CREEK ROAD GANG
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Our Star
Patricia Zita Krischcopyright 2002
I hear his car. I am out the door, racing across the small front lawn. “Daddy, Daddy, Daddy!” I am swung up in his arms and bury my face in the scratchy wool of his suit. He plops his hat on my head.
“How’s my Pitty-Pat?” he asks. If I’m lucky, he puts me on his shoulders as he trots us into the house neighing. I am breathless with giggles and the effort to hang onto his head. Mother greets us laughing as we come into the kitchen.
However, if I don’t hear the car, I am caught unawares. Suddenly, he is in the kitchen holding Mother in a strong embrace. They are kissing for the longest time. Meanwhile, I am pulling on his jacket, whining, “Me too, me too.” Anna Rita waits more patiently. At the end of the day, our star is home.
He was the family star. The booming voice, the wise cracks--how our attention riveted on him. The first born, only son of his thirty-four year old mother, he was her darling. Blessed with abundant energy and a self-confidence that he could “make things happen,” he strode through life as if it were an adventure made especially for him.
“Mama’s little precious,” his sister, Rita, called him when she’d had enough of his specialness, his need to be the center of attention. Although she always looked up to her big brother, even at eighty years of age she would sometimes mutter that phrase.
It is Sunday during a lunch of grilled cheese sandwiches, carrot sticks, pickles, and olives. Daddy starts on one of his stories. “When I was a girl in China. . .”
“Daddy, you’re a man. You couldn’t be a girl in China.”
“Oh, yes, I was a girl in China.” The story rarely gets beyond that point but might segue into, “When I was a boy in Greece.” The one I liked best is about when he and Mother met.
“I was a poor, naive law student, wan and pale, slaving away at the books, and along comes this beautiful damsel from the North. Husband hunting, that’s what she was doing. I had no chance against her wiles.”
Then he talks about how he was living in Ma Wallender’s rooming house in Berkeley, and Mother came to stay with her mother’s friend, Mrs. Wallender.
“The walls had ears,” Mother chimes in, telling us that his friends overheard her making dates with another man and kept Daddy informed.
“Tell us about sitting on your hat,” I beg. This is my favorite part.
“I took her dancing at the Claremont Hotel to set the stage to propose.”
“He was so nervous, he sat on his hat,” Mother says.
“A brand new hat,” he adds.
At such times, happiness spills over the table, soaks into the walls, surrounds us in a glow.
Once in a while, in the middle of the day, a truck parks outside our house. The deliveryman walks to the door with a long florist box. Mother breathless, blushing, opens it up to several long stemmed flowers, roses or gladioli. “For my lovely bride,” reads the card. The gift causes a minor sensation in the neighborhood. A neighbor asks, “Is someone sick?”
“No.”
“Did you have a fight? Did he get in trouble?”
“No.” Mother answers to all of that.
“It’s just Harold,” she says, smiling, happy.
“Are you sure he didn’t do something he shouldn’ve?” asks Mrs. Spoilsport.
From so many years distance, I can’t decide if Mother’s version was right or if the neighbor’s suspicions were on target. It is how he would ease a guilty conscience, but it is also how he would express sudden, exuberant feelings of romance.
Dad had the most expensive clothes in the family: well-tailored wool suits; good quality cotton dress shirts, done at the laundry; conservative neckties; a fedora; and shoes that were always highly polished. Dad, standing five foot eleven, was a substantial looking man.
His buying a new suit was an important occasion. Dad would shop first and then discuss it at dinner with Mother. Usually, Mother then went with him for a second look.
“Dad bought a very handsome suit,” she would announce when they returned. “It’s expensive, but it’s important that he look the part of a successful lawyer.” She would continue, looking proud, “I showed him how the collar on this one lay better than on a cheaper suit. That’s one of the signs of good tailoring.”
Ordinarily, Dad worked long hours, usually going back to the office after dinner or not coming home at all until ten or eleven at night. He ran the legal department of an insurance company that was one of largest private employers in Sacramento. His responsibilities only started with that.
He was an active member of various charitable and community boards; often he was chairman. He chaired the board of the Catholic Welfare Bureau, the major Catholic service agency, for eight years and served on it many more years. He served on the United Crusade board, also for many years, and chaired the annual fund drive one or two years. His largest commitment, however, was to the Sacramento Redevelopment Agency Board of which he was member for twenty years. He was its first chairman and served as the board’s spokesperson for all of his service. During that time, the agency tore down and rebuilt large parts of the downtown. This project was mired in controversy, especially during the early years.
By the time I was in high school, Dad was on national committees for the insurance industry and later also on ones dealing with redevelopment of cities. This increased his trips to the East, especially Chicago, Washington, D.C., and New York City.
He was always over committed, running behind. He thrived on it. Years later, he would comment on how much fun his life had been. He apparently never stopped to reflect on what all of this meant for Mother or for his children: the absent father, the lonely wife. Mother was expected to keep the household running smoothly and raise the children. And be a hostess. She did all of that competently but not always happily. Her loneliness simmered as a barely submerged anger that came out at Anna Rita and me and later our brother, Terry, never at Dad.
Mother always defended his absence to us. “Your father is an important man,” she would say. “He’s a force in the community. I’m happy to ride his coattails.” As we got older, she would instruct us, “the family’s social position depends on the man. You must always remember that.”
When all the children were grown and gone, suddenly her daily crabbiness turned onto him. He was shocked. For years, I thought this happened because he was now the only convenient target and in less generous moments thought, it’s about time. I have come to wonder now if, in addition, Mother would have liked a little time in the sun herself and simply got tired of the hard work that star maintenance required.
When I was grown, I would sometimes sputter, “He thinks women were put on the face of the earth to make life smooth for him. A wife, daughters, secretaries, that’s all we are good for.” However, I could only complain in his absence. Even in old age, his unquenchable bonhomie could take over the room, any room. When he was there, all ears were tuned to him. He was lively, he was charming, and he knew he was entitled to it all.
“How’s my Pitty-Pat?” he asks. If I’m lucky, he puts me on his shoulders as he trots us into the house neighing. I am breathless with giggles and the effort to hang onto his head. Mother greets us laughing as we come into the kitchen.
However, if I don’t hear the car, I am caught unawares. Suddenly, he is in the kitchen holding Mother in a strong embrace. They are kissing for the longest time. Meanwhile, I am pulling on his jacket, whining, “Me too, me too.” Anna Rita waits more patiently. At the end of the day, our star is home.
He was the family star. The booming voice, the wise cracks--how our attention riveted on him. The first born, only son of his thirty-four year old mother, he was her darling. Blessed with abundant energy and a self-confidence that he could “make things happen,” he strode through life as if it were an adventure made especially for him.
“Mama’s little precious,” his sister, Rita, called him when she’d had enough of his specialness, his need to be the center of attention. Although she always looked up to her big brother, even at eighty years of age she would sometimes mutter that phrase.
It is Sunday during a lunch of grilled cheese sandwiches, carrot sticks, pickles, and olives. Daddy starts on one of his stories. “When I was a girl in China. . .”
“Daddy, you’re a man. You couldn’t be a girl in China.”
“Oh, yes, I was a girl in China.” The story rarely gets beyond that point but might segue into, “When I was a boy in Greece.” The one I liked best is about when he and Mother met.
“I was a poor, naive law student, wan and pale, slaving away at the books, and along comes this beautiful damsel from the North. Husband hunting, that’s what she was doing. I had no chance against her wiles.”
Then he talks about how he was living in Ma Wallender’s rooming house in Berkeley, and Mother came to stay with her mother’s friend, Mrs. Wallender.
“The walls had ears,” Mother chimes in, telling us that his friends overheard her making dates with another man and kept Daddy informed.
“Tell us about sitting on your hat,” I beg. This is my favorite part.
“I took her dancing at the Claremont Hotel to set the stage to propose.”
“He was so nervous, he sat on his hat,” Mother says.
“A brand new hat,” he adds.
At such times, happiness spills over the table, soaks into the walls, surrounds us in a glow.
Once in a while, in the middle of the day, a truck parks outside our house. The deliveryman walks to the door with a long florist box. Mother breathless, blushing, opens it up to several long stemmed flowers, roses or gladioli. “For my lovely bride,” reads the card. The gift causes a minor sensation in the neighborhood. A neighbor asks, “Is someone sick?”
“No.”
“Did you have a fight? Did he get in trouble?”
“No.” Mother answers to all of that.
“It’s just Harold,” she says, smiling, happy.
“Are you sure he didn’t do something he shouldn’ve?” asks Mrs. Spoilsport.
From so many years distance, I can’t decide if Mother’s version was right or if the neighbor’s suspicions were on target. It is how he would ease a guilty conscience, but it is also how he would express sudden, exuberant feelings of romance.
Dad had the most expensive clothes in the family: well-tailored wool suits; good quality cotton dress shirts, done at the laundry; conservative neckties; a fedora; and shoes that were always highly polished. Dad, standing five foot eleven, was a substantial looking man.
His buying a new suit was an important occasion. Dad would shop first and then discuss it at dinner with Mother. Usually, Mother then went with him for a second look.
“Dad bought a very handsome suit,” she would announce when they returned. “It’s expensive, but it’s important that he look the part of a successful lawyer.” She would continue, looking proud, “I showed him how the collar on this one lay better than on a cheaper suit. That’s one of the signs of good tailoring.”
Ordinarily, Dad worked long hours, usually going back to the office after dinner or not coming home at all until ten or eleven at night. He ran the legal department of an insurance company that was one of largest private employers in Sacramento. His responsibilities only started with that.
He was an active member of various charitable and community boards; often he was chairman. He chaired the board of the Catholic Welfare Bureau, the major Catholic service agency, for eight years and served on it many more years. He served on the United Crusade board, also for many years, and chaired the annual fund drive one or two years. His largest commitment, however, was to the Sacramento Redevelopment Agency Board of which he was member for twenty years. He was its first chairman and served as the board’s spokesperson for all of his service. During that time, the agency tore down and rebuilt large parts of the downtown. This project was mired in controversy, especially during the early years.
By the time I was in high school, Dad was on national committees for the insurance industry and later also on ones dealing with redevelopment of cities. This increased his trips to the East, especially Chicago, Washington, D.C., and New York City.
He was always over committed, running behind. He thrived on it. Years later, he would comment on how much fun his life had been. He apparently never stopped to reflect on what all of this meant for Mother or for his children: the absent father, the lonely wife. Mother was expected to keep the household running smoothly and raise the children. And be a hostess. She did all of that competently but not always happily. Her loneliness simmered as a barely submerged anger that came out at Anna Rita and me and later our brother, Terry, never at Dad.
Mother always defended his absence to us. “Your father is an important man,” she would say. “He’s a force in the community. I’m happy to ride his coattails.” As we got older, she would instruct us, “the family’s social position depends on the man. You must always remember that.”
When all the children were grown and gone, suddenly her daily crabbiness turned onto him. He was shocked. For years, I thought this happened because he was now the only convenient target and in less generous moments thought, it’s about time. I have come to wonder now if, in addition, Mother would have liked a little time in the sun herself and simply got tired of the hard work that star maintenance required.
When I was grown, I would sometimes sputter, “He thinks women were put on the face of the earth to make life smooth for him. A wife, daughters, secretaries, that’s all we are good for.” However, I could only complain in his absence. Even in old age, his unquenchable bonhomie could take over the room, any room. When he was there, all ears were tuned to him. He was lively, he was charming, and he knew he was entitled to it all.
* * *
Biographical Note:
Patricia (Patty) Zita Krisch grew up in Sacramento, California, and
lived for many years in Chicago and for more years in suburban
Philadelphia. She is currently completing a book, A House Alive with
Words,
about a cohort of boys living in a residential A Better Chance program
to prepare for college. In an earlier time in her life she worked as a
demographer studying metropolitan population patterns and taught
college sociology classes. She has been a member of Virginia Newlin’s
autobiographical writing workshop class for thirteen years and wrote a
memoir about her mother, The Solace of Clothes. She also
writes occasional autobiographical pieces of which this is one. For more or Patty's stories which have appeared in our pages, see our Author Index Prose A-K.
