What's coming down the Massachusetts Pike next for Debbie? Will she find love back in Beantown? Will she make it the hub of her life? Will she get on that plane for Phoenix? What will she find there? Love? Friendship? A job? A life? "Are we there.......................................................................yet???...* * *:)
(Denise...Denise Dances...2011! -- 19 years later.)
Thursday, February 24, 2011
UP NEXT: The Single Mom of Cactus County II: Boston
UP NEXT: Debbie visits her friend, Boston Maddy in The Hub! before boarding the plane to Arizona.
THE SINGLE MOM OF CACTUS COUNTY: Part I
The roar of the engine submerged the sounds of the problems in her head. She leaned forward and pushed. A tin can was swallowed up and crunched by the engine. She gasped and pulled the throttle of the lawn mower. The scrunched tin remains lay underneath it among the damp green clumps of grass.
Up and down and around, forming a large square, a rectangle, smaller squares, a triangle, until all of the waving green grass was clipped. Sticks, last autumn's leaves were devoured in its midst. The snows had come suddenly before she'd had time to finish last season's raking.
Exhausted, she leaned forward, uphill, downhill, pushing, pulling, turning. Her mother came outside with a glass of water. The glass of water she was dreaming about, but would not stop for a minute to go get it. Here it was!
"There's lemon in it. Lemon-water," her mother said. She sat down and sipped on the patio. Her mother grabbed the handlebars of the lawnmower and smiled like a little kid. In her socks, she proceeded to mow a small portion of the lawn left unfinished. Debbie rose from the picnic table.
"I want to watch the motorcycle races," her mother said.
Finally finished, Debbie lowered the throttle and the engine sputtered and stopped. She wished she were still mowing. She reluctantly returned to the inside of the house, leaving the green grass, contrasting with the dull gray bark of the trees.
Phones, confusion, obligations. But inside her room, Debbie felt nothing but sorrow. Her cat's sudden death over the winter made her feel raw. In place of the commotion, she felt a deep, longing, strange sorrow. Sorrow. The cold January wind had swirled cleanly over the frozen snow. The cat was not coming back.
Spring's soft breeze brought along with it a haunting sound. A cat bird meowed, unseen. The air was cold with melancholy.
On the following morning, Debbie stared at the flower garden. She recalled the family cat who she called simply "Meow Meow" as she used to stroll through the garden, her garden. On the day after her death, Debbie had burst into tears behind the counter of the bank where she worked as a temporary teller. The bank was closing and they needed her for six months.
"Was she sick? Was something wrong?" Elizabeth tried to comfort her. Betty escorted her, showered with confusion, from the counters to the break room. "I used to breed dogs and lose them. I know how it feels," the usually bossy supervisor consoled her. Debbie looked at her as if to ask, What do I do now? Betty looked at her with pursed lips and sadness in her eyes and shook her head, unable to comfort Debbie.
Who would mow the lawns while she was gone? Why was she doing this? How could she leave home again after a year and a half of living back at home and helping her parents with the family business? She looked at the daffodils one las ttime, knowing there would be no more time to work in the garden. I shouldn't be doing this, she thought. I should have presented my parents with a baby boy by now, dressed in pale blue and white, someone to lift high over their heads and coddle.
At the breakfast table, she held up her cereal bowl. The bird, Nipper had been let out of his cage and was now approaching her. He stood on the table like a curious baby. He looked up expectantly at the bowl of cereal. Debbie giggled, holding her breakfast away from his smiling beak. Why was she leaving them?
Her parents laughed as they regarded their gray pet cockatiel. Her father sat down to put on his work boots.
"I hope you do find a job out there," her mother said.
Debbie left her car key and house key on her desk. Her friends' Boston and Arizona numbers were taped to her desk. She took one last look at the garden.
She hopped into her mother's truck. She would take Debbie to the bank where she would work until four o'clock closing time. Then she would come pick Debbie up with her suitcase and bring her to the train station. Ahead of them, a blue truck was parked on the side of the road. Her father's truck.
"What's he doing?" her mother cried.
Was it an accident? Her mother dropped her off in front of the bank. Then she drove off to find her father.
Cathy came smiling to the locked door and let Debbie inside of the bank. "My father's truck is stopped on the side of the road," she explained. She tried to peer out of the wide windows of the bank. "I hope it's not an accident."
Her mother walked past the windows of the closed bank, her grocery cart in front of her. When Debbie looked outside the windows again, her father's truck was gone.
"Are you looking forward to your vacation?" Jennifer said.
"I've been so busy, I haven't had even had time to think about it," Debbie said.
On her lunch hour, Debbie suddenly remembered to call her temporary employment agency. Although she was returning the call, the girl had to look her up on the computer.
"Your assignment ends May 7." She said. "You're back in our computer for availability."
"May seven? That's...today," Debbie said. She left the phone booth outside the bank where she had worked for the past five months and three weeks. She walked toward the door. Instead, she decided to walk past the door, this sunny day, and entered the adjacent drugstore. She bought lotion, razors, a travelling toothbrush.
"Did you say you're leaving?" John, the assistant manager at the drugstore asked. He stood at her supervisor's window.
"No," Debbie said slowly. "I said, I believe it."
Her supervisor said they hadn't gotten raises in three years and she believed it.
"You should look for work out there," Cathy said.
Debbie smiled. "We were roommates in New York," she recalled. "We both wanted to be reporters. We used to come home and complain about our office jobs."
"Well, maybe she can get you a job," Cathy said.
"She just got a promotion to editor of another newspaper," Debbie said of her former roommate in New York, moved back home to Phoenix.
"You should look for work out there. Maybe she can find a job for you. The bank is staying open now and you don't know where you're going to be. The bank is staying open!" Cathy's blue eyes were round with panic. They all knew she was hired as a temporary teller until the bank closed.
"I know." Debbie smiled slyly. Her temporary assignment was to be for six months or until the bank closed. For months, no one knew whether the bank would stay open, much to the hope of the loyal customers who had banked there all their lives.
The girls all looked at Debbie with her black stitched leather boots, black skirt, houndstooth blazer, and black sleeveless top with pearl necklace.
"That is a great outfit," Cathy said. "I used to be skinny like that."
Sweets, McDonald's, and the monumental event of bearing a child changed all of that.
They looked at her Western boots. "She's there," her boss, Betty said and Debbie smiled.
Elizabeth whispered to her. "Oh, no," Debbie said softly. Mac McAllister stood inside the lobby with his back to them. She surveyed his ugly neck. After hesitating for a few moments, he approached her window.
"The Astronomy Club is having a picnic tomorrow," he said.
"I won't be here. I'm getting out of this town tonight!" Debbie said.
"When will you be back? There will be another picnic on the Sunday..."
"I don't think you should make all these plans for me. I'm not sure when I'll be back," Debbie said abruptly.
"Oh. But you'll call me when you get back."
"I'm not going to call you," she said.
"Oh. Okay," he said.
"I don't know when I'll be back. I'm not trying to be mean, butI don't think you should be making all these plans for me."
"But you didn't get the job yet, right?"
"No. But I'm not sure when I'm coming back. Just let me go. Just let me go," she said, averting his face.
And Mac McAlister walked slowly out of the glass doors, still puzzled.
"Do you think I was too mean?" she asked Elizabeth.
"I would've been a lot meaner than that," the ever patient, soft spoken Elizabeth said matter-of-factly.
"They let me go," Debbie said to her. "I found out on my lunch hour. I called the temp agency. Today's my last day."
Elizabeth raised her eyebrows in surprise, but before she could say anything, Betty and Jennifer were upon her. They counted her cash. They added her wrok. They audited her cash box and took it from her. When she looked at Betty for a response, she looked away from Debbie. When Betty spoke, her sad voice sounded ready to crack slightly.
"Opportunity knocks," Elizabeth said as she watched them take away Debbie's cash box and prepare the way for her to leave.
"My mother's coming with my suitcase," Debbie said.
"Your mother's coming with your suitcase! Aren't you excited?" Cathy shouted.
"I need more cash!" Debbie said.
"If your train is coming at 4:47, you better get going," Betty said.
Debbie walked outside the door. "I may come back," she said. But her mother had arrived with the car and her suitcase.
"You mean you don't have a job?" she said.
"I'm leaving anyway. Now I can stay a little longer and look. The temp agency will have more jobs for me," Debbie said.
"I'm going to tell them you're doing really well out there and you sent your resume out there already," her mother vowed, angry at the bank where she had been a faithful customer for many years.
Debbie grabbed her suitcase, got out of the car, shouted "Happy Mother's Day," and walked into the New London train station. I won't be missing this place, she thought as she walked along the deserted pier and looked across the Thames River at the building of a former temporary assignment.
"I don't get it. Why do you have to leave at four on Friday?" Betty had demanded. Debbie told her she wanted to be on time. Betty still didn't get it.
"I have a train to catch," she said. Betty finally realized that Debbie was taking a train to Boston on Friday night in order to fly out of Boston early Saturday morning and that she was staying overnight at a friend's apartment.
"What time do you get into Boston?" she said.
Up and down and around, forming a large square, a rectangle, smaller squares, a triangle, until all of the waving green grass was clipped. Sticks, last autumn's leaves were devoured in its midst. The snows had come suddenly before she'd had time to finish last season's raking.
Exhausted, she leaned forward, uphill, downhill, pushing, pulling, turning. Her mother came outside with a glass of water. The glass of water she was dreaming about, but would not stop for a minute to go get it. Here it was!
"There's lemon in it. Lemon-water," her mother said. She sat down and sipped on the patio. Her mother grabbed the handlebars of the lawnmower and smiled like a little kid. In her socks, she proceeded to mow a small portion of the lawn left unfinished. Debbie rose from the picnic table.
"I want to watch the motorcycle races," her mother said.
Finally finished, Debbie lowered the throttle and the engine sputtered and stopped. She wished she were still mowing. She reluctantly returned to the inside of the house, leaving the green grass, contrasting with the dull gray bark of the trees.
Phones, confusion, obligations. But inside her room, Debbie felt nothing but sorrow. Her cat's sudden death over the winter made her feel raw. In place of the commotion, she felt a deep, longing, strange sorrow. Sorrow. The cold January wind had swirled cleanly over the frozen snow. The cat was not coming back.
Spring's soft breeze brought along with it a haunting sound. A cat bird meowed, unseen. The air was cold with melancholy.
On the following morning, Debbie stared at the flower garden. She recalled the family cat who she called simply "Meow Meow" as she used to stroll through the garden, her garden. On the day after her death, Debbie had burst into tears behind the counter of the bank where she worked as a temporary teller. The bank was closing and they needed her for six months.
"Was she sick? Was something wrong?" Elizabeth tried to comfort her. Betty escorted her, showered with confusion, from the counters to the break room. "I used to breed dogs and lose them. I know how it feels," the usually bossy supervisor consoled her. Debbie looked at her as if to ask, What do I do now? Betty looked at her with pursed lips and sadness in her eyes and shook her head, unable to comfort Debbie.
Who would mow the lawns while she was gone? Why was she doing this? How could she leave home again after a year and a half of living back at home and helping her parents with the family business? She looked at the daffodils one las ttime, knowing there would be no more time to work in the garden. I shouldn't be doing this, she thought. I should have presented my parents with a baby boy by now, dressed in pale blue and white, someone to lift high over their heads and coddle.
At the breakfast table, she held up her cereal bowl. The bird, Nipper had been let out of his cage and was now approaching her. He stood on the table like a curious baby. He looked up expectantly at the bowl of cereal. Debbie giggled, holding her breakfast away from his smiling beak. Why was she leaving them?
Her parents laughed as they regarded their gray pet cockatiel. Her father sat down to put on his work boots.
"I hope you do find a job out there," her mother said.
Debbie left her car key and house key on her desk. Her friends' Boston and Arizona numbers were taped to her desk. She took one last look at the garden.
She hopped into her mother's truck. She would take Debbie to the bank where she would work until four o'clock closing time. Then she would come pick Debbie up with her suitcase and bring her to the train station. Ahead of them, a blue truck was parked on the side of the road. Her father's truck.
"What's he doing?" her mother cried.
Was it an accident? Her mother dropped her off in front of the bank. Then she drove off to find her father.
Cathy came smiling to the locked door and let Debbie inside of the bank. "My father's truck is stopped on the side of the road," she explained. She tried to peer out of the wide windows of the bank. "I hope it's not an accident."
Her mother walked past the windows of the closed bank, her grocery cart in front of her. When Debbie looked outside the windows again, her father's truck was gone.
"Are you looking forward to your vacation?" Jennifer said.
"I've been so busy, I haven't had even had time to think about it," Debbie said.
On her lunch hour, Debbie suddenly remembered to call her temporary employment agency. Although she was returning the call, the girl had to look her up on the computer.
"Your assignment ends May 7." She said. "You're back in our computer for availability."
"May seven? That's...today," Debbie said. She left the phone booth outside the bank where she had worked for the past five months and three weeks. She walked toward the door. Instead, she decided to walk past the door, this sunny day, and entered the adjacent drugstore. She bought lotion, razors, a travelling toothbrush.
"Did you say you're leaving?" John, the assistant manager at the drugstore asked. He stood at her supervisor's window.
"No," Debbie said slowly. "I said, I believe it."
Her supervisor said they hadn't gotten raises in three years and she believed it.
"You should look for work out there," Cathy said.
Debbie smiled. "We were roommates in New York," she recalled. "We both wanted to be reporters. We used to come home and complain about our office jobs."
"Well, maybe she can get you a job," Cathy said.
"She just got a promotion to editor of another newspaper," Debbie said of her former roommate in New York, moved back home to Phoenix.
"You should look for work out there. Maybe she can find a job for you. The bank is staying open now and you don't know where you're going to be. The bank is staying open!" Cathy's blue eyes were round with panic. They all knew she was hired as a temporary teller until the bank closed.
"I know." Debbie smiled slyly. Her temporary assignment was to be for six months or until the bank closed. For months, no one knew whether the bank would stay open, much to the hope of the loyal customers who had banked there all their lives.
The girls all looked at Debbie with her black stitched leather boots, black skirt, houndstooth blazer, and black sleeveless top with pearl necklace.
"That is a great outfit," Cathy said. "I used to be skinny like that."
Sweets, McDonald's, and the monumental event of bearing a child changed all of that.
They looked at her Western boots. "She's there," her boss, Betty said and Debbie smiled.
Elizabeth whispered to her. "Oh, no," Debbie said softly. Mac McAllister stood inside the lobby with his back to them. She surveyed his ugly neck. After hesitating for a few moments, he approached her window.
"The Astronomy Club is having a picnic tomorrow," he said.
"I won't be here. I'm getting out of this town tonight!" Debbie said.
"When will you be back? There will be another picnic on the Sunday..."
"I don't think you should make all these plans for me. I'm not sure when I'll be back," Debbie said abruptly.
"Oh. But you'll call me when you get back."
"I'm not going to call you," she said.
"Oh. Okay," he said.
"I don't know when I'll be back. I'm not trying to be mean, butI don't think you should be making all these plans for me."
"But you didn't get the job yet, right?"
"No. But I'm not sure when I'm coming back. Just let me go. Just let me go," she said, averting his face.
And Mac McAlister walked slowly out of the glass doors, still puzzled.
"Do you think I was too mean?" she asked Elizabeth.
"I would've been a lot meaner than that," the ever patient, soft spoken Elizabeth said matter-of-factly.
"They let me go," Debbie said to her. "I found out on my lunch hour. I called the temp agency. Today's my last day."
Elizabeth raised her eyebrows in surprise, but before she could say anything, Betty and Jennifer were upon her. They counted her cash. They added her wrok. They audited her cash box and took it from her. When she looked at Betty for a response, she looked away from Debbie. When Betty spoke, her sad voice sounded ready to crack slightly.
"Opportunity knocks," Elizabeth said as she watched them take away Debbie's cash box and prepare the way for her to leave.
"My mother's coming with my suitcase," Debbie said.
"Your mother's coming with your suitcase! Aren't you excited?" Cathy shouted.
"I need more cash!" Debbie said.
"If your train is coming at 4:47, you better get going," Betty said.
Debbie walked outside the door. "I may come back," she said. But her mother had arrived with the car and her suitcase.
"You mean you don't have a job?" she said.
"I'm leaving anyway. Now I can stay a little longer and look. The temp agency will have more jobs for me," Debbie said.
"I'm going to tell them you're doing really well out there and you sent your resume out there already," her mother vowed, angry at the bank where she had been a faithful customer for many years.
Debbie grabbed her suitcase, got out of the car, shouted "Happy Mother's Day," and walked into the New London train station. I won't be missing this place, she thought as she walked along the deserted pier and looked across the Thames River at the building of a former temporary assignment.
"I don't get it. Why do you have to leave at four on Friday?" Betty had demanded. Debbie told her she wanted to be on time. Betty still didn't get it.
"I have a train to catch," she said. Betty finally realized that Debbie was taking a train to Boston on Friday night in order to fly out of Boston early Saturday morning and that she was staying overnight at a friend's apartment.
"What time do you get into Boston?" she said.
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Tales of Brookline: SCITUATE
SCITUATE 10/13/91
The red light on her answering machine was flashing.
She was still misty-eyed over what could only be a visitation from my grandmother. The choir at 11:30 Mass had suddenly sprang into "How Great Thou Art," a favorite hymn of hers. It was a good thing Debbie had not left early when her contacts began to irritate me.
"Hello, Miss Woman...such a sexy message, Miss Woman," the message began. Debbie recognized the voice of Madelyn, a former coworker she cashiered alongside at the grocery store. She assumed Debbie was working at the Ball & Chain, the old grind. She was on her way to Scituate and would call her tonight.
She played the message again. Had Madelyn left? Oh, no. Debbie did not feel like staying here, cooking and cleaning and reading newspapers all day.
She boiled water for more coffee. She attempted to do the huge pile of dishes in the sink, filling it with hot, sudsy water. When her bright red thumbnail broke after struggling with the milk ring inside the glass stolen from "The Red Lobster," she gave up.
The phone rang. It was Madelyn.
"Thought you left," Debbie said.
Madelyn had left a message on her answering machine, bursting into laughter about the Ball & Chain.
"Well, I didn't know I was so sexy!" Debbie shouted, in the empty, clean sunlit apartment.
Madelyn was going to Scituate to visit her parents. After a few more words, she said, Would Debbie like to come?
"Yes!" she said.
A horn honked. Debbie grabbed the Travel Section and was out the door, with her pocketbook, camera, and red nail polish.
An old man drove up the hill, passing the stop sign.
"What an asshole! Who taught him to drive? He shouldn't be driving!" Madelyn shouted, in between drags of her cigarette.
And with that, she clicked her tape deck. A country tune came on. "You're an asshole this morning, you'll be an asshole tonight, I have a feeling, you'll be an asshole the rest of your life."
They sang along and she shut it off. She clicked through one mainstream station after another. They stopped to get gas. Debbie thought of my hometown, and how she would be familiar with gas stations again soon.
A tour bus barged in front of them on the entrance to the highway. Click.
"Have you always been an asshole or have you worked at it your whole life...Someone even told me you have an asshole for a wife."
Click. Back to more mainstream stations. Mainstream disco. Mainstream rock and roll. Neil Young. Sugar Mountain. Old Man. Orange and russet and red touches in a highway foliage mostly still green.
Disco. Debbie thought of her dancing days, sometimes going out on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights. The pulsating beat. The flashing lights. The rotating silver sphere. What happened to her?
Madelyn told her about her oppressed childhood, the priest who couldn't talk to her when she lived with a Jewish man, the nuns who punished her and her sister for having a Catholic mother and a Protestant father in the days when Protestants and Catholics were taught to shun each other.
"You're lucky you're not scarred for life," Debbie said, as they drove by the austere white church across from the Cohasset town green. She drove along country roads that she knew Debbie would like.
Her parents had dinner waiting and they were served soon after they arrived in the driveway, greeting the hundred-year-old cat. Madelyn barraged her quiet mother and friendly father with tales of the highway dirvers, the asshole song, the way the judge on public TV had used the words "elongated penis," how men were always flashing Debbie. Her father showed Debbie various news clippings of maritime disasters in Scituate and the recent article about debt-laden Stop and Shop.
They burst into laughter about the asshole song, Madelyn singing all the words for the benefit of her parents.
"Relieves the tension," her father agreed.
"You just have a bag of tricks," Debbie giggled. "You have got to be the funniest person I ever met!"
"And I called his mother the other night, played my machine-gun tape and hung up. Then I laughed my ass off!" Madelyn informed her parents.
"She knew it was you," her father said quietly.
"Who else would it be?" Debbie burst into ridiculous laughter.
"Has she called you since?" her father said.
It was going to be dark soon. Madelyn's parents urged her to show Debbie Scituate.
"Oh, it's beautiful," Debbie gasped.
They were on top of a hill, overlooking cozy New England shingled houses and a cove. They drove along the small coastline, out onto "The Cliffs," beach grass and goldenrod, growing alongside the road. They stopped at a large parking lot, a shopping center on the water. Debbie stepped onto the rocks, feeling confident in the cold air and sat on a large rock on the shore of a small inlet, ducks floating behind her.Tall grass, a marsh lie beyond. Madelyn snapped a picture of her in long black boots, heavy navy sweater, aqua fringed scarf. Her face was light, her eyes barely lined with blue liner.
Natural.
They walked into a drugstore.
"You shouldn't have lent her money," Madelyn said. "Now you're up a creek. I think she gives it to one of her beaus to buy drugs and that's not right. She's a good person..."
"It's Dave," I said.
"Who is he?"
"Well, he's got a cute face. Looks young. He has kind of a slouchy look. Like a hood," she said.
The shy cashier smiled.
Madelyn fiddled with the new film on the counter, inserting it into the camera. By luck, a former roommate had left it behind, rewarding Debbie when she cleaned her room.
"Hope they come out," she worried.
She discovered the lighthouse, the buoy-laden white fence, the yellow and orange berries growing alongside it.
"We'll go to Minot Beach," Madelyn said. "There's Lover's Lighthouse." It flashed three numbers, the Morse code for "I Love You." How sweet, Debbie thought.
"I have to have a picture of it," she said. She trampled the long grass along the cement walkway, walking down to the railing and ducking to take a picture. So far away in the gray blue water, beyond the rocks and the beach. It looked small in the window of her camera.
She stopped the car at a beach, below the hill. She walked in the tall dune grass, finding a hidden path. She stooped to take a picture of this lovely, lonely beach, a small cove with waves stretching across the sand, slapping at the rocks below. Gray cottages in the distance. Silken, silver waves in the near dusk.
Onto the fishing pier. Lobsters, a gray sign with red letters said, from a distant dock beyond the boats. Across the boat-filled deserted harbor. Beside the large pond which now reflected the several houses, all in a row, in its clear pool.
"This is what contest winners are made of," Debbie said.
She liked the lovers' lighthouse and the lonely beach and the duck-filled cove the best.
The red light on her answering machine was flashing.
She was still misty-eyed over what could only be a visitation from my grandmother. The choir at 11:30 Mass had suddenly sprang into "How Great Thou Art," a favorite hymn of hers. It was a good thing Debbie had not left early when her contacts began to irritate me.
"Hello, Miss Woman...such a sexy message, Miss Woman," the message began. Debbie recognized the voice of Madelyn, a former coworker she cashiered alongside at the grocery store. She assumed Debbie was working at the Ball & Chain, the old grind. She was on her way to Scituate and would call her tonight.
She played the message again. Had Madelyn left? Oh, no. Debbie did not feel like staying here, cooking and cleaning and reading newspapers all day.
She boiled water for more coffee. She attempted to do the huge pile of dishes in the sink, filling it with hot, sudsy water. When her bright red thumbnail broke after struggling with the milk ring inside the glass stolen from "The Red Lobster," she gave up.
The phone rang. It was Madelyn.
"Thought you left," Debbie said.
Madelyn had left a message on her answering machine, bursting into laughter about the Ball & Chain.
"Well, I didn't know I was so sexy!" Debbie shouted, in the empty, clean sunlit apartment.
Madelyn was going to Scituate to visit her parents. After a few more words, she said, Would Debbie like to come?
"Yes!" she said.
A horn honked. Debbie grabbed the Travel Section and was out the door, with her pocketbook, camera, and red nail polish.
An old man drove up the hill, passing the stop sign.
"What an asshole! Who taught him to drive? He shouldn't be driving!" Madelyn shouted, in between drags of her cigarette.
And with that, she clicked her tape deck. A country tune came on. "You're an asshole this morning, you'll be an asshole tonight, I have a feeling, you'll be an asshole the rest of your life."
They sang along and she shut it off. She clicked through one mainstream station after another. They stopped to get gas. Debbie thought of my hometown, and how she would be familiar with gas stations again soon.
A tour bus barged in front of them on the entrance to the highway. Click.
"Have you always been an asshole or have you worked at it your whole life...Someone even told me you have an asshole for a wife."
Click. Back to more mainstream stations. Mainstream disco. Mainstream rock and roll. Neil Young. Sugar Mountain. Old Man. Orange and russet and red touches in a highway foliage mostly still green.
Disco. Debbie thought of her dancing days, sometimes going out on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights. The pulsating beat. The flashing lights. The rotating silver sphere. What happened to her?
Madelyn told her about her oppressed childhood, the priest who couldn't talk to her when she lived with a Jewish man, the nuns who punished her and her sister for having a Catholic mother and a Protestant father in the days when Protestants and Catholics were taught to shun each other.
"You're lucky you're not scarred for life," Debbie said, as they drove by the austere white church across from the Cohasset town green. She drove along country roads that she knew Debbie would like.
Her parents had dinner waiting and they were served soon after they arrived in the driveway, greeting the hundred-year-old cat. Madelyn barraged her quiet mother and friendly father with tales of the highway dirvers, the asshole song, the way the judge on public TV had used the words "elongated penis," how men were always flashing Debbie. Her father showed Debbie various news clippings of maritime disasters in Scituate and the recent article about debt-laden Stop and Shop.
They burst into laughter about the asshole song, Madelyn singing all the words for the benefit of her parents.
"Relieves the tension," her father agreed.
"You just have a bag of tricks," Debbie giggled. "You have got to be the funniest person I ever met!"
"And I called his mother the other night, played my machine-gun tape and hung up. Then I laughed my ass off!" Madelyn informed her parents.
"She knew it was you," her father said quietly.
"Who else would it be?" Debbie burst into ridiculous laughter.
"Has she called you since?" her father said.
It was going to be dark soon. Madelyn's parents urged her to show Debbie Scituate.
"Oh, it's beautiful," Debbie gasped.
They were on top of a hill, overlooking cozy New England shingled houses and a cove. They drove along the small coastline, out onto "The Cliffs," beach grass and goldenrod, growing alongside the road. They stopped at a large parking lot, a shopping center on the water. Debbie stepped onto the rocks, feeling confident in the cold air and sat on a large rock on the shore of a small inlet, ducks floating behind her.Tall grass, a marsh lie beyond. Madelyn snapped a picture of her in long black boots, heavy navy sweater, aqua fringed scarf. Her face was light, her eyes barely lined with blue liner.
Natural.
They walked into a drugstore.
"You shouldn't have lent her money," Madelyn said. "Now you're up a creek. I think she gives it to one of her beaus to buy drugs and that's not right. She's a good person..."
"It's Dave," I said.
"Who is he?"
"Well, he's got a cute face. Looks young. He has kind of a slouchy look. Like a hood," she said.
The shy cashier smiled.
Madelyn fiddled with the new film on the counter, inserting it into the camera. By luck, a former roommate had left it behind, rewarding Debbie when she cleaned her room.
"Hope they come out," she worried.
She discovered the lighthouse, the buoy-laden white fence, the yellow and orange berries growing alongside it.
"We'll go to Minot Beach," Madelyn said. "There's Lover's Lighthouse." It flashed three numbers, the Morse code for "I Love You." How sweet, Debbie thought.
"I have to have a picture of it," she said. She trampled the long grass along the cement walkway, walking down to the railing and ducking to take a picture. So far away in the gray blue water, beyond the rocks and the beach. It looked small in the window of her camera.
She stopped the car at a beach, below the hill. She walked in the tall dune grass, finding a hidden path. She stooped to take a picture of this lovely, lonely beach, a small cove with waves stretching across the sand, slapping at the rocks below. Gray cottages in the distance. Silken, silver waves in the near dusk.
Onto the fishing pier. Lobsters, a gray sign with red letters said, from a distant dock beyond the boats. Across the boat-filled deserted harbor. Beside the large pond which now reflected the several houses, all in a row, in its clear pool.
"This is what contest winners are made of," Debbie said.
She liked the lovers' lighthouse and the lonely beach and the duck-filled cove the best.
GOING HOME
GOING HOME 10/13/91
"You always go 'back home.'" I realized what a miserable life I was leading. for the first time. I felt alive! I quit my job in New York 5 1/2 months later and plunked myself down in Boston.
I wanted to make a change. A new life. But was it?
A year later, I found myself back in New York. A weekend wedding in Manhattan. I knew in an instant. I had made the right decision. Was it the girl in sneakers and a suit, walking tired past the buildings of 42nd Street?
In recent months, I started to attend church more often. Searching, wondering, waiting for the answer! Trying to understand.
A sense of peace and unbelievable happiness has filled me since I made the decision to return home.
A clean feeling. Going back to where I belong, my roots, Sunday drives on winding country roads, the salt-kissed air of lonely New London harbor. A quiet early night's sleep, deep in the woods. Lots of trees, changing color in the fall, shaking their leaves in the breeze.
"You always go 'back home.'" I realized what a miserable life I was leading. for the first time. I felt alive! I quit my job in New York 5 1/2 months later and plunked myself down in Boston.
I wanted to make a change. A new life. But was it?
A year later, I found myself back in New York. A weekend wedding in Manhattan. I knew in an instant. I had made the right decision. Was it the girl in sneakers and a suit, walking tired past the buildings of 42nd Street?
In recent months, I started to attend church more often. Searching, wondering, waiting for the answer! Trying to understand.
A sense of peace and unbelievable happiness has filled me since I made the decision to return home.
A clean feeling. Going back to where I belong, my roots, Sunday drives on winding country roads, the salt-kissed air of lonely New London harbor. A quiet early night's sleep, deep in the woods. Lots of trees, changing color in the fall, shaking their leaves in the breeze.
Monday, February 14, 2011
TALES OF BROOKLINE: Walk-a-thon Impressions 1991
"Are we there yet?"
He pulled a red wagon, its contents full of things for the walk; plastic water bottles, a panaxonic radio playing disco tunes, hats, visors, lunches. His small son walked beside him, his long white "Walk for Hunger" tee shirt pulled over him. The entire family wore the matching white tee shirts as they walked alongside the disco wagon.
She closed her eyes. All she could see was the Charles River, its refreshing blue waters peeking from between the trees.
Is this the bridge yet? She did not realize there would be several more, before passing finally, from Cambridge into Boston.
Beach Field. Nice name for a checkpoint stop. Laying on the grasses beside the Charles River. A brass band started to play. No vocals, just some enthusiastic players bowing and dancing to their own music.
On Commonwealth Avenue, one woman held up a sign. "YES!" it said.
The proper town of Newton, where young college boys sat on the porches of white Victorian houses, pretending to read The Globe and listen to radios as thousands of Bostonians walked by.
How many more miles?
Beacon Street. Back Bay. Lovely. Something like New York. Elegant. So long ago.
Boston Common in the Spring. The Public Garden on a dewy Spring morning. Swan boats all in a row. Fenced tulips in rose, yellow, lavendar. An arch of balloons, bobbing over the entrance to the Boston Common. Thousands, although it's only seven o'clock in the morning. Free hats, visors, plastic water bottles, stickers.
Chestnut Hill Reservoir. Isn't there a trolley that runs through here?
WALKATHON IMPRESSIONS 91
Harvard University. What a place for a campus. Elegant lawns overlooking the Charles River.
It first became visible through a sprinkling of trees, small boats in a quiet cove.
Dusty paths ambled through woods and thickets as trees dipped down to rest in the River.
Lavendar cherry blossoms clustered its banks. A dixie band started to play on the riverbank and someone let out a scream. "Yeee-hah!"
Girls wearing Indian dresses and skirts danced to the beating of bongo drums on Harvard's campus
UP NEXT: GOING HOME (the decision to move back to Connecticut) and a side visit to SCITUATE, the home town of my bosom buddy at the time, Pam Mitchell. (You can friend her on Facebook.) Here's to you, "Boston Pam!"
He pulled a red wagon, its contents full of things for the walk; plastic water bottles, a panaxonic radio playing disco tunes, hats, visors, lunches. His small son walked beside him, his long white "Walk for Hunger" tee shirt pulled over him. The entire family wore the matching white tee shirts as they walked alongside the disco wagon.
She closed her eyes. All she could see was the Charles River, its refreshing blue waters peeking from between the trees.
Is this the bridge yet? She did not realize there would be several more, before passing finally, from Cambridge into Boston.
Beach Field. Nice name for a checkpoint stop. Laying on the grasses beside the Charles River. A brass band started to play. No vocals, just some enthusiastic players bowing and dancing to their own music.
On Commonwealth Avenue, one woman held up a sign. "YES!" it said.
The proper town of Newton, where young college boys sat on the porches of white Victorian houses, pretending to read The Globe and listen to radios as thousands of Bostonians walked by.
How many more miles?
Beacon Street. Back Bay. Lovely. Something like New York. Elegant. So long ago.
Boston Common in the Spring. The Public Garden on a dewy Spring morning. Swan boats all in a row. Fenced tulips in rose, yellow, lavendar. An arch of balloons, bobbing over the entrance to the Boston Common. Thousands, although it's only seven o'clock in the morning. Free hats, visors, plastic water bottles, stickers.
Chestnut Hill Reservoir. Isn't there a trolley that runs through here?
WALKATHON IMPRESSIONS 91
Harvard University. What a place for a campus. Elegant lawns overlooking the Charles River.
It first became visible through a sprinkling of trees, small boats in a quiet cove.
Dusty paths ambled through woods and thickets as trees dipped down to rest in the River.
Lavendar cherry blossoms clustered its banks. A dixie band started to play on the riverbank and someone let out a scream. "Yeee-hah!"
Girls wearing Indian dresses and skirts danced to the beating of bongo drums on Harvard's campus
UP NEXT: GOING HOME (the decision to move back to Connecticut) and a side visit to SCITUATE, the home town of my bosom buddy at the time, Pam Mitchell. (You can friend her on Facebook.) Here's to you, "Boston Pam!"
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
DISCLAIMER
This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead is entirely coincidental. The names of the characters are the work of the author's imagination.
Up Next: TALE OF B'LINE: Walkathon Impressions 91
See ya here next week. After this, we will have one more TALE OF BROOKLINE: Going Home and Scituate. Up up next, stay tuned for the long-awaited: THE SINGLE MOM OF CACTUS COUNTY, a novella about my trip to Arizona in the 90s.
Until then,
Take care.
Denise
Until then,
Take care.
Denise
Monday, February 7, 2011
Up Next: TALES OF BROOKLINE: Walkathon Impressions 1991
"The life you save may be your own." (Sidney R. Rubicam Award for Volunteerism, Stop & Shop Walk for Hunger, 1991). Are we there yet?
Denise Dances!
Denise...Denise Dances...2011 -- 20 years later!!!...* * * :)
(Who can I thank? Where do I start? I have to start with my parents, whose natural smarts and strong work ethic I've inherited, obviously. "I"m the toughest boss she'll ever have," my father has often said. While my life has been tough, I feel, maybe the tough times I've lived through in this lifetime are what prepared me for the journeys ahead. While I feel life hasn't always been fair, "You must play the cards you're dealt," my best friend Paula once said and she's right. In response, I choose to take the dwelling in which I've been placed in the spirit in which it was given. "You're very generous. We want to reward you."
Denise Hickey
Williams Park Apts.
New London, CT
(Hear that? Stay outta my way!)
(Who can I thank? Where do I start? I have to start with my parents, whose natural smarts and strong work ethic I've inherited, obviously. "I"m the toughest boss she'll ever have," my father has often said. While my life has been tough, I feel, maybe the tough times I've lived through in this lifetime are what prepared me for the journeys ahead. While I feel life hasn't always been fair, "You must play the cards you're dealt," my best friend Paula once said and she's right. In response, I choose to take the dwelling in which I've been placed in the spirit in which it was given. "You're very generous. We want to reward you."
Denise Hickey
Williams Park Apts.
New London, CT
(Hear that? Stay outta my way!)
TALES OF BROOKLINE: Sick Leave
She plunked her groceries down on the conveyor belt. They floated to the end of the counter. She went to put down a can of tuna fish. But Diane's bag of cookies kept drifting past before she could finish putting the rest of her groceries down. She bit her lip. She looked up in annoyance.
"Stop!" she shouted, eyes widened in anger at James, the cashier, whose finger kept turning the button on, allowing Diane's cookies to move freely down the belt.
She awoke to banging noises on the ceiling above her. Cans of tuna she had been dropping on the counter were falling and rolling and bouncing on the moving belt in her sleep as she awoke to the accompanying clatter of the girls upstairs. What were they doing?! Bowling on the ceiling?! She felt nauseous.
She had looked at the weekend schedule. Eight hours on Saturday and eight hours on Sunday. Then, a gull {sic} eight hours at the bank on Monday. She would be earning time-and-a-half for all those hours on Sunday, but she knew she couldn't do it. All those hours, she thought wistfully.
She lay on the bed a little while longer. Then she knew she had to leave for work. Should she go for part of the 11:30 Mass? No, too much running around. She had to work at 12:30. What a peaceful morning it was, not too cold for this time of year.
She stood serenely behind the grocery counter. Joe, her favorite manager arrived in navy blue smock and yellow ribbon pinned to it. She was on the sixth cash register, in the middle of everyone, where she would not get the bulk of the customers. Consumers raced to each end of the row of cash registers, near the door, never the middle. She felt safe. She loved cashiering when Joe was running the front end.
"Don't worry, I've got everything under control. That's why I'm the boss," he would always say, which made her smile.
Today, she felt peaceful, but just a little whoozy.
"It's OK, go ahead," Joe told her, as he reached for her envelopes of cash locked in the security box beneath the register. She reached weakly for the ever moving cans and boxes of food on the belt. Joe looked at her. She reached slowly for a box of honey-coated cereal.
"I don't think I'm going to make it. How long do you give me?" she said to India, who was bagging for her.
"Four o-clock," the big, exotic girl said. She was wearing the necklace she always wore, the claw clutching a glass ball. Debbie called it the crystal ball. But it looked more like a good luck charm to ward off all evil and bad vibes in the grocery store.
India disappeared. Debbie had to bag the rest of the order herself. She swallowed a mint to keep from gagging on the dusty air. And another one.
All of a sudden, the dust stuck in her throat. There was a lull in the usually ever present line of customers. Coughing and choking racked her entire small body, as she traded four quarters for a dollar bill to a tall young college boy. She ducked below the counter, overcome with the fit of coughing. In one quick motion, she shut off her lighted number six, and grabbed her purse. She ran past the cashiers, past the produce and deli departments, as if making her way through the crowded streets of New York. She shielded her face from inquiring shoppers. She reached the water fountain.
"Your face is all red," one of the baggers observed as he saw her. She nodded through the coughing. Finally, she was in the basement of Stop & Shop, in the ladies' room. For a full five minutes, the coughing continued. Then she went back upstairs. "I"m going to leave as soon as I stop coughing," she said to one of the cashiers.
Now she saw Joe and Louise. She looked down shyly, then strode over to them.
"I have to leave," she said.
"What?" scowled Louise, the black woman who was head of all cashiers and managers of the Front End.
"I was coughing..."
"You were coughing?" Louise looked questioningly at Debbie.
"I don't feel good. You didn't hear me?"
"I don't hear everything from upstairs, Debbie."
"I don't feel good, OK?" she grimaced, showing her full set of straight, rounded teeth that she was usually too shy to reveal, due to years of wearing braces; as shoppers milled past her on their way to the door.
"Well, Joe. What do you think? It's such a nice day. Should we let her go home?"
Debbie looked pleadingly at Joe, who stood beside Louise, his eyes closed, his delicate lashes resting against his cheekbones. A yellow bow and spray of baby's breath was pinned to his blue uniform. He looked cute and shy this way, but he stood firmly, his broad shoulders proudly held back, the position of authority.
He nodded his consent, still not looking up, his lips pursed in sympathy.
"What about your tray?" Louise demanded.
"I don't feel good," Debbie shouted.
"Well, you're not going to leave your tray, are you?"
"All right!" Debbie said through clenched teeth, as is she were arguing with a member of her own family back home in Connecticut. She headed to Register Six and slowly gathered her cash drawer, plastic bags filled with coupons and glow-in-the-dark paid stickers. She brought her tray to an unused counter at the other end of the store. Joe quietly removed a cash drawer from the register. She looked up at him twice but did not say anything as she counted her cash intake for the last two and a half hours.
"I"m pissed!" she whispered with wide open eyes when she saw her young manager, Diane. She was also one of Debbie's favorites, so quiet and calm with big blue eyes, always touching people and calling them "hon," although she was just Debbie's age.
And then she turned around. She saw Joe take his cash drawer and slide it into register six. He started to take the customers which had multiplied since her coughing fit. She looked up at him across the distance of shoppers, cashiers and cash registers. She looked at him with affection and closed her eyes in disbelief. His face reddened considerably under her gaze so she looked away in understanding.
She made her way over to him, carrying the Sunday edition of the Boston Globe in a plastic shopping bag. She was going to buy soda and come through his line, but the line was too long.
"Hope you feel better, hon," Diane said.
"I know. I gave it my best shot!" Debbie shouted rambunctiously and smiled at Joe.
Denise Hickey
2/10/91
"Stop!" she shouted, eyes widened in anger at James, the cashier, whose finger kept turning the button on, allowing Diane's cookies to move freely down the belt.
She awoke to banging noises on the ceiling above her. Cans of tuna she had been dropping on the counter were falling and rolling and bouncing on the moving belt in her sleep as she awoke to the accompanying clatter of the girls upstairs. What were they doing?! Bowling on the ceiling?! She felt nauseous.
She had looked at the weekend schedule. Eight hours on Saturday and eight hours on Sunday. Then, a gull {sic} eight hours at the bank on Monday. She would be earning time-and-a-half for all those hours on Sunday, but she knew she couldn't do it. All those hours, she thought wistfully.
She lay on the bed a little while longer. Then she knew she had to leave for work. Should she go for part of the 11:30 Mass? No, too much running around. She had to work at 12:30. What a peaceful morning it was, not too cold for this time of year.
She stood serenely behind the grocery counter. Joe, her favorite manager arrived in navy blue smock and yellow ribbon pinned to it. She was on the sixth cash register, in the middle of everyone, where she would not get the bulk of the customers. Consumers raced to each end of the row of cash registers, near the door, never the middle. She felt safe. She loved cashiering when Joe was running the front end.
"Don't worry, I've got everything under control. That's why I'm the boss," he would always say, which made her smile.
Today, she felt peaceful, but just a little whoozy.
"It's OK, go ahead," Joe told her, as he reached for her envelopes of cash locked in the security box beneath the register. She reached weakly for the ever moving cans and boxes of food on the belt. Joe looked at her. She reached slowly for a box of honey-coated cereal.
"I don't think I'm going to make it. How long do you give me?" she said to India, who was bagging for her.
"Four o-clock," the big, exotic girl said. She was wearing the necklace she always wore, the claw clutching a glass ball. Debbie called it the crystal ball. But it looked more like a good luck charm to ward off all evil and bad vibes in the grocery store.
India disappeared. Debbie had to bag the rest of the order herself. She swallowed a mint to keep from gagging on the dusty air. And another one.
All of a sudden, the dust stuck in her throat. There was a lull in the usually ever present line of customers. Coughing and choking racked her entire small body, as she traded four quarters for a dollar bill to a tall young college boy. She ducked below the counter, overcome with the fit of coughing. In one quick motion, she shut off her lighted number six, and grabbed her purse. She ran past the cashiers, past the produce and deli departments, as if making her way through the crowded streets of New York. She shielded her face from inquiring shoppers. She reached the water fountain.
"Your face is all red," one of the baggers observed as he saw her. She nodded through the coughing. Finally, she was in the basement of Stop & Shop, in the ladies' room. For a full five minutes, the coughing continued. Then she went back upstairs. "I"m going to leave as soon as I stop coughing," she said to one of the cashiers.
Now she saw Joe and Louise. She looked down shyly, then strode over to them.
"I have to leave," she said.
"What?" scowled Louise, the black woman who was head of all cashiers and managers of the Front End.
"I was coughing..."
"You were coughing?" Louise looked questioningly at Debbie.
"I don't feel good. You didn't hear me?"
"I don't hear everything from upstairs, Debbie."
"I don't feel good, OK?" she grimaced, showing her full set of straight, rounded teeth that she was usually too shy to reveal, due to years of wearing braces; as shoppers milled past her on their way to the door.
"Well, Joe. What do you think? It's such a nice day. Should we let her go home?"
Debbie looked pleadingly at Joe, who stood beside Louise, his eyes closed, his delicate lashes resting against his cheekbones. A yellow bow and spray of baby's breath was pinned to his blue uniform. He looked cute and shy this way, but he stood firmly, his broad shoulders proudly held back, the position of authority.
He nodded his consent, still not looking up, his lips pursed in sympathy.
"What about your tray?" Louise demanded.
"I don't feel good," Debbie shouted.
"Well, you're not going to leave your tray, are you?"
"All right!" Debbie said through clenched teeth, as is she were arguing with a member of her own family back home in Connecticut. She headed to Register Six and slowly gathered her cash drawer, plastic bags filled with coupons and glow-in-the-dark paid stickers. She brought her tray to an unused counter at the other end of the store. Joe quietly removed a cash drawer from the register. She looked up at him twice but did not say anything as she counted her cash intake for the last two and a half hours.
"I"m pissed!" she whispered with wide open eyes when she saw her young manager, Diane. She was also one of Debbie's favorites, so quiet and calm with big blue eyes, always touching people and calling them "hon," although she was just Debbie's age.
And then she turned around. She saw Joe take his cash drawer and slide it into register six. He started to take the customers which had multiplied since her coughing fit. She looked up at him across the distance of shoppers, cashiers and cash registers. She looked at him with affection and closed her eyes in disbelief. His face reddened considerably under her gaze so she looked away in understanding.
She made her way over to him, carrying the Sunday edition of the Boston Globe in a plastic shopping bag. She was going to buy soda and come through his line, but the line was too long.
"Hope you feel better, hon," Diane said.
"I know. I gave it my best shot!" Debbie shouted rambunctiously and smiled at Joe.
Denise Hickey
2/10/91
SICK LEAVE
Today is the perfect day to take a sick leave day of absence. Coming up this afternoon: SICK LEAVE.
Friday, February 4, 2011
SICK LEAVE
How the fffff---? am I supposed to go from the Red Carpet in Hollywood to....cashiering at Stop & Shop in Brookline, Massachusetts???...* * * :) -- See ya tomorrow. Or Monday. Or Tuesday. Live from the New London Library if it's snowing, but not so hard that even the library is closed! (Sarasota, FL -- here I come? I wish!)
Have a great Superbowl Sunday weekend! Stay safe, everyone. DO NOT TEXT -- or sex-t -- or chat -- even hands-free while driving! Pull over to a safe place first. Better to be safe than sorry.
Denise
New London, CT
Skybox
Have a great Superbowl Sunday weekend! Stay safe, everyone. DO NOT TEXT -- or sex-t -- or chat -- even hands-free while driving! Pull over to a safe place first. Better to be safe than sorry.
Denise
New London, CT
Skybox
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
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