Daddy's Little Girl

When I was two years old, my father would lift me up and stand me on top of the refrigerator. Of course, refrigerators were smaller in those days, but, still, my feet were at the level of his chest.

"Jump!" he'd say, holding his hands out to catch me. I had no fear. I remember the triumphant joy of soaring through the air as if I were flying, and landing, giggling and safe in his arms.

Daddy loved to joke. Sometimes he would put me high on that refrigerator, and then fold his arms over his chest. "Jump!" he'd say. I never hesitated; I knew he wouldn't let me get hurt. I would leap, secure in my belief that Daddy would catch me, just as he always had, and indeed he would.

*          *          *

Daddy and Mummy always said I was a happy baby. I wasn't demanding, I didn't cry much, and I was good at amusing myself. Easy-going and even-tempered like Daddy, they said.  But I had my moments.

One day, when I was in a fussy, whining mood, I'm told, Daddy said in exasperation, "For crying out loud, Kay, cut it out! You're acting like a two-year-old!" Then he looked down at me.  My head was even with the top of the kitchen table. "You are two years old!" he said, laughing, and he picked me up and hugged me.

*          *          *

I loved Rootie Kazootie, a character featured in a children's television show of the early 50's. I don't know if I ever saw the television program, but I knew Rootie well from the Golden Books my father read to me. Daddy would check Woolworth's regularly to see if there were any new Rootie books, and he bought me every single one that he could find. We both loved them, which was lucky, because I asked for Daddy to read them to me over and over and over again. Like Daddy, Rootie was a very good baseball player and usually wore his baseball cap. But Rootie had the added benefit of owning a magic kazootie, some special kind of kazoo which could help him out of all kinds of scrapes. Along with his spotted dog, Gala Poochie Pup,  his girl friend, PolkaDottie, who was famous in her own right for making Polka Dot Pineapple Pies, and a helpful gentleman named Mr. Deetle Dootle,  Rootie could face any challenge, including those dangers caused by his arch villain, Poison Zoomac. Sometimes I would call Daddy Rootie, and I would be PolkaDottie. When we went to the A&P to buy food, I was always very interested in the pineapple pies they sold, which were not made by PolkaDottie, but instead by a lady named Ann Page whose picture appeared on every one of their red pie boxes. Once in a while, we'd buy an Ann Page pineapple pie, but I knew that they were not half as good as the PolkaDot Pineapple Pies that I made when I was PolkaDottie.

*          *          *

Our family often sang together, especially in the car, but there was one song that Daddy sang just for me. We were in our old Plymouth one time, Daddy much later told me. I was riding in the front seat beside him. As he drove us home, he was singing to me, "You're Daddy's little girl to have and to hold...."  Suddenly, a car pulled out in front of him. Daddy hit the brake and threw an arm out to catch me as we screeched to a stop. "I wasn't quick enough," he said. "I missed you, and you slid forward off the seat and banged your head on the dashboard." And as he told me that long-past story, I saw tears in his eyes.

*          *          *

Daddy worked in Malden Square at Mrs. Bell's Donut Shop. I don't know who Mrs. Bell was. The donut shop was owned by Daddy's boss, Al Bolton. I called him Al, and I liked him a lot. He was a skinny man, balding, but with wisps of pale red hair and a pale red mustache. Like everyone else at Mrs. Bell's, Al was always glad to see me when I came in. He'd say, "Well, look who's here! It's Kay!"  I'd happily inform him that he was wrong, and then I'd let Al know who I was that day. Sometimes I was Polkadottie, sometimes Princess Summerfallwinterspring.  Whenever I came in, he would greet me as whoever I had been on the last visit, but no matter what Al guessed, poor man, he was always wrong. In a pinch, sometimes I was even just myself.

 When Mummy took me to the donut shop, I would be escorted around the store to say hello to everyone. I knew Esther Rose, the scrawny old woman who washed dishes, and Tommy Ray, the cheerful man who cleaned the store. I knew all the waitresses, but my favorite was Prissy. She and Mummy were friends, and sometimes Prissy came to birthday parties at our house.

On one visit to the donut shop, I sat down at the counter, and a new young waitress asked me what I would like. "I'd like a glass of milk," I said.

"Cow's milk?" she asked in a teasing voice.

I thought that a very silly idea. Why would I want to take a glass of milk away from some poor cow? "No," I answered, quite seriously. "I want girl's milk!"

I am told the young waitress blushed, and never again asked me a silly question.

I loved to watch Daddy make donuts. He stood in a glassed-off room just to the rear of the restaurant area, so that customers could watch him as he worked. Although most people had to stay on the restaurant side of the window, I could walk right back and watch Daddy close up as he mixed the dough with his hands in a huge silver-colored mixing bowl. When he had mixed it enough, he would flop it onto the cloth-covered work bench, and would scrape the dough off his hands with his fingers. I liked the way he sprinkled the dough with flour before he kneaded it, and then rolled the dough out. I would watch his hands move quickly with the donut cutter. Sometimes I would watch him set cooking racks of donuts into the bubbling hot grease of the fryolator. His hands would fly as he used two long wooden sticks to turn the donuts over in the hot grease so they would cook on both sides. Daddy even took me with him to the darker back room, the location of the refrigerator, the storeroom, the sink and Esther Rose. 

I could go everywhere.

I knew everything about making donuts. I knew about the proof boxes where the raise donuts were placed to rise. I loved the jelly pump for filling all those jelly donuts. I watched Daddy sugar the donuts, or dip them into the honey glaze, or, my favorite, the chocolate frosting.

I loved Mrs. Bell's. 

I loved the small white tiles of the floor, the big rounded top mirrors on the wall against every booth, the L-shaped counter, and the front display cases for the donuts and other delicious things Daddy made. I could look through the glass of the case at biscuits, lemon squares, apple squares, and muffins. I could see the trays of donuts in the tall cases against the wall. I knew my Daddy was a very good baker. In fact, he made the best donuts in the whole wide world.

Mummy worked part-time at Mrs. Bell's some days after Daddy came home from work. When she worked at night, it was a special time for Daddy  and me. Daddy would make supper for us, and afterwards, we would have a special treat of ginger ale as we watched television together. We would lie on our tummies on the parlor floor in front of the television, glasses of Cliquot Club ginger ale beside us, and the bottle close by in case we wanted any more. We would watch all kinds of funny shows. Sometimes we fell asleep, and when Mummy came home, she would find us in the flickering light of the television, both asleep on the parlor floor, Daddy's arm around me.

                                                               - Kate Lydon Varley

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The Best Bedtime Stories Ever

For Father's Day, I'm remembering 

some of the stories my Dad told us at bedtime,

 many years ago.

“Tell us a story about when you were little!” Johnny and I begged.

Standing at the doorway to our bedroom, Daddy smiled, and we knew that meant yes.

“All right,” Daddy said. “Now, let’s see. One time, when I was just three or four years old, my mother needed to go to the store to get something for supper, so she called to my Dad to watch me while she was out, and she told me to be good. The store was just across the street, so she wouldn’t be gone a long time. My Dad was tired and he went to take a nap, and while he was sleeping, I got some nails and a hammer from his tool box, and I decided to help out. I started to nail down our rug in the parlor.”

“Why?” Johnny asked. We had never nailed down our rugs.

“I wanted it to stay down,” Daddy said. “I made such a mess! Those nails were twisting all over the place, but I kept trying, and I finally got nails in all around the rug. And when my mother came back home, there I was sitting on the parlor floor, with a bunch of nails around me and a hammer in my hand.”

“Was she surprised?” I asked.

“She was more than surprised! She was mad!”

“She was mad at you?” I tried to imagine my Nana mad at Daddy!

 “No, she was mad at my father! She went into the bedroom and got him up, and said, I ask you to watch Jackie for a few minutes so I can go to the store, and look what happens! You go to sleep, and he nails the rug to the floor!’

“My Dad said, I was just taking a nap! I thought he was with you!

“With me?’ my mother said. I told you I was leaving him with you!

“‘Well this is the first I heard of it,’ my Dad said.

“‘And didn’t you hear all that hammering?’ she asked.

“‘I didn’t notice,’ he told her.  But his nap was over, and he had to spend the rest of the afternoon getting all those nails out of the parlor floor!”

We both laughed, and then, quickly, before he could get away, we begged, “Tell us another story!”

“My father used to take me down to the corner store with him, and he’d tell the people there, ‘Between me and my son Jackie, we know everything. You can ask us any question you want, and between us, we can give you the answer.’  Someone would ask a real tough question, and my father would smile and say, ‘That one’s Jackie’s department! You tell them the answer, Jackie.’”

We laughed again.

“It was the Depression,” Dad said, “and no one had money. When the rent was coming due, if we didn’t have enough money to pay it, we’d move someplace else where the rent was cheaper. So one time we moved into an apartment on the top floor of a three decker where everything seemed fine until one night when it rained. The roof leaked, and we had water dripping from the ceiling. My mother put pots and pans underneath to catch the drips, and the next day, my father told the landlord about it. Well, the landlord said he’d fix it, but he didn’t do anything. The next time it rained, we had water dripping all over the place again. So my mother got the pots and pans out again, and the next day my father told the landlord again. He promised again that he’d fix it, but he still didn’t do anything. Every time it rained, we’d have pots and pans all over the floor. My father got so mad! One night when it started raining, he looked up at the ceiling where it was dripping, and he went for his toolbox. He got out a drill, and he drilled holes in the floor underneath every place it was dripping, so the drips would go downstairs to the apartment below. ‘Maybe if there’s more of us complaining, the landlord will do something about it,’ he said.”

Daddy’s father was so funny! But so was the rest of his family. “Tell us another story from when you were a kid,” we asked.

“Well, one time when we were living with my grandfather,” Dad said, “I decided to stick my head through the rungs on the back of a dining room chair, just to see if it would fit. I got my head through all right. The problem was, I couldn’t get it back out again. So I began to holler for my mother. Your Nana came running, and she and her sister Agnes tried to pull me out. Well, the more they pulled, the more it hurt. I was really stuck, and every time they pulled me, it felt like they were tearing my ears off. I began yelling, ‘Saw the chair! Saw the chair!’ And Agnes said, ‘The damn little brat!’”

Johnny and I giggled in shock that Agnes had said a swear word about our Dad!

“My mother got some butter and rubbed it on my head and my ears, and she and Agnes kept pulling me and rubbing butter on me until my head finally slipped out. Agnes was so mad at me!” Dad laughed.

“Tell us more about Agnes!” we begged. We loved the stories about her.

“It used to drive Agnes crazy that I pulled my chair in close to the table when we ate. She’d say to my mother, ‘Look at him! His chair’s too close! Don’t let him push it in so far!’ My grandfather Daddy Jim would tell her to leave me alone, and she’d be real mad. So I’d pull my chair in so close to the table that I could hardly breathe, just to bother her.”

“Tell us about Willie,” we’d beg.

“Willie was your Nana’s littlest brother, and he was just a teenager when I was a kid. One time my mother said that she was going to take me to the doctor to get a check-up before I started school. Willie got me alone before I went to the doctor, and he said to me, ‘Jackie, I heard you’re going to the doctor. Now don’t be scared about it. Going to the doctor isn’t so bad. There’s only one thing you have to watch out for. Sometimes the doctor takes out a little flat stick and tells you to open your mouth. Whatever you do, Jackie, don’t open your mouth, or he’ll take that little stick and shove it down your throat and choke you to death. So you be careful!’”

Johnny and I laughed. Willie was telling a big fib!  Doctors don’t try to choke you to death!

 “So I went to the doctor’s,” Dad said, “and everything was all right until the doctor took out that little wooden stick. ‘You’re not going to kill me!’ I yelled.  Well, the nurse started telling me everything was fine, and the doctor wouldn’t hurt me, and she and the doctor were both trying to hold me and telling me to open my mouth. I kicked the doctor as hard as I could and jumped off the table, and I started running. The two of them chased me all over the room trying to get me to open my mouth.”

That Willie! I thought.

“Another time,” Dad said, “it was a Saturday. I loved to go to the movie theater and Willie was all set to go with his friends. He said to me, ‘Aren’t you going to the pictures today, Jackie?’

‘I can’t go. I don’t have any money,’ I told him.

‘Don’t you know, today you don’t need money,’ he told me. ‘Today they have a special deal, and you can get in for a button.’”

“We always have to pay money,” I said.

“Well, I ran in the house and pulled a button off a shirt,” Dad said, “and then I ran down to the theater. There was a big line for the matinee, and I got in line and waited my turn. Finally I got up to the ticket window. I handed the lady my button and asked for a ticket.

‘This is a button, little boy,’ she said. ‘Where’s your nickel?’

‘You’re taking buttons instead of nickels today,’ I reminded her.

‘No, we don’t take buttons. You need a nickel to get a ticket,’ she said.

‘It’s a special button day! My uncle Willie told me it is!’ I said. ‘You’re giving tickets for buttons!’

‘Your uncle Willie lied to you,' she said. ‘Where’s your nickel?’

‘I don’t have a nickel,’ I said. ‘I just have a button.’

 “If you don’t have a nickel, you can’t get a ticket. Now stop holding up the line!’

“I was so disappointed that I started crying. But you know what? A big kid was selling papers on the corner, and he saw what happened. He came over to me and said, ‘Don’t cry, kid. 

Here’s a nickel. Go see the pictures.’ So I got to go to the show anyway.”

 “Tell us another story, please!” we’d beg.

“I bet you never knew that one time I gave Nana a black eye,” Dad said.

“Why?” my brother Johnny asked.

“We went to Revere Beach one day, and Nana put out a blanket on the sand for us to sit on. I sat down to take off my shoes. I was so excited to be at the beach that I was rushing so I could go in the water. I got my shoe off, and threw it over my shoulder to get it out of my way. I didn’t know it, but my mother was right behind me. It hit her in the eye, and she got a black eye!”

“Was she mad at you?” I asked.

“She knew it was an accident, so she wasn’t mad,” Daddy said. “But even when I was naughty, Nana always hated to punish me. Sometimes if I was naughty, she’d say, ‘If you don’t stop that, Jackie, you’re going to get a spanking.’ And if I kept it up and kept it up and kept it up, she’d finally take me over her knee. She’d lift her hand way up in the air, and then just barely touch it down on my bottom, about as hard as when a fly lands on you. She’d give me two or three little pats like that, and all the time, she’d be crying because she hated to spank me.

“When I was supposed to begin first grade,” Daddy said, “my mother told me, ‘You’re not going to be able to spend all your time having fun and playing in the park. Those days are over. You have to start school.’  I didn’t want to go. I was used to playing with my friends and my cousins in the park all day, and I wanted to keep playing. My mother sent me off to school, but instead I just went to Glendale Park to play. So my mother told my father, ‘You’re going to have to take him to school.’ The next day my father walked me to school. He waited until he saw me go in the door to the school building, and then he left.

“Well, I waited just inside the door, and when I saw he was gone, I ran off to the park to play. That night my mother said to my father, ‘I asked you to take Jackie to school, but the school said he didn’t come today either.’

“’I took him,’ my father said. ‘I saw him go in the door.’

“So the next day my father walked me into school right to my classroom door to make sure I got in. But as soon as the teacher turned her back, I snuck out of the room and went to the park again. My father found me in the park, and brought me back to school. He told me I had to stay there. This time he came right into my classroom and sat in the back of the room to make sure I didn’t sneak out.

“But it turned out I had a nice teacher. She had us act out nursery rhymes. She brought a candlestick into class, and every day she’d put it on the floor in the front of the classroom. While the class would recite, ‘Jack, be nimble! Jack, be quick! Jack, jump over the candle stick!’, I’d jump back and forth over it. So I started to like school.”

“Tell us another story!” we begged.

“That’s enough for tonight,” Daddy said. “It’s time to get some sleep.”

“Can I have another glass of water?” Johnny asked.

“Me too,” I said.

“Just one,” Daddy said, “and this is the last one.”

After we drank our water, Daddy kissed us again and tucked us in. Then he disappeared down the hallway. Still giggling, Johnny and I talked for a few minutes about when Daddy was a little boy. No matter how many of his stories he told us, it was never enough.

     ~ Kate Lydon Varley