26 Fairmount Avenue (3 page)

I called my Irish great-grandmother Nana Upstairs, because she spent all of her time upstairs. She was ninety-four years old. I called my Irish grandmother Nana Downstairs, because if she wasn't helping Nana Upstairs, she was either in the kitchen or sitting in her chair in the parlor, looking out the window so she'd know what was going on in the neighborhood. My Italian grandmother lived in Fall River, Massachusetts, so I called her Nana Fall River.

I called my Irish grandfather Tom, because he told me to. “Tomie will be grown up before he can say ‘Grandpa,'” he told my mom. “He can call me Tom.” So I did.

Every Sunday we went down to Wallingford. As soon as we arrived, I always ran upstairs. Upstairs was a special place for me, and my Nana Upstairs was a special person to me. I loved her, and every Sunday I spent all my time with her.

Nana Downstairs would help Nana Upstairs into the big Morris chair next to her bed. She'd take out a long cloth and gently tie Nana Upstairs in her chair so she wouldn't fall out.

I pestered and pestered Nana Downstairs until she tied me in a chair, too. But she'd put the knot in front so that if I got tired of being in the chair I could get down and poke around or go to the bathroom or something. When I heard her coming up the stairs, I'd climb back into the chair. I got pretty good at tying the knot back, and she never came into the room until I was ready. It was Nana Downstairs' and my private game.

I loved to look around Nana Upstairs' room. She had beautiful brushes and combs and glass jars that held her big silvery hairpins on top of her dresser. Sometimes I'd find candy mints or Life Savers in the sewing box on the table out in the hall.

One Sunday I opened the sewing box and there was no candy, only needles and thread and buttons. So I went searching, very quietly. Finally I got to the bathroom. I stood on the wooden toilet seat and opened up the medicine cabinet. There on the shelf was a small packet of chocolates all wrapped in silver paper. I took them and went back into the bedroom. I tied myself back in my chair, and Nana Upstairs and I ate the chocolates—all of them.

Well, those chocolates weren't chocolates at all. They were laxatives, and laxatives make you go to the bathroom a lot. Both Nana Upstairs and I didn't feel so good, and I think we both made a mess.

Nana Downstairs never forgot the mints or the Life Savers again.

Chapter Three

A
s exciting as beginning the new house and the big hurricane were, something I had been waiting for for a long time had happened in the spring of 1938. Mr. Walt Disney's movie
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
had come to Meriden.

My mother had read the true story of Snow White to my brother and me. I couldn't wait to see it in the movies. I thought Mr. Walt Disney was the best artist I had ever seen (I already knew that I wanted to be an artist, too). I loved his cartoons—especially “Silly Symphonies,” Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, and the Three Little Pigs. But now Mr. Walt Disney had done the first ever full-length animated movie—one and a half hours long.

I had been to a lot of movies—more than Buddy, even though he was eight. Because I didn't go to school yet, my mother took me with her to the movies in the afternoons. We both loved movies. My favorite real-life movie stars were Shirley Temple, the little girl with blonde curls who could sing and dance better than anyone, and Miss Mae West. (I called her “Miss” because she was grown up while Shirley Temple was about my age. We always called grown-ups Miss, Mr., or Mrs.) Miss Mae West was blonde, too, and she could sing. She didn't dance, but she was all shiny and glittery and all she had to do was walk and talk and everyone in the movie theater laughed and laughed.

Mom, Buddy, and I went to see Snow White on a Saturday. We got in line early at the Capitol Theatre so that we could get good seats. My mom bought the tickets, and as we went into the lobby, music was playing. She bought each of us a box of Mason's Black Crows—little chewy licorice candies (they didn't have popcorn at the movies yet).

We found our seats. The lights went down. First we saw a newsreel (it was all the real things that were going on in the world). After that was the coming attraction about the next movie that would be shown at the Capitol. And finally, with the sound of trumpets, and glittery stars filling the screen, the words I had been waiting for: “Feature Presentation.”

A big book appeared on the screen with “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” on the front cover. The book opened. My mother read the words to me quietly: “Once upon a time...”

Music played, and there, in beautiful color, was Snow White, with white doves flying all around her. She was down on her knees, scrubbing the stairs in the Evil Queen's castle. Snow White asked the doves if they wanted to know a secret. They cooed yes. She told them they were standing by a wishing well. Then she sang a song about wishing for her prince to come.

WOW! I was really seeing
Snow White,
and it was the best movie I had ever seen.