Tip It! (12 page)

Rubber bands, the ultimate accessory. Perfect for when a clip or a pin isn’t handy. And here’s why:

GREAT FOR HOLDING TISSUES TOGETHER.
Use two bands, one for fresh tissues and one for used.

STORE YOUR BEST SCRAPS OF PAPER
by folding, stacking, and wrapping them in a rubber band. Add a pen to the stack for writing important notes, and don’t forget to write “VIP” on everything.

GREAT FOR BINDING YOUR PANT LEG OR SKIRT
to keep from tangling when riding a velocipede (one of those old high bicycles the folks rode back in the day), but it also works for modern bikes.

PERFECT FOR HOLDING OTHER RUBBER BANDS
in a handy bundle.

GOOD FOR EMERGENCY TRIAGE
, as a tourniquet or to hold a compress of tissues to a wound.

CHEWING GUM IN A PINCH.
This was just a rumor back in my day, but during the great gum shortage of World War II, you’d hear of kids who would wind rubber bands around some mint sprigs and chew on that for up to a week. I’m not recommending it, though.

T
he story I want to tell about young Gary, I don’t think he’s going to like.

But it’s so cute!

See, Gary was a pretty introverted little kid. Where other members of our family might have been more outspoken or talkative or quick to make everyone laugh, Gary preferred to stay quiet and choose his moment to speak. Then it’d be really funny, maybe even more so because it took so long for him to say anything.

Well, one day early in his grammar school years, I not only walked him to school, but I offered to help out as a playground monitor. The Catholic school always needed any parental assistance it could get, and I was happy to oblige. So when lunch rolled around, I kept an eye on all the kids to make sure nobody did anything goofy like leave the grounds or get themselves hurt.

My son Gary in a school photo, looking adorable!

But Gary wouldn’t leave my side. “Go play, Gary,” I’d say. “I have a job here. I have to walk around and watch the kids.”

Then the bell rang, and in typically great Catholic school fashion, every one of those kids got in line without making a sound. (I always loved that!) As they walked in, though, Gary kept looking around for me, and when he caught my eye he gave me this look like a little lost dog, and he started crying. Nothing tantrumy, just a sad little cry.

When he got home from school, I said, “Gary, why were you crying?”

He looked at me and said, “I was crying ’cause I was momsick!”

Not homesick, momsick! Isn’t that just darling?

I know Gary’s going to hate that story. Boys hate it when you tell sweet stories about them. They want to appear brave and tough. So I guess I’ll add that we weren’t surprised when Gary became a lawyer because as he got older, he loved playing devil’s advocate with his family on any legal issue. (Johnny loved teaming up with him to do that.) When he starts throwing in “whereas” and “therefore” as he’s giving us some spiel on how the law does this when we think it should do that, that’s when I’ll go “Forget the lawyer lingo, Gar[e]! Can’t you just say the law’s wrong?” I think he gets a kick out of driving us nuts like that.

[
Oh no. The sole purpose of this book in my mother’s eyes
.
Get ready, people.
]

Dear Little Punk,

Maybe you remember that summer back in the late sixties.

The summer you did a horrible, horrible thing.

It was a lovely and lively night at the Griffin house in Oak Park, Illinois. We were having a party, like Griffins do, and this happened with a lot of our parties—the word about it had gotten out. Perhaps you heard about it from neighborhood people, or from my kids talking about it at school if you were of school age (which I think you were), or you were just driving by that night and noticed a lot of happy, well-fed people coming in and out of our house.

You wanted to join in the fun. And why not? I knew our parties occasionally attracted crashers. That’s because we threw great parties. Sometimes Johnny and I were able to shoo the crashers away.

Not this time, I guess.

Side entrance of our Oak Park house, where a vicious thief escaped!

Surely, you helped yourself to some chips, cheese and crackers, perhaps, and maybe some potato salad. Then you washed it down with a soft drink, or one of the beers somebody smuggled in. Well, let me make it clear, none of that was for you. But I was probably in the kitchen when you invaded our home, or I was talking to my husband in the living room, or forcing myself to be interested in one of my daughter’s rehearsed monologues from some damn movie.

Maybe I even saw you. We might have even met. You probably introduced yourself as a friend of my son Gary, who was in high school at the time and would have had a lot of his high school buddies there. If you did, that was a sneaky move. You little snot.

I imagine you then made your way down to the rec room, because that’s where the action always was. There, you probably overheard lively conversation about everything from movies and music to politics and religion. But none of that mattered to you, did it? Because that’s when you saw it.

Our family sword.

In 1901, my husband’s father went to fight in the Boer War in South Africa, on the side of the Afrikaners against the British—like many a good English-hating Irishman—and this sword was the fine, heavy, beautiful weapon he brought back from that conflict. Long, slightly curved, with a big handle and its own sheath, it was proudly displayed on our rec room wall. This was a piece of our history, something we
wanted
people to see—from the turn of the twentieth century!—and never in a million years did I think I was doing something reckless by having it in the open while we were throwing one of our parties. That’s how dumb and innocent we were.

And how cagey were you? Once your heart stopped racing from coveting something that wasn’t yours—let’s not even go into how many commandments you broke that day—you probably then noticed how easy it’d be for you to make off with our prized possession. Unlike a lot of homes then, where basement access would have meant going through the kitchen, we had a side entrance/exit. When we got that house, the side entryway was a good thing. We thought. Yes, kids could run in on snowy, slushy days and head straight to the basement without trudging through the house, but what it also meant was, we could never see who exactly was going in and out of our basement area. You would have noticed that, because you’re a goddamn sneak.

If you’d taken two seconds to think about what our reaction would be the next day, maybe that little ounce of goodness that I believe is in every person, maybe even including you, would have stopped you in your tracks. Because I was just sick when morning came and we realized the sword was gone. We went over every ounce of that house, looked in every crevice, hoping and praying that one of us had hidden it as a safety measure. Our next thought was “Whoever pulled this prank will come to their senses and return it.” I’m not saying we didn’t have a lot of goofballs among my children’s group of friends. I was counting on the thief having a guilty conscience. It’s probably why I didn’t do what anybody in her right mind would have done: put up flyers, get the police involved, make them check out all the schools.

See, when I was a little girl hanging out at my dad’s grocery store, I’d notice when kids would steal a piece of candy or a chocolate bar. These weren’t bad kids, I knew. I didn’t want to tell on them.

But I’d wait for them outside.

“I saw you take that candy bar!” I’d yell as they came out, watching their eyes get real, real wide. “Next time you do, I’m telling my dad!” Then, the kicker. “And
he’s
gonna tell your
mother
!”

Believe me, that candy they just wolfed down didn’t taste so sweet anymore.

But I wasn’t on the ball the night you showed up at our house, and I could kick myself. This was such an offense against our family and home, it had me fuming for a long time. Then the shame set in, because I don’t think we ever told Johnny’s family it was stolen. Any Griffins who came over and asked, “Where’s the sword?” would get a terrible lie from us as a response. “Oh, we have it upstairs hidden away because one of the hooks it was hanging from broke,” we’d say. I was afraid to tell them. They would have been furious.

But not as furious as I’ve been, and still am, with you. You little rat.

Johnny’s dad, Patrick Griffin, whose Boer War sword was stolen from us.

“Maybe it was a nutball who just threw it in a Dumpster,” my daughter Joyce said to me once. If that were so, it would just kill me. But you and I know that wasn’t the case. You knew what it was that night in our rec room: something special, something valuable. You’re probably reading this right now in your fancy library, where our sword is handsomely mounted on a wall with other precious items you’ve stolen from other people’s homes. Did you brag about it today to anyone? How you pulled the wool over the Griffins’ eyes? I’ll bet you did. I’ll bet you did just that.

Give it back! It’s not yours!

Sincerely pissed off,
Maggie Griffin

[
I told you. Dear reader, let’s sit with this for a minute. Just when I think my mom is a crazy ninety-year-old who can hold a box of wine like no other, she knocks me on my ass with something like this. I admit, I kind of wanted to make fun of her for including this insanely obsessed letter. But instead, her piss and vinegar at this age is, dare I say it, admirable. My open letter to the punk who stole the sword is: You might as well use that sword to stab yourself in the heart right now. Because you’ve been frickin’ served, Maggie style.
]

Y
ou know what I can’t get over? Kathy never swore in our house growing up. [
That you knew of
.]

I’m not saying I didn’t slip occasionally myself. [
Oh, this is going to be rich
.] Especially if I was mad. My kids like to tease me about how I could change on a dime from using one voice with them, then another as soon as I heard the doorbell ring.

The way it supposedly goes is: “I’ve about had it with you goddamn kids for Chrissakes, Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!”
Ding dong.
Front door opens. “Oh hi, Mrs. Schildgen!” Chat, chat, chat. Then the door closes, and Ma’s back at it again trying to discipline the little rascals, and maybe not so genteelly.

My husband’s brother Maurice swore a lot in our house. Not the “f” word, but a lot of “bastard” and “shit” and those kinds of words. [
My favorite uncle, btw.
] Usually he directed it at Johnny and me at parties when we were arguing politics. That was always kind of funny, watching the kids’ uncle Moe in full flight, calling us “nitwits” and worse. In fact, a neighbor once said, “Gee, Marge, I’m surprised your kids don’t swear a lot because of the way Maurice talks.” But my kids didn’t swear. At least not around me! [
Yep. You got it. For sure
.]

When I grew up, swearing was a big no-no. [
So were ladies wearing pants
.] Also, there were many more words you couldn’t say, certainly not the way you can say them now all over the place without anyone batting an eye. I remember once when I was in grammar school, I was sitting in the grocery store with my dad, just talking, when the bakery guy came in [
after the butcher and the candlestick maker
]. I happened to pick up one of the previous day’s rolls—because the baker was there not just to deliver new ones but take back the old ones—and I said, “Oh my God, this is so stale!”

THWACK!
Next thing I know, Dad’s whacked me on the arm!

“Don’t you use that kind of language in this house!” he said.

I almost didn’t know what I’d said, I was so shocked. Then I realized, “Oh, the ‘Oh my God.’ ” You can be sure I didn’t say it again. In my dad’s presence at least! [
Yep. You got it. For sure
.]

Kathy did get to know my dad before he died—this was when she was still in school—and they did love each other. Dad thought she was really funny and cute. “Kitten,” he called her. But boy, if my father had ever lived to see Kathy’s act, he wouldn’t put up with that for a minute. He wouldn’t have talked to me, either, for my putting up with it! [
Um, I’m sure Grandpa was great, but for the record, I would have thrown that roll at his noggin.
]

But I think of the kinds of words that were really bad back then—“bitch,” “bastard,” and anything taking the Lord’s name in vain, like a certain daughter of mine likes to use [
I learned from the master
]—and it does seem like you can say anything now. Sometimes a girl will be called a “bitch” and it’s supposed to mean something good! The “f” word is very acceptable now, bandied about and whatnot.

Sometimes we’d disguise a word when we could. “Shite” for “shit,” “witch” when we really meant “bitch,” and “friggin’ ” and “freakin’ ” for you-know-what. It helped make you feel like you were swearing, but not really, you know?

But Kathy doesn’t do any disguising, does she? I guess that’s what showbiz does to you. [
And my occasional Satan worship
.] When she started at the Groundlings, I had to get used to that kind of language real fast. Johnny and I did a lot of gulping. But you get immune to it. Sometimes—then and now—I know she’s saying something dirty, but I don’t entirely understand it, and really, I don’t want to, so that’s just fine. [
According to my mother, denial IS a river in Egypt
.]

Apparently, though, whenever a Groundlings cast member’s mom or dad or aunt or uncle was in the audience, they’d tell one another, “Okay, let’s really make it nasty! Let’s make ’em all sweat out there.” One of the guys there told me that once, and I said, “Oooh, you’re all a bunch of devils!” But when you’re around young people, who aren’t bothered by all that, you learn to live with it. [
Fuckin’ A right, you do.
]