Depression days

OUR BLOCK, OUR TIMES

 

Our house is just a house, one of twenty-two three story buildings  that look glued together. Only five are used strictly for families. We are almost one of those, except that the first floor of our house is for my daddy's office. He's a doctor. Behind his office and waiting room is our big kitchen. It's painted light green. We have an ice box and a gas stove that Mama has to light with a match every morning.

 

Some of my best playmates live upstairs from their father's businesses. Goldie's father is a shoemaker who doesn't make shoes. He just fixes them, adds heels or soles on the shoes of his few customers. Most of the time he only has a small yellow light in his shop so customers know he is there. They live on the second and third floors, have a skinny gray cat that Goldie has mentioned catches mice.

 

Anthony's barber shop is two doors from us. His wife has a beauty parlor behind it. My mother get her nails painted red there once a month. I saw her give Mrs. Belagos two quarters once but never told my daddy.

 

The place I love most is all the way at the end of our block. It's called Wally's Drugstore. Wally lets us kids go thru his trash before the trash truck comes on Friday mornings. We almost always find empty cigar boxes, lids from Dixie cups with pictures of movie stars on them and lots of crepe paper. Once I got lucky and found a tall cardboard stand -up figure of the bellboy in his red suit calling for Phillip Morris.
Richard wanted to buy it from me for ten cents but that was my prize find and I had to have it for the bedroom I share with my two sisters.
Evelyn is fourteen and has a boyfriend and didn't want it in our room. Mama made her leave me alone.

 

Four doors away is Dr. Tyler's office. He had his brick house painted white and it stands out like a broken hand. I watch and watch but have never seen a patient go inside. But, every evening, rain or shine, he comes outside with his two little tan pekenese  dogs on separate leashes. He says they bite, 'Stay away.' I do.

 

Near the corner that has a tall green mail box is Mr. Franzoni's hardware store. I love it. He let me look in all of the brown burlap bags he keeps on the floor and I find tools, nails, clips and can have a few of anything I want. My mother always knows when I have been to see Mr. Fransoni. I smell like putty. He always give me a clump so I can make dishes or snakes out of it. Mama makes me scrub my hands good before I come to the table for supper.

 

One night the noise of fire engines wake me. They stop right in front of Franzoni's. From my window I can see flames and smoke pouring out the broken front window. It's horrible, scary. My parents come to get me and we all leave our house, go to the end of the street near the drug store. It takes forever for the fire to be put out. In the morning there is much sadness when we neighbors, friends, customers,  learn that Mr. Franzoni died in the fire.

 

Nobody really believes it but we finally do. A sadness fills the air. We kids play more quietly. Our parents buy heavy ropes that can be tied to the legs of our beds so we can escape from our windows to the ground.  Mr. Franzoni's family has emptied the building, removed all signs of the fire and put a sign on the new window-STORE TO LET