After I finished eating, I searched the ground around me. Any fabric or paper would’ve long since deteriorated, but pieces of broken china or tools might have survived. I found droppings indicating coyotes had at one time or another used the dugout as a den, but nothing else until I arrived in the far corner. There, I pulled something long and stiff out of the dirt. It was a tarnished black fork with two missing tines, a piece of civilization that had probably been brought out as a prized possession by the first Mrs. Singleton. Not long after her arrival, she had most likely discovered how little use she had for such niceties as silverware, and when the tines broke off, she had probably just tossed this treasure away.
Back at the house, I found silver polish underneath the kitchen sink cupboard, and then I went to work on that fork. By the time Ray returned home, I had it shining mirror-silver again.
“Look what I found,” I told Ray when he came in.
He took a look, then said, “It’s broken.”
“That’s not the point,” I said. “It came from what’s left of the dugout, where your grandparents first lived on this land. I found it in the corner. Isn’t that amazing?”
With a smile, he said, “You bet.”
But once he had finished eating, he went to work again. After raking the sweaty hair off his forehead, he pulled out some ledgers and started scratching figures on the pages with a stubbed pencil. Every so often, he’d stop and rub his eyes with both fists, then resume working. Finally, he went to bed without ever touching the treasure.
For long days at a time, I managed on my own. Once Ray disappeared out into the harvesting fields, he never returned, all day. He arrived home in late evening, only after the sunlight no longer lit his workplace. But Rose and Lorelei were able to get away. Often they came by for lemonade or Cokes and a rest on the porch steps. One day I glimpsed them through the screen door before they knocked, and then I saw how they managed to stay looking so neat. They were taking turns brushing each other off, taking great pains to remove every fleck of grass and dirt that had landed on their clothes.
After I answered the door, they handed over a sack containing the maternity dress made of polka-dot jersey that already they had managed to sew.
“It’s wonderful,” I told them and held it up to get a better look. The tailoring was excellent; all the seams were perfectly smooth and flat, and the handwork, just as they had claimed, was imperceptible. The finished product looked more professional than the picture on the front of the pattern. “I’ll wear it soon.”
Both girls barely smiled. Rose said a shy, “Thank you.”
“You did an outstanding job.”
Rose looked away, and Lorelei toyed with her hair. “It’s nothing.”
“Really,” said Rose.
Perhaps I had praised too much, embarrassing them. I refolded the dress and stared at the truck sitting on the dirt drive. Ray had told me over breakfast that he would be spending the afternoon cleaning up and collecting garbage that had accumulated from the harvest. And he would be working with the tractor that day, not the truck. A few minutes later, I suggested to Rose and Lorelei that we go for a drive.
As we headed out, Rose said, “Father worries that his customers won’t dress so well anymore, now that he’s gone.”
Lorelei said, “They’re certain to miss his attention to detail.”
I paused for a moment, then curiosity overcame me. “What became of the business?”
At first they didn’t answer, and I feared I had pried too much, gone too far again. But then Rose replied, “We were forced to close it before evacuating. But it was just as well. Even my father’s most loyal customers no longer came in.”
“What of your home?”
“We had to sell it, too. Our bank accounts had been frozen, and we didn’t want to come out here without any of our own money.”
Lorelei blurted out, “We cleaned it for them.”
“You what?”
“We had to sell our house for half its worth, yet my parents insisted we clean it for the new owners. We even waxed the floors.”
Rose sighed at her sister. “I still don’t understand why the cleaning angers you so. We had to leave it clean. For our own sakes.”
Lorelei snickered. “I would’ve invited everyone I knew over for a dance and left it filthy.”
“Lorelei!” Rose snapped, then turned away.
Lately I’d been reading everything I could put my hands on about Japanese American internment. Our former governor, Ralph Carr, was one of the only politicians who had been bold enough to welcome and defend Americans of Japanese descent. It hadn’t been a popular stance, and some people even thought it had cost him the last election. The Denver Post expressed bigotry toward anyone of Japanese descent. One of their editors constructed a large effigy of a Japanese man complete with monkey face, whereas the Rocky Mountain News had been more open-minded, even pointing out to readers that Americans of German descent hadn’t been singled out. In truth, I think the common man and woman in Denver had given little thought to the struggle of Japanese Americans. As long as large numbers of Japanese hadn’t moved into their own neighborhoods, as long as nothing suspicious occurred, the average citizen went on with his or her life unaffected.
I drove on, swerving past trucks that rumbled up and down the roads, past fields swarmed with workers. With the harvest in full swing, most everyone was engaged in the effort to provide food for others. I remembered what Ray had said to me about pleasure driving, and a bit of guilt pinched me. Of course it was wrong of me. Perhaps if I could conduct some business along the way? I couldn’t give up this time with Rose and Lorelei. I wanted to learn as much as I could about them, and without driving, how would I continue to get to know them?
I told the girls I needed to stop at the grocery store, but in the end, I bought only a loaf of bread. Most farmers’ wives considered it lazy to buy bread in the store, but the opposite logic appealed to me. Why bake something that could so easily be bought? My preferences in shopping leaned toward ease of preparation, and already my blue point coupons for buying canned and processed foods were running low.
We drove on to Rocky Ford, a farming community that looked huge compared to Wilson. Named for the safe crossing point on the Arkansas River it had provided pioneers, it had become well-known for cantaloupes, watermelons, and honeydews. We managed to buy some of the last of the fall crop at a roadside stand. Later, we stopped for gasoline and sodas in the town of Swink, and as the girls and I relaxed around the truck in the sunshine, a conversation nearby caught my attention.
I saw a man talking to the attendant while a woman waited for him inside their car. I thought I recognized the couple from church, but wasn’t altogether certain. The man glanced up at me once, but he seemed unsure if he recognized me, too. A minute later, he showed his R coupon card to the attendant and paid him, then he began to walk in my direction. He kept moving my way until his expression changed. He stopped walking.
At first I thought he was reacting to the slacks that all three of us wore. Not long ago, even some men in Denver wouldn’t give women wearing slacks a seat on the streetcar. But then I saw the true reason for his displeasure. As he looked over Rose and Lorelei, something not kind crossed his face, the same look I had often seen when Negroes entered a nice restaurant in downtown Denver. The man apparently changed his mind about coming over to speak to me. Instead, he turned on a stiff heel and walked the other way.
Rose and Lorelei kept on sipping their sodas as if nothing had happened. Surely they had noticed. But I didn’t know—were they able to dismiss it? Or perhaps had they become so accustomed to prejudices that it no longer found a way to pierce their reserve?
I tried to converse and keep on smiling, but I found myself unable to fathom the source of that man’s displeasure. Daily, Japanese evacuees worked diligently and pleasantly in the farmlands around us. I had heard Ray and Hank both comment on the quality of the Japanese interns’ work and how much they wished to p
lease. On their occasional days off, those at Camp Amache were allowed to venture away from the camp, and all of them returned voluntarily.
I had often wondered why Rose and Lorelei were staying in the camp and putting up with all of this. The release of some college students from camps had begun as early as 1942. The Nisei were allowed to leave camps and resettle in any of forty-four states if they so chose, the only requirements being sworn loyalty to the U.S. and gainful employment. But the questionnaire required of them contained some tricky wording, and even with war jobs plentiful, most remained in the camps. Now the very thing I had just witnessed gave me my answer. Perhaps the intolerance and prejudice I had just seen kept them in confinement together, in the somewhat sheltered isolation of the camp.
As we leaned against the side of the truck, I found myself studying my friends’ faces. So much alike and yet so different, just like my own sisters and me. Lorelei became more beautiful every time I saw her, but Rose’s face had become beautiful to me, too. The sunlight danced off their hair like shine on black patent leather shoes. Always their posture was perfect, their exotic faces reflected composure, poise, and grace.
Rose looked back at me in a different way. She set down her Coke bottle and started talking in a changed tone. “I was on my way to take a final in English lit,” she said. “It was in 1941, before Pearl Harbor. A woman stopped me to ask me my views about Emperor Hirohito. And when I told her my views would be no more valuable than those of any other student, that I had never lived under his rule in Japan, she thanked me for my time, and we each went on our own way.”
Lorelei stopped drinking as Rose continued. “It was a pleasant conversation. But for me, it was a preview of things to come, like a prologue to a book I was someday going to have to read, although I’d not have chosen it for myself. She saw me as Japanese, nothing else. Certainly not American.”
“We left school even before the evacuation notices went up,” said Lorelei.
“When they did, I was almost relieved.”
“Well, I wasn‘t,” countered Lorelei.
Now I could see it. Despite the poise, I could see the suffering in their eyes. I tried to think of something to say, but what? The leaders of our country had determined that Japanese American presence in the coastal states posed a threat to national security. Loyalty had been questioned, and with so many lives and secrets at stake, perhaps most people felt that Congress had made a prudent decision. But I had begun to think they had reacted hastily and irresponsibly toward good citizens. After all, except for the American Indians, we were all immigrants or descendants of immigrants.
I longed for the right words to explain that for which there was no explanation. “It isn’t you they dislike. For some people ...” I thought for a minute. “For a lot of people, it’s difficult to separate those of you living and working over here from the enemy overseas. Those people probably aren’t naturally hateful, just ill-informed. They tend to group all persons of a certain creed or nationality together in one category. It isn’t right, but still they do it.”
“We are the enemy,” said Lorelei.
I sighed. “Of course you’re not.”
“We are Japanese.”
“You were born in this country.”
Lorelei shrugged. “No matter. We look Japanese, the same face as the enemy that bombed Pearl Harbor.”
“Look,” I said, “many others believe as I do. That a person’s individual accomplishments and personality are what matter. I believe we’re beginning to see a shift in this country, starting with our generation. In the future, these problems will get better.”
Lorelei and Rose finished the last of their sodas, whereas mine turned warm in the bottle. As I stood there, new thoughts showered me with sharp pebbles. In Denver, there had been just as many divisions. I had grown up attending an all-white and affluent church, my father’s. But in the city, there had also been Negro churches and Mexican churches, and never once did we join together for activities or socials. Soldiers were routinely segregated in the services, and there was even a separate USO for Negro soldiers located in the Five Points area of Denver. Even on the university campus, my friends and I had been a pasty collection who stood for equality for all, but did we really embrace it?
I asked, “Have you ever considered leaving the camp? Have you considered moving to Denver, going back to college, or getting a factory job?”
“We could never leave our parents and grandparents,” said Rose.
“They’re Issei,” said Lorelei. “They aren’t free to go.”
Lorelei leaned around her sister to look at my face. “Would it be any better in Denver? Would others find us acceptable there any more than they do here?”
“In the city, there are more people of various views.”
Lorelei asked in a louder voice, “But would it truly be any different?”
My shoulders fell. “Probably not.”
Twelve
Later, I drove us away into wisps of dust that never got a chance to settle back to the ground during harvest days. Dirt and grime layered the air and coated the buildings, equipment, and vehicles. Even the trains became smoky phantoms emerging out of the earth, instead of riding the ground above it. The sky-blue engines called the Blue Gooses were as grimy brown as the solid black steam engines of other trains.
That evening, I carried the maternity dress into my room, folded it, and smoothed it out flat inside one of my drawers. Eventually, I realized, I’d be wearing it. After all, my old coverings weren’t going to suffice forever.
The next day, Ray and I drove to church in the evening for a “social,” as he put it. I wore the plainest dress I’d brought with me and kept my hair down. Inside the church kitchen, I found women sitting at the table, pooling and trading ration coupons. I realized too late I should’ve brought my coupons along. Ray raised enough chicken and pork to feed us, so I could have traded our meat coupons for more canned goods, or even for nylons.
Another group of women was trading off vegetables. I started to pull up a chair to listen and watch, but then I heard some of the conversation going on. One woman sitting next to Mrs. Pratt was complaining about women leaving their children at home, working in factories, and simply by their presence wooing married men, and of course wearing slacks. I ended up joining the women who were ripping up worn sheets and rolling them into bandages for the injured. We also filled paper bags with shaving goods, packs of cigarettes, and chocolate bars for men in hospitals. Here the conversation was more bearable. A woman was telling us all about her son, a bombardier with the Fifth Air Force, who was back from combat attending B-29 school. She told us that his uniforms were custom-made in Australia and they were cream-colored, the loveliest she’d ever seen. And apparently the Electrolux man was in town. He had come out to one woman’s house and had done all her floors while she was out doing her shopping, just to thank her for buying one.
They discussed making butter and cheese, canning preserves, and making sausage, conversations I couldn’t even comment on. Soon I went to the window and looked outside to see what the men were doing. Hood up, some farmer’s old car was the center of attention. Leaning in, the men passed tools around and worked together.
Mrs. Pratt came up to stand behind me. “They’re fixing the fluid drive on our old Chrysler, but we won’t tell the factory.” She pointed outside. “They have to take the drum apart, put in new seals, and get us driving again.”
I watched Ray in the midst of the group leaning over the engine. “Is it dangerous?”
“I doubt it. The factory says you’re not supposed to do it, but we have to figure out our own ways, nowadays.” She smiled at me. “Don’t worry. He’s going to be all right.”
I looked back outside. Children were running around the church building and the broken-down car, engaged in fantasy and games, and I wished I could join them.
That night, long after the interns had boarded the trucks and returned to their camp, I went walking on the farm. I
left the narrow roadway and walked out into an open cleared field for the first time. Out in the middle, I looked over the remains of tangled bean vines, overturned stones, clods of dirt, and occasional pieces of trash and leaves blown in by the wind. And stamped down into the soil, I saw hundreds of small shoe prints, many of them as small as children‘s, footprints that could only belong to the Japanese interns.
Once we had talked of shoes. Arriving from the mild climate of Long Beach, Rose and Lorelei had brought with them only sneakers and sandals. Many of the Issei had come to camp with just their Japanese slippers. Rose found it a good excuse to buy boots she’d always wanted, but Lorelei complained about the cold winters. Never before had she felt such cold toes. I recalled an article that had once been published in Reader’s Digest entitled “One Small Unwilling Captain.” A Japanese man, in a letter to an American friend, had written, “I am a small man. I am an unwilling man. I am a captain in the Japanese Imperial Army, and I do not want to do this.”
Regardless of the view taken and despite the thousands of conflicts I’d once studied in classes, war’s effect on the innocent had never come to me so strongly as it did at that moment. It came in the remembrance of that letter and in those footprints pressed down into Singleton soil. As I walked back to the cluster of house and outbuildings, I couldn’t shake the vision of those prints. The wind blew in grit that coated my lips and peppered my eyes. Up ahead, I could see that Ray was home but still out working, piling up trash behind the barn. I stopped and watched from a distance.
As I stood there, a chill swept over me. In one instant, I knew what he had done.
I began to run. A pitiful sound came out of me—wail or cry, growl or moan—I didn’t know what it was. I didn’t even know I was capable of making such a beastly sound, but it came out of me without my will as I tore down the embankment to the barn. At the brink of the pile, I stopped and raked my hair with claw fingers. The trash heap now appeared as nothing but a mass of splintered wood pieces mixed with animal offal and bits of soggy newspaper. Pressure was building in my face.
The Magic of Ordinary Days Page 9