It is a hot, still
summer day. Butterflies flit slowly over
the larkspur and zinnias in the backyard.
Even the cicadas sound drugged. I
am seven or eight and already I am warm in my shorts set and sandals. My mother has had the windows open but has
now closed them and drawn the blinds against the heat. The tea is steeping in its cool water in the
kitchen and eggs have been boiled along with potatoes for tonight's potato
salad.
I am having
breakfast. The shredded wheat box is
separated into two layers by a cardboard divider which has pictures on it to
color. I am already deciding which
crayons to use. Timmy, the cocker
spaniel, is sprawled in the corner where the linoleum is still cool. He has done his chores for the day - running
down the cellar stairs when my father puts his coffee cup down hard on the
saucer. Timmy comes up with one work
boot in his mouth then brings up the other one.
It's his only trick but impressive nonetheless. He is definitely my father's dog -- oh, he
tolerates my mother and me, but gets all excited when the company Ford coupe
pulls up out front in the late afternoons.
He wags his whole backside then.
I am wondering what
I am going to do on this hot day when my mother announces that it's time to
clean out my toys and get rid of some of them.
She doesn't put it quite like that.
She says I'm too big for certain things and that, if I don't play with
them anymore, they should go to someone who could.
I immediately start
to whine and I feel protective of all my things. We go up the stairs anyway, my mother leading
and me following reluctantly. She makes
my bed, not too much work in the summer --two sheets and the cotton spread. Now we start to separate toys. There are things I haven't looked at in a
long time -- baby books and some wind-up things, old blocks and a rag doll I
was once fond of . I am sure that I love
that doll.
"Dawn's little
sister doesn't have much to play with and she would love to have these
things," my mother says calmly as I watch the growing pile in dismay. "I'll get them ready and you can take
them over this morning." She talks
gently but I know she means it.
I stump downstairs
and, in a few minutes, my mother comes down with a bag of toys. "Take them down now," she says,
"before it gets too hot."
"Come on," she adds with a smile, "you still have lots
left to play with.
I leave with the
bag in one hand and clutching the rag doll in the other. I see that there are also some shorts and
skirts and a dress that are two small for me in the bag.
I go out the door,
off the porch to the sidewalk and up to the corner. I turn down the road and go off into the
woods a little way on the path to the Zerbe's house. Mr. Zerbe works for my father on the mine for
the Cameron Coal Company. They have
three children. There is Wayne who is in
the fourth or fifth grade and Dawn who is in my room at school. She is very shy and quiet. Then there is her little sister who is going
to get all my things. I am angry when I
reach their house. Why don't they get
their own toys?
Mrs. Zerbe greets
me with a smile. "Oh, Sally, come
in. Look, Jeanie (so that's her name)
what Sally brought you." The little girl -- well, she's littler than me --
is all excited about the things in the bag.
Wayne is in the back in the kitchen and Dawn is
smiling by the table. They have a
smaller house than we do and I can see all of their downstairs at once.
"Oh, these are
nice," Mrs. Zerbe says. "Would you like a dish of
huckleberries?"
"All
right," I said. I had just had
breakfast an hour or so ago, but I never refused food.
She put a saucer of
blueberries and cream in front of me and the sugar bowl. I sprinkled sugar on the berries and began to
eat Everyone watched, smiling. Oh, they were good. I felt a little better when I had
finished. I remembered to say thank you
and left to go. They said goodbye and
Jeanie waved, clutching the rag doll.
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