by Lydia Davis
Minnie Does Not Work Out, and Soon Thereafter Mrs. D Decides to Hire a Girl from a Residential School for Delinquent Children
Mrs. D receives a letter from the field worker, Miss Anderson:
There are many matters to be considered before we could place a girl permanently in your home, and at the present time I do not have a suitable girl available.
Mrs. D Persists in Asking for One in Particular. Miss Anderson Answers
Anna would be glad to stay with you permanently. But I am afraid you would find that adequate supervision would be a bigger problem than you realize. I could tell you more about Anna’s very poor background, and her mentality, which we have studied over a period of years, and you would then realize why our rules have to be rather severe.
For instance, there is the question of the hour she is to get in when she goes to the movies one night a week. I set this at 10:30 rather than 11:30, thinking that she should be able to go to the first show, in which case 10:30 seems late enough. She has also asked if she may attend the New Year’s Dance at the White Eagle Dance Hall with her girl friend and their escorts. Knowing nothing of the type of dance this will be, I hesitate to grant this privilege. These requests are just a sample of the problems which would increase as time went on. We want our girls to be contented and lead as normal a life as possible, but they must be protected.
Mrs. D Persists. Miss Anderson Yields
As soon as I hear that a definite transfer has been accomplished I will send you a contract, and will contact the Welfare Department.
After discussing matters in detail we can probably be a bit more lenient, but success depends a great deal on her outside contacts, and she will need a great deal of guidance, as is the case with many of our state’s unfortunate girls.
Despite High Hopes on the Part of All Concerned, Anna’s Employment Is Not a Success
Mrs. D writes:
It is so hard to keep Anna in bounds, for even under this watching she managed to connive with a taxi driver and take our youngest out to visit friends of hers at a long distance and feed him Lord knows what.
She may also have been making indiscreet gestures downtown.
Back at the School
Anna writes:
Sorry not to have answered long before now, but we can write only one letter a week which is on Sundays.
How is everyone down that way. It sure is quite a lost to me.
The snow storm we had a week ago, didn’t have too much effect on our trip here. There was 2–4 inches of snow in Some places. Miss Anderson wished she had some chains that day. Cars slid from one side of the road to the other, and one car went off on the wrong side of the road into a ditch. Several had to get out of the car to clean off windshiels and I don’t know what. We stopped at the Rutland Dairy Bar for lunch, and then from there we had good weather.
Hope your trip was as successful as that of ours.
The points of view which you had mentioned in your letter are all very true and I only wished it had been a bad dream myself.
Glad to know you called Evelyn and Mrs. Warner. I can imagine how they felt and by all means Evelyn. She and I thought quite a lot of each other and I sure miss her. I miss church chior and M. Y. F. very much.
Close now with best wishes.
Mrs. D Finds Another Girl She Likes from the School and Receives a Contract for Her Hire and Supervision
Unless wages for your present girl are paid in full to date of return or transfer no other girl will be placed with you until full settlement of all accounts is made.
You will not hire this girl out to any other party.
You are to exercise parental supervision with due consideration for physical health and cleanliness, moral training, improvement of mind, and wise use of leisure time.
If girl does not prove satisfactory you will notify the school at once and she will be returned. The school also reserves the right to return the she any time the school sees fit.
You will promptly advise the Priest or Minister of the Church with which she is affiliated, as to her arrival in your community.
You will supervise the buying of her clothing and all other necessary articles and you will allow her a small amount of spending money, not more than $1.00 cents per week. Her wages will be $15 per week.
Mrs. D Gives Birth to a Healthy, Full-Term Baby. She Sends the School a Good Report of Shirley
Shirley has been wonderful all through my hospitalization and since my return home. Thanks to her I have had a good rest and shall be able to pick up my various responsibilities eagerly as soon as we get a little cool weather.
We have managed to get Shirley into a swimming hole for most of the hot afternoons.
Mrs. D Supervises as Shirley Buys Clothes
On the July 31 bill: raincoat, hairbrush, suit, skirt, jacket, underpants, gym suit.
On the August 31 bill: sweater, dickey, wool skirt, blouses, sneakers, blue jeans.
Meanwhile, Anna Writes from Her New Position in Connecticut
I said I would write and let you know where I went, when I got a new job, so here I am. I am working in Conn. They are lovely people and they take me with them most every place they go. I have a very nice room with a little radio, electric fan, private bath room with hot and cold water, and etc.
We are near the salt water beach, and go swimming 2 or 3 times a week, and we sure injoy it, as it’s so hot every day here, that we can hardly breath, and the humidity very heavy with out any stirring in the air that we all lie around like sticks.
Last Sunday, there was 8,500 people and children at the beach. What do you think of that.
I walk nearly 4 to 6 miles when I go shopping or movies, etc., both ways altogether. Except when they go in by the car.
I am partly on my own here, and next month I will be having all my own money. I don’t have to send any of my mail back to the school. The last letter I got from home was about a month ago saying that they were having nothing more to do with me because I wouldn’t stop writting letters to my brother in the service. I just couldn’t stop that for anyone as I think too much of that brother. I have written home to them twice with in the last 3 weeks and no answer. They won’t even let my sisters write to me any more.
Well I am so glad to think that I am out again and hope to hold it out.
I am so glad to know that you are adoring your little baby girl. I can see your reason if you take to them the way I do.
Write soon.
After a Year, Shirley Is Still with Mrs. D
It is an entirely satisfactory situation.
But Mrs. D Worries About Shirley’s Sensitivity and Her Family Back Home
Life isn’t easy for a girl like Shirley, sensitive and loving and having to give up a family whom it is natural for her to care about.
The Field Worker Is Not Sure Shirley Should Take On an Additional Job
Shirley requests permission to work Sunday afternoons in a luncheonette as waitress. Without knowing more particulars concerning the reputation of the luncheonette, the clientele, etc., I hesitate to give her permission. However if all is in order in that respect, and if such work would not interfere with her duties in your home and with her school work, I have no objection to her earning a little extra money in this way. However she must remember that her first obligation is to you.
Trouble: Shirley Explains to Mrs. D
Mrs. D; I lied to you about the Sunday night altogether. I was with Dixie, Dolores, & a soldier named Jimmie who I met before we left for the Cape. I didn’t think it would sound so suspicious to be out to dinner with Dixie, but I guess it sounded worse. You would probably think it was a pick-up, so I’m not going to try to argue out of it. As far as doing anything else underhanded, I’ve only been out once a week, so I don’t see how I could possibly do anything so terrible. I have missed Church about 3 times, maybe 4. Only two of the times I have helped out at the Maples. The other times I have waited for Tootsie & Ralph to come after me when they got out of Church. O
ne of the days that I said I had to stay after school I didn’t. I went riding with Judy.
Mr. Russell talked to me about it. He said to be “above board” with you, so I’m telling you everything. I can’t think of anything else I have done underhanded. Since last Thurs. I’ve tried to be very nice & happy with everyone but I’m not at all. If I can’t even go home to see my mother & family things must be in pretty bad shape. I haven’t been home since the last of Dec. I would like to see everybody.
I have learned a lesson Mrs. D and I’ll never lie to you again. I would be the happiest person, if you would give me another chance to work at the Maples. I want to very much because you wouldn’t have to give me any money then. I hate to ask you for it, and I do need it. I don’t like you to have to pay my cleaning bills, & money for the bus & things like that, that I have to ask you for all the time. You wouldn’t even have to give me an allowance. I promise you with my whole heart that you wouldn’t regret it. If you say be home at six thirty I’d be home if I had to leave everything in a mess. Ray told me when he called today that the girls who work there said they never missed anyone as they missed me sunday. I couldn’t get a job anywhere and make as good money as I do there, one day a week. I only want to work on Sundays, & no other place would want a person who could work just that time. Beckmann’s only pay 45 ¢ an hr. & the Walkers pay 60 ¢ besides the tips. Lots of the kids from high school came down that sunday, because I was working & it certainly helps the business. It is hard work but I love it, and would never complain about being tired. Ray also told me that Dixie wasn’t putting anyone on steady for Sundays, because he was waiting to see if I could come back. Dixie knows why I can’t do it anyway, because I told him why I’m here. He would be willing to help me, I know. I’m begging you for this one chance, and if it doesn’t work, I’ll go back to the school. I’d hate to but I would be willing to go if I knew I did something wrong.
Shirley
Shirley Is Forgiven, but Eventually Leaves Mrs. D of Her Own Accord. After Shirley, There Is Joan Brown, Though Not for Long
From her new job, Joan sends a note to Mrs. D’s little boy:
Everyone has their ups and downs. At our house, they are nearly all downs. I guess its the same at yours.
I really enjoyed working at your house, and I didn’t really understand myself, for more or less wanting to leave. But it is much more pleasant working at a store.
You shall never know how I feel about doing housework all the time, as you shall probably never experience it.
How Many Maids Will Mrs. D Have in Her Lifetime?
Mrs. D will have at least one hundred maids in her lifetime. At a certain point she stops calling them maids and begins to call them cleaning women. They don’t live in her house, but come in from outside.
After Joan Is Long Gone, Mrs. D Writes to a Friend
What I am doing is trying to start a new cleaning woman digging out some of the accumulations of this and that.
Names of Some Later Maids, with Characteristics
Ingrid from Austria, with them for a year: moved to Switzerland
Doris: came to clean twice a week
Mrs. Tuit, pronounced “Toot”: was hit on the head by a music stand
Anne Foster: lost a ring at the beach
Mrs. Bushey: deaf as a doorpost
20 Sculptures in One Hour
1
The problem is to see 20 sculptures in one hour. An hour seems like a long time. But 20 sculptures are a lot of sculptures. Yet an hour still seems like a long time. When we calculate, we discover that one hour divided by 20 sculptures gives us three minutes a sculpture. But though the calculation is correct, this seems wrong to us: three minutes is far too little time in which to see a sculpture, and it is also far too little to be left with, after starting with a whole hour. The trouble, we suppose, is that there are so many sculptures. Yet however many sculptures there are, we still feel we ought to have enough time if we have an hour. It must be that although the calculation is correct, it does not represent the situation correctly, though how to represent the situation correctly in terms of a calculation, and why this calculation does not really represent it, we can’t yet discover.
2
The answer may be this: one hour is really much shorter than we have become accustomed to believe, and three minutes much longer, so that we may eventually reverse our problem and say that we start with a fairly short period of time, one hour, in which to see 20 sculptures, and find after calculation that we will have a surprisingly long period of time, three minutes, in which to look at each sculpture, although at this point it may begin to seem wrong that so many periods lasting so long, three minutes each, can all be contained in so short a period, one hour.
Nietszche
Oh, poor Dad. I’m sorry I made fun of you.
Now I’m spelling Nietszche wrong, too.
What You Learn About the Baby
Idle
You learn how to be idle, how to do nothing. That is the new thing in your life—to do nothing. To do nothing and not be impatient about doing nothing. It is easy to do nothing and become impatient. It is not easy to do nothing and not mind it, not mind the hours passing, the hours of the morning passing and then the hours of the afternoon, and one day passing and the next passing, while you do nothing.
What You Can Count On
You learn never to count on anything being the same from day to day, that he will fall asleep at a certain hour, or sleep for a certain length of time. Some days he sleeps for several hours at a stretch, other days he sleeps no more than half an hour.
Sometimes he will wake suddenly, crying hard, when you were prepared to go on working for another hour. Now you prepare to stop. But as it takes you a few minutes to end your work for the day, and you cannot go to him immediately, he stops crying and continues quiet. Now, though you have prepared to end work for the day, you prepare to resume working.
Don’t Expect to Finish Anything
You learn never to expect to finish anything. For example, the baby is staring at a red ball. You are cleaning some large radishes. The baby will begin to fuss when you have cleaned four and there are eight left to clean.
You Will Not Know What Is Wrong
The baby is on his back in his cradle crying. His legs are slightly lifted from the surface of his mattress in the effort of his crying. His head is so heavy and his legs so light and his muscles so hard that his legs fly up easily from the mattress when he tenses, as now.
Often, you will wonder what is wrong, why he is crying, and it would help, it would save you much disturbance, to know what is wrong, whether he is hungry, or tired, or bored, or cold, or hot, or uncomfortable in his clothes, or in pain in his stomach or bowels. But you will not know, or not when it would help to know, at the time, but only later, when you have guessed correctly or many times incorrectly. And it will not help to know afterwards, or it will not help unless you have learned from the experience to identify a particular cry that means hunger, or pain, etc. But the memory of a cry is a difficult one to fix in your mind.
What Exhausts You
You must think and feel for him as well as for yourself—that he is tired, or bored, or uncomfortable.
Sitting Still
You learn to sit still. You learn to stare as he stares, to stare up at the rafters as long as he stares up at the rafters, sitting still in a large space.
Entertainment
For him, though not usually for you, merely to look at a thing is an entertainment.
Then, there are some things that not just you, and not just he, but both of you like to do, such as lie in the hammock, or take a walk, or take a bath.
Renunciation
You give up, or postpone, for his sake, many of the pleasures you once enjoyed, such as eating meals when you are hungry, eating as much as you want, watching a movie all the way through from beginning to end, reading as much of a book as you want to at one sitting, going to sleep when you are tired, sleepin
g until you have had enough sleep.
You look forward to a party as you never used to look forward to a party, now that you are at home alone with him so much. But at this party you will not be able to talk to anyone for more than a few minutes, because he cries so constantly, and in the end he will be your only company, in a back bedroom.
Questions
How do his eyes know to seek out your eyes? How does his mouth know it is a mouth, when it imitates yours?
His Perceptions
You learn from reading it in a book that he recognizes you not by the appearance of your face but by your smell and the way you hold him, that he focuses clearly on an object only when it is held a certain distance from him, and that he can see only in shades of gray. Even what is white or black to you is only a shade of gray to him.