Lost & Found Books

Resting my paintbrush on my palette and wiping my hands with a paper towel, telling Jennifer to take a break as I answer the phone. Another scam caller. These days I answer those unknown numbers calling, never knowing when it's one of my doctors or their nurse. Since my heart problems, I answer all calls.

I think of the time before the smartphone and Google, back when I had to ask Dad my questions and be told to read the encyclopedia. Before Netflix and television there was the radio and programs like "Gangbusters" and "Gunsmoke", that sparked my imagination. Homework done, the radio would be turned on if Patricia or Mom weren't playing the piano. I can still hear the voices of Amos & Andy at times. Sitting on the floor listening to Robert Conrad as Matt Dillon shoots it out with the bad guy and Miss. Kitty saying it had to be done. I could picture Matt Dillion and Miss. Kitty from the radio and imagine the horses and the others with their cowboy outfits,  drawing them as I did.

NC Wyeth and Harvey Dunn were my heroes then, their illustrations guided me with my own drawings. Mom bought cowboy books from rummage sales for me, they were beat up some, but you could see the illustrations fairly well. I was to read them, not just look at the pictures. I read aloud to Mom as she sewed, making a dress for one of my sisters. The next night, Dad would have my book, reading it, and I would have to return to doing homework. Dad insisted I read my math book even when it was summer vacation time. It wasn't just the cowboy books Mom got for me to read, it was all books that came into the house. My brother's college textbooks, if left laying around, Dad would snap them up and read them. 

My art book on materials disappeared for a while, not that I needed it. It told which colors were poisonous and how to cure you from that poison. Found it in my Dad's basement office with high school textbooks. Mom, too, checked out my books. Once I found a page missing from a book on French Impressionism... The nudes in all the books at the Aurora Library were covered over with a red stamp saying AURORA LIBRARY. At our house books were special and reading them was a gift from the author. Every Christmas at least twenty books were wrapped and exchanged. Books and plaid shirts resting under the tree replaced the dolls and baseball gloves. I didn't mind, especially when I unwrapped an art book by Robert Bateman, autographed too. 

Our House Was A Warm House

Dad loved baking bread and making candy. To get a piece of that candy, you had to do something like sweep the basement floor or clean out the garage. It was when Dad had certain pots going on the basement stove that we were at our best behavior. The smell of fudge coming from the basement was like Christmas time. The fighting and bickering stopped and it became sweeping time. There was a race to get the broom. Getting something done extra, like sweeping off his work bench, could mean getting to lick the mixing spoon with its fudge stuck to it, or being asked to test the peanut brittle. There were popcorn balls to be tested, too. Dad got the cleanest workbench every time he made candy. The candy he made wasn't for us, but for raising money for special needs kids.  

The sweet bread he baked was for raising money for other causes. Mom and Dad always had something going on in the way of raising money to help others. Mom had the March of Dimes and rummage sales, that she made coats for. They were always asking if Francis and I would like to give part of our paper route money to help out others. Later, much later, I found they were putting that money in the bank for us, and they were teaching us charity. Dad always reached in his pocket to make up for that paper route money. Whenever I said I wanted to keep a dime to buy a Sky Rocket Ice Cream bar, I remember being told people are starving in China.  That was also said a lot when mom made liver. 

Our house was a warm house, I remember. Dad, munching on peanut brittle, working his crossword puzzle, my sister, Patricia, playing the piano. Michael with his polio therapy exercises, and Francis helping with leg lifts. Mom, mending shirts, and Cathy and I fighting for space on the dining room table. Whose crayons were whose and, “Don't draw my doll!” were heard over Patricia's piano playing and the sewing machine.