Spending Time Home Alone

Excerpt from book, "God Forbid..."
“See you tomorrow,” I said as my classmates ran off in different directions. Then, I held onto my satchel to keep the strap from sliding off my shoulder, and skipped the remaining eight blocks home alone. At the house, I removed the chain from around my neck and inserted the key dangling from it into the lock.

“Latchkey Child,” didn’t apply; at least the term didn’t actually materialize until much later. In my day, most thought of me as precocious—mature enough to be left on my own for a couple of hours a day. However, the truth is, after my two older sisters left home—one married and the other entered Julliard’s School of Music—the teenagers my parents hired to keep an eye on me, couldn’t handle my vivacious spirit.

One said, “She won’t listen and runs off all the time.” Another admitted, “I just don’t have the patience for this job.” So at their wits end, my parents put a house key on a chain and placed it around my neck. There’d be the devil to pay if I strayed from the straight and narrow.

That first day I turned the key in the lock and entered an empty house, hearing only the ping, ping of water hitting the metal pan under the ice box, I darted to my bedroom and changed from my school uniform into jeans and a blouse that still hung on the bed post. Then I dashed into the kitchen scouring the cupboards for a cookie, but I only found crackers. I poured some milk, sat down at the table, spread peanut butter on my treat and munched on the saltines. I noticed a note from my mother, but my mind went into free spin.

I thought of Dad running a printing press at work, and Mom clerking at a downtown clothing store, which she’d done since I turned three. They’d told me many times that both incomes were necessary. I knew this to be true because, often, my parents did without milk, butter and meat, just so we girls had enough food. I remembered the issuance of Ration Stamps for food, and having to eat pancakes, creamed eggs on toast or macaroni and cheese for supper. However, I also recalled spinach. I hated that.

I picked up the note: “Practice piano, peel potatoes and leave them to soak in water, then do your homework.” I looked out the window for a few minutes, and then found the potato peeler and started slicing off the brown skin, trying to scrape away from my hand like Mom taught me. Then I pulled out the piano bench and opened my music. Mom’s words echoed, “If you want to take voice lessons when you turn twelve, you’ll have to practice piano every day until then.”

After practicing just enough to squeak by, I leafed through my class assignment, always leaving the actual work until after supper. However, that also meant my studies came under the close scrutiny of my parents. Homework was my least favorite chore. My grades proved it, too.

I soon turned ten, and although I still spent after school hours alone, now we were moving out of the apartment and into a little house that sat just around the corner. Mom’s boss loaned my parents the down payment. So now, we were cutting through the back yards dragging furniture and boxes to a home of our own.

It had a small living room, a tiny dining room we turned into a music room, a kitchen where the table sat squashed between the stove and the back entry door, meaning the table had to be pulled out every time the three of us sat down to eat, and if anyone came in the back door, Dad would have to get up to let them through the narrow entranceway. Also, the bathroom sat off the kitchen on the first floor, making middle of the night trips rare. However, no more pot belly stove to heat the house. In our little basement, we had a luxurious coal burning furnace, complete with a black, sooty coal bin.

The two bedrooms upstairs both had slanting ceilings, possibly converted from an attic. My small 8x10 room had no closet, so Dad put in a two-door cardboard wardrobe that fit in a corner near my dressing table. That table held many cherished items, like a stand-up mirror, edged in pink ceramic roses and a fancily decorated, gold edged mirror and brush set. Dad painted the small room in my favorite colors, too—pink and light purple. A perfect girl’s room.

One of the two windows in my bedroom faced the roof of the kitchen and looked out across the alleyway that ran beside our house. Sitting on my bed reading one day, I heard a smashing sound and looked up at the window to see cobweb-like cracks around a dime-sized hole. On the floor laid a pellet from a B.B. gun. I kept the shade pulled down for a long time after that.

However, this window also provided a quick get away. I could sneak out the window onto the kitchen’s shingled roof and jump to the ground from it, making for a fun escape. Not quite as much fun climbing back up, though.

During those many hours left on my own, I’d entertain myself listening to the radio and singing along with “Lazy River,” “More Than You Know” and swooning over the Benny Goodman band or, perhaps, listen to “The Shadow.” For my birthday, I received a little red suitcase containing a 45 rpm record player. Then, I enjoyed singing along more. I played “How Much Is That Doggie in the Window” over and over. I can still sing it.

Dad must have heard me singing that, because shortly after settling in our new home, Dad let me pick out a dog, a long-haired, full-sized, black mutt with ears that stood straight up narrowing to a point. I called him Tippy. Tippy would cuddle up beside me when I read or sang with the record player. However, he’d howl like a wolf if I sang high notes.

I still got bored. One time, I thought it would be fun to surprise Mom with a cake. I put all the ingredients in a bowl and began to mix it with a spoon. What a jumbled up mess, I thought. It looks like that erupting volcano I keep seeing in my dreams. It can’t be edible. I then threw it all out in the garbage.

When Mom came home that night, I told her about the cake batter and explained why I got rid of it. I thought she would faint. “You wasted all those eggs, sugar and flour,” she gasped, adding, “It’s supposed to look like that. You have to beat it with the mix-master before it gets smooth.” My stomach churned as she turned on her heels and marched off, leaving me to wonder if I’d just turned into a leper.

When I recall Mom’s face after that cake fiasco, I see a snapshot of her taken on a brutal winter day. She stood on the snowy-edged, front steps, wrapped in a long, brown fur coat, like a soldier in the Army. That picture sums up my mother: she kept a tight reign on her cub, she never allowed this child to challenge her authority, she demanded respect—and got it, and it reminded me that Mother always knows best. I saw a hint of a smile on her face, too. Perhaps, that’s why she later introduced me to pre-mixed cakes.

Spending all those hours alone turned me into a neat-nick, too. One time, after my parents stacked all their important papers and mail in one corner of the kitchen counter, I came along and stuffed everything in drawers. They spent days looking for unpaid bills, letters and their grocery list. Sometimes, they complimented me on my tidiness, but not that time. “You leave those papers alone, you hear?” Dad said.
Being an impulsive child, I soon headed to the basement where Dad kept all his Mechanics Illustrated magazines and piles of other dusty books and papers. Look at all this useless stuff, I thought. I knew Dad could fix most anything, but didn’t know he relied on these materials for help. I ditched his resources in the dumpster. When he discovered this, boy, did he hit the high C notes!

At ten, television came into being, and my sister sang on the television broadcast of the Olsen and Johnson Show, a distant cousin of their unprecedented hit, “Hellzapoppin.” Since we didn’t own a TV, Mom, Dad and I watched her at the neighbor’s house. Oh, to be a lyrical songbird like her, I thought. Soon afterwards, we too became the proud owners of a round glass, black and white TV, which hid behind two doors in a fancy wooden cabinet.

After television came to our house, I’d spend hours watching it. Before school, I’d watch Kukla, Fran and Ollie or Bozo the Clown. After school came The Lone Ranger, Gene Autry and Roy Rogers. In the evening, I’d prop a pillow on the floor while my parents relaxed on the furniture, and we’d all watch: The Hit Parade, Show of Shows, the Ed Sullivan Show and Arthur Godfrey. Not to forget, Dragnet, I Love Lucy and my favorite, Father Knows Best. Just the same, the singers impressed me the most: First my sister, of course, then Doris Day, Bing Crosby and Debbie Reynolds.

After grammar school, being home alone didn’t seem like such a big deal anymore. All my peers spent some time on their own, although most of their mothers didn’t work outside the home. Until I turned ten, I still felt Dad’s paddle when I did something really bad; and no matter how old I got, if I mouthed off to my mother, I still felt the sting of her hand on my cheek.

Although I spent many hours alone from the age of nine until I graduated from high school, throughout that time, I felt my parents’ influence. They guided my behavior towards a proper—if not seemingly narrow—path.