Our mother was a powerful person, controlling all facets of daily life, except whatever small aspects we could hide from her, or were naturally private. These did not amount to much.
Our father had power, too, but it derived from outside the house, where he spent most of his time.
We figured he did a lot of work out there, because when he left in the morning, he smelled fresh (shaving cream) and looked sharp. When he came home, something had obviously took the mickey out of him: wrinkled clothes, loose tie, immediate beer.
He seemed all right, though, and would stand in the kitchen with his beer talking to our mother while she finished cooking dinner.
The fact that he could even get to this job mystified me.
He took the bus on Clarkson and Utica Avenues in the opposite direction from everything I knew. I knew Clarkson Avenue, Lenox Road, Linden Boulevard, Church Avenue, Snyder Avenue, Tilden Avenue, Beverly Road. The library was on Beverly Road, a pretty far walk, and I didn't know anything beyond that.
In the other direction, I didn't know a single thing. Not even one street. He went that way because that's where the subway was.
The subway was a gigantic mystery. He tried to take me on it once. It didn't work out. I didn't like the noise or the smell or the fact that it was underground.
Underground? How do you know when to get off? I refused to get on, and that displeased him. I didn't mind the swat I got as he dragged me back upstairs. At least I was still alive and aware of my surroundings.
He also had the ability to drive a car. That was good, but I really admired his capacity in knowing where things were.
He knew how to get to Flatbush Avenue, Prospect Park, and Manhattan Beach, places we drove to regularly, but not frequently, so how did he remember? I sure didn't.
Every once in a while we would go to a different beach. Riis Park. He knew that, too. Or somewhere new. Shea Stadium. Are you kidding me? It was an hour away with a thousand turns. He never even asked for a second opinion.
Columbus was a famous guy, so I could see it was considered a valuable skill to know how to get places. Some day I would, I figured, though it might be by bus, for me.
Sunday, April 24, 2011
Saturday, April 2, 2011
Table Money
Clap hands, clap hands
Til Daddy comes home.
Daddy has money
And Mommy has none.
Our mother used to sing this little ditty to her babies.
It was related to the well-known couplet about fathers working, but not all day and night, like mothers.
I wasn't sure these things were strictly true, or even remotely so, but it showed you should get your message out there.
You didn't hear fathers singing or rhyming about their situations, which I could see was a blunder.
As far as I could tell, our father didn't have more money than our mother. He had less.
He had change. When he came home from work, he emptied his pockets onto his dresser. There was a torrent of change, but no bills.
He had nothing in his wallet, because he did not have a wallet.
On the other hand, "Go get my purse," our mother would say when the beer man delivered, or the milkman collected, and it was filled with large coarse notes.
On weekends, going shopping to King Kullen or Sears, my mother had the money. If our father was going out alone, to the auto supply or hardware store, our mother gave him money.
Where would he get any money? Our mother went to the bank. It was closed at nights and weekends, when he was home.
He had a piece of paper called a paycheck. On Friday nights he handed it to our mother.
Our mother turned that into a lot of papers. She had a big, brown accordion file filled with envelopes, and typewritten letters, and sheets of papers filled with numbers.
Our father never touched this file. Every once in a while, when our mother was working with these papers on the table, she would call, "Eddie, come in here," and he would get up, sit with her, and talk.
He got out of a lot of work at that table, no doubt, so I'm sure he would not have beefed about the judgment about who works more hours, mother or father.
He might have felt differently about who had more money, if asked. But really, what would he care? His answer probably would have been, "We have our money."
Til Daddy comes home.
Daddy has money
And Mommy has none.
Our mother used to sing this little ditty to her babies.
It was related to the well-known couplet about fathers working, but not all day and night, like mothers.
I wasn't sure these things were strictly true, or even remotely so, but it showed you should get your message out there.
You didn't hear fathers singing or rhyming about their situations, which I could see was a blunder.
As far as I could tell, our father didn't have more money than our mother. He had less.
He had change. When he came home from work, he emptied his pockets onto his dresser. There was a torrent of change, but no bills.
He had nothing in his wallet, because he did not have a wallet.
On the other hand, "Go get my purse," our mother would say when the beer man delivered, or the milkman collected, and it was filled with large coarse notes.
On weekends, going shopping to King Kullen or Sears, my mother had the money. If our father was going out alone, to the auto supply or hardware store, our mother gave him money.
Where would he get any money? Our mother went to the bank. It was closed at nights and weekends, when he was home.
He had a piece of paper called a paycheck. On Friday nights he handed it to our mother.
Our mother turned that into a lot of papers. She had a big, brown accordion file filled with envelopes, and typewritten letters, and sheets of papers filled with numbers.
Our father never touched this file. Every once in a while, when our mother was working with these papers on the table, she would call, "Eddie, come in here," and he would get up, sit with her, and talk.
He got out of a lot of work at that table, no doubt, so I'm sure he would not have beefed about the judgment about who works more hours, mother or father.
He might have felt differently about who had more money, if asked. But really, what would he care? His answer probably would have been, "We have our money."
Sunday, February 27, 2011
Paper Bag Credit Cards
Credit cards did not exist in Brooklyn 3, but a there was a system of consumer credit by merchants based on paper bags and clothesline.
People needed to eat every day, but payday was once every two weeks, and sometimes by the end of the cycle the household money had run out, or even before the end, like at the beginning.
So the butcher, the grocer, etc. would hang you credit.
Come in and place your order. Tell the store you need credit. They add up your order and reach not towards the register, but for a small paper bag.
They write your name on the bag. They write the amount you owe. They hang it with a clothespin on a clothesline behind the counter.
It is revolving credit. There is room on the bag for more owing. But not that much. It is a small bag on purpose.
The owner's expectation is that you will make good on it by the end of the bag. You probably will, because if you don't, you will have to consult with the finance department, which is the owner telling you that your hung credit is dead. You do not wish to be told this when your family is hungry.
You also don't want it known by the neighbors. Chances are they have already seen that your bag has a lot of numbers on it, preceded by plus signs, and no minuses. It is shameful among the people, and also hurtful to your credit rating at other stores.
Some people, however, were hard to shame, or even cajole, and were good at extending credit for themselves. My grandmother was among the best. I suppose you could say worst, if you were an economist. But if you appreciated art, the best.
I was with her one day on Church Avenue. She had money for the bakery and the butcher, but was holding out on the deli, where we stopped for a small treat.
- This is going to be cash, isn't it, Mrs. Keane?
- Ah, no, Morrie. I think I need a little more credit today.
- Well, I was thinking about asking you to settle up some, Mrs. Keane. I mean it's getting a little heavy here.
- I haven't got it, though. Not today. Soon. Just this little purchase, and we'll settle up before you know it.
- Well, I'd like to know it, Mrs. Keane. I mean you owe us quite a bit on this tab here.
- Well, you know, Morrie. I'd rather owe it to you than to have to cheat you out of it.
In the face of such artful intransigence, not only does Ma not get screamed at, or even scowled at, she gets today's order on the line, too. Morrie knows that otherwise he does not see her for a while. And if he is to tell others about the day's dealings with Mrs. Keane, they will only laugh. So the shame factor is non-existent.
She is funny. Chances are Morrie laughs, at least later.
It's not about the money. It's a dance, a bit of theater on the street, in the middle of bland afternoon.
A day's tedium is shattered for a while. No worries. A laugh today. The money? Maybe tomorrow.
People needed to eat every day, but payday was once every two weeks, and sometimes by the end of the cycle the household money had run out, or even before the end, like at the beginning.
So the butcher, the grocer, etc. would hang you credit.
Come in and place your order. Tell the store you need credit. They add up your order and reach not towards the register, but for a small paper bag.
They write your name on the bag. They write the amount you owe. They hang it with a clothespin on a clothesline behind the counter.
It is revolving credit. There is room on the bag for more owing. But not that much. It is a small bag on purpose.
The owner's expectation is that you will make good on it by the end of the bag. You probably will, because if you don't, you will have to consult with the finance department, which is the owner telling you that your hung credit is dead. You do not wish to be told this when your family is hungry.
You also don't want it known by the neighbors. Chances are they have already seen that your bag has a lot of numbers on it, preceded by plus signs, and no minuses. It is shameful among the people, and also hurtful to your credit rating at other stores.
Some people, however, were hard to shame, or even cajole, and were good at extending credit for themselves. My grandmother was among the best. I suppose you could say worst, if you were an economist. But if you appreciated art, the best.
I was with her one day on Church Avenue. She had money for the bakery and the butcher, but was holding out on the deli, where we stopped for a small treat.
- This is going to be cash, isn't it, Mrs. Keane?
- Ah, no, Morrie. I think I need a little more credit today.
- Well, I was thinking about asking you to settle up some, Mrs. Keane. I mean it's getting a little heavy here.
- I haven't got it, though. Not today. Soon. Just this little purchase, and we'll settle up before you know it.
- Well, I'd like to know it, Mrs. Keane. I mean you owe us quite a bit on this tab here.
- Well, you know, Morrie. I'd rather owe it to you than to have to cheat you out of it.
In the face of such artful intransigence, not only does Ma not get screamed at, or even scowled at, she gets today's order on the line, too. Morrie knows that otherwise he does not see her for a while. And if he is to tell others about the day's dealings with Mrs. Keane, they will only laugh. So the shame factor is non-existent.
She is funny. Chances are Morrie laughs, at least later.
It's not about the money. It's a dance, a bit of theater on the street, in the middle of bland afternoon.
A day's tedium is shattered for a while. No worries. A laugh today. The money? Maybe tomorrow.
Sunday, February 20, 2011
Our Other Mother
There was no such thing as divorce in Brooklyn 3. No kid ever lost a parent, nor got an extra one, that way.
Some kids got an extra parent through family, if a real parent got sick.
This happened with us.
Early in her marriage, our mother was hospitalized with polio. She had little kids. So her mother, Maryann Keane, stepped in.
Maryann lived a mile from us, with her husband, Patrick, in a fifth-floor walk-up, on the corner of Church and Brooklyn Avenues.
Maryann Lynch and Patrick Keane were from Ireland. Both came to America as children, fleeing poverty.
Maryann came alone, at age 16.
She'd had the misfortune to be born a girl, first child in a dirt-farming family.
"That's one for America," her father said when she was born, not male. He shipped her to New York as soon as it was legal.
There were boarding houses for such as Maryann. She went to work scrubbing floors in Manhattan.
On weekends, she went to dances for the Irish. She met a man - from Tuam, back home. He was good.
They married. Maryann was 24. Things were good enough that she stopped working.
She bore three children. She was thrilled with it and so was her husband.
Like herself, her husband was denied education as a child, thus choices later. Patrick worked digging ditches and pouring asphalt in the streets.
Their three girls slept in one bed. Maryann washed clothes by hand, in a tub with a washboard and wringer. By no means was there money.
But her husband was faithful, kind, and pious. Also, good-looking and fun. He played the accordion at parties on Saturday nights. Sunday mornings, he cooked breakfast for the family, before ushering at church.
Their girls were all spirited, smart and beautiful.
How much did she love Brooklyn? She loved the place entirely, she told me many times, in a brogue she never lost - jute-strong, song-sweet.
She'd built a life, against all odds, more solid, by a million, than the stone house she was cast from in Longford.
Presumably, to help a sick daughter raise children was no great burden, in her mind.
Maryann came to our house by bus each morning before our father left for work, and took the bus home once he returned. No need to bother him with driving, tired as he was. Some nights she stayed, if needed. On weekends she drove with her husband.
We children were small, and of course had all bonded normally with our mother, but there arose some confusion about the role of these two women in our lives.
Other kids saw their mothers a lot, and their grandmothers a little. With us, it was the opposite.
We referred to our grandmother as "Ma." Of course, our mother was Mom. But whatever a grandmother was, or was supposed to be, ours was more. Hence the splitting of the title.
I don't know if anyone tried to clarify the issue for us, or correct us. If they did, it didn't stick. We never referred to nor addressed Maryann as anything but Ma, our whole lives.
Some kids got an extra parent through family, if a real parent got sick.
This happened with us.
Early in her marriage, our mother was hospitalized with polio. She had little kids. So her mother, Maryann Keane, stepped in.
Maryann lived a mile from us, with her husband, Patrick, in a fifth-floor walk-up, on the corner of Church and Brooklyn Avenues.
Maryann Lynch and Patrick Keane were from Ireland. Both came to America as children, fleeing poverty.
Maryann came alone, at age 16.
She'd had the misfortune to be born a girl, first child in a dirt-farming family.
"That's one for America," her father said when she was born, not male. He shipped her to New York as soon as it was legal.
There were boarding houses for such as Maryann. She went to work scrubbing floors in Manhattan.
On weekends, she went to dances for the Irish. She met a man - from Tuam, back home. He was good.
They married. Maryann was 24. Things were good enough that she stopped working.
She bore three children. She was thrilled with it and so was her husband.
Like herself, her husband was denied education as a child, thus choices later. Patrick worked digging ditches and pouring asphalt in the streets.
Their three girls slept in one bed. Maryann washed clothes by hand, in a tub with a washboard and wringer. By no means was there money.
But her husband was faithful, kind, and pious. Also, good-looking and fun. He played the accordion at parties on Saturday nights. Sunday mornings, he cooked breakfast for the family, before ushering at church.
Their girls were all spirited, smart and beautiful.
How much did she love Brooklyn? She loved the place entirely, she told me many times, in a brogue she never lost - jute-strong, song-sweet.
She'd built a life, against all odds, more solid, by a million, than the stone house she was cast from in Longford.
Presumably, to help a sick daughter raise children was no great burden, in her mind.
Maryann came to our house by bus each morning before our father left for work, and took the bus home once he returned. No need to bother him with driving, tired as he was. Some nights she stayed, if needed. On weekends she drove with her husband.
We children were small, and of course had all bonded normally with our mother, but there arose some confusion about the role of these two women in our lives.
Other kids saw their mothers a lot, and their grandmothers a little. With us, it was the opposite.
We referred to our grandmother as "Ma." Of course, our mother was Mom. But whatever a grandmother was, or was supposed to be, ours was more. Hence the splitting of the title.
I don't know if anyone tried to clarify the issue for us, or correct us. If they did, it didn't stick. We never referred to nor addressed Maryann as anything but Ma, our whole lives.
Friday, December 31, 2010
Rhythms of Cement
Very little of the world in Brooklyn 3 had to do with nature. Rhythms and substance were defined by people - where they were and what they were doing.
Mornings were delivery trucks. If I was aware that birds sang mornings, I don't recall it.
Kids watched for good delivery guys to arrive at the stores, to catch free stuff. The best was Cake Man. Stand on the curb and chant "We want cake," and he would hit you up with first-class strudel.
Twice a week was garbage trucks. They were important to note because you could get tipped by neighbors for retrieving their metal cans, after the garbage gentlemen emptied and blithely flung them in random directions.
Mid-morning was the mailman. Larry was the regular. He had big thick glasses from years of address-reading. He had a great conveyance, two big brown leather pouches on a three-wheel frame. If you caught him he'd let you push it to the corner.
At lunch, unlike dinner, one was permitted to watch TV, and I liked game shows, as an indice of strange adult behavior. None of the adults I knew were ever silly, but on game shows they all were.
Some shows were edifying and not just mere curiosities. I found "You Don't Say" splendid, with a cunning tag line at show's end: "Remember, it's not what you say that counts, it's what you don't say," which struck me as archly insightful. I had the mistaken notion that Tom Kennedy, the host, was President Kennedy's brother.
In the mid-afternoon, kids returned from school. They tended to travel in packs. For some reason, kids walking alone, or in smaller groups, tended to be smart kids. Not that none of the kids in packs were, but you couldn't tell, and the odds were against it, considering the limited quantity of this commodity around us.
Late afternoon and early evening was the return of breadwinners; and the setting of tables.
Evenings were exciting, as the neighborhood was full, together again. In good weather, adults came out to talk, and kids to play.
The streetlights were stars, announcing night. They came on and mothers called children they couldn't see, somewhere out there - back to the nest, I guess.
Mornings were delivery trucks. If I was aware that birds sang mornings, I don't recall it.
Kids watched for good delivery guys to arrive at the stores, to catch free stuff. The best was Cake Man. Stand on the curb and chant "We want cake," and he would hit you up with first-class strudel.
Twice a week was garbage trucks. They were important to note because you could get tipped by neighbors for retrieving their metal cans, after the garbage gentlemen emptied and blithely flung them in random directions.
Mid-morning was the mailman. Larry was the regular. He had big thick glasses from years of address-reading. He had a great conveyance, two big brown leather pouches on a three-wheel frame. If you caught him he'd let you push it to the corner.
At lunch, unlike dinner, one was permitted to watch TV, and I liked game shows, as an indice of strange adult behavior. None of the adults I knew were ever silly, but on game shows they all were.
Some shows were edifying and not just mere curiosities. I found "You Don't Say" splendid, with a cunning tag line at show's end: "Remember, it's not what you say that counts, it's what you don't say," which struck me as archly insightful. I had the mistaken notion that Tom Kennedy, the host, was President Kennedy's brother.
In the mid-afternoon, kids returned from school. They tended to travel in packs. For some reason, kids walking alone, or in smaller groups, tended to be smart kids. Not that none of the kids in packs were, but you couldn't tell, and the odds were against it, considering the limited quantity of this commodity around us.
Late afternoon and early evening was the return of breadwinners; and the setting of tables.
Evenings were exciting, as the neighborhood was full, together again. In good weather, adults came out to talk, and kids to play.
The streetlights were stars, announcing night. They came on and mothers called children they couldn't see, somewhere out there - back to the nest, I guess.
Monday, December 27, 2010
Good Examples Versus Onions and Shoes
Adults should present good examples for children, but this was not always easy in Brooklyn 3, where there was so much reality.
Missing Mass on Sunday was a mortal sin. In our house, everybody went, every week. But not all families went, particularly not all fathers.
Some fathers got migraine headaches a lot. It was practically epidemic on Sunday mornings. It was transmitted by bottles the night before.
Most women didn't drive, so if the fathers didn't go, nobody went, although some kids with compelling fear of Hell would walk it, if they were old enough. If the mother had a baby, or babies, walking was out, unless the mother had a notion to shame the father, which of course could be as compelling as avoiding Hell.
You weren't supposed to curse, or take the Lord's name in vain, and this never happened in our house; our parents were good communicators, and could express bad feelings without vulgarity.
But this was not common, and even good kids learned powerful lexicons, and creative ways to use them.
With immigrant grandparents, some kids could curse internationally. We learned the expression "Tre cipolle culo di tuo fratello," or "Three onions up your brother's ass," from Cathy Dimarinis's grandmother. She would say it to people she didn't like, who didn't capish Italian, in a cheery tone of voice, and they would smile and wave.
You weren't supposed to steal, but sometimes the men found things, and would trade them for money, or for things other guys found, such as cartons of cigarettes, frozen meats, and new clothing.
Once, Jamesy Coppola's father actually went to jail for a misunderstanding about selling some shirts he had. The misunderstanding was with the owner of the House of Ivy clothing store on Church Avenue, where Jamesy's father worked.
There was much scorn in the neighborhood for Mr. Coppola being so stupid, getting caught selling some lousy shirts, when the store also stocked nice shoes.
I didn't second-guess the adults. I knew no one was perfect. I also knew not to note too hard what didn't involve me, and especially, not to ask stupid questions about things adults did. You can just as easily learn from bad examples as good.
Missing Mass on Sunday was a mortal sin. In our house, everybody went, every week. But not all families went, particularly not all fathers.
Some fathers got migraine headaches a lot. It was practically epidemic on Sunday mornings. It was transmitted by bottles the night before.
Most women didn't drive, so if the fathers didn't go, nobody went, although some kids with compelling fear of Hell would walk it, if they were old enough. If the mother had a baby, or babies, walking was out, unless the mother had a notion to shame the father, which of course could be as compelling as avoiding Hell.
You weren't supposed to curse, or take the Lord's name in vain, and this never happened in our house; our parents were good communicators, and could express bad feelings without vulgarity.
But this was not common, and even good kids learned powerful lexicons, and creative ways to use them.
With immigrant grandparents, some kids could curse internationally. We learned the expression "Tre cipolle culo di tuo fratello," or "Three onions up your brother's ass," from Cathy Dimarinis's grandmother. She would say it to people she didn't like, who didn't capish Italian, in a cheery tone of voice, and they would smile and wave.
You weren't supposed to steal, but sometimes the men found things, and would trade them for money, or for things other guys found, such as cartons of cigarettes, frozen meats, and new clothing.
Once, Jamesy Coppola's father actually went to jail for a misunderstanding about selling some shirts he had. The misunderstanding was with the owner of the House of Ivy clothing store on Church Avenue, where Jamesy's father worked.
There was much scorn in the neighborhood for Mr. Coppola being so stupid, getting caught selling some lousy shirts, when the store also stocked nice shoes.
I didn't second-guess the adults. I knew no one was perfect. I also knew not to note too hard what didn't involve me, and especially, not to ask stupid questions about things adults did. You can just as easily learn from bad examples as good.
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Last Name Basis
From the first days of school, we manly fellows addressed each other by last name.
It was not James, Danny, Stephen, John, but Behan, Boylan, Burke, Calabrese, et al.
It didn't have to do with being seated alphabetically. The girls were, too, on their half of the room, but they were Angela, Patty, Gianna, Karen, not Accardi, Achacoso, Alonzo, Amato.
It projected toughness and authority in a setting where you were pretty vulnerable, psychologically and physically.
If I am "Burke" to you, you are certainly not "Jimmy" to me. You're lucky you're not "pal."
St. Catherine's recognized our vulnerability by putting first- and second-grade boys in the girls' schoolyard, rather than with the third- through eighth-grade boys.
The schoolyards were separated by a big wire fence. You weren't scared or anything, but it was smart to stay away from the perimeters, where through the fence there was ribald taunting of first-grade babies and second-grade tots, and the occasional well-placed clam, or gob of spit.
In the boys' schoolyard were games of dodgeball and punchball. In the girls' was tether ball and jump rope.
Of course, for a boy, these activities were out of the question - the jump rope categorically, and tether ball by association. Once, James Fiore tried a little jump rope. There was an immediate, rabid raid from the boys' schoolyard. He was abducted and deposited into the St. Vincent de Paul dropbox in the boys' yard. It was a big metal box with a pretty small slot.
So, younger boys spent recess and lunch time flipping baseball cards or pitching pennies. I did a certain amount of that, but wasn't very good at it, and didn't have much money to lose. So I spent a lot of time just hanging around, talking and joking with last-name guys and first-name girls. I must have realized on some level that never again would I be in a daily social situation with females outnumbering males 4 to 1.
It was not James, Danny, Stephen, John, but Behan, Boylan, Burke, Calabrese, et al.
It didn't have to do with being seated alphabetically. The girls were, too, on their half of the room, but they were Angela, Patty, Gianna, Karen, not Accardi, Achacoso, Alonzo, Amato.
It projected toughness and authority in a setting where you were pretty vulnerable, psychologically and physically.
If I am "Burke" to you, you are certainly not "Jimmy" to me. You're lucky you're not "pal."
St. Catherine's recognized our vulnerability by putting first- and second-grade boys in the girls' schoolyard, rather than with the third- through eighth-grade boys.
The schoolyards were separated by a big wire fence. You weren't scared or anything, but it was smart to stay away from the perimeters, where through the fence there was ribald taunting of first-grade babies and second-grade tots, and the occasional well-placed clam, or gob of spit.
In the boys' schoolyard were games of dodgeball and punchball. In the girls' was tether ball and jump rope.
Of course, for a boy, these activities were out of the question - the jump rope categorically, and tether ball by association. Once, James Fiore tried a little jump rope. There was an immediate, rabid raid from the boys' schoolyard. He was abducted and deposited into the St. Vincent de Paul dropbox in the boys' yard. It was a big metal box with a pretty small slot.
So, younger boys spent recess and lunch time flipping baseball cards or pitching pennies. I did a certain amount of that, but wasn't very good at it, and didn't have much money to lose. So I spent a lot of time just hanging around, talking and joking with last-name guys and first-name girls. I must have realized on some level that never again would I be in a daily social situation with females outnumbering males 4 to 1.
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