I Never Got Up Smiling

When I came downstairs in the morning,
my mother would greet me with
"Good morning, Mary Sunshine"
Did I not get enough sleep?
Was someone's foot in my face all night?

We had a "Girl's Room" and a
"Boy's Room" upstairs and slept
3 or 4 in each bed. My sisters
used to hug one another because
there was nowhere else
to put their arms. They knew
where to put their feet --
generally, a foot in my face!
I do remember pushing feet off my face.

Richard was the youngest. I can't
seem to remember Richard --
did they put him in the Boy's room?
Or let him fall asleep on my mother's
and father's bed, and move him later?

Ernie (very young) did sleep in the
Girl's Room, across the foot of one bed
and I slept across the foot of the other.

Ernie and I were usually sent off
to bed before the others. One
evening he was already in bed
when I went into the room.
He put his finger to his mouth,
"Sh! he said, "listen!"
I can't remember what we were
listening for, but I would guess we
heard someone come into the house,
like Mabel, and we were curious.

I remember there were no chairs
in this bedroom. Two beds.
Not the two beds now in there. Lily bought
the twin beds, with the bedsprings
and the mattresses, for my mother
in later years, when only she
and Lily slept there. Our beds
were complete with a spring and a
thin mattress, with sheets and a
blanket or two -- maybe someone's coat
in the wintertime.

What did we wear?
Maybe we slept in our underwear?
Maybe the older ones had shirts?
Mabel had a nightgown.
Thelma and Lily had pajamas, I think.

No heat upstairs in winter.
Warm in summer. The older boys
sometimes slept outside on the lawn,
with old Indian blankets
(or army blankets later).

We never came down to breakfast
without being fully dressed, complete
with shoes -- well, maybe
summertime called for bare feet,
but I don't remember eating
breakfast with bare feet. Perhaps
my father made us put on shoes.

All I remember here is that
we were given a good morning and
a bowl of hot oatmeal with bran
and sometimes raisins, and in the
summertime, cornflakes, maybe with
blueberries -- or we liked shredded
wheat because of its shape,
and there was always something to read
and games and pictures on the packages.
On some, a prize -- some small thing --
made of tin.