During the first months that Leta lived with her brother Aaron
and his family in 1929, she sometimes joined her brother during his evening’s
work. He was a poker game dealer, a skill he acquired during his brief time in
Reno, Nevada and the Southwest. These games were held in the backrooms of
various illegal drinking establishments. While he was in the back room, she sat
at the bar, drank whiskey and participated in pleasant conversations with the
men who spent their evenings enjoying a drink or two before after a hard day’s
work.
They mostly went to the Flat Iron, which was located a few
blocks away. It was an inconspicuous place. The front windows were covered on
the inside in black muslin. The exterior was covered in peeling paint. The
parking lot, such as it was, was gravel. It looked like an abandoned shop of
some kind. Two broken down automobiles always sat there, rusting in the
changeable weather. Most of the guests parked in the farm equipment dealer’s
lot across the street. The front door looked like it was boarded up, but it
wasn’t. One needed only to knock, and someone would open it. The front area
held fewer than two dozen merrymakers at a time. In the backroom, the proprietor
set up a table large enough for six poker players. Aaron drove drive them, and
then left Leta to her own devices, while he went into the backroom to deal the
cards to the participants.
Leta sat at the bar. There were a few regulars she knew—mostly
married men. Occasionally one brought his wife for an evening away from home
and children. Two other women, both at least fifty years old, making them older
than Leta, also came regularly. One of the women was unhappily married. Her
husband worked in Michigan and only came home two weekends each month. When he
was home, he expected her to be at his beck and call. When he was gone, she was
responsible for caring for his invalid father, an unpleasant man made moreso by
chronic arthritis. The other regular female patron was a widow, slowly drinking
herself to nothingness. Most of the men were locals. They worked on farms or in
small factories nearby. The card game drew some outsiders, but they did not
stay in the bar long, unless the table was full and they had to wait until one
of the players left to make a space available. These fellows, Leta found, were
rather anxious about being there. They did not talk much to her. They kept one
eye toward the door and one ear to the outside.
The Flat Iron had never been raided by the county sheriff or
federal prohibition marshals.
Sometimes Leta left before Aaron did. A friend would drive her
back to the house. Sometimes, when his night concluded, the poker game
dissolved or he just became tired, her brother would collect her from the bar
and drive her home. Sometimes Leta did not arrive home until a day or two later.
During her evening, Leta would strike up a conversation with
another bar patron, and he would eventually invite her to a more private
assignation. When this occurred, she would almost always acquiesce.
Over the first three months that she lived with Aaron,
Florence and their girls, Leta made a steady shift; she entered a world of
temporary male companionship. She found that during her drinking, flirtations
and subsequent liaisons, she could disregard or suppress all of her grief,
loneliness and solitude.
In November she learned that her children’s father married a
woman named Eunice Powers, and she moved in with him, her children and his
parents. They met, she was told, at a church function. Eunice pursued Ralph
aggressively, and one day they went to the courthouse for the marriage
certificate. Ralph’s mother was not pleased, but by this time, Ralph was
working and supporting the family. With his children living there, he had become
the head of the household.
Leta had been entertaining thoughts of spending Thanksgiving
with her children. She was going to ask her brother and sister-in-law if she
might invite them to have dinner with the family. She had not seen them since
she took them to their father’s, and she finally felt stable and comfortable.
She missed them. Then she learned about Ralph’s marriage. Her informer told her
that the marriage took place in late October and that Ralph’s new wife had been
married previously.
Leta was devastated. Not only had she given over the raising
of her children to her first husband, but also he had gone and brought a new mother
figure into the house. Ralph’s mother Ida was a grandmother, an entirely
different function, but a woman her own age was definitely encroaching on
mother territory. She was angry with Ralph for marrying the woman, and for waiting
so long to do so. If he had married right after their divorce, when Vivian and
Dale stilled lived with her, the woman would have remained a secondary
character in their lives. They would not have seen her very often, not been in
the place to develop much of a friendship with her, let alone a relationship.
There would be no competition. This, however, was entirely different. Now,
she—their mother—was the outsider. First, she put her children through the
death of their beloved Albert, two terrible marriages, near poverty and living
in a perilous neighborhood. Then, with no alternative, she abandoned them,
because she could not provide what they needed. This she regretted every day,
even as she recognized that this was for their benefit. More terrible, if not
unforgivable, was that she had not seen or even spoken to
them since the August day she left them. She heard stories and rumors from
friends about their health and welfare, but personally, she had removed herself
from their daily lives. She was no longer their mother, no longer the providing
their primary care. She had become the woman who used to take care of them.
To be continued.
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