Authors: Anne Ylvisaker
Love,
Isabelle
May 11, 1944
Dear Papa,
Ian and Ida are going to draw a picture of you. I thought it would be best if they had some reminders that you are their papa, though you haven’t been here in a while. When Mama is busy with what she does around this house, Ida and Ian really listen to me. I tell them stories about you. In fact, I have started to put the stories in a book I made with a stack of paper and fasteners from the desk of Mr. Frank. He has an office somewhere downtown but has an office in the house, too! When I went in there to ask him to please not hold Ida’s hand in public, I left with a stack of supplies. He gave them to me, not like the towel and money I took unlawfully in Zumbrota. He recognizes that girls such as me have to look out for their families. He’d been cleaning his desk and wondered if I would be able to make use of some of the supplies that are extras, as no one is supposed to waste during the war (or anytime else, I told him). I have paper clips, fasteners, lined paper and unlined paper, and a box and a scissors. I will do my part for the war effort and put the supplies to good use, I told him. So I am making a book. It is like a history book. My new teacher is big on reading history. She said if
some people
had paid more attention to history, specifically the Great War, we would not be having war again now. Well, if Ida and Ian learn about the history of our family, maybe they will not be so eager to have it all changed up. A few parts I am having to fill in on my own. I know you won’t mind. Sometime I’ll have Mama or Aunt Izzy check facts for me, but writers must get the words out, my teacher says. She would know. She talks all day.
Yours,
Isabelle
May 12, 1944
Dear Papa,
Ian said today, “Papa never was sick. He just left.” I told him he was dead wrong. I saw you in the hospital all puffed up after they gave you that medicine. Then I saw them put the box in the ground after the medicine did not work but blew up your insides. I hope I never get an allergic reaction. But Ian and Ida did not see the box. They had to stay home with the Christiansons. I am putting a chapter in my book called “The Death and Funeral of Mr. Nils Anderson.”
It is Friday. We eat fish here every single Friday. I didn’t notice until it happened three Fridays in a row, and when I pointed it out to Mama, she said that’s what the Catholics do. The smell is bad even when Mama fancies it up with the recipes she’s found in the Altar and Rosary Society cookbook. It is her job to cook and clean here so she is only following the rules. I know she would rather be fixing a bacon sandwich for you.
I am putting Ida’s picture of you with my letters. She can’t be expected to remember your face exactly. I think the fact that she drew you to look like St. Nicholas must mean that she remembers you as a happy papa. I told Ian to start over. He put you hanging off the back of a train leaving town. He must not have understood the assignment. I don’t remember you ever taking a train trip.
Stanley said yesterday, “Sure miss your Pop, Isa-bellie-boop.” Me, too. I slipped him a twenty-five-cent tip out of the coins Mr. Frank gave me.
Love from,
Isabelle
May 16, 1944
Dear Aunt Izzy,
Mr. Frank took us to the movies Saturday. When we walked in, we saw the Nelsons from the old neighborhood. She never was my mother’s friend and her daughter Beverly never was mine. But Mrs. Nelson came right up to Mama and put her hand on her arm.
“Sophie, you look wonderful! And how your children have grown. Why haven’t we seen you out in the yard yet this spring?” Here she paused and smiled her red lips at Mr. Frank, then looked back at Mama. “Anything new, dear?” She raised her eyebrows way up and leaned close to Mama when she said it. That’s why I never played with Beverly. Always on gossip patrol.
“Nothing I can think of,” Mama said. “And you?”
Mrs. Nelson does not give up that easily but Mama just smiled big and fake and turned to walk into the theater. We all scurried to catch up with her but not before Ida had to say in a voice big enough for the whole lobby to hear, “Papa Frank, can we get popcorn?”
“Sure, doll!” he bellowed and grabbed her hand. “How about the rest of you?”
It is like that everywhere. Mr. Frank doesn’t go with us to church because of being Catholic, but people talk anyhow.
Mama says Mr. Frank is lonely. That is why we eat at his table at supper. And why he takes us places and stands in the kitchen drying the dishes and talking to Mama after supper. What do you think, Aunt Izzy?
Isabelle
May 17, 1944
Dear Aunt Jaye and Uncle Bernard,
Mama said I gave you quite a fright when I left. I hope I didn’t add to the gray hairs Mama says you’re sprouting. How are things in Zumbrota? Have there been many newcomers? Are the lilacs blooming? What did you see going on next door on the day of Eleanor’s party?
Have you talked to my mother? Did you know we have moved? We are on Mississippi River Boulevard. Mama is the live-in help for Mr. Frank Colletti.
He is a bachelor and Catholic. Just thought you should know.
We would love to have you to dinner next Sunday. Church gets out at 12:00 so dinner could be at 1:00. It should be a nice spring day for a drive, I think. It is a surprise for Mama. We will all be planning on you unless I receive a letter. Maybe you could suggest to Mama that we move back to Palace.
From,
Isabelle
May 17, 1944
Dear Irma,
How is spring planting going? I am no longer so mad as when I talked to you on the phone from Jordahls’. Inez misses you, though. I can tell.
We need to do something about Mama. It is not right that she is living here in sin. We could live on Palace and she could drive to Mississippi River Boulevard. Inez isn’t so sure. We have to let Mama be the mother, she says. (Who changed her from melody to harmony, I’d like to know!) Ian and Ida are too little, and since you didn’t come home, the least you could do is help out.
Please come to dinner this Sunday at 1:00. Inez and I are going to cook. Uncle Edgar is invited, too, of course. Aunt Jaye and Uncle Bernard will be here. Maybe you could ride together. It is a surprise for Mama.
We’ll plan on seeing you unless you write to me first.
Your sister,
Isabelle
May 21, 1944
Dear Papa,
Inez and I made dinner today.
Irma and Aunt Jaye and the uncles were here, too. That part was a surprise for Mama. Mr. Frank is a doctor so he was working. Can’t close the hospital like you can (could) the station, I guess. The food turned out good, but there are quite a few leftovers.
Having her brothers here was not such a good surprise for Mama after all. Bernard raised his voice, Edgar stuttered, Mama used a bad word, and Aunt Jaye cried and cried and hugged and hugged me. Irma rolled her eyes and said to Inez, “See why I don’t come back?” Then she said something disrespectful about Mama, and Inez slapped her face! Ida wailed for Papa Frank, and Ian just walked out the door and I didn’t find him in the tree until almost dark. Would we have been a disappointment to you, if you had been here today?
Inez and I cleaned up the whole dinner. She is thinking about going to college or signing up for training to be a war nurse. She will graduate in a week. Irma will, too, but from a different school.
Love,
Isabelle
May 22, 1944
Dear Aunt Izzy,
Mama is selling our Palace house.
I am afraid it is my fault. Inez’s and mine. We should not have invited the uncles for dinner last weekend without telling Mama. What will happen if Mama loses her cleaning job here?
Please think about coming back to your roots. The house is real nice and you and Mrs. Jordahl would be friends, I’m sure.
Mrs. Winthrop back on Palace has a job in the factory that used to make Fords and now makes guns and tanks for the war. Lots of ladies are working there.
You could call here and reverse the charges if you like. Mama has Irma do that every Sunday.
Do you need ration stamps to feed your cat? We’re always running low on meat stamps and Mama says Ian and me have hollow legs. When you come, bring your ration stamps.
From,
Isabelle
May 29, 1944
Dear Aunt Izzy,
Has something happened to you?
Maybe you are sick.
Maybe you have moved.
Maybe you have finally gotten married.
(Why aren’t you married?)
If you read this letter, please respond.
Mr. Frank hired a cleaning lady.
She cleans our part of the house, too!
Mama is wearing makeup and is not cleaning.
1234 is still for sale.
Isabelle
June 3, 1944
Dear Papa,
Mama is married.
Of course it is Mr. Frank that Mama is married to. (Or it is Mr. Frank
to whom
Mother is married.) It happened way back in March while I sat in my room in Zumbrota worrying about my Mama. Because of the mixed marriage, they didn’t say anything. They married in secret at a courthouse. But after the disaster with her brothers, Mama declared that she was a grown woman and deserved her happiness. I wonder if it was Mr. Frank that made Mama stop feeling tired. She says she was worried about my detentions at school for defending her and that her being married to a man outside the Church was not as bad as being accused of living in sin.
Mr. Frank and Mama sat us all down after supper tonight and told us. Mr. Frank went on about what a great man you had been and how you would always be our true papa, but that he would like us to come to love him, too. And how our mother makes him so happy and we will all be a happy family. It was worse than the gushy movie we saw at the Nile last weekend.
After that Mama got on the phone and called Irma and told her. Then she called up Uncle Bernard and told him.
Don’t worry, Papa. I am still your girl. I didn’t let Mr. Frank hug me. I didn’t call him Papa Frank, except one time when it slipped out during croquet when I won and was too excited to think clearly.
My head is in a spin. Inez and me are going for a walk.
Your very own girl,
Isabelle
June 4, 1944
Dear Papa,
Inez told me I am being a brat. She is glad that at least Mama is talking and cheerful and doesn’t have to work. Inez is happy that Mr. Frank is going to send her to college. She says I am ungrateful.
Do you think I am being ungrateful, Papa?
Love,
Isabelle
June 5, 1944
Dear Papa,
They got married in a courthouse, but now I find out they had a CATHOLIC PRIEST bless their marriage! That way he can still go to church, Mr. Frank says. I asked Mama what priests act like and do they speak English and is the inside of the church anything like the Lutherans’ (Catholic churches always look better from the outside, if you ask me) and she said she’d just have to take me there so I could see for myself. That was not what I meant! I think I will have the flu on Sunday.
Don’t worry, Mama is still Lutheran.
Your nearly feverish girl,
Isabelle
June 6, 1944
Dear Aunt Izzy,
Thank you for writing to me at last. I know that you are happy living the way you are and thank you for the list of what is polite to ask and not polite to ask. I was just curious is all, though now that you mention it I can’t stop wondering what you weigh, even though that was on the don’t-ask list. You were not as big as the other adults when I saw you, I think. But I was only four then and it could be that I remember it that way because you sat with me on the step. I weighed 65 pounds at the start of last term. They took my height and weight at the school in Zumbrota. I wonder if I will be tall like Mama or small like Papa. Right now I am in the middle.
I am afraid your letter to Mama was too late. If she has not already written you back, here is the news: Mama married Mr. Frank. That is why the new cleaning lady. As the wife of Dr. Frank Colletti, she no longer cleans except to pick up after us now and then.
I know you will be disappointed to receive this news. I am, too. But at least Mama’s spirits are better.
Poor Papa.
From,
Isabelle
June 9, 1944
Dear Papa,
I am a Stepdaughter. What a dumb word. There is not one other stepdaughter in my class. I’ll bet there isn’t one in all of Zumbrota or in Miss Lockey’s class either.
“Hello, have you met my wife, Sophie?” Mr. Frank says. “And these are my stepdaughters Ida, Isabelle, and Inez and my stepson, Ian.” He could just as well say, “Hello, this is the wife and family I have stolen.” Inez says it makes us more interesting. She wants to call Mr. Frank “Spapa” (short for step-papa) because people will notice and think she is mysterious. She has broken up with Charlie long-distance. How do you break up with a soldier? I was set on her marrying Charlie so he’d be my big brother. Her outlook has changed with college coming on in just three months. At least then I’ll have my own room again.
Love from Your Daughter,
Isabelle
June 9, 1944
Dear Charlie,
Don’t mind the letter you got from Inez. I know Inez pretty good, and I have seen how much she changes her mind. We are living on a new high-class street and the adjustment has gone to her head. She thinks she needs new friends to go along with the college life she is about to enter. Just keep writing to her so she doesn’t forget you. I haven’t forgotten the fun we all had with you around. She will remember, too.
Look out for those bullets!
Your friend,
Isabelle
June 10, 1944
Dear Aunt Izzy,
Now that the marriage is out in the open, we are going to meet Mr. Frank’s family in St. Cloud. There is a mother and a father and four sisters and three brothers and more nieces and nephews than Mr. Frank can count. Aside from the sister that is a nun and the brother that is a priest, Mr. Frank is the last one to marry. I was going to offer to stay at Jordahls’ while they were gone and teach Jimmy some letters and numbers, but then I might miss the nun. I have never seen one up close. I’m going to ask her if she has ears under the drape they wear on their heads. I did not see that on your list of things not to ask.