Love Everlasting: a Memoir Arthur Harris Kennesaw State University
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Kennesaw State University DigitalCommons@Kennesaw State University Dissertations, Theses and Capstone Projects 10-1-2011 Love Everlasting: A Memoir Arthur Harris Kennesaw State University Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.kennesaw.edu/etd Part of the Creative Writing Commons Recommended Citation Harris, Arthur, "Love Everlasting: A Memoir" (2011). Dissertations, Theses and Capstone Projects. Paper 478. This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by DigitalCommons@Kennesaw State University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Dissertations, Theses and Capstone Projects by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@Kennesaw State University. Love Everlasting A Memoir By Arthur Harris A capstone project submitted in partial fulfillment of the Requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Professional Writing in the Department of English In the College of Humanities and Social Sciences of Kennesaw State University Kennesaw, Georgia 2011 I dedicate this memoir to Sydell, The pulchritudinous protagonist of this ponderous personal portrayal. And my beloved wife. CHAPTER I THE EARLY YEARS “What’s your name?” I called out to the new face standing with the familiar ones of Evelyn and Bea on snow-covered Fenton Avenue. “Who wants to know?” she answered laughing. “Her name is Sydell and she just moved here,” Bea interjected. “His name is Arty,” she completed the introduction, turning to the girl beside her who was enveloped in a brown coat, scarf and boots. Not knowing what to say next, this sixteen year old, hormone-loaded male took action and advanced on the new kid, holding a heap of snow in my hands. Reading my obvious intentions, she started to scramble and slide to get away from me but that lasted less than two minutes before I caught her and proceeded to scrub this new girl’s pretty face with snow. “Welcome to the neighborhood!” I laughed. If you’re going to be stupid why not go all the way? Evelyn and Bea hustled her away, shouting and scolding as they took Sydell inside to dry out. I looked around for a hole to fall in but, not finding one, waited until they came out of the hallway where they had dried her off. 1 “Sydell,” I said. “Don’t talk to me!” she cut me off, but, seeing the woeful look on my face, she couldn’t help laughing. “Next time pick on somebody your own size. You’re twice as big as me!” Now that was uncomfortably close to the truth, especially since I was bundled against the cold, and all I could manage was to stammer an apology. “You’re right, and I am sorry. Let me buy you a hot chocolate to warm you up. Please? I’ll even throw in a pretzel,” I turned on what I hoped would pass as a charming smile. “All right, but no more rough stuff, okay?” Sydell said, flashing her own sweet smile. We made our way to Meyer’s candy store and sat in one of the four booths set in the right-hand wall opposite the soda fountain. My offer was more than paid for when she slipped off her coat, revealing a brown sweater covering a perfect 34B--I found out much, much later--bust. When she took off the white scarf that she was wearing to protect against the weather, I could see her shoulder-length auburn hair shining with red highlights. Wide open blue eyes made everything but her full-lipped smile and the freckles on her nose fade into the background. I was mesmerized. Sydell accepted the hot chocolate but turned down the pretzel. Little did I know that this was the first sign it was 2 going to cost a lot more to clothe this woman than to feed her. We talked for hours while I munched her foot-long pretzel and mine as we got to know each other and drank more hot chocolate. I told her about my folks and my brother. She told me about her mother and her sisters and her grandmother and her grandfather who lived with them and the crowd of relatives who constantly passed through their home, a two bedroom flat in a two-family house around the corner. I knew right away that privacy was a long shot when she told me that she slept with her mother and two sisters in two double beds in the front room. Her grandparents occupied the back bedroom. The rest of the apartment consisted of a dining room, kitchen and sun porch. The sun porch, a tiny room barely large enough to house a sagging daybed became our shelter on the too-rare occasions that the front room was deserted and we could be alone. It would become the only place where we could discover and nurture the feelings that still exist seven decades later. Well, there and the stairway inside the side door where we lingered when I brought Sydell home after a movie or just a walk. My nerd days were over! No more hours, days, weeks, months and even years spent with my figurative nose pressed against the window of life watching boys and girls, men and women together, holding hands, smooching, laughing when nothing funny was 3 happening, content to be with each other without stress, without angst, without loneliness. High school, for me, had been a shining example of non- achievement scholastically, socially and sexually. I accepted mediocre grades in return for a less than mediocre effort on my part. Parental disapproval wasn’t a problem, since Mom and Dad were convinced that their darling son could do no wrong and my brother, Jerry, disappeared into uniform along the way, so I didn’t have to account to him. Years younger than almost all of my classmates, I evidently wasn’t worthy of their attention. My only solace was the enormous lunch my mother packed for me to guard against any possible loss of surplus pounds. My large brown paper bag held two huge sandwiches of bologna, salami or leftover roast, fruit and some kind of dessert like Hostess Cup Cakes or Yankee Doodles. I’m not sure if the latter still exist but they were three small, chocolate, cream-filled cakes that each provided two bites of ambrosia for this fat connoisseur of such things. Team sports were out of the question for this rotund teenager, mostly because muscle was a missing component in my body but also because most of the varsity members were grown men with hairy, hardened bodies who would have rolled over in mirth 4 if I walked on the field. Jewish kids were far more likely to be in the band than on the team. Sydell’s walk was stately and erect, she talked in that delightful, little girl voice that years later would star in radio commercials, and took my hand so that I would not feel like an outsider any more. I had gained admission to existing in real time instead of being suspended in fantasies. “Making out,” known in those days as “Necking,” or, in more advanced stages, “Petting,” was not easy to arrange, even between two willing parties. Young people usually lived with their parents until they were married. There weren’t any cars to cuddle in, partially because of wartime restrictions but mostly because we lived in a city where public transportation was the way we got around. Buses and subway trains took us wherever we wanted to go and were safe at all hours. Sydell was the designated hair stylist and manicurist for her mother’s and grandparents’ cousins and sisters. Rose’s sisters; Pearl, Hannah and Anna, after drinking coffee with Fanny and Max, Sydell’s grandparents and cohabiters, would take their turns in front of the mirror of the vanity table in the front bedroom. Their contributions were the luscious baked goods they brought to eat with the coffee. Each sister had a specialty--Hannah did pies, Pearl produced sour cream coffee 5 cake and Anna hauled deadly, heavyweight cookies with fragments of maraschino cherries embedded in their centers. Even at the age of 15 and 16, Sydell’s hands and style sense prophesized the success we would enjoy in later years. The only catch was that all these services were performed in the front room, so we didn’t get a hell of a lot of time in the adjoining sun porch together. My home was out of bounds for romance. Even when my folks were out, Sydell was totally uncomfortable with the idea of getting together there. As much as she came to love my Mom and Dad and enjoyed being there with them, she felt them looking over her shoulder and would only stay long enough for me to change my shoes or shirt before she hurried me out the door. The only time I got her into my bed was one day when I was sick and she lay down, fully clothed, of course , next to me for a few minutes when my mother went to the store for food. I know all this sounds bizarre in this present day when, statistically, almost all kids are sexually active at age sixteen but, with a few exceptions who “hit a home run,” “third base” was as far as a boy could get. Even prom night did not result in more than kisses and a furtive brushing of budding breasts with the back of one’s hand. Admittedly, I was not aggressive, but even those who tried harder, “went home with 6 the morning newspaper,” as we said then.