Feb 15, 1945
DEAR PEE WEE,
It was so much fun getting a letter from you. How could you think I would forget who you are? Of course I know that you and Mitz are growing up and I have been away for such a long time. When I come home you girls will have to wear red roses in your hair, so I’ll be sure to recognize you!
Mitzi wrote and said that you are the champion speller in your school and that you will probably end up being the champion of all New York City. I’m sure she’s right. Spelling was never my best subject and I hope you don’t find too many mistakes in this letter.
Well, Peewee, take good care of yourself and if you have time, I would enjoy hearing from you again. Good luck in everything you do.
Love from
Buddy
Love from Buddy. Love, love, love. Everybody watched me when I took the thin V-mail letter from the kitchen table. But I went into the bathroom to read it, feeling excited and nervous. Love from Buddy. He said that Mitzi and I should wear red roses in our hair so he would be sure to recognize us. That sounded so romantic! I looked into the mirror above the sink. Would I really look that different when Buddy came home? The funny thing was you never saw the changes in yourself, even though you were changing and growing every single minute of the day. Buddy said that I would probably be the champion speller in all of New York City. That made me feel very proud. Somebody far, far away across the ocean had faith in me.
“Mirror, mirror on the wall,
Who is the greatest speller of them all?”
Of course I didn’t say who is the fairest of them all, the way Snow White’s stepmother did. I knew I wasn’t bad-looking and I thought that if my hair was blond instead of brown, if I had dimples and if my nose was a little different, I might even look a tiny bit like Shirley Temple. Yet I had to admit that I wasn’t the fairest in the land.
But spelling! Buddy had written that letter three weeks ago and he didn’t even know what had happened since then. A few days before, I had won the district-wide spelling competition against kids from eight other schools. It was very close, though. A boy named Alvin Michael Jones from P.S. 205 went right down the line with me. When everyone else was eliminated (with two of the girls crying like babies), Alvin and I just spelled one hard word after another. This time the bee was held in the auditorium of a neighborhood school, and the superintendent of the district was the one who read the words to us. The principals of all the schools were the judges.
Before the bee, Dr. Vanderbilt gave me another speech about being the pride of the school and the future of America, etc., etc. The auditorium was filled with teachers and parents and friends of all the contestants. Theodore had to sit on my father’s lap.
When only Alvin and I were left, neither of us made a mistake for what seemed like forever. Once in a while you could hear a tiny gasp from the audience or a nervous cough, but they had been told not to clap or cheer until the winner was declared. It looked as if we would be there all day, but then Alvin had trouble with the word “bookkeeper,” the only word I know of in the English language with three sets of double letters, one right after the other. He was so mad that he didn’t even congratulate me when I spelled it correctly. He just went stomping off the stage muttering about girls who think they’re so smart.
Of course the audience cheered and applauded all at once, and it sounded strange to me, like a great roar, like the ocean sound you hear in a seashell. A hundred people came up to shake hands with me and flashbulbs kept going off.
The next day my picture was in the newspaper. Underneath, it said:
BENSONHURST GIRL IS WINNER IN DISTRICT-WIDE SPELLING BEE
Shirley Braverman, a sixth-grade student at P.S. 247, took first place in a spelling bee held yesterday at P.S. 143 in Brooklyn. The runner-up, Alvin Michael Jones of P.S. 205, was defeated on the tricky word “bookkeeper.” Miss Braverman, an attractive young lady with curly brown hair and sparkling brown eyes, told a reporter for this newspaper that her secret formula for success was to study hard. She will go on to compete for the mayor’s medal in a competition to determine the best speller in all of New York City.
I didn’t even remember talking to a reporter! And that secret formula didn’t sound any more mysterious than the ones in Mrs. Golub’s Secrets of the Stars album.
My father bought ten copies of the newspaper with my picture in it and he taped the page to the front of the refrigerator. Every time I went to get a glass of milk or an apple, my own face smiled back at me. BENSONHURST GIRL IS WINNER...
I talked about it at dinner and after dinner, and even after Theodore and I were in bed. I talked about how great it felt standing up on that stage...Theodore made loud snoring noises as if he were asleep, but I knew that he was only fooling, so I just went on talking.
The next morning at breakfast, I went right to the refrigerator to get the oranges and to sneak another look at the newspaper article.
Velma was very grouchy at the breakfast table. Right after the bee she had been as nice as she could be, congratulating me and saying how wonderful it was that I had won. But at breakfast she started picking on me for leaving the cap off the toothpaste and not helping with the supper dishes the night before. Was Velma jealous of me?
I was standing in front of the mirror, holding Buddy’s letter and thinking about it all. “Mirror, mirror on the wall...”
And there was Velma again, standing in the doorway watching me. Velma the spy, always sneaking up when you least expected her. “Are you talking to yourself?” she asked.
“What?” I said, pretending that I was doing something to my hair. I didn’t have a comb or brush, so I sort of combed it with my fingers.
“Are you talking to yourself?” Velma said again.
“Of course not. Can’t you see, I’m just combing my hair.”
“Oh? Without a comb? Besides, I heard somebody talking in here.”
What an old snoop! “Well, it wasn’t me,” I said.
“Anyway,” Velma said. “Somebody is getting very conceited around this house.”
“I am not!”
“I never said who was getting conceited,” Velma said, in her meanest voice. “You must have a guilty conscience.” I opened my mouth, but before I could say anything, she said, “Just remember, Shirley Braverman, that pride goeth before a fall.” And she marched away with her nose up in the air.
Well! What was that supposed to mean anyway? Pride goeth before a fall. People were always saying things like that to me. All that glitters is not gold. A stitch in time saves nine. Don’t count your chickens before they hatch. Proverbs. She was just jealous because her picture wasn’t in the newspaper, because she wasn’t famous in Bensonhurst. Somehow, I knew that wasn’t really true. After all, she had been nice about my winning in the first place. She only seemed mean when I wouldn’t stop talking about it, when I couldn’t help bragging and looking at my own picture all day. I sighed, a long sad sigh like the sound of air going out of a balloon.
When I looked in the mirror again, trying to find the future best speller in the whole wide world, that attractive young lady with curly brown hair and sparkling brown eyes, I only saw myself, Shirley Braverman of Brooklyn, New York, as if a magic spell had been broken.