My aunt Maxine 2
There was another story about my aunt Maxine that I was looking forward to write. It’s about a lovely experience I had at her house, every Wednesday when I was 15.
My aunt had Kathy and at this point Kathy was able to sit up in a high chair; my aunt had totally regained her shape. God, she was gorgeous. On Wednesday nights my aunt wanted to go out with her friends and kick up her heels a little and my Uncle Jack always worked very late. So after school on Wednesdays I’d walk to Bartlett Street from Allderdice, have dinner with my aunt and Kathy, then my aunt would make herself beautiful and leave me with Kathy. My aunt really knocked me out when she got ready to join her friends–she had poise, superb fashion sense, had even taken a course on modeling and learned how to stand correctly to show off her figure.
During that year Kathy never woke up. Never! So I would sometimes watch television after I did my homework–I think that night was the Beverly Hillbillies–but I would also talk on the phone for hours to my friends. My aunt and uncle were laid back about a lot of things and that made the whole experience fun. My parents ran a tighter ship.
I would come into the house, drop my schoolbooks, and go back to the kitchen. Kathy would be in her high chair and my aunt would be feeding her. The atmosphere was warmly enveloping–all female, all related, all in a clan–and my aunt wanted me to tell her things about what was going on in my life. Just as it was with my grandmother and my other aunts. She always had plenty of time for me. This is making me cry a little…sigh. She’d always have something very good for me to eat, something she knew I liked.
My aunt’s house had a staircase leading to the second floor; however, there was a landing half way up. Lots of times I’d lay on the floor of the landing with the telephone by my side, my feet up against the wall, and I’d call all my friends. Nobody minded; my aunt and uncle thought I was cute.
They loved me.
My aunt stayed out very late on those Wednesday nights; my uncle Jack came home first. We loved those late nights, he and I. We would make bologna sandwiches and talk until midnight! This would never, ever happen in my house! But this is what aunts and uncles are for. Just like everybody else in my family, my uncle liked to sit and talk to me. When I look back on this–I don’t know–I just feel like crying, it was so beautiful.
I slept on the third floor where there was a bed, ready for me. In the mornings I’d walk up Bartlett Street to where Janet Berger lived and we’d walk together to Allderdice.
lgmwriting 