|
|
|
From the The Tenement Series of non-fiction essays by Harry Buschman
© by Harry Buschman
The Swenson Affair
In the masculine world of dog eat dog the urge to compete starts early, and so long as a spark is left in us, we can't help trying to outdo each other. The competitive spirit is surely one of the big differences between man and animal. We play games as children and we fight to climb the corporate ladder as adults, stopping only to acknowledge applause. Nations wave flags and compete on a grand scale while each individual gets as far as he can with the little he has to work with.
That was the big difference with the friendship that existed between me and Ernie. We never competed with each other. There was none of the "My Dad's richer, smarter or stronger than your Dad" baloney. Each of us knew our Dads were poor, dumb and weak, so we never challenged each other ... what was the point?
But in school we found ourselves challenged every day by kids who knew damn well they could run faster, throw further and fight better than we could. Let me tell you, after a few bloody noses you learn your limitations and you willingly accept the fact that you're second best. A smile is your best umbrella. So when some thick-necked belligerent bully like Eddie Holberg confronted either Ernie or me in the school yard with, "I can lick you with one hand tied behind my back," we readily agreed. If "Four-eyes" Williams issued the same challenge either one of us would have kicked his ass.
But it's strange how a man's best laid plans are thrown into a cocked hat by a woman. I mean you can get along on friendly terms with your neighbors, be reasonably successful in your chosen profession and greet each dawn with pleasurable anticipation until some golden-haired snippet of a girl crosses your path, then everything that made sense before is suddenly in disarray.
Mrs. Irwin and
her daughter moved out of the top floor. "Three months back in her rent,"
my mother told me -- "you'd think with all those men friends of hers she'd
have enough to pay her rent." It took a while to clean out her apartment,
what with all with the bottles and having to repaint the bedroom. The new tenants
were a Mr. & Mrs. Swenson with a preschool toddler and a daughter Birgit.
From the moment I saw Birgit I knew I had found the perfect woman and I might
just as well propose now and get it over with. I wanted to tell Ernie first
of course, but I kept the news from my mother and father because when you're
eleven, parents assume you're too young to accept such responsibilities. I didn't
tell Birgit either -- time enough
for that, it was enough for me to know that I had made up my mind.
I pointed her out to Ernie one day in school as she minced down the hall all blond and bouncy and I could tell from the look on his face that trouble was brewing.
"What do you think, Ernie?"
"She's terrific -- what makes you think she's your girl?" From that moment on Ernie and me were competitors, we didn't roll up our sleeves and pummel each other in the corridor, but both of understood she was not to be shared and only one of us would be the lucky man.
It was show-off time. We'd wait until she was out on the stoop playing jacks or on the sidewalk playing potsy with her friends and we'd flash by on our skates or play stoop ball nearby, each of us trying to outdo the other. We'd wrestle each other to the ground ... keeping a close eye on her to see if she was watching. The other girls were fascinated but Birgit was aloof -- well, maybe more than aloof, without so much as a glance in our direction she would flounce inside.
We tried every trick in the book, I'd watch Ernie and he'd watch me. When Ernie did something like a 180 on his "push mobile," I'd do a 360. It wasn't easy -- neither of us were skilled, and our attention was always divided between the accomplishment of the exploit and its effect on Birgit. Her aloofness continued. I healed easier in those days than I do now, but I can recall that my scarred and bruised condition prompted my mother to ask me if I'd been fighting again.
After two or three days of this me and Ernie decided we had better regroup and figure out an alternate method of winning Birgit's hand. Apparently we had done nothing right ... her loathing for us increased daily. Perhaps if we cooperated instead of competed, the two of us might do what one could not do. We joined hands (and pooled our pocket money) and bought her a bouquet from the flower stand at the subway entrance around the corner. We left it outside her apartment door with what we both thought was a clever note from me and Ernie -- it went something like this:
2 yy UR
2 yy UB
ICUR
2 yy 4 US.
I thought it was complimentary and not too sentimental, and from all we learned, flowers and candy are the surest ways to a woman's heart -- candy, however, was way out of our price range.
The Swenson family lived above me on the fifth floor. Their footsteps could be heard clearly on their kitchen linoleum. I learned to recognize Mr. Swenson's slow elephantine gait and Mrs.Swenson's sharp staccato heels, like small arms fire, as she beat a regular course from stove, to sink, to icebox and back again. The littlest Swenson's were halting and tentative ... punctuated by frequent thuds as he went down on all fours. Birgit's, although she seemed to spend very little time in the kitchen, could be compared to those of a frightened doe in a mossy forest glade.
On that particular evening with my homework in front of me, my ears were tuned as never before trying to visualize the effect of our bouquet on Birgit and her family as they sat down to dinner.
"What are you looking at the ceiling for?", my mother asked me. With a sigh that came from the depths of a tortured swain, I could only reply ... "tryin' to figure out these fractions Ma."
The presumptions
my imagination conceived were dashed the following morning
when me and Ernie met in the hall. Our flowers and confessions of love were
stuffed in the vestibule trash barrel.
Collectively and individually we were at a low ebb. Each of us singly had done his utmost to win her affection and we had come up short, and now it was apparent that our combined efforts had been equally ineffective. We scuffed off to school in high dudgeon.
As always we met at the school gate when classes were over. Our mood was testy -- not to each other mind you, but to the world in general. Had either of us been challenged by Eddie Holberg that afternoon I think he might have had more than he could handle. As we started off for home, who should we see in front of us but Birgit! -- and at her side carrying her books was "Four- eyes" Williams.
It was a crushing blow and more than we could stand and it pushed us over the limit ... we quickened our steps and taunted "Four-eyes." I shouted, "Hey "Four-eyes," do you take your glasses off to skip rope?" Ernie added, "How about a fast game of Potsy, "Four-eyes?" "Four-eyes" was having difficulty walking with his double load of books and his glasses had ridden down to the end of his nose -- all he could do is turn around and give us a sickly grin. Birgit though, spun around sharply, stamped her foot and with her beautiful blue eyes blazing said, "Will you two rowdies leave US alone!"
"Us! ...... US!!" she said! Me and Ernie stopped in mid stride and a creeping feeling of mortification swept over me much as it had the morning I farted in church. Little "Four-eyes!" He couldn't do push-ups, he couldn't chin himself ... he even wore long underwear in the winter, but he had ridden up like Sir Lancelot and carried Birgit away. I couldn't tell how Ernie felt, he was already walking back the other way.
©Harry Buschman 1996
|
|