@helloplantlover
Mother by Grace Paley
One day I was listening to the AM radio. I heard a song: "Oh, I Long to See My Mother in the Doorway." By God! I said, I understand that song. I have often longed to see my mother in the doorway. As a matter of fact, she did stand frequently in various doorways looking at me. She stood one day, just so, at the front door, the darkness of the hallway behind her. It was New Year's Day. She said sadly, If you come home at 4 a.m. when you're seventeen, what time will you come home when you're twenty? She asked this question without humor or meanness. She had begun her worried preparations for death. She would not be present, she thought, when I was twenty. So she wondered.
Another time she stood in the doorway of my room. I had just issued a political manifesto attacking the family's position on the Soviet Union. She said, Go to sleep for godsakes, you damn fool, you and your Communist ideas. We saw them already, Papa and me, in 1905. We guessed it all.
At the door of the kitchen she said, You never finish your lunch. You run around senselessly. What will become of you?
Then she died.
Naturally for the rest of my life I longed to see her, not only in doorways, in a great number of places—in the dining room with my aunts, at the window looking up and down the block, in the country garden among zinnias and marigolds, in the living room with my father.
They sat in comfortable leather chairs. They were listening to Mozart. They looked at one another amazed. It seemed to them that they'd just come over on the boat. They'd just learned the first English words. It seemed to them that he had just proudly handed in a 100 percent correct exam to the American anatomy professor. It seemed as though shed just quit the shop for the kitchen.
I wish I could see her in the doorway of the living room.
She stood there a minute. Then she sat beside him. They owned an expensive record player. They were listening to Bach. She said to him, Talk to me a little. We don't talk so much anymore.
I'm tired, he said. Can't you see? I saw maybe thirty people today. All sick, all talk talk talk talk. Listen to the music, he said. I believe you once had perfect pitch. I'm tired, he said.
Then she died.
"A Man Told Me the Story of His Life" Grace Paley
Vincente said: I wanted to be a doctor. I wanted to be a doctor with my whole heart. I
learned every bone, every organ in the body. What is it for? Why does it work?
The school said to me: Vicente, be an engineer. That would be good. You understand
mathematics.
I said to the school: I want to be a doctor. I already know how the organs connect.
When something goes wrong, I'll understand how to make repairs.
The school said to me: Vicente, you will really be an excellent engineer. You show on
all the tests what a good engineer you will be. It doesn't show whether you'll be a good
doctor.
I said: Oh, I long to be a doctor. I nearly cried. I was seventeen.
I said: But perhaps you're right. You're the teacher. You're the principal. I know I'm
young.
The school said: And besides, you're going into the army.
And then I was made a cook. I prepared food for two thousand men.
Now you see me, I have a good job. I have three children. This is my wife, Consuela.
Did you know I saved her life?
Look, she suffered pain.
The doctor said: What is this? Are you tired? Have you had too much company? How
many children? Rest overnight, then tomorrow we'll make test.
The next morning I called the doctor.
I said: She must be operated on immediately. I have looked in the book. I see where
her pain is. I understand what the pressure is, where is comes from. I see clearly the
organ that is making trouble.
The doctor made test.
He said: She must be operated at once!
He said to me: Vicente, how did you know?
“Wants”
by
Grace Paley
I saw my ex-husband in the street. I was sitting on the steps of the new library.
Hello, my life, I said. We had once been married for twenty-seven years, so I felt justified.
He said, What? What life? No life of mine.
I said, O.K. I don’t argue when there’s real disagreement. I got up and went into the library to see how much I owed them.
The librarian said $32 even and you’ve owed it for eighteen years. I didn’t deny anything. Because I don’t understand how time passes. I have had those books. I have often thought of them. The library is only two blocks away.
My ex-husband followed me to the Books Returned desk. He interrupted the librarian, who had more to tell. In many ways, he said, as I look back, I attribute the dissolution of our marriage to the fact that you never invited the Bertrams to dinner.
That’s possible, I said. But really, if you remember: first, my father was sick that Friday, then the children were born, then I had those Tuesday-night meetings, then the war began.Then we didn’t seem to know them any more. But you’re right. I should have had them to dinner.
I gave the librarian a check for $32. Immediately she trusted me, put my past behind her, wiped the record clean, which is just what most other municipal and/or state bureaucracies will not do.
I checked out the two Edith Wharton books I had just returned because I’d read them so long ago and they are more apropos now than ever. They were The House of Mirth and The Children, which is about how life in the United States in New York changed in twenty-seven years fifty years ago.
A nice thing I do remember is breakfast, my ex-husband said. I was surprised. All we ever had was coffee. Then I remembered there was a hole in the back of the kitchen closet which opened into the apartment next door. There, they always ate sugar-cured smoked bacon. It gave us a very grand feeling about breakfast, but we never got stuffed and sluggish.
That was when we were poor, I said.
When were we ever rich? he asked.
Oh, as time went on, as our responsibilities increased, we didn’t go in need. You took adequate financial care, I reminded him. The children went to camp four weeks a year and in decent ponchos with sleeping bags and boots, just like everyone else. They looked very nice. Our place was warm in winter, and we had nice red pillows and things.
I wanted a sailboat, he said. But you didn’t want anything.
Don’t be bitter, I said. It’s never too late.
No, he said with a great deal of bitterness. I may get a sailboat. As a matter of fact I have money down on an eighteen-foot two-rigger. I’m doing well this year and can look forward to better. But as for you, it’s too late. You’ll always want nothing.
He had had a habit throughout the twenty-seven years of making a narrow remark which, like a plumber’s snake, could work its way through the ear down the throat, half-way to my heart. He would then disappear, leaving me choking with equipment. What I mean is, I sat down on the library steps and he went away.
I looked through The House of Mirth, but lost interest. I felt extremely accused. Now, it’s true, I’m short of requests and absolute requirements. But I do want something.
I want, for instance, to be a different person. I want to be the woman who brings these two books back in two weeks. I want to be the effective citizen who changes the school system and addresses the Board of Estimate on the troubles of this dear urban center.
I had promised my children to end the war before they grew up.
I wanted to have been married forever to one person, my ex-husband or my present one. Either has enough character for a whole life, which as it turns out is really not such a long time. You couldn’t exhaust either man’s qualities or get under the rock of his reasons in one short life.
Just this morning I looked out the window to watch the street for a while and saw that the little sycamores the city had dreamily planted a couple of years before the kids were born had come that day to the prime of their lives.
Well! I decided to bring those two books back to the library. Which proves that when a person or an event comes along to jolt or appraise me I can take some appropriate action, although I am better known for my hospitable remarks.
Samuel
By Grace Paley
Some boys are very tough. They're afraid of nothing. They are the ones who climb a wall and take a bow at the top. Not only are they brave
on the roof, but they make a lot of noise in the darkest part of the cellar where even the super hates to go. They also jiggle and hop on the platform
between the locked doors of the subway cars.
Four boys are jiggling on the swaying platform. Their names are Alfred, Calvin, Samuel, and Tom. The men and women in the cars on
either side watch them. They don't like them to jiggle or jump but don't want to interfere. Of course some of the men in the cars were once brave
boys like these. One of them had ridden the tail of a speeding truck from New York to Rockaway Beach without getting off, without his sore fingers
losing hold. Nothing happened to him then or later. He had made a compact with other boys who preferred to watch: starting at Eighth Avenue
and Fifteenth Street, he would get to some specified place, maybe Twenty-third and the river, by hopping the tops of the moving trucks. This was
hard to do when one truck turned a corner in the wrong direction and the nearest truck was a couple of feet too high. He made three or four starts
before succeeding. He had gotten this idea from a film at school called The Romance of Logging. He had finished high school, married a good friend,
was in a responsible job, and going to night school.
These two men and others looked at the four boys jumping and jiggling on the platform and thought. It must be fun to ride that way, especially now
the weather is nice and we're out of the tunnel and way high over the Bronx. Then they thought. These kids do seem to be acting sort of
stupid. They are little. Then they thought of some of the brave things they had done when they were boys and jiggling didn't seem so risky.
The ladies in the car became very angry when they looked at the four boys. Most of them brought their brows together and hoped the boys
could see their extreme disapproval. One of the ladies wanted to get up and say, be careful you dumb kids, get off that platform or I'll call a cop.
But three of the boys were Negroes and the fourth was something else she couldn't tell for sure. She was afraid they'd be fresh and laugh at her and
embarrass her. She wasn't afraid they'd hit her, but she was afraid of embarrassment. Another lady thought, their mothers never know where
they are. It wasn't true in this particular case. Their mothers all knew that they had gone to see the missile exhibit on Fourteenth Street.
Out on the platform, whenever the train accelerated, the boys would raise their hands and point them up to the sky to act like rockets going off,
then they rat-tat-tatted the shatterproof glass pane like machine guns, although no machine guns had been exhibited.
For some reason known only to the motorman, the train began a sudden slowdown. The lady who was afraid of embarrassment saw the boys
jerk forward and backward and grab the swinging guard chains. She had her own boy at home. She stood up with determination and went to the
door. She slid it open and said, "You boys will be hurt. You'll be killed. I'm going to call the conductor if you don't just go into the next car and sit
down and be quiet."
Two of the boys said, "Yes'm," and acted as though they were about to go. Two of them blinked their eyes a couple of times and pressed their lips
together. The train resumed its speed. The door slid shut, parting the lady and the boys. She leaned against the side door because she had to get off at
the next stop.
The boys opened their eyes wide at each other and laughed. The lady blushed. The boys looked at her and laughed harder. They began to
pound each other's back. Samuel laughed the hardest and pounded Alfred's back until Alfred coughed and the tears came. Alfred held tight to
the chain hook. Samuel pounded him even harder when he saw the tears. He said, "Why you bawling? You a baby, huh?" and laughed. One of the
men whose boyhood had been more watchful than brave became angry. He stood up straight and looked at the boys for a couple of seconds. Then
he walked in a citizenly way to the end of the car, where he pulled the emergency cord. Almost at once, with a terrible hiss, the pressure of air
abandoned the brakes and the wheels were caught and held.
People standing in the most secure places fell forward, then backward. Samuel had let go of his hold on the chain so he could pound Tom
as well as Alfred. All the passengers in the cars whipped back and forth, but he pitched only forward and fell head first to be crushed and killed
between the cars.
The train had stopped hard, halfway into the station, and the conductor called at once for the trainmen who knew about this kind of death and
how to take the body from the wheels and brakes. There was silence except for passengers from the other cars who asked, What happened!
What happened! The ladies waited around wondering if he might be an only child. The men recalled other afternoons with very bad endings. The
little boys stayed close to each other, leaning and touching shoulders and arms and legs.
When the policeman knocked at the door and told her about it, Samuel's mother began to scream. She screamed all day and moaned all
night, though the doctors tried to quiet her with pills.
Oh, oh, she hopelessly cried. She did not know how she could ever find another boy like that one. However, she was a young woman and she
became pregnant. Then for a few months she was hopeful. The child born to her was a boy. They brought him to be seen and nursed. She smiled. But
immediately she saw that this baby wasn't Samuel. She and her husband together have had other children, but never again will a boy exactly like
Samuel be known.
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