Reconnecting with Burnie

I don’t remember dreaming anything, but I remember Mother gently and persistently shaking my shoulder.

“Mable, Sweetie, time to wake up. We have a baseball game to watch,” Mother was whispering in my ear. “We need to get downstairs for a good breakfast. It’s going to be a busy day.”

I opened my eyes when I heard “busy day.” It dawned on my sleepy head what that meant. I am going to see both Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig today! I sat right up on the edge of the bed. It took me a minute to get my bearings. You know how when you wake up in a strange place and you are really not completely sure about where you are? It was like that. Then I remembered I was in Burnie’s house. That felt good again.

“Okay, Mother. Do you know if the bathroom is available?” I asked.

“I’ll check, dear. Do you know what you are going to wear?”

I started to answer her, but she had already headed down the hall to check on the availability of the bathroom. What she didn’t suspect was that I had not given any thought at all to what I was going to wear today. I spent most of my time thinking about what I was going to wear tomorrow. It actually surprised me, when I thought about it, that Mother even cared what I wore. I thought she knew me better than that! Oddly enough, then I started thinking about it. What would I wear?

“Bathroom is available, Mable. I’m ready, so I’ll just meet you in the dining room. Anything I can do to help you? Do you want to lay out what you are going to wear on the bed?”

“No, thank you, Mother. I haven’t decided what I’m wearing yet,” I told her as I whisked past her and down the hall. “I can take care of it. Don’t worry, I’ll be right down.”

As I washed up and ran my brush through my hair, I looked at myself in the mirror. I smiled, practicing what I would say to Mr. Ruth when I met him. I tried several different greetings, but they all sounded fake. I decided to just see how Mr. Ashby greeted him, and then just say the same thing! Brilliant, Mable, simply brilliant. Well, even if it wasn’t brilliant, it was the best I could do for now. We weren’t going to catch up with him until tomorrow after the Drake scrimmage, so I had almost two days to come up with something appropriate and original.

When I returned to the bedroom, resplendent in my velvet robe, I thought maybe I could just wear my spectacular robe to meet him. The Babe would certainly never forget me! Geez, I had strange thoughts pop into my head sometimes lately. It had to be my nerves. Then I thought about how I hoped I could get my photograph taken with him. Surely Mr. Ashby would have his camera with him.

I had to get dressed. I opened my suitcase and looked at my dark green dress. It would look really nifty under my North High letter sweater. I was the only girl in my class who had one. After all, I was the only one who had lettered in practically every sport they had for girls. It would probably be getting a little cooler after the scrimmage tomorrow, and I would be nice and warm. Maybe Babe Ruth would ask me about my letters and chevrons and medals. Wow, I must have been going nuts. Only a hammerhead would be thinking like this. ‘Get dressed, Mable, and get downstairs,’ I told myself. ‘Focus on the game today and quit worrying about tomorrow.’ For today, I chose a blue skirt, white blouse, and a blue sweater. Good enough for a baseball game.

Everyone else was already down in the dining room, of course, and practically finished with their breakfast. Burnie’s mom directed me to the kitchen and asked me to help myself to the French toast and bacon slices that were in the warmer on top of the stove. French toast! That was downright fancy for a Saturday breakfast. I thanked her several times for going to all the trouble, but she said she really enjoyed cooking for a crowd. And we were a crowd, with Mother and me, Uncle Albert, and the three Orwigs. It all felt good, though, like family.

The exhibition baseball game was going to be at Holcomb Park on 6th Avenue, home of the Des Moines Demons, at 11:00 A.M. This was also known as the Western League Park, where in May of 1930, they played the first-ever night baseball game under permanent lights. I didn’t get to go, as the crowd was nearly double the capacity of the ballpark, but I sure would have loved to be there. Baseball Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis even came to town to see it!

I loved watching baseball, and had not seen a real live game for what seemed like ages. Last summer had been so hectic, what with all the things going on in my life. Since Father passed away, baseball had almost slipped out of my life, too. Father would not have liked that. I was thinking how swell it would have been for him to be here today to see Babe and Lou, not to mention meet Babe tomorrow. Golly, I really missed him. My life was so busy and I was doing everything Father wanted me to be able to do, but he wasn’t here to see it.

I had all these thoughts running through my head and realized that Burnie was trying to talk to me.

“Hello, hello, hello, Mable? Are you here?” he said it in a rather sing-song voice, so I reasoned it was not his first attempt to get my attention. Oops.

I apologized. “Sorry, Burnie. I have all sorts of different thoughts going through my head. I’m really sorry. What were you saying?”

“I was saying how they must be starving you at that university. You really goofed down that French toast! How much bacon did you eat?” he asked.

“I only had three pieces. How many did you have?”

“Not that many,” He let out a little oink sound, like a pig, and I knew he was trying to be funny. I, however, was not amused.

“Well, I’m in two sports right now, smarty pants. I’m hungry. Is that alright with you?” I realized I sounded pretty defensive, but Mother just patted my lap.

“She’s tired and cranky, still…not awake maybe. Do you want some nice cold orange juice, Mable? It certainly woke me up.” Mother was trying to make up for my meanness.

“I really am sorry, Burnie. I have a thousand things going through my mind. Maybe we can find some time to talk before we leave for the game?”

Burnie’s mother interjected, “Why don’t you two go for a walk over past your old school? You can catch up with all of each other’s news on the way?”

I wiped my hands and mouth on the cheery yellow cloth napkin and pushed back my chair. “May I please be excused? I’d like to go for a walk.”

Burnie pushed his chair back also. “May I please be excused? I’d like to go for a walk.”

“Please go, kids,” ordered Mr. Orwig. “Have a great time. It’s 9:30 now, so try to be back in about forty-five minutes. We need to all be in the car and heading down to the ballpark by 10:30, okay?”

Burnie’s dad was so organized. He had a schedule for the whole day, I’ll bet! Burnie grabbed his baseball cap on the way past the hat rack in the front hall, and we went quickly out the front door.

We had walked nearly a full block before Burnie said anything. I knew that he knew. He knew I was unhappy. I knew he was going to make me tell him everything. Well, he really wouldn’t have to make me tell him. I needed to tell him all of it. The problem was, I wasn’t sure where to even start.

“Just spill the beans, Mable. You can’t fool me,” Burnie said rather flatly. “Just spill all of them.”

“I don’t know where to start,” I said quietly. They were very tiny, quiet words that came out of my mouth. It surprised me. I actually had a pretty loud voice. I didn’t even sound like me.

“Just start. We can put it all in order later. Start anywhere. I want us to have a special day, and you are definitely not going to have any fun today with all that bother bottled up inside. It’s not like you at all,” coached Burnie, sounding more like a brother than he ever had before.

The next breath I took was so deep, it even surprised me. I stopped on the curb at the end of that first block. I let out that breath. We just stood there, not even crossing the street. It was a quiet and peaceful Saturday morning, but I knew that in many of the houses all around us, people were getting ready to go watch Babe Ruth play baseball in Des Moines, Iowa. I felt part of all that. It felt familiar and comfortable again. This was the perfect place to tell Burnie everything I was thinking.

I started right at the beginning. I told him about moving in with Dorothy and about how well we got along. The registration story had him nodding his head. I know he was sympathetic with my struggle to stay oriented in that huge, loud registration auditorium. Continuing with my Seals Club tryout and my disappointment at not being able to compete in the backstroke my freshman year, I let out my frustrations and felt my voice getting stronger and louder, more normal, but shaky. I tried to stay calm and not cry while telling him how I thought about Grandma Von Dornum every morning when putting on my robe and every night at bedtime when I slipped under my beloved quilt. I told him, with no small amount of embarrassment, about nearly getting a D on the first anatomy test. I explained how it was impossible to get even one tiny byline on the Daily Iowan, just because I was a freshman, and that I had a growing dread that as a sophomore next year, I was going to be given all the ‘girly’ articles and not get to be anywhere near the sports page.

In addition to that, I continued, that synchronized swimming stuff was taking a lot of time that should have been spent swimming my laps and sprints. I was truly afraid of not being ready to compete for national records next year if I didn’t do more actual swimming. All the time, I kept remembering how proud of me my dad would have been and I did not want to disappoint him. I really had not made any other friends besides Dot. My journalism class was all fellas. My anatomy class was a lot of fellas going for pre-med. Dot was thinking of pledging a sorority, and I knew for sure that was not a route I was interested in. I felt lonely and I was terribly worried about my mother, although she kept telling me in her letters that she was just fine. How could she be fine? Her husband died and then her mother died.

Tears welled up constantly now as I spoke and I did not want to go back to Burnie’s house with red eyes! I could not help myself. Burnie stood there in front of me, with his hand on my shoulder. I was hoping he would have some magic solution for me. The only solution I could think of was to move to Steamboat Rock with my mother. Maybe I could go to the Iowa State Teacher’s College in Cedar Falls. I didn’t want to be a teacher and I was pretty sure I had never heard of a national level swimmer from there, but it was the closest college to Mother’s house now. It was a state school so the tuition would be the same, which was reasonable, but I would have to work to save up for it, because there was no way that school had swimming scholarships. They probably had a newspaper, but there was no way it could be the same caliber as the Daily Iowan.

All of this information and a rambling train of wild thoughts poured out. I looked up into Burnie’s eyes a few times. Mostly I just looked up at the leaves on the trees across the street. They were turning colors and some were falling down around us. I felt like I was falling, and failing. I had never really failed at anything and my world was turned all sideways. I stopped talking.

“Mable, that’s a lot of brutal stuff going on. I had no idea from your notes that you were that unhappy,” Burnie offered. “I am so sorry.”

“Well, I’m sorry, too,” I sobbed. “I’m sorry I hate everything I’m doing right now. I always have done what I like to do, and I’ve been good at it, and I have had fun doing it. I’m not having any fun right now, and I don’t like doing any of it, and I just want to QUIT! I need to quit and do something else. This is not the right time for me to go to college. It’s too awful to keep up. I feel like I’m on the losing team every day, with everything I do. It’s no fun to lose and I need to quit. Just quit now, and go live with Mother until I’m ready to try again.”

Suddenly Burnie grabbed both my shoulders with his hands.

“No way. I hear you saying you are all tooted out and just exhausted, but you are tougher than this, Mable. You are talking like a lardhead. Your father would not be listening to any of this gibberish. Harry Hall would tell you to ‘put your shoulder to the wheel’ and to ‘give it some gunch’! He would not listen to any of this nonsense for even a minute. Where on earth did you get a dumb idea like quitting?”

“I don’t think it’s dumb. It makes perfect sense to me. Nothing, absolutely nothing about my first year of college is going the way I thought it would. Everything is wrong. I just need to start over, that’s all,” I explained. “Just quit right now and start over. I think after your dad drops me off in Iowa City tomorrow I will just pack up and have Uncle Albert pick me up. Be done with it as soon as possible. I need to go home to my mother.”

Bernie was really scowling now. He asked me if I had told Mother, or Mr. Ashby, or my Seals Club coach, or anyone. Had I told Dot already?

I told him I hadn’t told anyone but him. Why would I be stupid and tell anyone before I told him?

“Well,” Burnie began slowly. He was talking to me in a tone of voice that I interpreted like he was talking to a really stupid person. I did not appreciate it, and I told him so.

“Well,” he began again in the same tone, totally ignoring my complaint. “I don’t think you are stupid, but you are thinking like a hammerhead.”

“Hrumph! You are not being much of a friend. I thought you were on my side.” I scowled at him this time.

“There are no sides, Mable. You are just wrong. I am your best friend and I have been and will always be for you…when you are right. This quitting foolishness is just that…foolish. You won’t be hearing me say it is a good idea at all. No one else will either. It’s quitting. You don’t quit. I don’t quit. We don’t quit. It’s the worst idea I have ever heard. There isn’t anything you have told me that can’t be cured by either giving it a little more time, or a little more effort.” Burnie had his hands on his hips now and was staring hard at me.

“What time is it?” I asked.

He pulled out the spiffy pocket watch he had received for graduation in May. It glistened in the mid-morning sun.

“We need to head back. We will talk more about this later. This discussion is not over, trust me,” he said sternly. Now he sounded more like a parent than a brother.

I nodded, saying nothing. I could see he was pretty upset, but I couldn’t help it. I was pretty darned upset, too.

Burnie switched over so he was walking on the street side of me, like a gentleman was supposed to do. I thought I heard that the custom of the man walking between a lady and the street was from back years ago. The carriages on the muddy streets might splash a person as they drove past, and the man was supposed to protect a woman from getting wet or dirty. I liked it, but it was bound to be a bad deal for the fella. I guess it could still happen with passing cars or bicycles.

Just as we approached his front yard Burnie said, “We are not going to discuss this in front of our families. We both need to do some thinking and we can talk about it again later, okay? Let’s just go have a heck of a day at the ballpark. Deal?”

“Deal,” I mumbled. I felt a little bit better getting it all off my chest, but I still felt extremely unsettled. I was looking forward to the baseball game for sure, so I knew I had to let go of my worries for now or I would spoil the whole day for myself and for everyone else. I did not want to do that. The adults in our lives had gone to a great deal of inconvenience and expense the past week arranging all the transportation and such to get Burnie and me to Des Moines to see the game and meet the great Babe. We were done thinking and talking about it for now. I stopped and peered into the entryway mirror as we passed it to make sure my eyes were not red.