RUDIMENTS, pt. 976
(remembering the baldwin ladies)
In that previous chapter I
brought up Mary Tse - the
Taiwanese girl, staying in
Elmira. It made me think
of something else: When we
were away once, for some 2
weeks, we agreed for her to
stay in our house there,
house-sitting and tending
to our dog, while we were
gone. It started out OK.
We had no contact over
that time, and upon returning
home we found - no Mary,
and no dog! I guess I should
have known; many times
Asians have an aversion to
dogs, for whatever reason.
But Mary had not shown any.
What happened though, she
said, was that after two days
or so, the dog (uncharacteristically)
was barking, antsy, and acting
nervous. Mary was, or felt she
was, overwhelmed. She bailed,
after letting the dog out! (I
probably should have beaned
her one good one for that, but
didn't). Mary just turned her
back on the whole scene and
went back to her college quarters
(only a few blocks away anyway).
The at-large dog, making noise,
and locally wandering, was,
fortunately, taken in by the two
elderly sisters who lived alone in
a large house at the corner,
with a fenced yard. These
were the wealthy Collins sisters,
of whom we knew little. No
husbands, or at least only dead
ones. They were more than a
bit eccentric in their elder
habits, but tolerated. Not
often seen, one of them drove
a large, 1950's, car, to get the
usual groceries, and to do errands.
(There was a show on about this
time, called The Waltons, which
also had two half-tipsy, eccentric
sisters in it - the Baldwin Sisters.
Which is what we called the Collins
sisters). When we arrived home,
and tried to see what had gone on,
they told us they had the dog, and
they related what had happened,
except they thought we'd simply
abandoned the dog, and thus were
a bit hostile. After we explained all
that had transpired, our way, they
brought us to the dog. Which dog
they had been 'sedating' for about
8 days - by whatever means; dog
sedatives or whatever. I don't recall
exactly. The dog was a mess, but
way-pleased to see us, and it took
3 days or so for it to come around
to normal again. Lucky break. I
considered all fortunate, and let
it go. BUT there was more...
-
These Baldwin ladies - oops, I
mean Collins ladies - had a
habit of, in any public or yard
scene, of being overly sweet,
almost cloyingly so, friendly,
sentimental. Offensive to no
one, and pleased with the world.
One day - this is true - our
nearby neighbors, on our side
of the street, a black family,
friends to us, very nice; the
guy was a chef in some
local, fancy, restaurant, were
having a large, yard-gathering,
cook-out, party. They had a
built-in pool, there was amplified
music, wafting aromas of meat
and barbecue, etc. All evidences
pointed to a big party. Well,
about mid-afternoon, lo and
behold, (remember, I said this
is true) who should be out in
the middle of the street, drunk
off their asses, but the two
Collins ladies. Looking slovenly,
wobbly, all disheveled, (and
quite obviously drunk), of all
things, the two were screaming:
'You fucking N...ers, with your
smells and smelly food, loud
music, and noise, you're no
good. We've never liked you
being here and this just proves
how disgusting you are!' I'm
not even covering half of what
they said but this gets the gist.
Nothing violent came of it; the
cops were called, arrived, took
the two ladies off. About a
month or so later there was
a court hearing of some sort,
and I recall maybe a fine, but,
most humbling was the public
apology - to be given in the
street, right where the offense
occurred, and when sober. They
were quite apologetic, real or
not, I don't know; they seemed
humbled and embarrassed, and,
after that, really were seen very
little. The whole thing was one
of the weirdest scenes I'd ever
witnessed, from its start to its
finish. And just think, they'd
been sedating my dog too!
-
This little street I'm talking of,
in Elmira, was Lincoln Street.
At the intersection of Washington.
Our house was #827, and it was
two houses in, from Washington,
where the Washington School
was - across the street of
Washington, the Branch Office
which was a bar I've written off
as the Bra Off, which is how it
appeared when the traffic light
was in front of it as you waited
at the corner. The word Branch,
back then, was above the word
Office, on the sign (It's no longer
like that), and all you'd see were
the first three letters of each line.
There was also a 7-11, a record
store, and a bowling alley. Those
last two are still there. The Collins
ladies interacted with none of
that, (thankfully none at all with
the Branch Office). But, in any
case, the little street was quite
interesting and had its share of
quite unique people.
No comments:
Post a Comment