I didn't like for them to get too close because I was a little scared of them, afraid they'd peck me or flog me with their wings, but they amused me with their weird noises, odd springy head movements, and malevolent eyes.

Larry's mother Edna called us for lunch around noon, and we ate catsup sandwiches. They almost rivaled the mustard and sugar ones that Boy and I ate at his house, but Edna didn't add any sugar to them which I thought might improve the taste.

A few times, I went to Larry's house on Sunday afternoon, and we ate at his paternal grandmother's house. She lived just down the road in town in a dark little house with heavy brocade drapes that never seemed to admit any sunlight. She cooked what she called a "log rolling" for Sunday lunch, which she called Sunday dinner. It sure beat the heck out of catsup sandwiches even if we had to stay in that cramped home with Larry's relatives.

Fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, fried okra and squash,blackeyed peas, fresh tomatoes, iced tea, and carrot cake for dessert. After she and Larry's mother cleaned up all the dishes for about twenty family members, she got out a big round tablecloth, gathered all the pans and bowls of food onto the round oak table and with one of them on each side, lifted the tablecloth in the air over the table and let it float parachute-like down over all the containers.

"Why are they covering the food like that?" I asked Larry.

"Aw, we'll eat that food tonight for supper," Larry said.

I stared at him, uncomprehending. "Will it just sit there till you eat it?" I asked, with increasing confusion.

"Yeah," he said. "Just on Sundays, we do that. That way they don't hafta put it all in the frigerator."

"Oh," I said simply, glad I would have to go home before supper. I wanted to remember to ask my mother what she thought of that. She was fastidious about refrigerating food, though we might eat bits of what she'd cooked for a week if any of it was left over, which was not often.

"We have iron stomachs, I hope," my dad would laugh.

Larry had run ahead of the group today about twenty yards, but he suddenly diverted into the grassy ditch to retrieve something, then took off running again. We could see a big twisted stick that moved up and down with each pump of his arms.

"Hey!" Robert, the only other boy, yelled. "Stop running with that stick! You'll put your eye out."

When the shout reached him, it appeared that Larry immediately stopped, braking abruptly with both feet. His right hand flew up toward his face, the stick moving upward, hitting him somewhere up there with a sickening snap. Larry screamed like a girl and turned to face us. Blood streamed from his right eye. His hand flew up to his cheek, wiping away blood, and he screamed again, louder this time. He looked frightening!

All of us except Robert stopped walking, staring at the scene before us.
Robert took off like he was running a sprint, moving toward Larry. Meanwhile Larry turned,still screaming, and began running away from us, zigging and zagging across the street. We figured he was heading home, which was about three blocks away, but he sure wasn't going to get there very fast running in that manner.

"Wait!" Robert called to him. "Wait, let me look at it. Let us help you. We can go in the Williams' house."

But I guess the adrenalin kicked in and Larry left us in the dust like the roadrunner left Wiley Coyote in the cartoons.

"Stupid kid," Robert said disgustedly, "I told him not to run with that stick. He probably put his eye out."

I didn't want to think about it. His eye, the chickens' eyes, staring, looking evil, blood flowing like a red river down his cheek. I wondered if he would have to wear a patch like Captain Hook if his eye was really put out.

"Mother," Susan said as we stormed through the front door. "Larry ran with a stick, and we think he put his eye out."

Mother's face registered alarm, and she went immediately to call Edna.

"He's going to be all right," she assured us when she hung up the phone. "Edna doesn't blame any of the other kids. She knows how highstrung he is. He even told her that one of the boys tried to help him."

We all breathed a sigh of relief, but all evening I had to shake my head to clear images of staring chicken eyes with blood running down their white feathered heads, a black patch attached loosely over the damaged eye.
It also occurred to me that I didn't want to eat any more catsup sandwiches at Edna's house.
Installed

1950s SMALL TOWN LIFE/THE RUNT/PART 2

The chicken pen was only an interim solution. We hadn't planned on getting a dog. Certainly our parents hadn't. We had dog pens, proper ones, but they were filled with stinky hounds who were transported into the country at night to chase foxes and wolves. They'd kill Julie with happiness, they'd be so glad to have her in the pen.

They never met a dog or anything else they didn't like. They'd jump on her to say hello until she couldn't stand up, then lick her and nudge her till she'd die just to get away from them. We couldn't possibly put her in that pen.

The only other enclosure available was a chicken coop, but we'd never had chickens, not really, unless you count those little green and blue chickens we got at Easter some years. They never lived very long, though we fed them and tried to take good care of them.

We usually found them dead after a few weeks. Mother never liked the idea that they were dyed a color. She said yellow was good enough. She always thought the dye killed them once it got in their systems. She only bought them to save a few from the fate she felt most of them met.

"People buy them like they're candy. And they don't even have a place to keep them or kids who have any idea how to treat a chicken," she'd say as she put a tiny feeding center in the coop.

We had the coop all right, but it wasn't meant for a dog. Still, it was all we had for Julie until Daddy found time to build her a better one. We kept her out most of the day and played with her endlessly. We ran, she chased us. We hid, she found us. We fed her, she ate. We got drinks for ourselves out of the cistern and filled her waterbowl with the same fresh rainwater. We sipped, she lapped. Mother said she couldn't come in though. She never wanted a housedog.

So we put Julie in the coop when we went in the house for meals or to get in out of the worsening heat. It was May, and the Texas thermometer was starting to simmer. We placed the pen under the large oak tree beside the house. We rolled the chickenwire coop over, its spare framing holding it taut, so that the small rectangular door was on the top.

We'd pick her up, drop her gently through the opening and latch the door. She showed her dislike of this arrangement by jumping up and bumping the door repeatedly with the top of her head, trying to get out, whining loudly all the while. I found her behavior upsetting.

This behavior concerned all of us, but bothered me so much that I rushed through meals, often stopping midmeal to run out and check on her. We had only had her three days, and Daddy had set posts for a new pen in the pasture beside the house. He would bring the wire home to finish the new pen after he left the gin today.

Today, though, Julie seemed to sense impending freedom and to resent the restriction of the coop even more. Her jumping was turbocharged, her whines louder than ever. For some reason, during supper, I felt the need to jump up and check on her and rose suddenly from my chair.

"Are you through eating?" Mother asked.

"No, I'm going to check on Julie," I said as I moved quickly toward the backdoor.

"Now, you need to finish supper," she said, but for some reason I ignored her, heading with singleminded determination for the backyard, moving like a piece of iron drawn by a powerful magnet. Opening the back screened door, I let out an odd screaming sound I didn't recognize as my own voice. Now frozen, with wooden legs and arms, I watched as several people ran past me toward the coop.

Julie hung suspended, her head trapped in the partially open door of the pen, legs pedaling furiously. There was no sound from her. Her brown eyes were huge, bulging, filled with fear.

My brother Elton grabbed the pen door, opened it and swooped Julie up by her torso. I was at his side in an instant. She whimpered, and he handed her to me. We were both quivering. Elton patted my shoulder and patted Julie's head.

"She's okay now. Lucky you went to check on her," he consoled me. "Daddy, where is that wire for the new pen? I'll go ahead and get that done."

That night Mother didn't say anything when Julie slept on the foot of my bed. She just didn't acknowledge it. Starting the next day, Julie had a nice large pen to stay in when we weren't playing with her. But Julie ended up sleeping on the foot of my bed every night until the end of her life; Mother never mentioned it. After all, she didn't approve of dogs in the house.
Installed

1950S SMALL TOWN LIFE/THE RUNT

I don't think my erudite grandfather drank, though I can't imagine what else could have prompted him to mention the new litter of boxer puppies that were born to his next door neighbors' beloved pet Gretta. Susan, Jan, and I immediately jumped up and down, alternately grabbing Mother's hands and turning in circles, begging her to let us go see them.

"We just want to see them," Jan whined.

"Mother, can we just go over and pet them for a minute?" Susan asked reasonably. I saw Mother's look change as she gazed at Susan, whose voice always seemed able to pierce the din of childrens' voices and reach the ears of the adults.

"I really want a dog," I piped up, though I hadn't given it a thought prior to seconds ago.

At that remark, I saw Mother grimace, hesitate, and for a minute I thought I had ruined our chances of getting our hands on the puppies.

"Oh, okay," she relented. "Dad, can you go over with us?" she said while moving toward the door, followed by her own three puppies, happily skipping, scuffling, and yipping all the way to the neighbors' house.

Mrs. Minter opened the door and smiled at the multiple knocks from three small pairs of fists. "Oh, I guess you've come to the see the puppies." She smiled down at us benignly. "How do you do, Mr. Newlin?" she said more formally than neighbors should, it seemed to me.

"The girls would like to see them. Do you mind if they hold them a little?" he asked.

"Oh no, not at all," she said leading us to a huge basket filled with boxer puppies crawling in all directions and spilling out over every edge. They were pawing at each other, squealing, tumbling from the basket, running about the room, furry brown balls of energy with varied white markings on their faces. Their mother lay on the floor against the wall, impassively watching their frenetic activity, her jowls making her look permanently out of sorts.

We melted to the floor, laughing, enchanted by their sharp little yips, and tried to corral them. Susan sat with two on her lap; Jan got one and petted it tenderly. While still trying to catch one to caress, I noted a furtive movement in the corner under a wooden chair.

A tiny brown puppy with no white markings of any kind on its face tried unsuccessfully to hide. It was half the size of the others and had large, sad brown eyes and a black button nose. I imagined that it flashed me a "help" message from its soulful eyes. Crawling under the chair, I gently pulled the tiny dog from its ill chosen hiding place.

It nestled close and didn't struggle or try to get away. In fact, within a few minutes, Susan remarked that it looked "proud".

Mrs. Minter was engrossed in a conversation with Mother. "Yes, we have them all sold. You know they're from a good bloodline, so it's not hard to sell them. Our Gretta is quite a specimen, don't you think?"

"She's sure BIG," Mother said, uncharacteristically succinct, glancing briefly in the dog's direction.

Gretta stared back angrily.

Mother was observing us with the puppies, and likely planning our exit.

"Well, thank you Mrs. Minter. The girls enjoyed seeing the little things, I'm sure. Didn't you girls?" We obediently and simultaneously nodded our heads yes, and Susan and Jan gently put their little charges down on the floor, watching them scamper off to play with their six siblings. I couldn't force myself to let go of the little brown furball I held in my lap yet.

"Let's go, girls," Mother said with finality, looking directly at me.
I stood reluctantly, my new brown friend still cuddled in my arms.

"Felisa, put the little thing down. We have to go. Anyway, all these have been sold; they have homes."

"Except that one," Mrs. Minter said unexpectedly, pointing toward me.

Mother looked like she wanted to bolt. "Why not that one?" she asked, appearing fairly disinterested in the answer.

"Oh, well that one is a runt. No one would pay anything for that one. Didn't you see how she stayed in the corner? Even the other puppies push her around. They know she's weak. I don't know what we'll do with her. I'm just not sure. Can the girls....?"

Mother interrupted her in midsentence, but by then we had heard what she started to say and I tightened my hold on the puppy nestled in the crook of my arm, hiding, as though we had practiced for this moment and the pathetic look she'd project toward my mother when it was time.

"Please-------please, please,please,please,please," we all said over and over, small obnoxious parrots chanting the same word until someone wants to stop the sound by strangulation. Mother shot a glance at me.

I tried to look pitiful and mentally signaled my new best friend for the "pathetic look" which she delivered like a pro. Our mother's face softened, more in resignation than happiness, and she told Mrs. Minter we'd take the puppy and could we pay her. Mrs. Minter laughed at that.

"I should pay you" she said amiably. I noticed Mother didn't return her good humor. My granddad, who had been unnaturally quiet the whole visit, turned toward me, reached out, and patted the little mutt, then gently patted my shoulder.

"You all will be good to her," he said quietly, smiling down as all of us huddled around the dog, hands soothing her.

All six hands were vying for the little pup, but I held on tight, marching proudly back to my grandparents sprawling white two story home.

"Dad," mother whispered behind us. "Did you know she had a puppy to give away?"

"Libby, I swear I didn't," but I detected laughter in my grandfather's voice.

We spent the remainder of the spring afternoon on the large wooden L-shaped front porch playing with Julie. We had christened her within an hour or so, after some brief skirmishes about the name, several ending in our hitting each other in the back. Purple iris and wisteria vines silently observed us, hoping, I'm sure, to have their quiet sanctuary back once we left that Sunday evening.

Julie didn't seem to care what we called her as she ran willy nilly about the porch, her unclipped ears, clipped tail and large feet giving her a goofy appearance. While we were involved in a heated argument about her name, it nearly became a moot point when she ran to the screen door that opened into the parlor and came face to face with Granddad's rotweiller, Boots, who barked at her loudly and then tried mightily to come through the screen, succeeding in tearing it about eight inches at the side before Granddad pulled him away by his thick leather collar and shut the wooden door.

On the trip home, all three of us rode in the back of the pickup, playing under a patchwork quilt with our little treasure. The quilt, made in 1926 by Mrs. Mollie Frazier, or at least that's what was embroidered in the corner of it that I was holding down, flapped wildly in the wind as our dad drove the turquoise vehicle down the two-lane highway from Ennis toward Corsicana.

Each of us held a corner, leaving the fourth corner to flap at will. We took turns holding Julie, grabbing for the corner when we could, trying to secure it so our tent would be cozy and safe for her.

As we arrived at the northern edge of Corsicana, I reached to grab the popping quilt corner, but was distracted by large letters spread across a building we were passing. I was just learning to read, so I sounded them out, "A DAM HAT FACTORY," I pronounced, absorbing what it spelled.

"What, what?!" Susan said from under the quilt. "What are you saying?" she asked with a hint of incredulity.

I repeated what I had read. " A dam hat factory."

Silence except for the flapping of the quilt. A corner folded over toward the center and Susan's head appeared. She looked east over her left shoulder and started laughing. "Adam," she said. "Adam Hat Factory."

"Oh," I said quietly, ducking my head under my corner of the quilt.

Julie belonged to all of us, but I really wanted her to be mine. In a few days, something would happen that would cement our bond and make me feel like she belonged only to me.




Installed

1950s SMALL TOWN LIFE:LOOKING THROUGH CRACKS

I could never prevent myself from being deeply curious about things I wasn't supposed to see. At home, I searched through drawers in my parent's room when I thought no one was looking, sneaked upstairs to my brothers' room and went through desk drawers and closets,went through upper kitchen cabinets to see what unseen treasures lay there, looked under beds, and inside cedar chests, just to explore what was inside, hoping, I guess, to find an exotic object or some secret thing. What-I didn't know-it was just the thrill of searching for the unknown.

I always felt like there were things I wanted to know, but maybe no one would tell me. Maybe I would find secrets or something tucked away and forgotten that I would want to learn about. I would have to find out by myself. It was quite a burden for an 8 year-old.

The time at piano lessons suddenly piqued my curiosity and presented an opportunity.   I discovered that Mrs. Hutchinson's elderly parents lived in her home, and their rooms in the big two-story house connected to the stairwell where I took lessons, on the first floor.

I didn't know about them for a long time because they were quiet. I thought maybe Mrs. Hutchinson had them bound and gagged during the day so they wouldn't upset her piano students or bother her workday.

But one afternoon,  right in the middle of My First Waltz, I heard someone. It was soft and sweet sounding, like someone talking to their dog, or something they love. The words were muffled, but I heard two distinct voices, one male, one female, back and forth several times.

It was impossible to try to listen to the conversation and focus on the piano piece, and soon Mrs. Shirley knew it. "Concentrate," she said. "Watch your rhythm."

Hearing that conversation was too enticing.  I just had to find a way to see what they were doing in there and if they were all right. I obsessed about it every time I was there for my lesson. What were they doing back there? Why didn't anyone ever see them outside? Were they happy? Did they need anything?

Mrs. Shirley usually only left her chair at the end of the lesson to walk to the door and call the next student. One day, though,she appeared at the door, nodded to me to come in, and then she was called into the front room by Mrs. Hutchinson. I noticed her swallow hard, and without saying anything, she motioned me into the practice room, as she simultaneously walked the other way, toward the living room.

I walked in quickly, shut the door, and went straight to the piano, which was set at a 90 degree angle to the locked door of the elderly prisoners' apartment. After squeezing past the piano bench and Mrs. Shirley's chair, I wedged myself against the door, squinting through the tiny crack that ran along the edge of the door.

I could see part of a man with white hair;  he was portly, and he was standing looking at a magazine. Just as I peered in,  he moved and sat in a large barcalounger with his back to me.

I could hear the voice of a woman, but couldn't see her. My breath was not moving at all, though I didn't realize it until I was startled by Mrs. Shirley's voice, causing me to suck in air loudly.

"Felisa, what are you doing?"

"Nothing," I lied. "Nothing at all," I said, as if repetition would reinforce my innocence.

"Well, stop that nothing," she scolded. "You don't need to be looking back there."

I felt ashamed, but not too much. I genuinely thought I needed to know how they were. I didn't trust Mrs. Hutchinson to be good to them.

The next week Mrs. Shirley made sure I had no time alone to pry, but she called me in a little early while someone else was playing, and I had nowhere else to sit but the stairs. It occurred to me that I had never seen the upstairs portion of Mrs. Hutchinson's house and that I would like to.

Quietly, I pushed my rear up one step, then another, then another. Just as I reached the landing, Mrs. Shirley noticed my feet disappearing, and caught me once again - to my chagrin. "Don't go up the steps," she chided. "There is nothing for you to see up there."

Well, I doubted that was true, but I did feel a little ashamed getting caught snooping twice in one week's time. I supposed I'd have to give it up, content to see only the public parts of the house.

Still, there was one more room that interested me. I'd never been in the kitchen, and I really wanted to see it. One of the kids had glimpsed it through the swinging door that connected it to the dining room, and said it had a little booth, like in a restaurant.  I'd never seen a kitchen with a booth.

The cookies at Club might be my ticket. I began to plot, thinking how I'd surprise Mrs. Hutchinson, who probably thought I was mute, by offering to get the cookies from the kitchen for refreshments. It seemed like a good plan, and it might work, if only Mrs. Shirley didn't stop me. For the first time in my life, I was actually looking forward to Club. 
Installed

1950s SMALL TOWN LIFE: RECITAL ANTICS

Piano recitals were traumatic events, beginning with their timing. Sunday afternoons. We attended church, ate lunch, then raced into town for the event, arriving with only minutes to spare.

Riding in the car, I played my recital piece in my head, or sometimes I played the piece on my thighs. And inevitably, I came to a part I couldn't recall, sending myself into a panic. Jan, riding in the backseat with me, usually chose that moment to embark on a conversation she'd been saving since the previous week.

My fingers working busily on playing my thighs,  I shot her a mean look to make sure she quit talking. She usually was looking out the window when she casually started the conversation, but looked toward me, and seeing my fingers moving, became mute,  realizing I was "practicing".

Arriving at Kinsloe House, an imposing white former residence converted into a women's clubhouse, I hopped up the brick steps, entered the large front reception area and made my way into the small auditorium, actually just a room with a stage, pianos, and cold metal chairs.   At the center of the stage sat a large white basket filled with dahlias, gladiolas, and mums in brilliant spring colors.

The student participants were already seated on the front rows, facing forward like frozen soldiers, no movement visible. I sat down quickly next to Judy, a good friend from school. She was barely moving one white patent shoe, fitted snugly over her pantyhose, in small circles on the floor.

She grinned at me. "Won't you be glad when you don't have to wait on your mother and can drive yourself?"

My silent answer was eyes rolled up toward the ceiling. It was time to start. Mrs. Hutchinson was standing in front of the stage, smiling toward the parents like she was genuinely happy, welcoming everyone, introducing the program.   She nodded toward Howard Cannady, who had a bad attitude generally, and a bad one particularly toward piano. He was to play first.

He scowled at her, stood up slowly, and stomped his way up the steps and across the wooden floor to the piano, jerking the heavy wooden bench roughly from under the piano, and plopping down on it.

He slowly placed his fingers over the keys, seemed to think for an eternity before beginning, and played only three or four measures before he quit, dropping his hands disgustedly to his lap and turning toward the audience.

"Can I start over?" he asked, looking toward Mrs. Hutchinson, an edge in his tone.

"Yes, of course you can, Howard," she said in an uncharacteristic voice, sweet as corn syrup.

After a few seconds that seemed like minutes, fumbling with his hands in his lap, he began the piece again. This time he hit the keys with more force, like he was taking his anger out on the piano. He played about half a page of the piece this time, then hit several notes that were reflected in cringes on people's faces, after which he stopped again, waited an interminable amount of time, and turned for the second time toward Mrs. Hutchinson.

"I need to start over." he said, no trace of courtesy or respect in either his voice or demeanor.

Still, Mrs. Hutchinson  responded with an overly kind voice I had never heard. "Yes, Howard. Go right ahead and start over."

The kids sitting in front of us started squirming uncomfortably in their seats, making tiny little movements of their feet and hands only.

Howard grimaced, shook his head quickly back and forth, like he was shaking something off, and reluctantly moved his hands toward the keys. This time when he started, he pounded the keys like he was trying to destroy the piano, and he pressed his foot down hard on the pedal, making the sound linger long and loud.

The audience held its collective breath. He almost completed the first page, but some wrong notes tripped him up. This time, he did not ask permission.

He stood up fast, almost overturning the piano bench, turned sharply, and exited the stage, stomping down the two steps, then stomping even harder from the front to the back of the auditorium, Mrs. Hutchinson rising to follow after him, calling "Howard, Howard, now that's all right."

It was so foreign to see her act this way, solicitous and kind, that all the kids, heads ducked, were cutting their eyes up toward one another, not understanding what it meant.

Howard's mother, who was married to a prominent man, but rumored to be an alcoholic, followed her son to the door, looking embarrassed and apologetic.

Mrs. Hutchinson returned to the front, made an uneasy apology, and continued the program. The parents sat like stones. Not one had even turned a head to watch Howard and his mother leave. Their expressions were odd, pleasant facades pasted over shock.

Rita, who was sitting on the other side of me, was next on the program. She was unnerved by what had happened.

"What song was that?" I asked her when she sat down after performing.

"No song," she whispered. "I just made up chords and played them. I couldn't think of anything but Howard stomping out." We giggled almost uncontrollably, hands over our mouths, shoulders shaking.

I had caught Mrs. Hutchinson looking at Rita with an odd expression while she was playing, but thought the piano teacher was still just shellshocked.

After that a few of the more accomplished students played, and Mrs. Hutchinson relaxed visibly, as did the parents.

I suffered through all the pieces until it was my turn to play, walked self-consciously up the steps and to the piano, but made it through the piece with little trouble.

Exiting the stage, I was surprised to see Mrs. Hutchinson clapping enthusiastically, grinning broadly, and bouncing a little in her seat. After Howard's performance, I guess a kid like me didn't seem so bad.

"Was something bothering Howard?" my mother asked innocently as our family exited Kinsloe House.

"Yeah," I answered, noticing my father, who was a friend of Howard's dad, suddenly looking interested.

"What?" she said.

"Life," I countered, trying not to sound impertinent.

What I didn't tell her was what Rita had leaned over and whispered to me when Howard quit playing for the third time and stomped off.

"The other kids said," she whispered, "that Howard was mad because he was made to take his fingernail polish off before the recital."

I gratefully let the conversation die. My mother would not understand. Nor, if I were honest, did I.
Installed

1950s SMALL TOWN LIFE: MUSIC GUILD

Mother took off work, picked me up at school, and dropped me at the Corsicana Public Library, where I was to play for the national piano guild.
The library, a massive stone building built in 1906 by the generosity of the Carnegie Foundation, was imposing and matched the local courthouse in architectural style.

To participate in guild, a student had to memorize ten pieces, and the ability to play and interpret pieces would be rated by a nationally certified judge. I dreaded it even more than recitals, except there was only one person to be embarrassed in front of, not a whole audience.

Inside, I crept slowly up the gray marble stairway. Putting off the inevitable, I ran back down quickly, made a half circle and started up the steps on the other side. Both sets ended at the landing.

Dragging the toes of my penny loafers over each of the eight steps, I arrived there slowly. A hopscotch step Mother had taught me took me midway across the landing, where I turned left, and started up the wide staircase that led to the 500 seat auditorium on the second floor.

At the top of the stairs, the massive double doors to the auditorium were opened wide as though they had been flung open for a large crowd to exit the last wonderful cultural event held there years ago, then left that way, frozen in time.

Everything about the library seemed massive and fine, though after some fifty years, it was beginning to exhibit signs of decay. A poster-sized piece of tan paint was peeling from far up on the wall in the stairwell. I noted the wooden auditorium floors, almost bare of stain or varnish. A mist of fine dust seemed to hover a few feet above the floor, little dust particles in frenetic activity in the one slant of sunlight illuminating the cavernous space.

Brass rails topped the ornate ironwork that flanked the stairs, but they were tarnished and neglected. Everything looked oversized, the tall ceilings, the broad stairs, the huge auditorium with its wooden seats.

When it was built in 1906, about the same time as many others across the country, it had been grand. Over 50 years had passed now though, and Mother said there was talk about tearing it down.

I loved to go downstairs in the main library and look at the Stereo Viewer. It looked like swim goggles on a stick, but when I put a picture postcard in the holder, held it up and stared through it, the scene looked alive.

Pictures of Corsicana in earlier years, downtown, people walking about, and all sorts of other pictures made me want to jump in there, like it was a time machine. The people looked like they could walk and talk. It felt like I could become part of it.

Susan spent many summer days at the library. Mother would come to pick her up, and she'd come out the tall front doors, barely able to carry all her books. Sometimes she, Jan, and I would spend the afternoon there, reading and looking through the Stereo Viewer. The ladies always smiled broadly as we entered, and they greeted Susan by name.

I had reached the auditorium; there was no turning back. Gazing across the tops of all the seats, I could see the stage, and sitting up there at a small desk about ten feet from the Grand Piano was a tiny woman with white hair, hunched over, writing furiously. She had not seen me yet.

Would Mother get mad if I just didn't go in, instead went downstairs and jumped into 1906 Corsicana in the Stereo Viewer? That would be a relief. I'll bet they didn't have National Guild then.

Creak. My weight caused one of the ancient boards to complain. Her head snapped up.

"Felisa," she called pleasantly enough. "Are you ready?"

I swallowed hard, nodded affirmatively, lying, and made my way down the interminable center aisle like a girl headed to the gallows. When I got to the end of the aisle, the stage was taller than I, so I couldn't really see her any more. I turned right, mounted the four steps into the anteroom, and creaked across those old, worn boards and through the door onto the stage.

"Sit down at the piano, please," she said, motioning to her right.

I hated guild partly because I couldn't talk and explain myself, or my mistakes. She didn't really want to know anything about me, only if I could play the piano. And that wasn't my best attribute. In fact, it was one of the worst-and weakest.

I wanted to tell her how I could ride a bicycle and swing by my knees on the bar, hang from my hands on the rings at Mr. Watts' house, and how, once, Boy and I had made lovely rainbows on his walls even if his mother didn't appreciate their beauty. And how I was strong enough to get both my sisters off my back. But she wasn't interested in any of those things.

"Proceed," she said formally, looking at me over the rims of her black glasses, the neckchain dangling from both sides of her face, looping down beside her cheeks.

"Yes ma'am," I said, scooting forward on the piano bench and curving my fingers in anticipation, though as soon as I started playing, I forgot to keep them bent.

The tune resonated in the auditorium, stark sounds in the vast quietness. "Too loud," I thought, letting up on the keys.

When I finished playing, I glanced in the direction of the judge. She was not looking at me, but rather writing frantically, as though she could never get everything she wanted to say about that performance written.

All of a sudden, she stopped writing, tapped her pen, glanced at me, and said "Begin."

We repeated this strange ritual for the entire ten songs. It took about an hour. Five songs into the performance, I started sweating, not because it was hot, but because of the tension.

Between songs five and six, I surreptitiously wiped my hand across my forehead, near the hairline. When I began song six, my hand almost slipped off the keys due to the moisture.

Miss Judge didn't seem to notice. I assumed she was a Miss since I couldn't imagine anyone being married to such a woman. It would be so dull that I assumed her husband might turn into stone if he didn't just shrivel up.

She wouldn't care about him except one single thing. And whatever that one thing was, I could just see her with a large three page form like she had today, critiquing his every move.

"You held that rake too long," she'd say, for instance, when he was doing yardwork, scribbling maniacally on the form. "Watch the strokes; make them more staccato. And for heavens sake, rake quietly when you need to be quiet, and more loudly when the raking calls for it!"

Then she'd try to give him just a little positive regard so he'd keep raking. "Ok, nice phrasing on that set," she'd say. "You seem to understand the raking, what it is supposed to sound like."

"Ok," she'd say to him, "you're almost through."

"You're almost through," she said, clearing her throat.

"Oh, okay. Sorry. Is this number 10?" I asked, returning suddenly from my reverie.

"Yes, yes it is. Proceed," she said, turning to her rapid scribbling.

Mercifully, the song was over quickly, and I hopped up from the bench, walking toward her small desk. She looked up at me with an emotionless expression. "That will be all," she said flatly. "Goodbye."

"Bye," I said, exiting toward the anteroom, exhaling with relief. I practically skipped up the long aisle, bursting out into the foyer like I supposed that crowd had so many years ago when they'd left the doors open. Then I ran, really ran, down the stairs and jumped off the last step, landing lightly in the foyer of the library.

Glancing left, I drew a big smile from one of the librarians, who was sitting at the large counter looking out the glass in the tall walnut double doors leading inside. I sensed other kids before me might have done the same thing. We all hated guild, or at least any self respecting kid wouldn't admit it if he or she liked it.

"How did you do?" Mother asked when she came to fetch me.

"Ok, I guess," I shrugged. "She didn't talk to me. She just wrote and wrote on a long form."

"Her evaluation of your playing," she explained.

"I know that. I really know that," I said, turning toward the car window.
"But she doesn't know anything about me," I complained. "She never asked amything about me at all," I said disgustedly. "Is she married?"

"I have no idea. Why?"

"Just wondering," I said.

I was thinking about how we had the Bach Festival in February and the Hymn Festival and how very much I disliked all of them. I thought festivals were fun. Maybe the music teachers conspired to call them festivals so all the kids would come, thinking they were going to have a good time.

Next year I did not plan to be at the Corsicana Public Library in an abandoned auditorium with a woman who would cause her husband to dry up. I just had to think how to get out of it. I had a whole year, surely I could think of something.
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1950s SMALL TOWN LIFE:A SAD HISTORY OF PIANO LESSONS

I fervently hoped that taking piano lessons would remove the trauma of my dancing deficiencies, but it was obvious to both me and Mrs. Shirley, who drew the black bean and became my piano teacher, that I had no innate ability and almost no interest in practicing.

"Curve your fingers," she'd say kindly. "You haven't practiced this week, have you?" she chided.

Practicing bored me, and was also incredibly frustrating. Our decrepit old upright piano had only about half of its keys working properly, and about every seventh key was nonfunctional.

We kids suppressed laughter as our grandmother, playing hymns in our living room on Sunday afternoons, hit sour notes and keys that wouldn't work, stopped to say a little bad word, and resumed playing.

"Rock of ages, cleft for me, bad word," she'd sing, then angelically, "let me hide myself in Thee."

I felt like God would forgive her for expressing her frustration. That piano really could make a saint curse.

My favorite part of the half hour music lesson was the tiny piece of penny candy we chose from a small glass bowl at the end of the lesson. Sometimes there was only one choice, usually peppermint, but occasionally lemon, lime, or strawberry pieces were heaped in the bowl. Selecting had to be fast, for if it took too long, Mrs. Shirley gave a gentle reprimand. "Hurry up, Rebecca is waiting."

The next student, Rebecca, was waiting outside in the small front parlor that served as a reception area. She had golden ringlets and deep blue eyes, but she looked bored and lifeless as a rag doll. She slouched on the green vinyl setee, resting her feet on one of the two straightbacked chairs pushed under the wooden table where all students were systematically tortured in the spring preparing for music theory exams.

My practice room wasin a tiny hallway under the stairs, which I perceived was reserved for the worst students. Mrs. Hutchinson, the owner of the studio, taught the best students in the spacious living room, with its expansive paned windows, sunlight streaming through, and two beautiful mahogany grand pianos.

There were unsubstantiated rumors that she used a wooden ruler to tap the errant hands of students who made mistakes while playing, and once made someone bleed, the red blood staining the beautiful ivory keys. That rumor alone made it okay with me that I was assigned to the small, dark stairwell with its old upright piano.

There was another teacher, Mrs. Olson, who taught in the dining room, a large comfortable room, but with no pleasant window light, its heavy draperies blotting even the hint of sun. She was my favorite, kind and friendly.

She looked like a mother, slim, with slightly graying soft hair loosely touching her ears, wearing her just-below-the-knee cotton plaid skirts and cotton front-buttoning blouses. She was everything Mrs. Hutchinson was not. I assessed that she was the Tier 2 teacher, for those students who couldn't quite cut it in Tier 1 with Mrs. Hutchinson.

Mrs. Hutchinson never had any kids, and it's a good thing, because she would probably have been mean to them, snapping a ruler on their fingers while they practiced endlessly on the piano until the performance suited her.

Barely five feet tall, her red hair matched the rouge carefully applied in a big circle on each cheek, and her coiffure looked like someone rolled her hair, but forgot to comb it out. Tight, like her personality. She did everything precisely, quickly, with intention. She looked like a musical drill sergeant at a piano boot camp.

My teacher, Mrs. Shirley,was the youngest and prettiest,and it was whispered that she had a 24 inch waist, but I think she got the worst room to teach in and the worst students, like me. All the teachers seemed like they were scared of Mrs. Hutchinson, the way they answered her with "Yes ma'am," any time she asked them anything, like they were kids and she was the only adult.

Making our practice room even worse was a little half bath squeezed in that tiny hallway. Sometimes students would knock on the door and ask if they could use the bathroom. Of course she wasn't going to tell them they couldn't, but it did distract us a little, all that water running and toilets flushing. And some of the kids stayed in there, just playing in the water, running it for a long time, just to pass the time.

I got through lessons by being respectful and telling the truth about not practicing, which Mrs. Shirley knew anyway. After a year or two, she figured out that I was never going to practice much, so we muddled through the lessons, and she told me goodbye, knowing that I would probably not touch a piano until the next lesson. I sure wasn't going to be the kid she bragged about, but I didn't really care. I was increasingly busy with other activities and things that interested me more.

It never really bothered me until one day waiting for my lesson, I noticed that Rebecca, who was my age and had  perfect hair, skin, and eyes, but was limp, had Book 3 while I was still in Book 1, which I surreptitiously slipped under my hips until she left to enter the stairwell for her lesson.

I grew to hate the Saturdays every quarter when we met at the Hutchinson Piano Studio for "Club". It didn't feel like a club to anyone but Mrs. Hutchinson. I was pretty sure that no one wanted to be a member, if you gauged it by the looks on the faces of the participants, who looked either quietly terrified, mad, miserable, or bored.

Everyone had to wear nice dresses and Sunday shoes, and the boys wore white shirts and ties. Our mothers came, but I noticed no dads ever came. I guess they had important work to do on Saturday.

Each student played one piece. The other students clapped politely, sitting straight up in dining room chairs that had been pulled into the room for the event, forced smiles on their faces. The mothers of course clapped too, but Mrs. Hutchinson bounced around the room, words of encouragement fairly bubbling from her lips, clapping enthusiastically for each child as if each were her favorite.

Her conduct seemed so out of the ordinary that several of the children shot confused looks at her as they made their way back to their chairs after performing. She always exuded energy, but on these days, her wall to wall smile, endless greeting and talking, and extra springy step on her stiletto heels, made her seem like a red-headed bobblehead doll.

"Well, that was nice, wasn't it?" my mother said, as we descended the five steps from the tall porch.

"I really liked the cookies," I offered, trying to avoid conflict.

"You played really well." she kept on. Couldn't she just let it rest?

"Do you think so?" I asked, not really caring if anyone thought I played well since I was three books behind the others my age.

"Well, I'm so proud you can play with both hands," she said.

"They won't let me play with my toes," I said sarcastically, drawing a warning look from her.

"Well, just take one more year," she said conciliatorily.

Had I  been psychic, I would have said no, because she suggested the same thing every year for the next ten years, and somehow I caved in to her wishes even though I believe I was just in Book 4 by the time I finally ended my own suffering, when I was 16, almost a senior in high school. No more "Club", no more practicing, no more lessons, no more theory, no more music guild, no more Bach or hymn festivals.

My last day of piano lessons, I felt like I had heaved a giant turtle from my back. And as I walked down the piano studio steps that day, I imagined I was leaping in the sand, following the giant creature into the surf.
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