Christmas Icons, Their Legends and Lore

The Christian Church is now in the Advent season, and we all seem to be planning in one way or another for Christmas.  I am reprising my post for December 2012 about the origins of the symbols that signify Christmas, which officially begins on Christmas Day and lasts for twelve days.  Several years ago, I wrote brief pieces opposite the greeting for a series of Christmas cards, each describing the various beloved icons that appear at that time of year.   My presentation of those little stories follows below.

A Tale of the Holly


Long treasured at Christmas for its burnished green leaves and bright red berries, the popular holly has not escaped the inevitable connection to pagan peoples.    Ancient folk revered these and other evergreens in celebrating the cycle of life.   The early Romans brought plants into their homes during the festive January Kalends to be offered as a sacrament, a blessing on the house.  This custom traveled to northern lands with the Romans where the favored plant was the beautiful, prolific holly. 
Although the Church frowned on what they saw as a lapse into pagan ceremonies, they soon realized the value of such practices if the holly could be accorded Christian significance.  Thus the holly became known familiarly as "Christ-thorn" in order to represent the high and holy things of Christ's Passion:  the cruel spikes His Crown of Thorns, the red berries His Blood, the white flowers His Purity, the bitter bark His Sorrow.  For whatever reasons, sacred or secular, the holly has remained through the years a favorite holiday greenery.

A Tale of the Mistletoe


Under a sprig of mistletoe, according to legend, comes a blessing of peace between enemies and love between friends.  The little parasitic plant, found in America on maple, osage orange, and black gum trees, is considered an emblem of affection at Christmastime, but its legend has roots in paganism.  The Druids revered it as the "golden herb," which symbolized strength and purity.  In mythology, the Norse goddess of love, Freyja, gave to the plant the property of peace-maker.  How natural that in the middle ages the mistletoe, called "all heal" or "guidhel," continued to be plucked from its European host tree, the oak, and brought inside during the season that celebrates "good will toward men."  Mistletoe even appeared in the churches of medieval times where it was a symbol of pardon for sinners.  Only in more recent years has the charming plant been relegated to a more secular use.  Each Christmas the white-berried mistletoe is found atop door sills where those who pause may receive a kiss of friendship and peace.


A Tale of Santa Claus


The Santa Claus so beloved of American children came by his unique appearance and name from significant changes through the centuries.  Originally known in legend as St. Nicholas, a kindly, fourth-century bishop, he was transformed after the Reformation in Germany to Kris Kringle, from Kristkindlein, the little Christ Child.  Sixteenth century Dutch immigrants are credited with introducing the concept of Santa Claus to the New World; it took, however, a celebrated poem of the last century, "A Visit From St. Nicholas" by Clement Moore, to firmly establish the old gentleman as we know him today.  "Santa Claus" is merely a corruption of St. Nicholas's name, but the pale-faced, lean ascetic in ecclesiastical robes has given way to a jollier figure with red suit and matching cheeks. Despite the superficial changes, the benevolent spirit of Santa Claus has persisted.   He is the imaginative incarnation of generous giving in imitation of the greatest Giver of all:  "For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son."


A Tale of the Christmas Stocking

For generations, children throughout Christendom have hung up stockings on Christmas Eve with only thoughts of Santa's bounty.  Few have questioned the practice of using stockings rather than other receptacles such as baskets or bowls.  In fact, stockings hung by the chimney may seem to be a happy tradition whose origin is lost in the mists of time.  But legend has it otherwise in a story about the forerunner of Santa Claus, the famed St. Nicholas, the fourth-century bishop, whose generosity was unmatched.  Among his parishioners was a poor man with three daughters about to be sold into slavery because he had no dowry for them.  The good bishop saved the daughters with bags of gold, tossed down the chimney into their stockings left there to dry.  The traditional gift of an orange or tangerine in the toe of the Christmas stocking is a reminder of St. Nicholas's golden gift.


A Tale of the Christmas Tree

The Christmas tree is one of the more beloved traditions of the holiday season, despite some attempts to link it to paganism and ban its use.  If it is true that primitive peoples worshiped the tree as sacred, it is equally true that our familiar Christmas tree was inspired solely by Christian thought and sentiment.  A wonderful legend told by Georg Jacob, an Arabian geographer of the tenth century, soon spread throughout Europe:  On the night Christ was born, all the trees in the forests, heedless of the weather, bloomed and bore fruit.  So taken were people with this story that it even appears in one of the Coventry Mysteries, The Birth of Christ, and in German folk tales.  It was in Germany that the transition was made from natural blooms to artificial decorations.  The Christmas tree was noted to be in homes there as early as 1604, and despite periodic puritanical grumbling, it remains today as the crowning glory of Christmastide customs throughout the world.


A Tale of Christmas Lights

The brilliant star that announced the Christ Child's birth hung in the heavens amid a field of stars that first Christmas night.  Since that time, lights have illuminated our celebration of that sacred event.  The story is told of the German reformer Martin Luther who being overwhelmed by the wonder and beauty of the starlit sky one Christmas Eve wished to transmit his sense of awe to his children.  He brought in a small fir tree and adorned it with candles in gratitude to Him who "for us and our salvation came down from heaven."  Symbolically, lights represent to Christians not only the starry heavens that night in Bethlehem, but also they represent Jesus Christ as the Light of the World.  Almost unimaginable is a Christmas without lights.  From simple candlelight to dazzling outdoor displays, the lights of this season spread their shining message of peace and love to all who would see them.

The Last Threshing Run

My brother, Ken Wald, recounts the following bygone event, which was originally published in the Slater (Iowa) Area Historical Association Newsletter of May 2006. 

           
            The summer of 1946 I had just gotten out of the U.S. Navy, having been in the last battle of the war at Okinawa a year earlier. The Navy lost more than 4,000 men there, and the Army and Marines lost around 7,613 men.  After being discharged, I became a member of the 52-20 Club ($20.00 a week for 52 weeks) while looking for permanent work.  In other words, I had plenty of time on my hands.

            While growing up, I had spent summers on the farm of my grandparents Cyrus R. and Bertha Tesdell Sydnes.  Those had always been a fun times, especially for a city boy from Des Moines. Sometime during that summer of '46 my uncle Ed Sydnes, who lived at my grandparents' farm, asked me if I would like to haul bundles for him during the threshing run, which would take place end of August. ''Run'' simply referred to the several farms in the area that were to have threshing done. Knowing that the threshing of oats had been a exciting time with all the activity going on, I jumped at the chance. I also knew that this would be my opportunity to be on the last threshing run; after that, it all would be done with combines.

            I was to drive a team of horses using a hayrack, a large box-like wagon, surrounded on four sides with boards that were separated several inches apart and extending up from the floor bottom about four feet (could be higher or lower). The horses I was to use belonged to another uncle, Fred Sydnes, who lived over by Alleman. They were two beautiful bays, brown in color and named Doc and Dan. They were very gentle and obedient and could even be ridden. Sometimes, if I had a load of oats on the wagon at quitting time, I would have to ride one of the horses and lead the other one back to our farm if there was no stall available at the farm where we were working. Doc was the leader but Dan would pull his weight too. Uncle Ed showed me how to harness them, and it was a job to throw that harness up over those big rumps. The next thing was to learn how to hitch them up to the wagon. There were some chains on the rear of the harness that attached to what is called the doubletree. The doubletree was attached to the tongue of the wagon and the front of the tongue was attached to the harness between the horses in the front of the wagon.

            The first day the doubletree broke before I even got started, so a new one had to be bought and installed the next day. The wagons would go out into the fields in twos to pick up the bundles of oats. I was teamed up with another fellow named Bill Houge, a nice looking and accomodating young man who was working for Mike Mickelson, also in that run. Mike was the engineer who kept the threshing machine in good working condition. That was quite a job since there were many moving parts on it that had to be greased and oiled and then repaired when something broke down. Mike was a wiry little man with a high voice and a Norwegian accent.  Like my uncle, Mike was also a bachelor and very likeable.

            My uncle drove the tractor that was used to pull the threshing machine from one farm to another and which actually ran the threshing machine by use of a long belt connected from the flywheel on the tractor to one on the threshing machine. Uncle Ed could pull that threshing machine anywhere—through narrow gates and difficult locations just outside the barn where the straw was to be blown in or out in the yard to be stacked.

            Prior to threshing the oats, it first had to be cut and stacked in the field. The oat stalks had the oats at the top of the stem or the straw. A binder machine was used to do the cutting (usually a McCormick Deering). It was pulled by a team of horses with a large platform and cutting saw blade on the side. The driver sat in the back of the machine to steer the horses and operate the various levers that ran the machine. The next job was for a man to pick up the bundles and stack them together with six to a stack, one on the top to protect the stack from rain.

            Extra help was usually brought in to the stacking of what was called shocking. It had to be finished in time for the threshing. When it was time for the threshing, we would start going out in the field with our rig about seven AM and work until lunch time and then out again until about six PM. Out in the field, we would first throw the bundles into the wagon box, using a three-pronged pitch fork. We would throw these in the box any which way until they reached the top of the box which was approximately four feet high. After that, we would start placing the bundles side by side alI around the box slightly tapered in toward the inside. This helped to keep the load from sliding off when it got higher in the wagon. The reins that went to the horses were tied to the top of the ladder in the front part of the wagon so they could be reached once the wagon was filled.

            The horses responded to "Getup'' or ''Whoa'' or maybe just a clicking sound from the driver's mouth to have them start. We would fill the wagon with bundles until we could not throw them any higher; then we would climb up the ladder and head back to the threshing machine to unload them. That was quite a ride back as the wagon would sway from side to side under the big load. One time, the back of my wagon caught a post going through a gate and I lost part of the load on to the ground. Bill quickly helped me throw it back on top so it turned out ok—thanks to Bill.

            Once the hayracks arrived back at the machine, they were driven up as close to the machine as possible right next to the big belt coming from the tractor. The horses did not like being so close to that turning belt and had to take a little coaxing by the driver. The bundles were pitched into the loader and the machine took over by shaking out the oats and then the straw blown out the blower pipe into the barn or stack.

            The women worked hard preparing meals for the threshing crew and they were wonderful meals and welcomed for the hungry thrashers. They consisted of a full course dinner and usually pie for dessert. We men all sat around the table with our sweaty clothes but clean hands and faces from washing up outside in the places provided. It was difficult sometimes for the women to know if they would also be serving the meal because the threshing might get done prior to mid-day and the team would move on to the next farm. Then that place would be responsible to get the meal. The women were usually assisted by friends or relatives in preparing the meals.

            Some of the farms on the run that I can recall were those of C.R. Sydnes (my grandfather), Ole Fjelland, Albert Alleman, Stanley Floden, Shorty Ersland, Louis Anfinson, Ernie Sydnes, OIe Storing, J.R. Sydnes, Mike Mickelson and Irving Ryan—most all the men were of Norwegian extraction.  I well remember Ernie Sydnes and Shorty Ersland who both drove the oats wagons. They were fun guys and when I was a kid would tease me about growing up to be a bachelor like my uncle Ed. They were right about that. For me, this bit of history that took place nearly seventy years ago was a great experience to be remembered with clarity and nostalgia since it was never to be repeated.

Incident at Union Park

            My parents bought a house during World War II in one of the oldest but still presentable sections of Des Moines, originally settled by Scandinavians.  Certain blocks had maintained their desirability because they were adjacent to Union Park, which gave its name to the immediate area.  One might speculate because of its name that it was built just following the Civil War, but it actually dated to 1892, one of the city’s fivc original parks. 

            It was a favorite haunt for residents, having not only extensive grounds and lush plantings, but also most every amenity adults and especially children could wish for.  We splashed in the wading pool until we were old enough to travel a perilously narrow and lonely road along the lagoon (on which we skated in the winter) to the big pool a half-mile away.  Next to the wading pool was an open rock structure with enclosed rooms for supplies, the domain of parks employees who conducted summer children’s programs.  Picnic areas with shelters, ranks of tennis courts and playground equipment, seasonal gardens, and broad grassy stretches ringed by myriad trees comprised the balance of this haven.

            The official entrance, sitting catty-corner to the roughly triangular park area, had elaborate plinths upon which tall columns rested with brass plaques that announced the park’s name and founding officials.  Lovely and inviting, Union Park seemed unlikely to constitute a threat to youngsters who routinely romped through its grounds.  Then an incident took place one sunny summer day when I was eleven years old.  It was the late 1940s, an uncomplicated time when the world was safe again for democracy and everything else.   A neighbor girl, Mary Rasmussen, and I had set off to play Let’s Pretend in the main area of the park. 

            We had earlier discovered a natural arbor formed by over-arching tree-like shrubs.  Inside this secret place we cagily hid our bikes for the duration while we moseyed here and there and pretended to be detectives, as I recall.  We’d spied two young women sunbathing on blankets, screened from the main road beyond the park by thick trees on one side, and by a huge planting of brilliant cannas and fruit trees from the main park area on the other side.  As we walked farther afield, we saw several teenage boys shooting baskets in the enclosed basketball court and a young couple playing tennis.  Roaming from one end of the park to the other, we amused ourselves for at least an hour with stories from our imagination about the people and things we passed. We had just decided to call it a day, when at twenty feet or more from the sun-bathers we rounded the bed of cannas to see a strange sight.

            In the middle of an open area next to the road that wound through the park, a man was standing alone, fiddling with something near his stomach.  We stopped and peered wonderingly at him for a few seconds, looked at each other in puzzlement, and then turning aside, we trotted off to fetch our bicycles, entering the shaded recess.  But then everything changed about this perfect day in the park.  Upon the seat of my bicycle a thick milky substance had pooled.  I may have been young and inexperienced as to the seamy side of life but it suddenly came to me what the man had been doing while we watched.

            I had seen something similar when I was five years old.  It happened while Mother was attending a meeting at church and I had been playing outside on the sidewalk with a little girl my age who lived next door.  We had been taking turns on her tricycle, but as it was a hot summer day, she suggested we go into her rather shabby small house for a drink of water.  We had no sooner entered the hallway, when above us from the stairway, a man stood glaring at us.  “Get out of here or I’ll ram this down your throats,” he yelled, brandishing something through an opening in his trousers.  It was a sight I was to bury but not forget.

            We turned and ran outside.  “Who was that?” I asked the girl.

            “He’s my uncle,” she whispered.

              I left her there and went into the church to tell my tale that shocked the ladies and broke up their meeting.  I have no idea what transpired about the nasty man or his poor niece.   But that day in the park as I looked with horror at my despoiled bike seat, I somehow knew what the man had been doing as we watched, and what he had done in our secret place.  We ran back to the young women sunbathing and gave an excited account of what had happened.  They said we should dash to the drugstore across from the entrance to the park and call the police.  When the pharmacist-owner heard our breathless request, he made the call himself. 

            The patrol car was there within minutes and drove us into the park to the area in question.  The man had disappeared.  The officer got out and looked around, including where we had stashed our bicycles.  The women, who had grabbed their blankets, were heading out of the park themselves.  They hadn’t seen the individual, but it was reasonable to assume a pervert had been frequenting the area.   Eventually, the policeman took our names and addresses, leaving Mary and me to claim our bikes and get ourselves home.

             I balked at riding mine with the mess on the seat and would have left it there forever, but Mary was brave and wiped it off with a Kleenex she had in her pocket.  I rode my bike standing up the entire three blocks to my house, abandoning it in our back yard.  My mother, maintaining her usual calm in the face of such a traumatic adventure to her daughter, made little of the incident, even when I dramatically threw myself on the studio couch in the solarium just as a heroine from any of my favorite novels might.  Mother did seem somewhat startled the next day, however, when a detective arrived seeking more information, which I was unable to give.  I don’t know if the man in the park was ever caught, though for a time, the police regularly patrolled there during daylight hours.  But I never again played so freely in the park, its charm tainted by the incident.  My bicycle could not get clean enough to suit me and it stayed outside the rest of the summer through pelting rain and blazing sun.  Eventually, my dad bought a new seat for it.

Coming of Age in the ‘50s: A Place in the Sun

           We’re called the Silent Generation, and rightly so.  We had welcomed back from the War our brothers and fathers who slipped seamlessly into their former roles.  Of course, some didn’t come back, but they’d made the sacrifice for world peace, and we were comforted.  Now our own young men had to spend time in Korea, but again, we believed in the Cause—defeating the spread of Communism.  And so we were silent.  We were aware of other concerns that were confronting us, atom bombs, for one, but we couldn’t do much about that, and besides, their use had ended the war.  And so we were silent.

East High, Des Moines, Iowa, January 1955

            The pace of life in the ‘50s was not hectic, but full and fun.  Women had totally embraced “The New Look,” and even girls wore mid-length flowing skirts or form-fitting sheaths. We had boy-girl parties in junior high where we played spin the bottle as an excuse to kiss one another innocently.  Football and basketball games, along with sock hops in high school enlivened our studies.  And those wonderful formal dances at the Tromar or Val Aire with that beautiful, romantic music--how lucky we were!      
             Drugs were not unknown, but only certain individuals were reputed to be using marijuana, at the most.  Oddly enough, I was “pals” with a tough guy at my high school called “Duke,” who was a rarity by having his own car, a Studebaker coupe, and by wearing a leather jacket and his hair in a DA.  We never talked about drugs, but the rumors were rife that he indulged in them.  For some reason, we gave each other advice, even about clothes, he suggesting I wear tight straight skirts to “show off my best feature!”  We never went beyond conversations, however, as we both knew we weren’t the other’s type.

            I went to an integrated school, so the race concerns that were affecting the South had little impact on me personally and less on our school system. The Rosa Parks affair was smack dab in the middle of the ‘50s, but for us teenagers in the Midwest, that definitive issue was as remote as the moon.  I lived in ignorance, even unaware of the ruling from the Supreme Court, presided over by my second cousin once removed, Chief Justice Earl Warren.  I know that my one assurance was that our nation’s leaders would always end up doing what was the right thing, the best thing for everyone. Eisenhower’s “I Like Ike” catch-phrase dominated the era, and whether he was an effective President or not, he was a symbol to the populace that all of our problems were under control.  If anything got out of order, Ike could fix it.  Democrats controlled Congress, but Republicans had the Presidency—at least for two terms.  Not until the ‘60s would another generation respond very differently to the government's policies.  And to those of us from the Silent Generation observing those violent protests, all hell seemed to break loose.  But that’s another story.

            As far as religious duties, everyone in my day seemed to attend one church or another, and though we didn’t make much of the many Protestant groups, Roman Catholics were a different matter, almost feared by outsiders.  The Midwest, like probably many other areas of the country at that time, preferred a conventional outlook; we craved anonymity and conformity as an appropriate approach to life, so “popishness” could only be suspect.  Furthermore, I knew only one Jewish girl who lived in our neighborhood and attended my high school.  Poor thing.  She was truly an outsider, not treated badly, but rather ignored.  We didn’t intend to be cruel, but we hardly knew how to react to anyone whose background was so extraordinary.  True, we of the '50s were less tolerant of differences, thinking everyone wanted to be like us--white, respectful of authority, and Protestant.  But seeing how much filth is tolerated today, I wonder about some happy medium.      
         The ‘50s were a time when women—girls particularly—were protected from themselves as well as men.  Sex was hardly mentioned overtly, only suggested as something reserved for “sluts” and “whores” outside of marriage, but as sacred after the ceremony.  In high school I dated many guys and in my senior year went to fraternity dances at then Iowa State University and the University of Iowa with my mother’s blessing.  She had no fear of anything untoward happening to me as I went under the auspices of slightly older friends.  I only had one unpleasant experience, and that wasn’t dangerous, when a blind date at Iowa State tried to get me into the football game with a student ID he had procured.  The problem was that the person I was supposed to be, “Felipe Navas,” was so improbable that I was refused admittance.  The rest of the day followed this pattern of stupidity and carelessness.  The date turned out to be a member of the band, so I sat out all the numbers at the dance while he steadily drank until his fraternity brothers carried him off at the end of the evening.  That was my last adventure with a blind date. 

            At my own college, girls had a curfew of ten o’clock during weekdays, upped to midnight on weekends.  Dorms were NOT coed, a concept that still seems ridiculous to me and one I would have hated to live with.  The one great difference in relations between the sexes then and now is that the sense of mystery we enjoyed is gone.  Then, girls maintained a reserve that only was breached when a couple became “pinned” or engaged.  It made the dating game exciting and romantic, something that today’s young people cannot even imagine.  Is it significant that among my sorority sisters in a ten-member “round robin” there have been over the last fifty-plus years no divorces?

            All this may seem strange to those who came after us, but it added up to a time remembered as peaceful and orderly.  Nothing stays the same, and throughout history, there have been periods of licentiousness and disorder, eventually resolving into a less chaotic period, which again is replaced by something else.  I can’t imagine what might be in store for my grandchildren’s children, but I would hope they’d experience a semblance of the happy times of my generation’s youth.

The Newspaper Game

This is a true story (with the names changed) of my first real job.  A version of this episode appears in my coming-of-age novel, SNUSVILLE.

In January 1955, I graduated from high school as part of an unusual mid-year option in our school system which continued until the 1960s.  Like most of my college-bound classmates, I decided upon my graduation I would work six months before enrolling in college, determined for once to start the school year in September.  To that end, I applied at several downtown businesses, but the only attractive offer coming my way was as a classified advertising clerk at the city’s morning and evening newspapers which had different editorial staffs but other operations in common.  It was rather exciting to think I’d be working in those environs, which called up many a movie that featured newspapers and reporters.  My first day on the job I was beset by conflicting emotions, thrilled with anticipation but racked by nerves—my first real job.  I had dressed carefully but casually, thinking Lois Lane, my hair shiny clean and curled in a neat flip.  Everyone I saw going into the building seemed to have a romantic air about them, as if they had witnessed untold stories.  I felt my youth and inexperience keenly and might have been someone’s little sister just visiting for the day. 

“You’ll sit at this desk beside me,” said Shirley, the Classified supervisor, whom I guessed to be in her late twenties or early thirties, “so I can keep an eye on you.  It won’t be any time before you get the hang of it, kiddo.”

Miss Shirley Shaw’s desk was the middle one of three that sat directly beneath a low wooden panel shutting off the main advertising operations from the public area.  Outside the paneled railing, walk-in customers would go to a central station in the middle of the room, where behind a high counter another three women took want ads in person.  Across the room from the mail staff, of which I was one, two rows of women sat with headphones and took call-in ads.        

Behind Shirley’s desk was the office of the Advertising Manager, George Rankin, red-faced, loud-voiced, chain-smoking, but kind when he welcomed me to the department.  His main concern, I was soon to discover, was the harried-looking squadron of retail advertising salesmen whose desks, cluttered with newspapers and clip sheets, were segregated near the windows just beyond our little group.  They were the prima donnas, as Shirley teasingly termed them, or workhorses, as they called themselves, who brought in the real revenue for both the newspapers.  The papers shared certain staffs, most importantly the Advertising Department. 

Shirley was in charge of all the Classified staff, but took particular interest in her “mail girls,” as she liked to call me and my co-worker Madelaine Chaffee.  Shirley was full of catch phrases, which I came to know well.  If someone stopped by our desks instead of going to the walk-in counter, Shirley would always say, “What can I do you for?”  Anyone tripping over their feet within her range would be told to “watch that first step; it’s a tricky devil.”  When she let out the occasional swear word, she’d apologize with, “Pardon my oo-la-la.”  I came to be quite fond of Shirley’s stock of one-liners, particularly her invariable “Stop the presses!” shouted when just before deadline she sent the ads through the pneumatic tube to Linotype.

Madelaine was a tiny, pale girl with carroty hair who had been out of high school three years and talked incessantly about her fiancé, Steve, and their activities.  She was what I at that time thought of as typically Catholic--not very pious but devoted to the rituals of her church, which she referred to irreverently.  When she spoke of Confession, for example, she invariably said she had to go “spill my guts.”

Both Madelaine and Shirley and two of the counter girls smoked on their breaks at the cafeteria next door to the newspaper, and before long, so did I.   I bought a pack of Pall Malls my second week on the job after Madelaine said in her usual dry tone when I “borrowed” my fourth cigarette, “All you seem to have is the habit.”  After I got home from work, I carefully stashed my purse containing the cigarettes into the bottom drawer of my dresser.  Soon the drawer emitted a distinctive odor.  My mother did not know I smoked—until putting away some freshly washed clothes in my dresser she got a whiff.  She took to her bed that day in horror and shame when she discovered her daughter smoked, but that’s another story.

I had seen women that looked like Shirley when I went downtown shopping or to the movies, but I had never known one personally.  Shirley’s face was an orangey color from the thick pancake makeup and flame-colored rouge.  Her mouth had overlarge lips painted on in bright carmine.  Rhinestone or pearl studded combs held her permed hair away from her face, which in spite of the strange makeup was attractive with bright blue eyes and a pleasant expression.  She was unfailingly good-natured and unfazed by my occasional slip-ups.  “It’ll all come out in the wash,” she’d say.

One of the counter girls was a plumpish, demure young woman with eyes that crinkled when she smiled, which was often.  Like me, Dorothy McMahan had just graduated in January—only it was from the girls Catholic high school.  Unlike me, she knew what was in store for her future.  One day, a few months after we’d begun work as we were walking back from our break, I asked her if she was planning on going to college.

“Actually, no.”  She looked at me and gave me her crinkly smile.  “I’m going to the convent in September.  I plan to take the veil.”

“What?  Become a nun, you mean?”

Dorothy nodded.

I could think of nothing to say except, “How interesting.”  Then I thought a moment and said, “Why are you working here now?  Shouldn’t you be home getting ready, praying or something?”  I smiled, half joking, half serious.

Dorothy laughed.  “I do pray, but I haven’t taken any vows yet.  It will be a while before I do, you know.  I have to be a novice first, then a postulant, and if everything goes all right, in about three years I’ll take final vows to become a nun.”

“I’m really surprised,” I said, and I meant it, hardly something I ever heard with my Protestant background.  Dorothy was a cheerful girl who seemed to like everyone.  Why would she want to separate herself from life in such a way?

“You know,” said Dorothy in a musing tone, “I’ve had a few dates with one of the guys who works in Editorial—we kept meeting in the lobby and finally he asked me out.” 

“No kidding?  Doesn’t it seem funny to be dating?”

“I don’t know why.  I didn’t see any harm in going out and having fun.  He’s a nice guy, but when I told him last week I was going to the convent in the fall he got mad at me.”  She looked at me, perplexed.  “Really mad.  Why would he feel that way?”

I understood, but I couldn’t explain it to Dorothy if she didn’t know.  Dorothy was the same as engaged, and her date had felt betrayed, as if on the sly she had been stepping out on her real fellow—Jesus.

After that, I caught myself sneaking glances at Dorothy, trying to imagine her in a black habit.  Yes, there was something simple and unworldly about her.  She would probably make a pretty good nun, but it still seemed a waste.

The advertising department might have been on the moon for all I saw of the rest of the newspapers’s operation.  Sometimes, Tommy in Linotype called to verify some copy, but other than that, I spent my days at my desk, opening envelopes, counting words, typing out some ads and pasting others on a special form.  “Time for Kindergarten 101,” Shirley would say each morning as she got out her scissors and paste.

But one day, Mr. Rankin called me into his office and handed me an envelope.  “Take this up to Editorial.  Hand it to the girl at the front desk.  She’ll give it to the editor.”

Oh, thrill!  I coolly told the elevator man “Four,” pretending I was a reporter going to her job.  Maybe that would be the career for me.  I stepped out of the elevator into a huge room filled with side-by-side desks, smoke, and the sound of typewriters clacking away.  People were talking on the telephone or leaning back in their swivel chairs staring at the ceiling.  I saw two women typing furiously, wearing hats as if they had just come in from a fast-breaking story.  No one paid any attention to me.

“Can you tell me where the editor is?” I asked a smartly dressed girl at the front desk.  I waved the envelope.  “I have something for him from Mr. Rankin in Advertising.”

“Over there, behind that glass partition.”

The editor barely glanced at me as he took the envelope and said, “Thanks.”  I walked slowly back through the room, memorizing details.  I saw large machines that seemed to be typing on their own.  People would go over, read the messages, and then tear off a section.

But I couldn’t hang around there forever.  Reluctantly, I boarded the elevator, which had to be held up until a thin young man with pale blue eyes and almost non-existent eyebrows ran in.  I was still thinking about working on a newspaper when I realized he was addressing me.

“Haven’t I seen you in Classified?”

I looked at him, startled.  “Yes, I work there.”  I smiled, uncertain how friendly I should be.  I had not forgotten to be cautious of strange men just because I was now a newspaper woman.

He held out his hand.  “I’m Howard Last.  I’m a photographer in Features and Promotion.”

I shook his hand, conscious of my cold fingers and his sweaty palm.  “I’m glad to meet you.”  He was tall and very pale and must have been at least twenty-eight.

“I’ve noticed you around here.  It struck me that you might be interested in modeling for some of the pictures we take for the syndicated health and beauty aids column.  My last model didn’t work out, and I’m needing someone with your looks.”

“Modeling what?” I asked suspiciously.  He seemed so unlikely a person to be hiring models, I couldn’t help but wonder if he actually worked for the paper.  Maybe he operated some sleazy photographic studio housed in this building.

“Oh, just housewife stuff--you know, getting ready for an egg shampoo or exercising, that sort of thing.”

“Really?”  I stepped out of the elevator and looked toward the glass doors of Advertising.  I’d been gone quite a while; I’d need to get back.

“It pays three dollars an hour, and we could set up the sessions after work or on Saturdays.”  He jerked his thumb upwards.  “The studio’s on the fifth floor.”

Three dollars!  That was almost three times what I made.  “Gosh, thanks, I--I’ll--why, yes, I’d like to very much.” 

“Good, I’ll call you and we’ll set up a time.”

I stood for a moment, confused by his staring face so near mine, and as I turned to go through the glass doors into Advertising, I felt his eyes on my back.  I walked away self-consciously, but my heart leaped and sang.  Maybe this was to be my life--famous health and beauty aids model!  I could hardly wait to tell my friend Elaine, who would rejoice at my good fortune; I was less eager to get my mother’s reaction.  She would think the job frivolous, the sort of thing Mrs. Plush might do (her invariable name for me if I wished for anything beyond the ordinary).  I posed for the very non-glamorous pictures the remainder of my time at the paper and even during Christmas break, but by that time I could see my experience with newspaper work was turning out to be quite different from my imaginings, not altogether a bad thing, but not Lois Lane, either.  Many years later, I worked for two much smaller newspapers and finally was allowed to write something! (to be continued)