By Samantha DeRose
Junior High is such a great time to be a kid…said no social
outcast ever.
You’ve read it before.
Need I remind you of the bloomer gym suit? Didn’t think so.
I was an outcast. How did you
survive those graceless years, you ask? Let me tell you.
I didn’t have many friends, but those that I did have, in
addition to a whacky but loving family, were my life line… much like
today.
At an age when most tweenaged girls were fixated on boys,
makeup, and cheerleading, I was still wildly entertained by Little House on the
Prairie and Mork & Mindy, by making weird noises / faces, pretending to speak
foreign languages fluently, pretending to be an opera singer, skipping /
galloping on a whim. Let’s face
it. These were the types of activities
that weren’t getting me voted most popular in junior high (or high school or
college).
It was around this time, in junior high, that I became
besties with my elementary school friend, Marygrace. We had known one another since first grade. She was “the new girl” (having transferred
from Catholic school to School 9).
I was “the sick girl” (having been hospitalized for Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever… yes… a disease that dogs get).
Marygrace’s home was a sanctuary for me. Her family, like mine, was loving and
outrageously (insert whacky adjective here) funny, silly, goofy. One of my
first memories of Marygrace’s mom, Lois, is walking into their house and
hearing her sing (operatically) “Ooooooh, Sweet Mystery of Life at Last I Found
Yooooooouuuuuuuu!” Marygrace’s horrified
face was shining a brilliant red as I fell to the floor in peals of
laughter. Lois had become my
goddess at that very moment!
Lois would tell me how she LOVED to sing and then somberly
belt out, “AAAAAAAVEEEEEEEE MAAAAAARIIIIIIIIIIAAAA!” but she couldn’t look at
me while she sang or she’d start to laugh… As a matter of fact, I don’t recall
her ever getting past the first two words. I guess that was the point. To laugh. Truth
is, though, she had a great voice.
She would entertain me for hours with her fascinating
stories … There was the one about the time that she had convinced a bunch of
uppity folks at a cocktail party that she was, in fact, a former Rockette. She was not. I’m sure the uppities
still believe that they met a bona fide former Rockette that night. There was the story of the party where,
after a glass or two of red wine, she got up on a table and danced… like a
Rockette. **
I wanted to be JUST like
Lois when I grew up.
It didn’t take us long before our mission together, Lois and
mine, was to embarrass Marygrace at every given opportunity.
Lois would take us shopping and she and I would pretend to
speak a foreign language. I’ll
never forget the day shopping at Harmon, the two of us sauntering around the
store speaking our native tongue, while Marygrace hid in the shampoo
aisle. And we didn’t stop at the
checkout line. Lois, with a stick
of Mitchum deodorant in her hand, looked at it, looked at me, looked at
Marygrace, looked at the cashier, and said, “Meeetchuuuuum! Alad amdich
grucfchtsh locqui blenschtrov!” and we fell to the floor laughing at the
private joke that we both shared about Mitchum deodorant.
Then there was the mantra. Marygrace’s little sister (she’ll always be the little
sister), Emily, made a new foreign friend. The friend had come to dinner one night and Lois made a
chocolate cake, much to the new friend’s liking. The next time Emily’s friend was invited to their house, the
young foreigner, fondly remembering the American delicacy – chocolate cake - said
to Em, in broken English, “Emileee… Dell you muddah do beg dat kehk. Dell you
muddah do beg dat choc-led kehk.”
Well. That’s all Lois
needed to overhear. From then Lois
would randomly begin chanting and dancing (in a jerky, non-Rockette fashion),
“Tell-your-mother-to-bake-that-cake.
Tell-your-mother-to-bake-that choc-late-cake.” Every time she did it, Emily would cry, “Stop making fun of
my FRIEEEENNNDDD!” and I’d double over crying with laughter.
There was the time that Lois picked us up from high school
and saw an old lady lugging a bundle of groceries down the middle of Colfax
Ave. She stopped the car, warned
us NEVER to do this, and then motioned for the old lady to get in. The ancient woman got into the car and
looked at Lois with cataract-weepy eyes and a bright red lipstick schmeared
smile across her face. Lois asked
her where she lived and the woman replied, “Heh?” Lois: “WHERE DO YOU LIVE, HONEY?” Decrepit woman: “HEH???” Then Lois glanced at us in the rearview
and said, “She can’t hear a word I’m saying. I gotta get her home before she
has a heart attack in my car.” I
don’t know how we got this picture of frailty home or if the place where we
dropped her off was in fact her home, but Lois did the right thing and
that’s all that matters.
Oh. And
remember when aerobics was the exercise of du jour? None of this Zumba crap. I walked into Marygrace’s house one afternoon, heard
music coming from the TV room, and Lois breathlessly chanting, “Fire
Hydrant! Fire Hydrant! Fire Hydrant!” I asked Mayr what was up and she said,
“Don’t ask. My mother’s trying to
do aerobics.” Naturally, I raced
to the TV room only to find Lois on all fours, in front of the TV, trying to
mirror the instructor who looked like she was taking a leak on an invisible fire
hydrant. That might have been the time I fell on the floor and laughed so hard I farted.
Of course, Lois couldn’t let her poor husband Jim, a.k.a. Pa (as in Pa Ingalls...we were all fans), off the
hook with her hijinks. Lois
thought it would be hilarious to take this “head” – I think it was one of those life-sized Barbie heads that you could put
make up on or a mannequin head …whatever – while Pa was sleeping, rest it on
her pillow, and place additional pillows under the covers fashioning a
body. She then told the girls to
tell Pa that Ma wasn’t feeling well.
When he shook “his wife” the head rolled onto the floor giving Pa the
fright of his life. I think Lois
may have had to make a few extra chocolate cakes to smooth that one over. Actually, I’m not really sure whose
idea it was the girls’ or Lois’s…but the point is, Lois went along with
it…gladly.**
While I was away at college, I could always count on at
least a letter a week in my mailbox from Lois with countless stories of the
hilarity that was ensuing on the home front (and always a few bucks for beer...I mean book money). One time I received a card that simply read … “Took this picture at a fair…reminded me of you and Marygrace. Love, Ma” Enclosed... a picture of
cattle (and some cash).
On visits home from college, I’d enjoy double Thanksgivings,
Christmases, and Easters… sent back to school with bursting care-packages from both
my mom and Lois. There is a reason
for the Freshman 15. Two doting
moms.
I could fill volumes with the lifetime of
parties, family reunions, holidays, weddings, births of our children...but I'll end with this:
Lois, you took a girl who felt as if she had no place in
this world and made her feel as if she was special. Thank you for linking arms with me through the awkward years
and for making those moments priceless instead of painful.
You gave me the courage to be silly, to sing, to dance, to make weird
faces … to just be me… just by being you.
... and P.S. Sing Ave Maria for Chip, would ya? It’s ok if you laugh.
I love you.
**Correction.... Lois convinced nuns at the hospital where she worked that she was a former Rockette... the rumor spread, a priest who knew a Rockette found out and starting asking too many questions... so Lois had to confess!
Correction #2 .... It was a Cher head and it WAS Lois's idea on April Fool's Day to scare Pa!
Ah, Lois... What an Amazing mark you left on this world! We were so luck to have you.
