8. College Days

One of my most pleasant memories of college days concerns my employment on Saturday afternoons and evenings in a downtown haberdashery.

First let me say that I had always detested Saturday, not for its having done me any specific injury, but just on general principles. At home there had always been an ashes-burning stove to clean within and polish without, washtubs to fill and empty, and enough other drudgeries to cancel a jaunt to the river for fishing in summer or skating in winter. On Saturday, too, the family bathed, a miserable business in cold weather. This affair was conducted in the kitchen, immediately after we had finished doing the noon dinner dishes. Papa bathed first; my little brother and I followed. It would be nearing two when we boys would be out of our baths and into fresh clothing; rosy and smelling of soap. I am remembering us, at the moment, as being, respectively, about eleven and five.

One feature of our papa’s Saturday-afternoon routine was the winding of the clock which Mama had bought when she was a schoolteacher. It stood alone on the mantel in our living room, which we called the sitting room, though most people said “settin’ room.” This fussy and noisy clock was as conceited and eager for attention as a White Leghorn pullet after having laid her first egg.

It was an eight-day clock: that is, you wound it up every Saturday, but in an emergency you had one day of grace. “Emergency?” you inquire, “like a death in the family?”… No, it needn’t be that bad. When there was a death in the family it was a country custom for some helpful neighbor to stop your clocks, probably as a courtesy to the deceased. The same neighbor’s Aunt Maria would turn all your mirrors to face the wall. I have no theory to explain that one.

Mama’s clock was an excellent timepiece, but the apparatus that struck the hours wearied as the week wore on, so that by two on Saturday it could hardly drag one foot after the other. Earlier in the week the striking had been prompt and decisive. No loafing now; mind you! Put down that book, and clean out the stable. But by two on Saturday afternoon the clock was completely exhausted. I should add that the striking, whether lively or ailing, was preceded by a warning whirr, similar to the rat-a-tat-tat-tat-tat racket made in these days by small boys who bob up from behind the shrubbery to machine-gun you.

Mama’s clock would emit a dejected whirr, and strike two; “b-o-n-g… b-o-n-g.” Papa would now come forward and wiind and wind and wind, both the keeping-time side and the wearied striking side. It was a long hour that we had to wait. My brother and I would stand before the clock as the dramatic moment neared. We shivered with excitement. Smack on the button, at three, the refreshed little clock laid the egg: “Tttt-bang-bang-bang!”

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