My parents’ oblivion to possible dangers involving their young daughter, alone upstairs at night among strangers, didn’t even occur to me until years later when I’d grown up. At any given time, at least a dozen boarders lived with us in the house. Any one of them could’ve been a thief or worse. But later, I had so many mysteries to contemplate, that sleeping among strangers was a minor detail in the tangled mass of oddities that defined my childhood.
Great Dog Brutus
One of those oddities was that gentle giant Brutus, the family Great Dane, was my designated guardian. Canine Brutus loved ice cream as much as I did. On hot summer days, our favorite place for ice cream was Maple Avenue Drugstore. Walking from Fairfield Avenue down a steep hill was fun and easy: coming back was long and sweaty. Behind the shiny marble counter, busy soda jerks nodded and smiled at me—a chubby little girl who always ordered the same thing. “Two large please ice cream cones, one vanilla and one strawberry.”
Mother, Dad, Danusia, and Great Dog Brutus in Hartford, 1946
The vanilla was for me and the strawberry was for Brutus. If any adult patron of the drugstore thought it strange to see a child—I couldn’t have been older than four—ordering and paying from a supply of coins in her pocket, they didn’t mention it. No one ever asked me where my mother was, or why my only companion was my dog. As for me, all I cared about was getting away from Mother’s unpredictable temper and the yucky food that she prepared and I detested.
One blistering hot day, the ice cream was irresistible to greedy me. Sad-eyed Brutus watched me exit Maple Avenue Drugstore, preoccupied by voracious, up-and-down licking of both ice cream cones. Brutus waited for a few minutes until he saw his chance. Then, in one great gulp he seized his rightful share of the strawberry cone, followed by licking of my sticky berry-coated fingers. Consumed with outrage, I lunged for Brutus, grabbed his barrel chest and bit into his Great Dane lip. Like a wounded soldier howling with pain, Brutus sank to the sidewalk and collapsed his massive torso over the hot cement. Brushing a giant paw across his bleeding lip, he blinked up at me. I loomed above him—legs-splayed, gulping in and spitting out hot air. Mere moments later, Brutus lumbered back up to his full height. Gentle as always, he nudged me away from the traffic side of the walk and waited for me to grip his leather collar. His canine strength forged us up the arduous hill—once again, Brutus safely led me home.
In winter, our routine shifted to the front vestibule, where Brutus’ prostrate body covered nearly every inch of the shabby Oriental rug that bore endless comings and goings of dirty shoes. On certain days, when instinct told me that snow was coming, I’d climb over Brutus’ supine chest and position myself in front of the etched glass door panels to watch and wait. At last, the icy crystals began to fall. My imagination transformed the snow into delicious layers of melted marshmallow flowing over the front yard, topping the hedges and covering squares of sidewalk. The entire world around me had turned into a sugar-coated fairyland.
“Danusia, take letters to mailbox!” Mother commanded from somewhere in the house, piercing my daydreaming and alerting Brutus to lift up his great bulk. Slowly, he’d pad to the wall of coats and hats hung on wooden pegs, high for adults, low for me. I’d stretch to reach my red hat with ear warmer flaps and jammed it over my auburn hair. Then I‘d pull down my snug wool coat and stuff my arms through sleeves blocked by pesky woolen cords attached to dangling mittens. Puffing with effort, I’d bend over to pull on my rubber boots and fumble to close two rows of metal clips.
Wrapped and ready, hanging on to Brutus by his collar, we’d slide across the icy porch to make our way down snow-covered steps. What an odd pair we must have been, trekking along the sidewalk to the public mailbox several blocks away. During the early years of my childhood as I stood on mounds of cold winter snow, I actually believed that the thoughtful city of Hartford lowered mailboxes in winter so that little children like me could more easily reach the metal handle of the mail bin, slam it open, and shove important envelopes into the chute. Yet again, if any neighbor saw something strange about a small child and a very large dog undertaking walks together in the middle of winter, I never knew.
Grandma S
In spite of the constant presence of transient boarders, I was a lonely child. No kids my age arrived with the adults who came to live in our house. Perhaps by then, Mother didn’t take in boarders with children. Aside from my cousin Theresa, Great Dog Brutus was my sole companion—until Grandma S arrived.
Jennie S, who had no apparent relatives living near to care for her, arrived at Boarding House #2 during my preschool years and found a home with us during her remaining days. Although our time together was brief, I soon called her Grandma S out of love for the only grandma I’ve ever known.
“I’m ninety-eight years young,” Grandma S said, challenging anyone to doubt her piercing blue eyes. “I’ve lived this long because no morsel of meat has ever passed my lips.” A conviction she attributed to being a Seventh-day Adventist.
Mother nodded. “You are first healthy vegetarian person ever stay my house.” The deceptive smile on her face told me something devious was on her mind.
Brutus adored Grandma S as much as I did. We followed her around the house and kept her company in her small bedroom. Brutus always took his regular place stretched over the circular cotton rug on the floor. Grandma S would pat the chair seat cushion, too large for her trim bottom, and motion to me. I’d scramble up next to her and watch her fingers, agile and swift despite wrinkles and age spots, guide needles looped with brilliant colored threads. The bouquet of violets emerging within the wooden embroidery hoop mesmerized me.
“Stay close little one,” Grandma S murmured. Her affectionate voice, like her slimness, disguised a will of steel. With a thimble-tipped finger, she pointed just below the yellow embroidered bow, a blaze of hundreds of meticulous yellow silk stitches, and said, “Soon I will put your name here.”
Never doubting Grandma S, I imagined my name right along with hers. Would it be yellow or another brilliant color?
“Dear child, these flowers wouldn’t exist without you by my side,” she said. I pressed my chubby body into her leanness. Was the floral scent I inhaled coming from Grandma S or had the embroidered violets come to life?
From day one, Mother loved Grandma S. Unique among boarders, Grandma S was allowed to take her meals with me in Mother’s kitchen, where cooking odors seemed embedded in the walls. Even Brutus didn’t like the smells. He’d keep his big body turned backward in the corner. Three times a day, we’d wait for what was coming.
Mother shoved a plate heaped with mounds of Polish mystery food in front of me. “Eat!” she threatened with a greasy metal spatula. “Yes, Mamusia,” I blurted through a mouthful of yucky mush. When Mother spun away, I raised a paper napkin to my lips and lowered one less mouthful to my lap. Conspiring glances passed between Grandma S and me. And as if he knew and approved, Brutus grunted and farted from the corner.
“Something special for Grandma S,” Mother announced at the stove, then turned outstretched hands slick with spillage from the overfilled folk-patterned blue and white bowl. “Is only good Polish vegetables and broth!” As she slid the offering toward Grandma S, I took a suspicious look at the “broth” brimming with solid brown lumps. “No meat for you!” Mother’s voice was loud and she averted her eyes. Grandma S kept a serene smile on her face as she reached underneath the table to gently detach my hand from its soggy paper mass and hold it tight.
Grandma S had lived with us only six months when I had the bad dream. I was lost in dense white clouds, searching for someone important who had disappeared. My body temperature spiraled from numbing cold to sweating hot. Suddenly, a small opening compelled me, and I began to step through. A voice commanded, “Get back to earth!” Lightning flashed, everything around me turned black. I was back in my single bed, legs pushed tight against the wall. I twisted around to see pale morning light filtering through the venetian blinds.
It