Mom had 9 sisters and 3 brothers! For the arithmetically challenged, that makes
10 girls and 3 boys...a real “baker’s dozen.” Oddly enough, the first two
children were boys, followed by 10 girls, and then the 3rd boy. I think there was only one set of twins,
which makes 12 pregnancies. As the
saying goes, “It weren’t no record, but it weren’t no hobby, neither!” Imagine raising all those children during the
depression. Mom said that her father was
one of the fortunate ones who always had a job during the depression. She remembered that whenever her mother met a
woman for the first time, or hadn’t seen her for a while, her greeting always
included, “Is your husband working?” Mom’s father primarily worked as an elevator
operator in the Waldorf Astoria, one of the tallest and most prestigious
buildings in the world at that time.
(Something that younger people may not be aware of is that elevators
were not always self-operated. They were
a lot more mechanical than electrical, probably required some size and strength
to operate, and required a trained person to be on hand in case something
malfunctioned.)
Mom used to tell the story of the Christmas that she
wanted a new doll that her parents simply could not afford. On Christmas morning she opened a gift
containing a doll that she recognized as having belonged to one of her older
sisters. Her mother had tried to clean
it up and put some different material on it, hoping it would at least make her
happier than receiving no doll at all.
Mom said that it was only a few days before she really regretted the
fuss and tantrum she threw about receiving a hand-me-down doll. But it was a few more years before she
understood how much it pained her parents to not be able to give her a new doll
for Christmas, and how much worse she made them feel that Christmas
morning. I mention this to emphasize how
tough things were for a large family in those days, even with the father
working. Also interesting, however, is
the selfishness and self-centeredness that children seem to be born with. It is not something that we teach them. It is natural, and is thought to be part of
the human survival instinct.
Mom also told the story several times of the day a
well-dressed woman and her husband knocked on the door and offered to buy one
of the children. Apparently, they
couldn’t conceive and were thinking that someone with a lot of children and no
money might give the proposition some serious thought, like: “We have a lot of
money and no children; you have a lot of children and no money. Can’t we work something out?” Mom said she was scared to death that her
parents might decide to sell one of them, even though her mother told that
couple in no uncertain terms to get lost and never come back. I think if we all understood and appreciated
how well off we are compared to the people of those days, we would be walking
around with perpetual smiles on our faces, a bounce in our steps, and an
attitude of continual gratitude. I talk
elsewhere about the importance of consumerism to our economy and our standard
of living, and I must admit that if we were all happy as clams with what we
have, and didn’t want anything more, then our economy would stagnate and go
backwards. The reality is that our system
depends on our dissatisfaction with what we have as long as there is something
better out there…the way Mom felt about that second hand doll.
I refer to Dad’s parents as Grandma and Popu, but to
Mom’s parents as “Mom’s father” and “Mom’s mother,” probably because I had
essentially no relationship with them. I
never saw them living in their own home.
I can only remember visiting Grandma Dwyer at one of the state
hospitals, either Pilgrim State or Bellvue State, both of which were commonly
referred to as “the insane asylum.” I
learned in 2013 that actually, these were full-service state-run hospitals with
large sections devoted to the mentally ill.
Other hospitals did not have such sections. They were not insane asylums. People with conditions that we have names for
today, such as schizophrenia, Alzheimer’s, dementia and OCD, were simply
thought of as “crazy” in those days, at least by the general public.
Mom told me of a time when she and one or two of her
sisters went to visit their mother in the hospital, and told her that one of
her other daughters had recently had twins.
Grandma was thrilled. A little
later during the same visit they told her as if for the first time, and she
rejoiced all over again, having completely forgotten that they had already told
her. They tried it a third or fourth
time during the visit, until Grandma said, “Yes, you already told me.” Well, she got to enjoy the moment two or
three times instead of just once. I
think Mom told me that story to help me understand Grandma’s condition. Dad
always led me to understand that Grandma Dwyer was driven to “insanity” by not
only the number of kids she bore and tried to raise during the depression, but
by the riotous and inconsiderate behavior of her husband and older boys. It was only in much later years that I heard
from Mom that her father was a good, considerate man, and that her mother had
issues of her own.
Dad liked to prove his point by telling of the time that
a bunch of the couples met at the Dwyer home for dinner and visiting, but
Grandpa had stopped at his favorite bar on the way home from work and wouldn’t
leave. Well, they made the mistake of
sending the oldest boy, Frank (Uncle Frank, to me) to go get him and,
predictably, now Frank and Grandpa were both stuck in the bar and not coming
home for dinner and visiting. Next, the
second oldest boy, Jack, was sent to fetch them both, and then all three of
them were stuck at the bar. I think they
finally sent Dad, who could be counted on to come back, but I don’t recall whether
he returned empty handed, or whether he succeeded in rounding up the other
three. Mom’s version of this story may
have been much different. I don’t know.
I remember that Grandpa Dwyer used to rotate among his
many childrens’ houses, staying with some longer than with others, depending on
how welcome he felt. Some had financial
struggles; some had too many kids; some had marital issues, etc. I only remember him staying with us for a few
short periods of time, but then I tended not to be particularly aware of my
surrounding as a boy, so he may have been with us an amount of time that would
be considered our “fair share.” I was
not aware of whether he was thought to be a burden at all; or whether Dad
resented the intrusion or not.
I do remember that we had a cat that we never named. We just called it “the cat,” and Grandpa used
to call it “the bum cat.” One time the
cat had evidently been in a fight, and came home with its tail nearly
severed. I can’t imagine my parents
paying a veterinarian to deal with it, but I know that the tail was carefully
severed and the cat went around with a white bandage for awhile, and then with
just a stub for a tail. It looked
hilarious, unless you were a cat lover, which none of us were. Grandpa used to grumble at the “bum cat” and
act like he had no use for it, but I think he secretly enjoyed seeing it
slinking around with a stub for a tail.
Aunt Dot says she used to call it “The Tailless Wonder.” I don’t know
how much it handicaps a cat to have no tail; maybe it harmed its self-image or
one of its means of communication or something.
When we were staying at Aunt Alice and Uncle George’s
summer home in Shirley, out on the Island, which I talk more about elsewhere,
our girl cousins (mid-to-late teens at the time) usually had friends staying
over, as well. Grandpa was there, and he
tried to be friendly and fun, although his thought process and facility with
speech was failing him. At breakfast one
morning one of the girls had a piece of toast and he pushed the butter dish
towards her saying, “Have some butter, you bastard.” I don’t know what fun and friendly thing he
was trying to say, but that is what came out.
The girl was horrified at first, and then there was a lot of laughter
around the table. Variations of that
sentence were used by most of us kids in many other contexts throughout the
summer, always causing lots of laughter.
Dad also liked to tell the story of how Uncle Frank, who
had been drinking on the job all day, was walking home from work (construction
site) when he came across an open manhole.
He proceeded to yell threats, challenges and insults to the men he could
see working down in the sewer, until he lost his balance and fell down through
the manhole. The men apparently got him
back up to the road and laid him down, out cold, but not seriously hurt. I don’t know whether the police got involved,
or how he got home. Perhaps he woke up
and continued his walk home.
Anyway, in contrast, Dad’s parents, Grandma and Popu,
lived just a couple of towns over from us on Long Island, and we saw them
frequently, until they moved to Florida when I was around 14 years old (1958). I
find it interesting now that it feels like they were always in my life growing
up. I guess by age 14 I was the typical
self-absorbed teenager who was not concerned about family, or the absence of
people who had always been in my life.
Strange. Teenagers are strange,
and I probably more than average. It
amazes me now to realize that the few short years from age 6 to 16 loom so large
in my memories, yet were only ten out of seventy. Our growing up years definitely shape us for
the rest of our lives. I recall one
speaker saying that our self-images are pretty much set by the time we are 5
years old. That would have been before
Massapequa, a time I hardly remember. I
don’t know if the speaker knew what he was talking about, but it sure seems
like the first 10 years of cognitive memories, say ages 5 to 15 or 6 to16, have
the greatest impact on who we think we are in our own minds as adults.
I can remember Grandma and Popu’s front room furniture
and back yard, and the long expanse of grass over to the back neighbor’s
yard. (They had kids for us to play
with). A few years ago I came to an
observation that I later had to discount.
I noticed that front room furniture and family room furniture are
subject to changing fads, and that it was not unusual at all for families to
replace couches, chairs, coffee tables, lamps…the whole look of their
rooms…every 5-10 years or so. I was
thinking that my grandparents’ furniture never changed; that furniture in those
days was built and bought to last a lifetime.
But then I realized that the picture in my mind of my grandparents’
living room and family room, which has been with me all my life, is actually
based on an 8 year or so period from age 6 (when we moved to Massapequa) to 14 (when they moved to Florida). On the other hand, I can’t remember the
furniture in the house I grew up in at all!
I think I was blocking out a lot of stuff in those years, for reasons
that may become clear or obvious later.
When Donald and I and Cousin Harold were all there
together, Popu delighted in having the three of us reach up as high as we could
and shake the trunk of the “money tree” in his backyard. As he encouraged us to shake harder and keep
looking up, Popu would reach into his pocket, where he had earlier stashed a
bunch of coins, and throw them into the air over our heads, and down would come
money from the money tree! For the longest time after I knew there was no such
thing as a money tree, I thought that Popu would get a ladder and painstakingly
place coins on the branches and the sturdy leaves before we got there. What an elaborate labor of love, I thought. I may have been ten or twelve before I realized
what he was actually doing. He was good
at having us turn our backs to him and look up while shaking the tree harder
and harder, while he tossed the coins.
Who knew? By that time, I also
knew that a dime, though smaller than a nickel, was worth more. However, Popu showed Donald and Harold a
nickel and a quarter and asked them to choose which one they wanted. Drawing upon my superior knowledge, I
counseled them to choose the smaller of the two coins. Doh!
I also remember riding in the back seat of Grandma and
Popu’s car and noticing that in their car the man sat on the right and the
woman sat on the left (Popu didn’t drive), which was exactly opposite of how
things worked in Mom and Dad’s car (Dad always drove). I don’t want to guess how old I was before I
realized that the cars were not built differently; that the steering wheel was
in the same place in both cars; that in one case the woman drove and in the
other case the man drove. Aunt Dot just
told me, by the way, that Mom learned to drive first, then Dad. She said it was very rare for a woman to
drive a car in Grandma’s day, and also pretty rare that a woman of Mom’s
generation would learn before her husband did.
I also remember Popu’s 59th birthday cake, where Grandma
deliberately switched the numerals to read 95.
As she made comments, trying to get him to notice, the rest of us
started to notice and laugh. It took him
a while to finally see what we were laughing about.
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