StoryWorth question #5:  What is your favorite children’s story.

Cinderella was the first thing that popped into my brain.  Then Where the Wild Things Are,followed by Horton Hatches the Egg. It took me a while to get there, after all, who doesn’t love a story in which the underdog prevails or a story about forgiveness.  In the end, though, I realized that my almost-life-long  admiration for a creature who kept his word in spite of personal hardship — no matter what — made this inspiring Seuss tale my all-time favorite.

Have I mentioned that my curiosity leads me to pull on a thread until the entire scarf is nothing more than a pile of curly yarn?  Well, as regards Horton, I decided to “wiki” his creator, Theodor Suess Geisel, a.k.a. Dr. Suess.

Suess Geisel started out as an illustrator and had a very successful career in advertising before entering the world of children’s literature.  Between advertising and Horton (his fourth children’s book published in 1940,) he drew political cartoons during WWII and illustrated a series of books based on amusing  things children wrote or said – today we might call them bloopers – but back in the day they were called “boners,” hence, a series of very popular books, Boners: Seriously Misguided Facts- According to Schoolkids and More Boners. From what I can tell, the books are a cross between Art Linkletter’s show, Kids Say the Darnedest Things,  and the results of the Washington Post neologism contest.    

One last thing about the good doctor:  he once said, “Kids can see a moral coming a mile off.”  And I see that in his work.  Right.  Suess Geisel was not a sermonizer, but he did impart a good measure of his political ideals through his children’s stories. 

I cannot talk about books without mentioning Jeanette Burch and the Cannon Falls Library.  In the first place, Cannon Falls didn’t have a library until the year I was born.  That year it was a wall of books in the Girl Scout Leaders’ meeting  room.  Not long after, it was moved to the old Fire Hall, which is a skinny two-story stone building on Mill Street, just east of where the library is now situated.  That is the library of my childhood, and that is where Jeanette Burch presided with her neat script, checking out books at her desk right by the door in the dim and dusty light filtering through the tall wavy-glass windows.

Both the library and Mrs.  Burch were characters in their own right, and both seemed to have harkened from quieter times.  Mrs. Burch was ‘intellectual,’ which was evident even to my seven-year-old self.  As with the library, she was quiet, unassuming  and, maybe, just a bit unapproachable.  At least to a child.   She wore gabardine suits with a starched white blouse, thick nylon stockings and brown lace shoes with block heels. 

What was also evident, though, was that she loved providing reading materials for the denizens of Cannon Falls.  I’m sure she knew that my first stop in the library would be the Dr. Suess books, followed by Nancy Drew, all of the Oz stories and Lord knows what else.  The only time I remember bypassing her advice was when at age 13 I wanted to check out Gone with the Wind.  For some reason she didn’t think that was appropriate for me, but she could not censor my choices.  And, of course, I read it with great interest, completely missing  any R-rated overtones.  Mrs. Burch really had nothing to worry about.

Here is a snippet from her obituary (March 14, 2009, age 89) :

Jeannette was a lifetime member of the Congregational Church of Cannon Falls, where she was the Church organist for more than 35 years. She sang in and directed the choir, taught Sunday school, served as Sunday school superintendent, and Church historian. She was a member of various church organizations, the Tuesday Club, The Daughters of the American Revolution and served on the Goodhue County Historical Society Board.

(She and her husband) had two children and sponsored the first foreign exchange student in Cannon Falls. They also were foster parents for a boy and two girls. 

Jeannette was not very outgoing, but the friends she made, she made for life. She had a good sense of humor and enjoyed making puns.

R.I.P. Mrs. Burch, and thank you for the Cannon Falls Library.

*Free Dr. Seuss Clipart #1323726 (License: Personal Use)

StoryWorth Question:  How did you get your first job?

Up on the hill, on the other side of the street from our house, stood an aging duplex.  In one side lived Mamie and Francis, mother and daughter, who were very quiet and kept very much to themselves.

The “Good” family, Mom, Dad and three children, lived on the far side.  Mrs. Good, or, “Good-Doris -Across-the-Street” as we used to call her, was a happy soul who coffeed with Mom and Gram a few times a week.  Little did I know she was eyeing me up for a babysitting position during those social hours, and I have always wondered what she saw in me in that regard, for I didn’t play much with dolls, preferred the company of adults, and didn’t have younger siblings.  In short, I was miserable babysitter material.

Nonetheless she hired me, either out of pity or desperation, I suppose, and at the tender age of twelve I started looking after her three young children on Saturday nights when Good Doris and her husband would go out on the town following a week of working at a factory (Doris) and  construction (Jess.)  

Looking back, I imagine this time for the Goods was a welcome respite from their jobs and family responsibilities.  It was obvious that they were just scraping along, and yet, Good Doris always paid handsomely and had the house clean, dishes done and children bathed and ready for bed when I arrived.

So really, all I had to do was pop them in, police the stairway until they fell asleep, and then read Good Doris’ romance magazines and watch TV until Dave Moore and the Sealy Mattress commercials portended the dreaded test pattern and the end of the TV signal for the night.  Good Doris always told me to go to sleep, but I tried hard – not always successfully – not to.  It was a pretty cushy job, maybe even the best one I’ve ever had:  no real work to be done, reading magazines and watching whichever TV programs I wanted, I could sleep on the job and, oh yes, the great snacks Good Doris would always leave for me.  In retrospect, I think I should have paid her!

Eventually Good Doris and her family bought a house across town and settled into a new neighborhood, and while we didn’t visit as often, we did keep in touch.  In our family, Good Doris is remembered for her charming “Dorisms”  —  “I wouldn’t do that for all the peas in China,” and talk of a delicious “powerhouse” steak— and for her generous heart, big smile and unflagging optimism.  As for myself, Good Doris will always be remembered for being the first and best employer a girl could ever have.

Question:  what were your grandparents like?

(Note: I’ve delayed publishing this because I wanted to add photos of my grandparents. Really just an excuse for procrastinating.)

Although I had five grandparents, I really only knew one of them.  I never met two of them – my mom’s dad, a railroad man, was killed on the job by a train, reports of which are a long, gruesome story for another time.  Grandma Vernstrom’s second husband, my step-grandfather, I guess, died the year I was born. 

Grandma Mary, Mom’s mom, died when I was about five.  I have dim and fond memories of her in her converted-bank house in Randolph, MN.  She gave my four-year-old self the grave responsibility of crossing the street to collect her mail at the post office.  Even though there was zero traffic – maybe eight cars total during the day – she watched me cross both ways and praised me with words and a hug when I returned.  From all reports she was a character with a quirky sense of humor and the kind of personal strength that helped her raise five young children by herself during the Great Depression and helped her survive tuberculosis in the days before welfare and known treatments for TB.  She died young at age 56, primarily of misdiagnosis and treatment by a well-known medical community; these days there would be lawsuits.

That leaves Dad’s parents, Grandpa Carpenter and Gramma Vernstrom, who became unwed sometime in the early 1930s…

Grandpa Carpenter and I share a birthday. From all accounts he was brilliant, introverted, an alcoholic—all of which together construct a personality that can be construed as mean, I think.  My father and he were estranged, so I did not have many opportunities to discover for myself who Grandpa was.  I never sat on his knee or heard a story from his childhood or, for that matter, from any part of his life.  My memory of him is of him standing at the door of his tiny Airstream trailer, which was parked on my aunt’s property, and giving my cousin, Sarah, his library order- everything from Dickens to Bugs Bunny comic books.  He was tall, wiry and smelled of pipe tobacco; if one were to walk past his trailer on a summer evening,  the sounds of Amos ‘n Andy could be heard alongside the tree frogs and crickets.

He died of emphysema in 1966, 22 days before his 78^th and my 15^th birthday.

Not many years ago, my sister-cousin, Sarah, showed me a box of letters written by seven of his sons while they were serving during WWII.  The letters are moving and telling, giving a glimpse into each of the lives of these very different men, and the fact that the “boys” wrote so frequently to their dad and that he saved their letters presents a sweeter picture of Grandpa than the one I had been given.

One final note about Grandpa:  I don’t think it would be hyperbole to say that nearly all of his offspring are prolific readers.  My dad spent most of his retirement reading, and I remember reading Golden Books while my parents bowled – I was probably six.  My cousins and I never lack for conversation, because we always have a good book to discuss.   Not a bad legacy at all.

Over the years I have wondered how the taciturn Grandpa Carpenter could have convinced my jolly grandmother, Grandma Vernstrom, to marry him and to give birth to thirteen children.  I’m still wondering.

And I’ve wondered how Grandma Vernstrom, who divorced sometime shortly after her thirteenth child was born, could remain so jolly and open hearted when faced with raising said children sans child support or any public welfare during the Great Depression.  Another unanswered question.

A phenomenal cook and baker who measured ingredients by hand from recipes in her head, Grandma was friend and counselor to people from all walks of life; it was a rare day that someone did not share a meal or a baked treat at her table, and she did all of this with barely a penny to her name.

Music was cheap entertainment, though, and the Carpenter/Vernstrom clan could SING! It was not uncommon for someone to head over to the piano, pluck a note, and starting up an ad hoc  songfest in the middle of a coffee or while kitchen work was going on; more formal occasions most always ended with a family sing-along.

From Grandma’s sixteen children – thirteen Carpenters and the three Vernstrom girls – I count a total of 34 cousins, which is somewhat surprising, considering, although it must be kept in mind that two of the sons did not have any children, two others died in infancy, one was MIA during WWII, and two of the girls were taken away shortly after Gram’s divorce.

And among those 34 cousins I wouldn’t hesitate to say that I was closest to Grandma.  This was not of my own making (although I’m sure I was a lovely child… 🙂 )  More, it had to do with the fact that my mom and I would visit Gram nearly every day from the time I can remember, and  my dad would pick her up and bring her to our house for supper nearly every evening.

There are so many memories:  Gram making little loaves of bread for me, served warm with loads of butter, and on very special occasions, a glass of orange juice.  Grandma praising my progress on the piano – she had one and was a fine musician in her own right.  Listening to Tennessee Ernie Ford, Marty Robbins and Oklahoma on her magical record player, doing dishes on Thursday nights after Mom left for bowling (“A good dish wiper can wipe the dishes clean.”) And, most especially, burrowing into her ample arms during the scariest parts of The Wizard of Oz, which came on once a year.   A frequent overnight visitor at Gram’s, I remember that I loved all of the aforementioned things along with the special treat of taking a bath in her bathtub (we didn’t have one.)

One morning I arrived at my usual 7:00 a.m. ready-for-breakfast hour.   Gram, of course, had been up before the birds.  I suppose by this time she was in her mid-60s and experiencing some hearing loss (probably from raising a passel of rowdy kids.)  “Gram,” I said, “what was that skraching I heard from your house last night?”  

“Skraching?”

“Yeah. You know.  Kind of a cross between ‘scraping’ and ‘screeching;’ it sounded like you were moving furniture or something.”

“Oh.  That. I couldn’t hear my radio, so I moved the bed closer to it.”

Grandma Vernstrom died in October of 1975, just three months and six days after her 77^th July Fourth birthday.  With so many children and grandchildren and a lifetime of minimal resources, Gram didn’t have a lot of material goods to spread around.  The things I have, a woolen dust mop that was a shower gift from her, the little saucepan in which she made our many breakfasts, and the Spring Garden Cookbook, are all things I use at least once a week.  Sweet reminders of my strong and openhearted Grandmother.

If Grandpa’s legacy were reading and a predisposition for introversion, my 100%-German grandmother gave us- or tried to- a love for music, an open heart, and an appreciation for good cooking.  Priceless.

Question: Are you still friends with any of your friends from high school? If so, how have they changed since then?

I was among five Marys in the Cannon Falls Class 1969 (about 110 graduates.)

Among us were a wealthy Mary W, the daughter of the then-richest (as far as we knew) man in town. It seemed to me she was a bit snooty, and as a confirmed nerd, I didn’t have much truck with her.

There was Mary X, who came to us in the last years of high school. She had a romantic and sophisticated aura, having lived overseas as part of her military family. With her dimples she was cute, nice and popular – in fact, well-liked by her classmates.

Mary Y had a congenital facial deformity. If it seems unkind to introduce her as one with a deformity, please keep in mind that these are the memories of a young person. Mary Y seemed to me to be an average nice girl, and because I mostly hung out with band and choir kids, and she was not one of them, I didn’t have much truck with her, either.

That leaves Mary Z, who came from one of the poorest families in town, again, as far as we knew. I remember other kids speaking snidely of her; she smelled, she had green teeth. She didn’t appear to be very smart. Some, but not all, of those things were true,and the true things were fixable.

Worse, the sins of the fathers – and mothers – were visited upon her. It was rumored that her dad was not a good provider, and her mother was not a good housekeeper.

In the intervening years between the 5th and 50th reunions, I sometimes dreamed about Mary W. It was always the same dream: she would drive up in a black limo and open the door so we could all see her expensive clothes and jewelry. So it was not a surprise that, at our 50th reunion, she showed up pretty much as I had dreamed about her in expensive black, sans limo, conversing only with a very small group of the “popular kids.”

But now with my 50-years-later glasses, I could understand that she was simply with her people, just as I kept with my people, and it had nothing to do with wealth or popularity. One recurring dream checked off.

And thanks to FaceBook, I have reconnected with Mary X, who has turned out to be a well-read activist, a supporter of the arts, a cat fosterer, a connector and, most especially a wise woman who always seems to have a kind word and an upbeat attitude in spite of an often debilitating physical condition.

Mary Y went on to become a mom, wife and office worker. Because she has eschewed contact with our class, there is little information to be gleaned about her; however, I like to imagine that this nice high school girl shone as a parent and as a leader in her work.

But the real story here is about Mary Z. A few years ago – I’m ashamed to admit it took me that long – I began to wonder what happened to her. A short online search turned up her obituary, which was hot off the press. It turns out that she was a pioneer and innovator in psychiatric nursing. She loved the outdoors, her husband and the planet. I have a strong sense that there was a lot more to her than the few paragraphs I could find online.

Here is the emoji sad-face ending: at our class reunion there was no mention of Mary Z. Not her life after high school nor her recent death. No nuthin’.

Of all of our stories, I find hers to be the most magnetic, which seems better than being just one of five Marys from a small-town graduating class.

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It’s been a while — too long — since I’ve visited these pages. Part of it, I think, is due to not having fully learned the lessons of slowing down that Covid taught us. I’m just as busy as ever.

Part of it has been the relief of having a sane person in the White House. Well, more than one, actually. We’re not out of the woods by any means, but there is hope.

And the last part? I’ve been writing elsewhere. Yep, I’ve been stepping out on COS friends and have started an affair with StoryWorth.

But being a modern person, I don’t mind a little threesome, especially when it’s just words. (Okay, let’s not go any farther with that line of thinking.)

StoryWorth is a subscription I learned about from my librarian friend, Lynne. Her kids gave her a gift subscription one year for Christmas, and at the end they all got a book out of it. I decided not to put that upon my kids and purchased my own subscription.

Here’s how it works: Each week I receive a random question. My answer can be as long or as short as I wish, or I can choose another question. So far I’ve received four questions and have crafted two answers. Typical!

My plan is to post the questions and answers here, and so…

Question One: What was your mother like when you were a child?

FIRECRACKER

Firecracker:  “A firecracker is a firework that makes several loud bangs when it is lit.”  -Collins online dictionary.

Actually, Mom was more of a one-bang firecracker, and she had a slow burn.  But when she got lit, look out.  She was sneakily loud, like those fireworks you see sail high up in the air and then drop, waiting till they are about halfway down before emitting their expected-but-still-surprising boom.  Yep, one and done, that was Mom.  

You never wanted to get her riled up in the store, because she would grab you by the elbow and apply pressure to some nerve that made you sink to your knees.  (Silently, of course, because others need not know you were being disciplined.)

She was tough, she was funny – we knew that even as kids. 

She was resourceful.  Winters moved our family’s income from okay to something around zero.  Eventually the oil would run out, and all funds likely went toward food to feed our family of five.  An army blanked tacked to the doorway between the tiny kitchen and living room, along with the oven going full bore, was Mom’s way of providing a warm place for us on those many sub-zero Minnesota mornings.

She covered a lot of ground.  She gardened and canned, cooked, did laundry sans automatic anything (if you’ve never tried to dry a pair of jeans in 10 degree weather, give it a shot,) she had basic mechanic and plumbing skills, she sewed, she fished.

She was creative.  A river transected our small in-town acreage, and in the winter she would take us down there and set up “camp” among the cattails and beaver lodges.  We’d feast on roasted hot dogs and marshmallows, sitting around a fire that was made directly on the ice, our skates still on. 

She was a tomboy.  I think she really preferred adventures with my more boisterous older brothers.  Nonetheless, she seemed to enjoy dressing me up in clothes she’d made.  I don’t think the same true about my long hair.  It was never graced with a pretty ribbon, and was often pulled back so tightly that my eyes would change shape.

She was wily.  Once, when I was on school patrol, I removed my unfashionable snow pants just before getting to my stop.  Not long after, Mom drove up and made me put them back on right there in front of of everyone.  Point made.

She was wise.  She knew when to push and when to back off.  Rather than being overly protective, Mom let us learn lessons and still somehow kept us all alive.  Think skating down the “shorty path,” on a steep hill between two neighborhood houses.  The path, about five feet wide and braced by trees, featured ice-covered roots and rock, providing sledders and a few skaters (my brothers and me) with some extra challenges on the way down.   And jumping off the Mill Street Bridge just before the place in the river where it tumbled over the dam.   She understood that children needed both boundaries and freedom, and she knew well the maps and territories of each.

And along with all of this grit was a heart so filled with love for her family that none of us would ever doubt it. 

Perhaps her greatest gift to me was the gift of piano lessons.  She and my brothers were taking lessons from Mrs. Theel. When, at the age of three, I started to exhibit interest, Mom started working on Mrs. Theel to teach me.  It took a year and a half, but Mrs. Theel finally gave in (did I mention that Mom was persistent?)  and Mom gave up her spot so I could study.

Grit and love.  That was Mom.

(From January…)

Three years ago when Dennis came to tune my piano, he noted, as I already knew, that it needed a new action.  For those of you who are not pianists, the action is the “front” part of the piano – the part that causes the key touch to make the sound.  For pianists, the action is a crucial and very personal thing.  In my case, the action has a medium weight touch, and I do prefer a Steinway, even over a Bösendorfer. 

So I’m very lucky to HAVE a Steinway Model B, and one that I fell in love with 43 years ago at the Minneapolis Schmitt Music store.  And after 43 years, the action did need replacement.

 “Dennis, will it cost an arm and a leg to rebuild the action?” 

“Probably not as much as you think…”

“Whew!” I thought, and tried to nail him down on the cost a little more.  “Just an arm, then?”

And he named a price that was closer to the cost of a 2015 used Prius than the cost of a hefty mortgage payment, which was what I had imagined.  Ulp.

“But I would have to put you on a waiting list.  It will be three years before I could get to it.” (Dennis is a popular guy.)

“Okay,” I said.  “That will give me time to save up.  My 70^th birthday is in three years.  That will be my birthday present.”  Forget the trip to Spain…

Not long after, I was relating this to my conductor friend, Pete, who quipped, “So.  You’ll be getting a little action for your 70^th birthday?”

Fast forward to 2020, the year of the pandemic.

One of the beauties of being halfway unemployed, due to the pandemic, is that there is more practice time.  Over the summer I played every day, usually for about an hour.  On many evenings I would open the windows, because my neighbors had informed me that they loved listening to the music.  They were getting a lot of Mozart and Bach, some Rachmaninoff, Brahms, Debussy, Beethoven.  And on weekends, just for them, Lorie Line and movie music.

At first things were okay, but not great.  Then one of the keys started sounding like a bad guitar.   Then another joined in, and another.  They were all playable, but the sound was went from bad guitar to bad banjo.

I knew it was time; Dennis was called in.

He did a temporary fix on the worst ones, which made them almost presentable to my ear.  Then he said he might be able to get me in ahead of a church, which had to fall back because of non-income related to the pandemic. 

Now, Dennis is a detail guy.  He talked about all of the things he would do.  He would replace the Teflon bushings, which did not change seasonally with the wood that was holding them in place.  There would be new keytops, “sharps” (black keys,) hammers, the works.  The keys would be weighted within a tenth of a gram.  And the cost had only gone up by $2K in the last three years!

And then the good news:  “There is a guy who does the back end – sound board, strings, pedals – who is about to retire.  Most people who have the action rebuilt also like to have the back end done, and this guy is the best.”

“How much,” I asked.

And he named a price that, together with the action, would buy me a 2018 Prius IV.  I was so tempted, but, as I say, halfway unemployed…

November rolled around.  Dennis took away the action just before Thanksgiving, and this week I just got it back.  During that time he kept me apprised of his progress.  Here is an example:(remember “detail guy…”)

It’s okay if you don’t read the whole thing.  I breezed through it, although there was a little hitch in my reading when I saw “geometry.”   

Afterward he presented me with this graph of the key weight both before and after the rebuild.  The erratic line is the “before,” and the bold somewhat-straight line is the “after.” 

Geometry, capstans, 17mm shanks aside, the rebuilt action is really beautiful.  Like playing on silk, and, of course, totally worth it. 

And I’m okay with not having done the back end.  The sound board is in great condition and the strings are fine.  Because I’m pretty sure my family will keep this instrument when I am finished with it, I’ll leave it up to them to do any more rebuilding.

Now this might have been a more beautiful visual beginning for this post; however, it’s really the end of the story of Dennis’ thoughtful and precise transformation of my piano.