SPRING

There’s a 1935 calendar from the local funeral parlor hanging on the kitchen wall. There’s a pocket attached for letters and bills, and it’s slowly filling up. The January and February pages are already torn off.

“SPRING” is printed on one square of the March page of the calendar. But I can tell when that day arrives without even looking at the calendar. Some inner dance begins soon as I open the outside door, and warm breezes lift me upward into a soaring ballet that waves goodbye to winter.

As if on cue, beckoning sounds of spring resound throughout our neighborhood. I hear the whirr of roller skates, thumping of balls, clicks of bats, and a coaster wagon rumbling by. Coatless girls chant singsong verses while twirling their jump ropes, as if they are pipers calling me outside.

“One, two, buckle my shoe…”

I don’t want to watch, I want to join in as soon as I can. “Daddy, take the wagon down!” we clamor, badgering him to get the coaster wagon off the wall hook in the basement, and hang the abandoned sled in its place.

“Daddy, wipe away those icky cobwebs,” I say, pointing while standing far away.

“I get the first ride,” Buddy announces. He likes to be first in most things. “Boys rule” is his motto if we question him.

Daddy wipes away the cobwebs and oils the wheels for us, and soon the wagon is rumbling along on the sidewalks. That echoing sound means spring is really here and we no longer have to stay inside the house, as we did most of the cold winter.

We have several fun-filled days of nothing but coaster riding from the time we change our school clothes till we’re called in for supper, with the sun still shining.

Up and down the block we go, zigzagging crazily to the bottom, then halting quickly so we don’t go over the concrete curb. Kids with clamp-on roller skates sometimes hitch rides, holding onto the wagon. The double vibrations of skates and coaster sing through the leafless trees, clunking over and over, hitting sidewalk cracks, all of us squealing with laughter. Our wagon, an old wooden one purchased at some farm auction, rumbles horribly, especially when empty, but for our clan it’s a magic carpet that carries us to far-away places, if only a few blocks from home.

We do have a family car, but it’s only used for visiting country relatives, or Sunday picnics. Daddy puts the old Ford up on wooden blocks during winter. “To keep the tires from getting flat on the bottom,” he says with a laugh. And to save gas, Daddy turns off the ignition at the top of steep hills and coasts as far as he can. We never expect to be driven anywhere, and we never are.

Two wheeled bikes? You don’t even ask for one till you’re in eighth grade. When we ask Mama for things, she usually has two answers. “Wait till you’re in eighth grade,” or “Wait till you’re married.” So the coaster wagon’s our wheels.

On Saturday morning, we quickly do our chores so we can go on our favorite outing, which is to the local high school, a castlelike building on a high hill overlooking Lake Michigan. For grade-schoolers like us, it’s a mysterious, forbidding place, where the “big kid s” go to school, looking so important as they walk by in chattering groups, holding stacks of books. We go to the high school when they aren’t there.

“You get the blankets, I’ll make the sandwiches,” Catherine tells us, and we quickly gather things. We throw the itchy army blanket and package of thick homemade bread and jelly sandwiches into the wagon. Buddy calls out “Everybody on board!” and we begin our wagon train to the high school, picking up friends along the way.

We take turns pushing or pulling, switching places at each corner. The little ones usually get to ride all the way on someone’s lap.

Once there, we go right to our favorite picnic spot, which is the bandstand area, circled by a wall of flat stones, perfect for sitting on. It’s grand for after lunch speeches, because there’s such a resounding echo when we talk loud.

Other times, we eat lunch under the football field bleachers, an army blanket draped over them, forming a perfect tent area underneath. It’s especially good during rain, which happens quite often on spring days. But we don’t mind. Being outside on our own, away from home, is all that matters.

We’re anxious for the highlight of our Saturday trip, the wild ride down the grassy high school hill in our speeding wagon. It’s even more fun than winter sledding on the same hill, for whatever spills occur now are onto soft new grass.

While waiting for our turns, we watchers find our own thrills, lying down on the grass sideways, rolling from the top of the hill down, gaining momentum as we turn faster and faster, over and over, till the last halting rotation. When we open our eyes and try to stand up, the whole world’s still spinning crazily, and we’re ready to do it all over again.

Our wagon isn’t only for play. We’ve gotta’ haul things in it, too. About once a week, two of us are reminded, “It’s your turn to go for dried bakery.” Getting dried bakery is the trip we hate most. Fresh bakery is sold to people with money. Returned bakery, which dries out pretty quickly, is for the down-and-outers. These days, everyone’s scrimping. Still, there’s a certain stigma attached to some things, and going for dried bakery with our noisy coaster wagon is one of them.

We leave early to make sure our friends aren’t out yet to see us going on this trip which we feel ashamed to make. The empty wagon sounds like rumbling thunder as we try to walk quietly, certain we’re waking up everyone along the way, that people are watching from behind their sheer curtains.

Returned bakery, brought back from grocery stores by truck because it didn’t sell, is sold at the rear entrance of the store. In the early morning, there’s always lines of mostly silent people, white aproned bakers, and yeasty smells at the back of the bakery. There are always more customers in back than in the front of the store. Being kids, we have to push and shove extra hard just to hang onto our place in line, juggling the coaster between us.

Finally, it’s our turn to go inside. We try to fill our box quickly with the stickiest buns, frosted or filled doughnuts, and the fewest hard rolls. For 25 cents you get a large cardboard box of hardening, finger-poked bakery. We don’t care how they look; it’s the enticing smells that make our mouths water.

The trek back is miserable, with evidence of our mission in plain view in the open box. Sometimes we go blocks out of our way to avoid familiar streets. But once home, we hungrily dig in with the rest, taking our allotted two choices, the rest saved for later. Even days later, those last remaining hard rolls are still tasty, especially when dipped in hot Postum.

Mama says getting dried bakery is nothing to be ashamed of, and she doesn’t know why people on Relief can get oranges, and lots of other things we can’t afford, for free.

I hear her complain to friends, “Just because we own our house, which we’re still paying for, they won’t give us Relief, no matter how many kids we have!”

I also hear her say, “Auntie Rose is too dang lazy to go out and scrub floors, because she’d rather be sitting around, munching on her Relief oranges.”

Only she never says such things to Auntie Rose when we visit her, even when we get to eat the good food Auntie sets out on the table for us. There are always fat pieces of oranges in her fancy Jell-O molds, too. Mama just says, “No, thank you,” when the plate of wobbly Jell-O is passed around and never even tries any.

I don’t know what Relief is, but if it would give other delicious things like Auntie Rose has, it can’t be says.