The Cheerful Card Company

 

As I completed my Superman comic book, I turned to the last page which was a bizarre honky-tonk assortment of little square advertisements for a wide assortment of curious products. You could buy a Whoopie Cushion or a plastic snake to scare your sister, or a steel Slinky that would crawl down your stairs; you could even buy a real live exotic squirrel monkey for the exorbitant sum of $14.99! My eyes wandered over to an advertisement for The Cheerful Card Company promising the inconceivable sum of $100 that could be earned by selling 100 boxes of Christmas cards in the months leading up to the holidays.

That night after dinner I broached the subject with my parents who approved of the enterprise, presumably surmising that it would be a good learning experience. They agreed to help me get started.

My lips were dry and butterflies fluttered furiously in my stomach. I had put on my Sunday clothes and polished my dress shoes in order to make a good impression on my potential customers as a representative of The Cheerful Card Company. At a one dollar commission for each box sold, the incentive was extremely motivating to a twelve year old boy. It took me a seven day week of delivering the Daily News and the Times on Sundays, which was as thick as a telephone book, to earn twelve dollars a week! I now envisioned that it would be possible to own the entire collection of plastic Aurora Knight models from the Maspeth Hobby Center, in addition to a whole platoon of lead soldiers purchased with my own money at Woolworths and new missiles for my Robot Commando who had carelessly lost his. With my face, hands and nails scrubbed, and with my teeth and hair brushed, and dress clothes on, I had pushed the envelope and realized a previously unrealized level of personal hygiene and fashion acumen!

I knocked on many doors without reply, occasionally a window blind would be lifted and quickly dropped again, or I would find an eyeball staring at me through a peephole. It was as if I had just been released from prison and were looking for work.The next house was a family named Schumacher. I pressed the bell. I could hear some commotion inside and finally a young woman came to the door looking somewhat harried with messy hair and a scared look of chaos and panic in her eyes that somehow told me she could be my first customer.

“Hello, may I help you?” she asked, running away momentarily to separate two little cherubs who were attempting to kill each other.

“Hi, sorry about that, they are driving me crazy today. Four boys in a row, what are the odds?”

I avoided answering this rhetorical question to get right to my speech.

“Hello Mrs. Schumacher. Do you realize that it is only 120 days to Christmas? Luckily, I have just the thing to avoid one more chore in delivering this lovely assortment of beautiful Christmas cards to you today for the very reasonable sum of $3.50!”

As I finished my rehearsed speech a transformation came over Mrs. Schumacher’s face, and not the expression of relieved elation that I had expected.

“Oh no is it really that soon that another burden added to my plate?” Mrs. Schumacher reflected and then pivoted on her heel to stop two little imps in the act. “Joey stop hanging your brother by his foot,” screamed the overwrought Mrs. Schumacher! “Excuse me young man, but this is a bad time, not that there is a good time, but Thursday is my husband’s payday so if you come back Friday, I will buy a box of cards from you.”

“Ok Mrs.Schumacher I will come back on Friday, thank you!”

I wondered if this was the bums rush or would I make my first sale.

“Young man, I have a list of chores as long as my arm that my husband hasn’t gotten to yet. I will pay you two dollars an hour if you are interested in completing some of them?”

I expressed my appreciation and gratitude.

“Great, bring your box of cards but wear work clothes so you don’t ruin your Sunday best.

“Ok Mrs. Schumacher I’ll see you then!”

I had stumbled upon a goldmine of opportunity! I was to be a wish fulfilling Genie completing desired chores as requested. Mrs. Schumacher’s wish was my command. As I walked home, I calculated the enormous sums that I could accumulate at the astronomical wage of $2.00 an hour from the overwrought and overwhelmed Mrs. Schumacher. The entrepreneurial spirit was rekindled in me and now burned brightly in my little capitalist mind. I had learned that the job of a salesman was not an easy one, requiring patience and humility as well as persistence, all the while remaining neat, clean and polite. Upon reflection I thought that Mrs. Schumacher didn’t need the cards but purchased them to secure some much needed help. I mowed the lawn and gardened. I painted the garage and fence. I mastered masonry and cleaned up the porch making room for a table that I later wrapped Christmas presents on and even filled out the very same Christmas cards that I had sold to Mrs, Schumacher. I was always paid in cash at the end of each day and was offered milk and cookies for my rest break. I met Mr. Schumacher once as he came home from work looking very tired in his suit and tie. He trudged past me as I repaired some brickwork on the footpath. He smiled and thanked me for the help. As time passed and items were checked off the Honey Do List, other new requests were added, leading to a never ending supply of work. On October 16,1968 I walked into Maspeth Federal Savings Bank with $50 and opened a savings account with Mr. Wadley, a large man with a skinny tie who explained to me how compound interest worked. He explained that interest made your money work for you as opposed to working for your money. While I never made my $100 commission from The Cheerful Card Company it was a great learning experience and taught me how to talk to people and do business.

 

Jim

Aug 2022

Stockings

 

“Absolutely no stockings,” confirmed Mrs. G.   She assured my mother, “Francine will be wearing anklets to the party,” Mom placed the receiver on the phone and turned to comfort me. I would not be the only girl at the party not wearing stockings. We party invitees were eleven. We were on the verge.  We wanted to wear little kitty heels, shoes that would reflect the fact that our bodies were beginning to change, that we would soon be wearing real heels like our older sisters and the sophisticated models in the magazine ads. We wanted to wear nylons, those sheer, sensuous stockings so coveted by cinema femmes-fatales. All those handsome movie war-heroes presented silk stockings to their love interests on screen, implying a certain intimacy that we eleven-year-olds perceived, but did not fully understand.

It didn’t matter that our skinny legs had no calves to define a shapely stockinged leg. Wrinkled material drooped in all the areas that mature curves would eventually fill out. Those pre-pubescent legs resembled puny twigs swathed and wobbling in stilted shoes.

I went off to the party with misgivings, although I repeated to myself encouragingly, “I won’t be the only one. I won’t be the only one.” I was greeted warmly by my friend’s parents and was directed to the stairway down to  the basement. As I slowly descended the basement stairs, I become more and more self-conscious. I looked around the room, Marjorie wore stockings; Susan, wore stockings, Debra wore stockings. They all wore stockings. I searched out Fran in her party dress. My eyes moved from her hair to her hem, to her shoes. My face fell, along with my heart. Cold betrayal. Francine was wearing stockings.

At the end of the evening, Fran snuck off to the bathroom. When she returned home from the party, Fran was wearing anklets. Her mother was none the wiser. My mother was disappointed, but not nearly as much as I was.

Marsha H

Traveling

 

When I was a young person, I wanted to go to the Sacramento California State Fair because I had read so many travel brochures that I was convinced it was to be my new home.  

I managed to talk my girlfriend into taking a trip to California with me. We boarded a train to go to Sacramento to partake in the food and farm animal rides, roller coaster, forest hikes, strawberry picking, Ferris wheel, water slide and scenic view that I planned to move to.  

It was a long trip across this beautiful United States. Purple soil in Kentucky, mountains of Pennsylvania, flat lands of Kansas and Colorado. Steer country in Iowa, through the Mojave Desert of Nevada and finally into California.  

We had already booked a motel two blocks from the Fair. After a full night’s sleep and a breakfast of pancakes, eggs and bacon and coffee we were off to our first full day of entertainment. The next day we were going to check out apartments in the area.  

We found vendors selling Native American artifacts. There was a scruffy man selling local honey from his very own bee house, we bought some. We tried the water guns and toss the ring. We went on the huge swing for adults. By noon we were exhausted and hungry. Off to the food vendor for sausage with onions and peppers. 

This is where it got weird. The food was terrible, and we had to throw it away, there was a sudden storm and lightning hit the Ferris wheel and it fell over and started a fire in the farm holding all the animals. There was chaos, animals running everywhere, people panicking and leaving the grounds in waves. We stood under an awning frozen not knowing what to do. The police and emergency services showed up in about ten minutes. We were out of there and back to the motel. 

We were still in shock and collapsed on our beds. What just happened? After getting centered we went to the motel's cafeteria for some dinner. We couldn’t miss the chatter about the catastrophe at the Fairgrounds. We ate dinner and decided to get some rest and checked out some real estate the next day.  

Up early we ate breakfast, and the real estate agent came to pick us up to view two apartments in the area.  

The first one was near transportation making it easy to get around. The apartment was two bedrooms, wide kitchen, bathroom, yard, living room and laundry room. The price was reasonable. The only problem was it was located directly next to a strange commune of people who were incredibly noisy. So, it was a no go. 

The second apartment was in the same area, same amenities but it was up against a cemetery. Too scary. Also, a no go. 

Back to the motel. We had to leave for the train back to New York the next day. Our visit was not what I expected; I decided that I had to rethink this whole moving to California thing.  

Boarding the train, I could see the massive cleanup at the Fairgrounds.  I felt cheated in a way, but it was the lightning’s fault for starting the fire. Back across the beautiful USA. We sailed through Nevada, Iowa, and Colorado. I fell asleep through Kansas, Missouri and Kentucky. Woke up feeling the rush of the train and swept through Pennsylvania and finally to New York.  

As beautiful as the trip had been, there was not enough time to make plans to move there. However, the travel brochures did not mislead with their descriptions of beautiful, clean, breathtakingly awesome state of California.  

Ultimately, I did not move to California, but I did vacation there many times over the years and that satisfied my longing to live in California at least for some time in the year. 

Georgia

A Summer Job, A Summer Plan

 

“Get married!! Get married!!, that was the constant refrain coming from my mother. At first the complaint was leveled at my sister, five years my senior and almost thirty years old. Still not married, she’d once been married for two weeks; marriage annulled (White dress on the closet door. That’s another story). Finally, the summer of 1955, she was getting married. So now at the age of twenty-four, I was the recipient of the demand, “Get married!! Get married!!” Enough to give this Jewish potential Old Maid Jewish guilt.

My summer plan was directing my action toward pleasing my mother. Let me introduce you to Green Mansions. Green Mansions was a book and a movie, but it was also a beautiful summer resort in the Adirondack mountains. It was a very popular way for young Jewish singles to meet a mate. That’s where I headed during the summer of 1955.  The resort was a Garden of Eden with great food, lake, tennis courts and summer theater. Their entertainers were not yet famous. The resort was a summer theater laboratory to hone their talent. The theater staff my summer included Bernie West (later to become the writer for All in the Family, The Jeffersons). Sheldon Harnick (future lyricist of Fiddler on the Roof). Charles Strouse (Composer and lyricist Annie, Bye Bye Birdie, etc. etc.).   Carol Burnett (no description necessary). These are some names I recall, but in prior summers, there was Zero Mostel, Clifford Odets and a host of other luminaries. The entertainment included opera, dance, musicals and serious plays. During the McCarthy era, jobs were given to blacklisted people. 

I was already a schoolteacher, with a fine summer salary when I got a job at Green Mansions as the waitress for the owners of the resort (no tips, small salary. My thinking was, if I went as a guest, I would be there for one week and maybe meet one handsome professional guy for my winter dating; if I went as a waitress, I would be there eight weeks and perhaps meet eight guys. There was a method to my madness. My mother’s voice echoing in this exquisite mountain resort.

So Green Mansions was my summer job and a handsome, professional guest was my lucky catch. He drove me to my sister’s wedding when his week was over at the resort. The rest is history; this winter, we will be celebrating 67 years of marital bliss.

Ethyl Haber

A Summer Job

 

I was the youngest of five children having been born on January 17, 1928.  My family had very little money and my allowance during elementary school was one penny a day. At ten years of age, it became clear if I wanted a few cents in my pocket, I needed an afterschool job. My first job was Thursday afternoon delivering the Hoffman butcher’s chicken to customers in Middle Village for which I would be given a tip earning a total of one dollar. Thereafter I always had a variety of after school jobs and during the summer as well. When I was 16 and 17 years old, I had two summer jobs working as a busboy and waiter in an exclusive summer resort called Totem Lodge located near Albany, New York. I earned $1,000.00 each summer totaling $2,000. When I was 17 years old I had decided to become a lawyer and unlike some who become reluctant to their first choice, I never changed. Lawyer to be was it. 

     When I was admitted to Brooklyn Law School, it was for three years and the cost was $600.00 a year. I had never spent the $2,000 I had earned at Totem Lodge and it covered my full tuition and cost of books.

Suffice it to say, the Totem Lodge summer job was the best one I had. Not only did it pay for my law school tuition, I end up a lawyer which I practiced for 50 years and fully enjoyed.

     It is to be noted, laziness pays for nothing.

Ben Haber

The Garment I Yearned For

 

   Wow, I am not that young anymore.

   In October 1972, the newly formed National Hockey League expansion team, the New York Islanders, played their first game.  Freshly 12 years old, I had heard the local Long Island buzz about the team, yet had a fledgling interest in hockey.  I had watched the N.Y. Rangers on TV with my brother, but didn’t really understand the game yet.  My mind was a blank slate, ready for new information.  There was plenty of room there, I was 12.

   On December 5, 1972, I attended my first Islanders game at the very new and then cutting-edge arena, the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum, in Uniondale.  The Isles laced up their skates to take on the Los Angeles Kings. My older brother, Steve, was 20, and his buddy, Mark, was an ice hockey player for local Nassau Community College.  Mark’s team had won the New York State Junior College Ice Hockey championship two years in a row.  How’s that for us down state city slickers?  As the third period began, we were able to move down to the front row, behind one of the goals.  That was allowed way back then when a team would not sell out due to poor advertising or poor play.  We were standing right up against the boards and plexiglass that surrounded the rink.  The play made its way into the left corner where I was standing, face up against the glass.  I was entirely enthralled by the action.  I was 12.  The players, as the action would have it, crashed into the boards with body checks and a corner scrum, all trying to get the puck.  I was knocked backwards violently, almost falling to the ground while my brother grabbed on to me.  He said, “You see, it’s a rough game.  Don’t stand so close to the glass."  I was hooked.  I was a boy totally enraptured by a man’s game.  Professional, major league ice hockey.  I am still a big Islanders fan, dare I say it, these 50 years later.  Yikes!

   The L.A. Kings won the game 6-1.  I looked it up a few years ago and my memory served me well.  A 6-1 drubbing on Dec. 5, 1972.  My Isles went on to a dismal season record of 12 wins and 60 losses, a record for futility at that time.  Eight seasons later, “We” would win the first of four straight Stanley Cups.

   On Christmas 1972, my Mom and Dad got me a football and other clothing items.  As early as 2 PM on Christmas Day, my friends, Tommy and Paul from across the street, and Steve and Bobby from down the street were playing street hockey, with actual plastic street hockey sticks, and two goals, and a goalie stick and mask and goalie pads.  Right in front of my house.  Why was I not invited?  As fate would have it, their parents agreed to get them all street hockey sticks. 

   The 7^th Street Bombers were born!  I ran out there, stick-less, to watch.  Then, a brilliant idea.  I ran back to our garage a got my older sister’s wooden high school girl’s field hockey stick.  I didn’t care about my friends’ ridicule; I was playing street hockey!  The next day, I begged my mom to take me to the sporting goods store to return the football and buy me a Mylec ™ street hockey stick.  A day late, I was an official 7^th Street Bomber. 

   Within a week or two, my street hockey pals had official or near official New York Islanders jerseys, both in home white or road blue.  Adorned with the round NY Islanders logo with Long Island on it, with a hockey stick forming the “Y” in “NY.”  They must have promised their parents the world, as the jerseys were not cheap, say, $20.-$30.00 for the real deal.  This, when my mom had problems with buying me $4.00 sneakers. (That’s a different story).

   My parents were not cheap, merely frugal, with four children to feed and clothe and a house to pay for.  Well, here I was with only a street hockey stick and regular clothes.  My friends eventually got other jerseys to my none.  Again, I begged my mom to get me a New York Islanders hockey jersey.  I would paint the entire house for that jersey, although I recall doing many chores and odd jobs to get the jersey.  My mom came home one day with a jersey in a bag.  I opened it up in rapt anticipation, I will finally be one of the dozens of kids in school now with a hockey jersey.  In the bag, as I unfolded the blue jersey with gold arm stripes, it was a jersey that looked like the Buffalo Sabres team jersey.  And it didn’t even have a logo.  Fiddlesticks!

   As my dad had taught me well, I was gracious to my mom, who knew absolutely nothing about “My” New York Islanders.  I was just happy to wear my kind of official, non-logoed Buffalo Sabres jersey.  Hey, I used to play street hockey, way back when, with my sister’s wooden girls field hockey stick.

   I never did get that elusive “Official” New York Islanders hockey jersey.  Not until I was 18 or 19, when I could buy one for myself.  It’s amazing how one garment, in the mind of a 12-year-old boy, could make or break you.  When at a game today, I chuckle when I see a man wearing an ancient Islanders jersey, fitting him quite snuggly.  It’s not a good look for anyone.  I don’t want to be that guy.

Let’s Go, Islanders!!! 

 

Richard Melnick, July 23, 2022.

Writing from the Heart class assignment from July 16, 2022.

Cowgirl Outfit

 

When I was around eight years old my sister and I would play dress up. Plastic high heel shoes, plastic wigs, old odd fitting clothes that smelled musty, fake jewelry that turned green and pretend money. 

We would play and pretend we were big ladies shopping at the department store that our mother took us to so many times. We really didn’t understand the money part but we would put it in our pretend cash register and slam the money draw closed and hear the ding of the bell.  

It was fall season and almost Halloween. Time to pick a costume. We went to Woolworths and there was the usual plastic mask, flimsy pull-on costumes of clowns, cats, superheroes, doctor, witch and vampire. I wanted a Cow Girl outfit.  

We went to the local stores with no success. Mom decided to take up to Gimbels Department Store in Manhattan. The lobby of this now long-gone mega store had six-foot witches and hanging spiders and a man dressed as Dracula to greet all the customers. It was so much fun and I was so hopeful in finding my Cow Girl outfit. 

Up to the second floor where the costumes were, my sister and I grabbed Mom’s hands and raced to the display. There it was the Cow Girl outfit of my dreams.  

Brown fringed skirt spotted here and there with a black and white cow pattern with pink tulle outlining the hem, black hat with a gold band studded with cowboy turquoise jewels, fake of course but I didn’t know the difference. Boots, there were boots too. The shirt was gold ochre button down embroidered with green horses and purple lassos and a blue vest. It had a belt with a plastic silver gun and pretend bullets and to top it off and yellow bandana.  

I tried it on and it fit. I was overjoyed. My sister picked an angel outfit. I am not surprised because she is younger than me and little kids like angels. Bigger girls like me are more daring; I wanted the risk of being a Cow Girl and ride horses and shoot guns.  

Off we went to the cashier and Mom paid. Stopping at the cafeteria located in the store and we ate grilled cheese sandwiches and drank vanilla sodas. With our packages we boarded the train back home.  

I slept with my perfectly boxed outfit until it was time to parade around in it. My sister did the same with her angel costume but she drooled on it during the night. That is what little kids do. It was OK, Mom fixed it.  

The last day of October arrived and we dressed carefully, me in my Cow Girl outfit and my sister in her angel outfit. We met up with friends and marched up and down our block with trick or treat bags filled up with pennies and candy and chocolate. As the night ended, we got home and filtered through our treats. We had enough candy to last at least a month.  

There is no other outfit I ever wanted as much as this Cow Girl outfit and getting his outfit made that day my best and most wonderful and most memorable Halloween I ever had. 

Georgia