Amazons: An Intimate Memoir by the First Woman Ever to Play in the National Hockey League

by Cleo Birdwell

  Or did I want him because he was the closest I’d ever get to something in the arts?

  Either way, we found ourselves in a room full of comic books. They were stacked five feet high in some parts of the room. There were drifts up to six feet near the window. I assumed Archie had bought them in bulk from a distributor. It would have taken six lifetimes to collect all these specimens individually.

  As an afterthought, there was a cot with an army blanket. Murray stood alongside it. He was nude except for his little round glasses. The better to see me undress.

  I noticed he was holding his breath. Men do this, of course, to conceal their drifting flesh. It is a nude tactic by and large, although you also see it at beaches and around pools. Murray wasn’t exactly overweight, but he wasn’t rock hard either, and I guess he felt that an intake of air would give his silhouette a touch of extra svelteness, from the Latin. When a man holds his breath, he not only diminishes his bunchy middle but also makes his chest appear to be larger and firmer than it really is. Murray’s chest, however, was a fairly sunken affair, and I don’t think any amount of breath-holding would have improved matters.

  The other thing that distinguished him was body hair. He had it in fairly substantial amounts. This was no shining piece of godlike marble that stood before me in the Mediterranean sun. This was a fellow with hair on his back. Also his rear end, his ankles, and his knees.

  While I was taking off my teddy pants, he sneakily let out his breath, figuring I was too occupied to notice the resulting wavelet around his middle. So touching, these ploys. Even naked, people find disguises. It is a testament to something.

  “Cleo, this is an intimate moment, so I don’t mind telling you I have a thing about women’s underwear. There’s nothing fetishy about this. It’s just the plain delight a man takes in a sexy undergarment.”

  “So?”

  “Well, those pants, I wonder if there’s anything you can tell me about them. Is there a story to those pants? They’re crazy and delightful, but what gives?”

  “I wear these pants in winter. They’re a sort of update on the ancient, baggy teddies. They’re an alternative, that’s all.”

  “What about the T-shirt? I love it. What’s Badger Beagles?”

  “I have nineteen of these. We were a Softball team one summer. All-girl. When I outgrew the original shirt, I started ordering these by mail from a novelty outfit.”

  “Four or five would be sentimental. Nineteen is an obsession.”

  “You’re probably right.”

  “I love it a lot,” he said.

  “I keep ordering. I order all the time. I have a morbid fear I’ll run out.”

  I struggled out of the shirt. By the time my head emerged, Murray was under the blanket. Not a bad idea. It was cold in the room and we heard a mean wind howling.

  I walked over and popped in next to him. He seemed pretty distracted for a man in bed with a woman he hadn’t been in bed with before. Maybe my mistake was taking off my underwear.

  “I love being out here in America,” he said. “I really do. But I wish some of the sports arenas were closer to towns, real towns, instead of these vast, nameless, outlying areas.”

  “You want a town. I’ll give you a town.”

  “A place. A real place. A small, innocent, corn-on-the-cob, American place.”

  “You want a real place?” I said.

  “Yes, somewhere in the heartland. I love that a lot. The heartland.”

  “I’ll give you heartland, Murray. All you can handle, fella. A lifetime’s worth. The most precious childhood memory. The one and only. The finest, the saddest, the deepest, the truest, the best.”

  I would give him Christmas in Badger.

  He took off his glasses and placed them carefully on a nearby stack of comics. Then he lay on his side, his upper body propped on an elbow and his head resting in his hand. The wind howled and I snuggled a little closer for warmth. A small light glowed at the other side of the room.

  “Seasons were strictly observed,” I began, “and in our house we began to get really, really serious about Christmas the first Sunday in December. Between three and four in the afternoon. This is when we’d sit at the dining room table to sign and address the Christmas cards. My father would light a fire made from cherry and peach and birch and apple wood. The birch logs made the fire burn bright and long, and the fruitwoods gave it a wonderful smell of autumn sweetness. The fire crackled, as fires should but seldom do.”

  I felt a hand on my thigh.

  “It usually snowed during the signing of the cards. Big, soft, feathery flakes. Real snow. The whole town would be hushed. My mother would make steaming mugs of hot chocolate. Real hot chocolate. Made with sugar, a pinch of salt, blocks of German chocolate, boiling water, milk, a vanilla bean, and whipped cream folded into the mixture. She’d put in a cinnamon stick for a stirrer and dust the top with nutmeg. And she’d serve it to us with the first of the Christmas cookies. Cookies shaped like trees and bells and stars and wreaths. Cookies sparkling with red sugar, green sugar, silver beads. Cookies with frosting made to look like bows and beards and angels’ wings. The cookies were packed layer upon layer in an old, round, silvery tin that had belonged to my great-grandmother.”

  Murray shifted position on the bed, stroking me gently all the while.

  “My brother and I would put on the records. These were records my father had owned for years and years, and they were Christmas records, to be played only at Christmas, and only after my mother brought in the hot chocolate and cookies, during the signing of the cards. RCA Victor Red Seal records. Big, heavy, substantial seventy-eights. We had the Longines Symphonette, we had Toscanini, we had an old, old, old version of Bing Crosby doing ‘White Christmas,’ with ‘I’ll Be Home for Christmas’ on the other side. We always started with ‘Hark, the Herald Angels Sing.’”

  I was aware that Murray was sniffing me. My shoulders, my neck, my breasts. He had his head under the blanket, sniffing my breasts. Sanders Meade had sniffed my hair and had seemed content with that. Murray didn’t even bother with hair. He was after naked skin. I lifted the edge of the blanket and peeked down under there seeing one of his dark, velvety eyes shining in the dimness.

  “What about the Christmas cards themselves?” I said. “Well, all you have to know about the cards themselves is that no two were alike. Imagine, Murray, the care, the precision, the thoughtfulness that went into selecting these cards. No two alike. One hundred and fifty different Christmas cards. Each one chosen for a particular person. The steam engine locomotive pulling into a cheerful, red-brick station was for Mr. Rushing, whose hobby was trains. The red bird sitting on a snowy branch was for an uncle and aunt who loved birds. And so on. No two alike, Murray. The cards.”

  He surfaced and began licking my ear. I think he liked the cheerful, red-brick station.

  “Everything was written out carefully. Names, personal greetings, the addresses on the envelopes. No abbreviations, no slashes, no dashes. And the cards had to be put in the envelopes so that the people receiving them would take them out rightside up, ready to look at, read the greeting and open to the inside to see those carefully hand-scripted names which indicated that the Birdwells cared about Christmas and neatness and standards and the good, traditional, finicky Presbyterian things of life. After we wrote and addressed the envelopes, we sealed them. The envelopes were tongue-licked and sealed carefully along the edge. No wet sponges, no Elmer’s Glue-All. Tongue-licked, Murray. Because we cared enough to send the very best.”

  He discarded the blanket and heaved himself on me to suck at my left nipple. I felt his penis stiffen a bit.

  “Choosing the tree,” I said. “Always an important part of Christmas and a beautiful, sad, haunting tradition. We always picked out the tree ten days before Christmas. It had to be the perfect tree. We all agreed the perfect tree was a double-needle balsam. The double-needle balsam has small dark green needles all around its b
ranches, not just on top. The double-needle balsam also has needles which are just the right length for hanging ornaments. And it is a symmetrical tree, Murray, and doesn’t drop branches the minute you get it into the house. Some families went to a forest and cut down their own balsam.”

  Here Murray hardened considerably, clutching me and moaning. I think he was on the verge of a premature ejaculation. What may have caused it was the picture of a little Presbyterian family trudging through the woods to cut down their own Christmas tree. I hastened to correct the impression.

  “Wait, steady, hold off now. I’m not saying we went into the forest to cut down a tree. We didn’t, we didn’t. But we did the next best thing. We went to the old, abandoned Socony Mobil service station—the one with the flying red horse. This is where the Masons sold Christmas trees for the crippled children’s hospital.”

  The crippled children calmed him down, I think. He resumed slurping on my nipple.

  “It was always very cold when we went to pick out the tree, and the hard-packed snow squeaked and crunched under our boots, and the service station was garlanded with Christmas lights. The Masons dressed in big, heavy coats and earmuffs, and they rang bells, and exhaled steamy air, and warmed themselves over a fire. It was safe. A safe kind of cold. A safe fire. Safe snow crunching under our boots.”

  Murray must have thought that particular nipple had terrific mouth texture, like unripe brie on a Bremner wafer.

  “The trees were all there. All the trees were there. Some were displayed on crossed wooden planks. Others were tied up, leaning against a jerry-built fence. We took a long time picking out our tree. The poor Mason who got the Birdwells as customers had to be a patient, heroic, warmly dressed fellow. Standing trees were never perfect, somehow. The poor fellow had to carry tree after tree away from the fence, and untie them, and shake out their branches for us. After we narrowed the field down to three or four, we discussed their merits, defects etcetera. It wasn’t only the tree that had to be perfect. It was the discussion, the ten-degree weather, the steamy air that came out of the Masons’ mouths, the sound of the snow crunching under our boots.”

  His head was between my breasts and he was inhaling deeply. I reached down for the blanket and pulled it up over both of us.

  “What is Christmas without gifts?” I said. “For a child, at Christmas, in Badger, there were many, many anticipations and pleasures. Gifts seemed almost an overabundance. Yet, as I say, what is Christmas without gifts? My mother and father and aunts and uncles and my brother and my cousins—all of us, starting in mid-September, would begin asking each other what he or she wanted for Christmas. Lists were made of blouse sizes, waist sizes, glove sizes, books, perfumes, records, bracelets, earrings, brooches, pins, charms—it was absolutely endless and wonderful. We’d start shopping in mid-October, making every effort possible to be sure we weren’t duplicating a gift. Shopping had to be finished by the day after Thanksgiving. Don’t ask me how that rule got into the family. It just did.”

  Murray had sunk deeper into the blanket. He was thrashing around down there. His tongue was cutting a swath across my belly. I felt his beard momentarily in my navel.

  “Then started the search for the exactly right wrapping paper, the perfect ribbon, the appropriate gift card. Every gift, Murray, no matter how large or small, skinny or round, bumpy or smooth, was wrapped with the utmost care and precision. Just like the Christmas cards. Neatly cut paper—no ragged or curvy edges. Tape concealed under the ribbon. The ribbon was a blossom of loops and bows, exactly in the middle of the package. It’s a wonder, Murray, we didn’t all have nervous breakdowns. Nerves were sometimes frayed, but we felt this was part of the great search, the perfect Christmas, the most symmetrical tree, the steamy air coming out of the Masons’ mouths, the crisp, browned surface and juicy meat of the turkey, the lights and shiny ornaments and angels’ hair hanging from the tree, and the flying red horse in the Socony Mobil station.”

  At the sound of “the flying red horse,” Murray’s penis stiffened further. I could feel it against my foot, which must have meant that his legs were sticking out of the blanket, off the bed, straight into the air, or maybe resting on a stack of Captain Marvels.

  “After the presents were wrapped, they were put away in an unused bedroom, placed neatly on the bed. My brother and I weren’t allowed to go in there and shake or heft the packages with our names on them, but we did, practically every day, jiggling those boxes against our ears as if they were maracas. The presents from my mother smelled sensational. She used to sprinkle Yardley’s sachet powder on the tissue paper in the box. A typical extra touch.”

  Murray threw off the blanket once again. He was all hunched up down around my crotch like someone trying to fish a ring out of a sidewalk grating.

  “Of course the mention of presents always brings to mind the subject of Santa Claus. The fact is nobody in Badger after the age of four or so believed in Santa. Badger was just too practical and down to earth for that kind of extravagant fantasy. However, when I was just learning to print, I printed out a letter to Santa Claus, and my father and I went down to the basement and threw it into the coal furnace, and then we scampered upstairs and out the door, no coats on, to watch the embers come up out of the chimney, smoldering red in the night sky, and fly up, up, up, to disappear in the dark and arrive eventually in the North Pole, on the other side of the night.”

  I don’t know whether it was the idea of writing to Santa, or just the mention of the coal furnace, but Murray grabbed one of my legs, and hoisted it, and got in under, and then raised the other leg so that one of his shoulders supported each leg, and his hands were under my buttocks, and he was crouched down, advancing into me tongue-first. With some effort, I could look up over my breasts to the top of his head.

  “Maybe the saddest, truest, deepest thing of all was the Christmas caroling,” I said. “Very haunting and beautiful. We went out two days before Christmas. There were different groups. Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts, church groups, children of Masons, children of the American Legion etcetera. My group was a pee wee hockey team. We made our own lanterns. They were big, tall tin fruit-juice cans with a pattern of holes that we made with a hammer and nail. Two more holes at the top for a wire handle. Then we melted wax in the bottom and stuck in a candle. My pattern was Christmas trees and Christmas stars.”

  Murray was extremely active. I think it was the homemade lantern that got to him. I could hear him sort of warbling down there. Coonylinkus, as we used to call it.

  “We would meet in the middle of town, in front of the biggest bank on Bank Street. Then we’d all light our lanterns, and there were oohs and aahs at the different designs. Our leader would pass out the caroling books and off we would go, caroling. The snow would squeak under our boots. Down the side street from the bank, we’d stop first at the Presbyterian minister’s home. The minister and his wife would come to the door and stand framed there, with the lights of their tree in the living room behind them, and it would begin snowing lightly, and we would start with ‘Hark, the Herald Angels Sing,’ which was the first carol in the book. The minister and his wife tried not to look so morbidly correct, and when we finished they wished us Merry Christmas and we shouted back Merry Christmas, and went on down the street in the lightly falling snow, our lanterns swaying gently, casting a sad, beautiful light.”

  Murray was tunneling under, using his shoulders to lift my legs higher as he got more excited by the caroling. Warble, warble. Occasionally he’d pause to breathe and then he’d tunnel again, lifting my legs way, way up.

  “Our favorite houses stayed pretty much the same from year to year. We particularly liked to sing in front of houses that had decorations in view. Nothing fancy or suburban-grotesque. Just small, welcoming stuff like a wreath on the door or some lights in the window. When we started singing, doors would open all up and down the street, and heads would appear in windows, and lights would go on in upper rooms. In this way, Murray, we continu
ed through town, going through the caroling book maybe one and a half times, usually finishing up with ‘We Three Kings of Orient Are,’ which was mysterious, strange, plaintive, and a bitch to sing, and included the words frankincense and myrrh, which were as much a part of Christmas as the shiny ornaments and angels’ hair hanging from the tree, the RCA Victor Red Seal records, the little Baby Jesus in the manger on our Chippendale table, the crisp, browned surface of the turkey, the steamy air coming out of the mouths of the Masons, the tongue-licked envelopes, and the flying red horse in the Socony Mobil station.”

  I was getting cold again, and with my right hand I groped around for the blanket. Found it and tried to drape it over us. In the position we were in, with my legs way up and Murray burrowing so that together we probably resembled a frightened animal seeking shelter under a wheelbarrow, it was not easy to sort of float the blanket over us. But I managed finally, flinging it rather than floating it, although the blanket, hanging from my raised feet, didn’t completely cover my breasts at one end and Murray’s ass at the other.

  “The last house was the home of our leader, Mrs. Tupper, and we’d all go inside and have hot cider with cinnamon sticks and cloves. Around about ten, our parents would arrive to take us home. That was it for another year. The caroling.”

  Murray came up out of his crouch and flung himself on me, full body. My legs came down and the blanket fell amongst us, getting tangled in the general clash of bodies. Murray started nuzzling and sniffing again. This time my face, my eyes, my mouth. I was beginning to feel like a bundle of greens that was destined to meet its end in the silvery flash of his four-inch Wüsthof. I thumbed him in the ribs, and I guess he got the message because he immediately switched to breast-fondling and other manual activity.

  “Then came the arrangement of the Nativity scene,” I said. “This was something I was personally very deeply involved in, although my father helped out in the little practical matters and my mother sort of oversaw the whole affair, as she oversaw and loomed over and quietly supervised every detail of the entire Christmas season. The Nativity scene was set across the entire top of a large Chippendale table in the living room. There was a hand-carved stable with beams, and it even had little bins to hold hay for the animals. I had grass I’d saved over the summer and I used it for straw in the manger. It looked nicer than straw and it still had a faint, sweet smell of freshly mown grass.”