by Jean Little
Men do look good in uniform. More handsome. Dad is not handsome really. His hair, what’s left of it, is the same colour as mine. He is also a bit chubby. But he is the best father going.
Barbara came over after school and we listened to the radio and ate cookies and talked about the boys in our class. Barbara loves discussing those boys! I can’t see anything so special in them, although sometimes I pretend. She brought over a new movie magazine. We took it up to my room to read. I sometimes cut out pictures of movie stars and put them up on my bedroom wall, but Barbara’s parents won’t let her. She hides them in her bottom dresser drawer.
Mother says those magazines are trashy and full of lies. How does she know?
My room is messy compared with Barbara’s. Hers is all filled with matching pink furniture, and the ruffled bedspread and curtains are the exact same colour. I think they look babyish but I don’t let B guess. She’d probably think I was jealous. None of my furniture matches, but I like it.
If only her parents didn’t send Barbara to camp for the whole summer! It seems unfair. Especially when she says she does not want to go. But her mother went to that camp when she was young and that settles it. If I could go too, we would have fun. They sail and ride horses and go on overnight canoe trips. But even if we could afford that kind of camp, I couldn’t leave home now anyway, not with our War Guest coming.
Last year Eleanor went to Miramichi CGIT camp on Lake Huron, between Southampton and Port Elgin. It only lasts ten days, but they have lots of fun and she’s been going since she was twelve. No expensive things like sailing and horseback riding, but fun things like swimming and campfires and cookouts. They sleep out under the stars too, in bedrolls. Now I am twelve, I am old enough to join CGIT this fall. Then, next summer, I can go to CGIT camp.
Friday, June 21, 1940
I had an earache last night so I am staying home. It stopped hurting as soon as school got started, which was nice of it. I lay in bed and listened to all the soap operas on the radio. Even if you miss a month or so, nothing seems to have changed.
Mother said such a speedy cure was suspicious, but I don’t think she meant it. It really did hurt in the night.
Lizby brought me a cup of tea. Her life would make a good book, Diary. Her real name is Elizabeth. When she was sixteen, she came over on a ship to help take care of a lady who was moving here. The lady went back two years later and would not take Lizby with her. Aunt Carrie heard about Lizby and brought her to help Mother care for her new baby. That was me! Eleanor was five and George was six and Mother needed Lizby badly. Lizby did not want to go back to Ireland, so she was happy to stay with us. There, that’s enough for today.
Here is a thought I had, Diary. You are made of paper. Did you ever think about it? It is all made from trees. Imagine a lot of trees growing in a woods and someone tells them they are going to be made into paper. There are so many sorts of paper. Newsprint, Christmas wrapping paper, scribblers, maps, diaries like this, paper dolls, flowery notecards like Mother uses, tissue paper in dress boxes, wax paper, doilies like Aunt Carrie puts cakes on, Dixie cups, paper towels and toilet paper! The list could go on and on. I never thought of it before, but tree careers are surprising. If I were a tree, how I would pray to be made into a lovely book and escape being toilet paper! Being a diary would be next best.
After lunch
Princess Elizabeth and Princess Margaret Rose are staying in England in spite of the War. I have a Princess Margaret Rose doll that Aunt Carrie says I am too old to play with, but I do not agree. I am not a teenager yet. I wonder if Princess Elizabeth played with dolls when she was my age. Probably not. Princesses must have to study how to be queens and don’t have time to play. If the War lasts a long time, she’ll grow old enough to do war work, but maybe that would be too risky. After all, she is going to be our queen someday. Margaret Rose is younger though, and she won’t ever be queen.
Good thing Aunt Carrie doesn’t know that I still sleep with my favourite doll Susan and that I have the others sitting in my chair. I don’t really play with them now, but I tell them my secrets. They never interrupt or have to go turn the oven on or answer the telephone.
See you later, Diary.
Evening
Aunt Carrie came over today. I was in a bad mood and she said, “Keep the corners of your mouth up, Duckie. You look as woeful as a wet washday.” Mother told her about my earache and Aunt Carrie said, “It certainly doesn’t seem to be troubling her at the moment.”
I turned my back and went up to my room without a word. I thought I was noble but Mother scolded me later for being rude. I wish I had dared to tell Mother exactly what I wanted to yell at darling Auntie. But I don’t think she knows I know such bad language.
I HATE FOREVER SMILING. My cheeks get exhausted. Then I am tempted to cross my eyes or stick out my tongue. I wonder if that bit about “Lead us not into temptation” in the Lord’s Prayer means that kind of temptation. Did kids back then stick out their tongues? I cannot picture Jesus doing it.
It is hard to believe Aunt Carrie is Dad’s sister. When she hears me say “Yeah” instead of “Yes” she says I sound like a little Dutch girl. But I have heard her say it herself.
No news about our War Child yet, although some are here in Canada already.
Saturday, June 22, 1940
George was home for a bit because he had to take stuff to the market. He said he wants a boy War Child but he was only teasing. It was nice to see him even though he couldn’t stay. He showed off his bulging muscles. They are hard as rocks.
When I want to talk to Mother these days, she is always off at a meeting of the Red Cross or busy knitting socks for the soldiers and busy counting stitches. She is teaching Eleanor to do it too. “Working for The Cause,” Aunt Carrie calls it.
I am glad Mother has given up trying to turn me into a knitter. My lost stitches stay lost. So many socks are being sent overseas you would think every soldier was a centipede.
Eleanor keeps turning up the radio so she can listen to Glenn Miller while she knits. Mother groans, but today I saw her toe tapping.
Barbara finally came to supper, but it did not feel like my birthday anymore. Whenever I mention our War Guest, Barbara says I never stop talking about the WG children. I do not understand her. If her family were getting a child, Barbara would talk my ear off about it.
Maybe it is because she will be at camp all summer and she is afraid I won’t want to be friends by the time she comes home. Yet we have been friends ever since they moved to Guelph when we were starting Grade Four.
Sunday, June 23, 1940
After church, Aunt Carrie and Grandpa came over. They were all talking about the news. France has surrendered! The Germans are in Paris. Dad said he was not surprised but I don’t know why. Aunt Carrie went to Paris once when she was young and she said she could not bear to think of German soldiers “goose-stepping through those lovely old streets.”
I cannot picture her young. It is almost as impossible as picturing Jesus sticking out his tongue.
I thought of asking Miss Carter about this in Sunday School but she is so proper I couldn’t.
Mother and Aunt Carrie have gone to the evening service. I have new library books. I am going to get into bed and read.
Monday, June 24, 1940
Flat feet! That is what the Army won’t take. I can’t picture them and I can’t see why you couldn’t march on flat feet. Dad said I soon would if I tried it. He says it would “hurt like billy-oh.” Lillian’s father picked her up after school to take her to the dentist so I watched him walking, but his feet looked just like everybody else’s. I wonder which bit is flat. Maybe the tops of the toes. That wouldn’t show in shoes.
Tuesday, June 25, 1940
There was a rainbow in the sky over our house this afternoon and Eleanor and I sang “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” to it.
Do you suppose pilots ever fly through rainbows and forget the War for a minute?
I have a
feeling rainbows are too low, but planes have to be low when they are taking off and landing, so it could happen.
Dad says he thinks flying will become a normal way to travel in the next twenty-five years. It does not sound likely to me. They could not take very many people at once, and the planes would be too heavy to get off the ground. Also, I should think lots of people would be too scared of crashing.
Wednesday, June 26, 1940
We had to clean out our desks today. I found a hard old ball of bubble gum stuck in the very back corner of mine. It was furry with dirt. I wanted to leave it there for the next kid to discover, but I didn’t.
I said “Ugh!” right out loud and Barbara wanted to know why. I couldn’t tell her. Her desk is as clean and neat as a cupboard in a hospital.
I kept the gum in my pocket until we got home and then I put it into a hole in the maple tree out front. I hope no squirrel finds it and thinks it’s a nice nut. He’d be as sad as Squirrel Nutkin.
I went to the store with Mother and she bought me an Eskimo Pie. Yum. It is really just an ice cream bar coated with chocolate, nothing to do with any Eskimo and not a pie. I guess they call it that because it is cold.
I told you nothing much happened, Diary. But I did promise Eleanor I would try to write every day.
Thursday, June 27, 1940
School is almost over. No more pencils, no more books, no more teacher’s dirty looks. Then the summer will stretch out, full of long sunny days for playing and long rainy hours for reading. Oh, I do hope our WG likes reading! And swimming. And all the other summer things. Strawberries and then raspberries and then blueberries. If only they lasted so you could eat fresh berries all summer and even in the fall. Mother’s jam is just not the same. And she won’t let us put sugar on our berries. She says they are plenty sweet enough, but they are even better with sugar. There’s that sweet scrunch.
It is funny though that they do taste plenty sweet enough when you pick them and pop them straight into your mouth. I love eating fresh berries that way, especially the wild ones.
I have a new autograph book to take to school tomorrow. Mother already wrote in it:
Being a girl is a great adventure.
Being a girl is a wonderful thing.
Something like being a great explorer.
Something like being a king.
I like it even though kings are boys.
Friday, June 28, 1940
School is out at last and I am promoted into Grade Seven. Barbara stood top of the class as usual. She says her mother keeps telling her that all the girls in her family stand top of their class. I’m glad my parents don’t expect me to be so brilliant.
The hard thing in Grade Six was decimals and percents. I hope those have been left behind in Grade Seven. And I don’t really understand rods and acres. I know miles because it is one mile from our house to Aunt Carrie’s. I admit that Math is my least favourite subject. Ever since I skipped Grade Three I have not been fast at multiplying. Mother can do it at the speed of light, but she used to be a teacher before she married Dad. She had to stop then because they don’t allow married women to be teachers. I think it is because they believe men are the providers and married women should stay home and not take money from a man with a family to support.
Mother thinks that now so many men are going overseas, the board might have to hire some married women. I wonder if she wishes they would ask her. I can’t imagine it. When I come home from school, I like her to be waiting to hear about my day, even when I am not in the mood to say much. Barbara’s mother has milk and cookies waiting! But she quizzes Barbara about school while Barbara eats. That would spoil my appetite. My mother just listens.
I am still writing in here because, when Mother called up that I had to turn the light out, I told her I was writing in my diary. She said, “Well, turn it out the moment you finish.” So, if I kept writing, I could stay up until dawn.
Saturday, June 29, 1940
Late afternoon
Summer holidays have begun. Hurray!
If only Mother would agree to having summer holidays from housework. There seems to be much more to do when I am not at school. Boring things like dusting and polishing silver and shaking out mops and beating rugs. They aren’t big rugs but I still don’t like it. Grit blows into your face.
I don’t like helping with the washing either. I have to feed the clothes through the wringer into the rinse water and then through again into the basket. I am always nervous because we had a teacher in Grade Two who had a crooked finger from getting it caught in the wringer. Just thinking about it gives me the shivers. Lizby stands on the other side making sure the things land safely in the basket and then we lug them outdoors.
But hanging the clothes out on the line is easier and sometimes even fun if Lizby or Eleanor and I do it together. They are fussy though. If I hang a shirt upside down or something, they make me unpin it and do it their way. I can’t see that it matters. Eleanor says I would understand it if I had to do the ironing. I tried to do it once as a grand surprise for them, but I scorched the front of Dad’s best shirt. It smelled terrible and a hole was burned right through it. It was mortifying. Mother says she will teach me when I have increased my powers of concentration. Lizby says ironing is no treat and I should put it off as long as possible.
Thank goodness washday only comes once a week. Last Monday I heard Lizby singing “This is the way we wash our clothes.” I almost asked her if she learned it at the orphanage, but stopped myself. She sounded so happy.
Stopped to watch a troop of soldiers marching past and singing, “Pack up your troubles in your old kit bag.” It made me want to march with them. They sounded so jolly you would think they were off to a giant party. Yet some of them may get wounded or even killed. How can they sound so carefree? I would be scared. Maybe they are but hide it.
Sunday night, June 30, 1940
This afternoon was the Sunday School picnic. I love the squishy tomato sandwiches. Robbie and I went in the egg-and-spoon race and lost. Our side won the tug-of-war though. For a while we were losing but Dad noticed and grabbed hold of the rope and dug in his feet and hauled us to victory.
I wanted to talk to Mother and Dad tonight but they were laughing so hard at “Fibber McGee and Molly” that I couldn’t. I don’t think it is all that funny. If I let everything come tumbling out of my closet that way, Mother would not smile, let alone laugh out loud. It sounds like an avalanche.
I wish I had a radio all my own in my bedroom instead of having to listen to the big one in the living room. At least we have our old Victrola. When Robbie comes over, he loves winding it up and playing Shirley Temple singing “Animal Crackers in My Soup.” I know that he likes playing the other side better though. It goes, “Oh, we wish that we were swallows so we could fly away. That’s the song they sing in the singsong in Sing Sing.” Sing Sing is a prison.
I wish we had two telephones too. I’m always the one who has to run to answer it when it rings, even though it is usually for one of the others. Barbara’s family has one upstairs in case her father gets called by one of his patients during the night. But even she doesn’t have her own radio.
July 1940
Dominion Day
Monday night, July 1, 1940
Today is Dominion Day, the date that they signed something that joined the provinces and made Canada a country. I don’t know if all of them joined. I think some of the western ones came later. Now there are nine and I can recite their names and their capital cities.
Barbara goes to camp tomorrow. I helped her pack some of her stuff. What a long list! It sounds neat. She has to have her own soap dish and her own flashlight and a groundsheet to put over her bedroll when they sleep out. Or under it maybe?
We have heard that our War Guests are on their way. Some have already arrived here in Guelph. My stomach feels queasy when I think about our girl on a ship in the Atlantic with German submarines hiding under the waves. Her parents must be scared to dea
th.
George came home with sparklers for us to light up because of Dominion Day. But no rockets. The true firecracker day is Queen Victoria’s birthday on May 24. But the sparklers are fun as long as you don’t hang on too long and crisp your fingertips.
Tuesday, July 2, 1940
Eleanor and her friend Carol and I took sandwiches and hiked out to the Ridge for fun. It was hot and it seemed a long way home. They talked to each other and I wished I had brought a book. But it was better than staying home and doing chores. Eleanor said, “Sitting here in the sunshine with the wind blowing the clouds like that makes it hard to believe we are at war.”
I wished she had not reminded us. The clouds were fat and puffy and blew along like clipper ships in full sail. I lay on my back and watched them and loved the whole world. When you look straight up, the very top of the sky is such a deep blue. Not dark. Deep. As though you could swim up into it.
Wednesday, July 3, 1940
Mother came home from grocery shopping today, fuming because people have been saying mean things to the Muellers. Their grandson Albert is in Robbie’s class. I never thought about him being German. He’s just Albert. I’ve known them all my life. They came from Germany long ago and have lived in Canada for years. Gus Mueller was in George’s class. Anyway, Mother bought some things we didn’t even need, to show them she knew they were good people.
Somebody actually threw a rock through their front window. It had a piece of paper tied onto it that said something nasty. And they wrote things on the walls too. Mother would not say what. I feel confused about Germans. They might be spies. But I know that the Muellers would not be spies. They still have accents but they love Canada.
