Emma and Miss Spencer

Wearing my red flannel shirt and dungarees and with my baseball glove hanging from the handlebars of my bike, I would ride the quarter of a mile to the local drug store to buy a Coke and a Table Talk blueberry pie. No one told me to eat everything on my plate or to take my elbows off the table. It wasn’t that the pie tasted better than my mother’s scrumptious desserts, but when coupled with my freedom of choice and the short respite I felt from my parents’ unhappiness, nothing was more delicious. I shared nothing about my secret trips to the woods, so that they would not be infringed upon by my strict father or a mother who worried about what the neighbors would think. My private time was precious because it gave me the chance to rejuvenate. I sang in harmony with the birds and had quiet talks with the small creatures that kept me company there. I leaned against my favorite tree, hidden by the large, leaf-filled branches, relieved that no one in the world could see me. I picked Lily of the Valley to bring home to place in a small vase on my bureau next to the statue of the Blessed Mother. But on those days I spent in the woods, I didn’t even want Mary to know where I was. Sometimes, though, as I leaned against the large oak, I would ask her to make my parents happy. I never really expected an answer, because I knew that even she couldn’t perform that miracle.