*
All seven members of our family were up and about early today, it was a busy Saturday for all of us. Mom and Dad were leaving early to go to a wedding in another town about 40 miles away, our aunt and uncle were coming to collect them soon. Mom was wearing a nice dress and hat, while Dad wore his best suit and hat.
As for me and my brothers, we were going to be doing our chores early this Saturday morning, and had different plans for the afternoon. Andy and Richie were going to a sleepover with some of their male cousins and friends, and knowing what these boys were like I was glad not to be the one supervising them.
Johnny had an interesting afternoon and evening planned. He and some of his friends — my boyfriend Bobby included — were going as observers and to assist with some basic support functions at a joint training exercise between the Navy and Coast Guard. They would be staying overnight and not back until early Sunday afternoon. Our high school and others in the other region often organized exercises with the police, fire brigade and armed services for boys who were interested in careers in these organizations.
It would have been neat if the girls had been allowed to go too, but unfortunately not, it was boys only. Once during a careers day at school I had told some female teachers that I would have liked to join the Navy, given my father served with them in the war. It was recommended that I take typing and shorthand, as the men at the naval bases always needed girls to type for them, until the girls got married and had to leave the service.
My Saturday included a girls’ softball game in the early afternoon. With so many kids at the local schools who loved sports finding time for all the different teams to play was a challenge, so the girls’ softball games were always played on Saturday afternoons. This afternoon we were playing against a team from a girls’ Catholic Parochial boarding school, who were pretty good opposition.
“So good luck with your game today Betty, and I hope you and your friends learn plenty at the Navy and Coast Guard training camp Johnny,” said Mom, as our aunt and uncle’s car pulled into the driveway.
“Thanks Mom,” Johnny and I said in unison.
“I know you and your friends will win today Betty,” said Dad as he drained the last of his coffee and adjusted his hat. “And Johnny, I hope you decide that a Coast Guard career is for you after tonight, it is a very rewarding job. Pay attention and listen to everything they say.”
“Yes Sir,” said Johnny.
Dad then turned to my younger brothers. “You behave yourselves at the sleepover tonight, your mother and I don’t want to hear any more negative reports from your Aunt about annoying the neighbors’ dogs again.”
“We’ll be good,” said Andy.
“Yeah, we promise,” said Richie.
“That had better be the case, otherwise your father and I will have a fun summer ahead planned for you two boys of math revision and writing essays,” Mom promised them, collecting her purse as she and Dad made for the door.
“Have a good time at the wedding,” I said as our parents went on their way, the sound of our aunt and uncle’s car driving away up the street audible.
Johnny turned on the kitchen radio, and all four of us got busy with our chores. One of mine was doing my laundry, and soon I was carrying my clothes out to the line to dry. Not to my surprise, who should be on the other side of the hedge that separated our garden from the Higgins’ garden but Eric with a pair of garden shears, pruning the hedge.
He looked at me through his thick glasses, delighted and almost disbelieving to see me appear. It was like I was a famous movie star like Lauren Bacall, Olivia de Havilland or Rita Hayworth and he was star-struck. Or if President Truman or King George VI from England had both turned up and cheerfully greeted Eric with ‘good morning.’ I acted casually as Eric looked my overall clad figure up and down from my blonde hair to my bare feet, and gave him a friendly wave and greeting. “Hi Eric.”
“Oh hi, um, hello, good afternoon, I mean morning Betty,” Eric stammered, getting tongue-tied as he always did with me.
One thing about Eric was that he dressed more like he was from actual England rather than New England on the other side of the Atlantic. Today he wore a beige shirt, beige knee-length shorts, a beige knitted pullover and brown shoes and socks. Coupled with his glasses it made him look so square, and a target for bullies male and female.
Still, at least Eric wasn’t wearing socks and sandals like one day at the beach down on the Maine Shore last summer, his parents and aunt dressed like they were going to church. My two younger brothers thought Eric’s socks and sandals funnier than watching a Laurel and Hardy movie, and despite Johnny and I warning Andy and Richie not to laugh at Eric, it only seemed to encourage them even more and they sounded like a pair of hyenas.
The awkwardness thing around me was nothing new either. It happened everywhere, at home, at school, at church and in many other places. Like most teenagers Johnny and I had part time jobs to earn money, Johnny and Bobby working at a store packing shelves while I would work shifts at a restaurant waiting tables in my black dress and white apron.
One time, Eric came in with his family and I was to serve them. Poor Eric, at 18-years-of-age having his mother and aunt sitting next to him constantly reminding him to sit up straight, use his cutlery properly with his mother at one stage using a table napkin to wipe soup from the corner of her son’s mouth. I felt embarrassed for Eric, especially as all this was happening in front of me. All the time his father sat there saying nothing as usual, plus they were lousy tippers. I would have preferred them to leave me no tip, rather than the insulting amount they did leave.
“So, it’s swell weather today?’ I said, beginning to hang out my clothes.
“Yeah, I mean no, I mean I guess,” said Eric, blushing and again looking at my bare feet.
I just acted casually and kept talking about various things as I pegged out my clothes on the line, Eric getting more and more flustered especially as I reached my underwear. Most of my bras and panties were pure white, but I had some pink, light blue and lemon colored underwear as well, and I had to hide my amusement as Eric tried to make it seem as though he wasn’t looking at my bras and my panties now drying in the sun, his spectacle-covered eyes going from the sky to the grass, to my bare feet, to the trees and the power poles.
With my last pair of panties now pegged out, I picked up the laundry basket. “Well see you later Eric,” I said.
“No, I mean maybe Betty, see you later,” Eric stammered while blushing, me feeling him watching the shape of my bottom through the denim of my overalls.
Eric kept casting discrete glances at my drying underwear as he continued to trim the hedge, and my brothers and I continued to do our chores, this time cleaning the first floor windows. Our chores done, we went back inside mid-morning to get ready for our afternoons.