Literacy and Longing in L. A. (15 page)

Dr. Seuss Doesn’t Like Kids

“It had been startling and disappointing to me
to find out that story books had been written
by people, that books were not natural
wonders, coming of themselves like grass.”

~
Eudora Welty (1909–2001),
One Writer’s Beginnings ~

Y
ou may be wondering why we’re speeding down the 405 in Darlene’s faded yellow 1963 convertible Thunderbird. I’m riding shotgun, Bea and Harper are in the backseat, the sun is beating down on us, and the windshield acts more like a funnel than a barrier. Darlene drives her ratty muscle car as if it were a Ferrari, and as she downshifts I hear something that sounds suspiciously like metal scraping blacktop. My thighs are stuck to the vinyl seat, the radio squawks an old Beach Boys song, the shocks are a thing of the past, and Darlene is in heaven.

“I love my ’bird,” she yells at me over the wind. Sometimes you just need a party. And then you call Darlene.

It’s been a month since Lorraine died. Fred and I have spent a lot of time helping Bea with all the formalities and paperwork. I usually played with Harper outside while they sat at the dining room table filling out forms and dealing with the mountains of official documents that needed to be filed.

After a few weeks of this, Fred told me that Harper was finally going back to school and Bea had asked him to come along for moral support. He added that Harper was less than enthusiastic and that Bea kept putting off the date of her return. On the day before he was supposed to take them, Fred got a call from Bea telling him not to bother. We had just eaten breakfast and Fred was getting ready to go to work. The two of them had been getting on each other’s nerves lately and it was obvious, at least to me, that Bea felt she had disrupted Fred’s life long enough.

“She doesn’t really mean it,” I said to him. “She just doesn’t want to impose. I still think you should go.”

“If you think it’s so important, why don’t you go?” he snapped.

“Okay, I will,” I said. Boy, is he in a bad mood. But now I’m stuck. I AM right, though. Someone should be with them.

I called Bea back and told her I’d like to go instead of Fred and was that all right. I had bought a few things for Harper’s room and I was planning on bringing them this weekend anyway. Bea, ever gracious, said she’d be delighted. Fred grumbled and left for work.

The next morning, I held Harper’s small, delicate hand as Bea and I walked her into her second-grade class. The teacher, a young woman in her mid-twenties, gave Bea and Harper a hug and told them how much she missed having Harper in class. There was a poster on the blackboard signed by all the children welcoming Harper back, and I noticed her trying to wiggle out from the glare of all the attention. No kid wants to be different.

The teacher took Bea and me aside and reassured us that the counselor was standing by to help. It seemed as if the school had it handled. As we were leaving, Harper, whispering in my ear, asked me if I’d be there when she got home.

“Yes, of course,” I answered. She wrapped her thin arms around my neck and buried her head in my shoulder. Then she whispered something to Bea as well and clung to her until Bea gently pulled away. “Now, you’re my big girl and you’re going to be just fine.”

I had bought a pink satin poufy comforter with matching sheets and pillows for Harper’s room and a pretty round braided area rug to put by the bed. When Bea and I got home, we set up Harper’s room and then spent the rest of the day taking boxes of Lorraine’s stuff to Goodwill.

When Harper got home and saw the room, her eyes widened and she covered her face with her hands. “I love it,” she said shyly.

Later that night, when I told Fred about the day, he admitted that it was good I had gone and thanked me. He said Harper was bouncing off the walls and it was about time she was back in school.

In the weeks that followed, Harper resumed her usual activities, including Bible studies and an art class after school. Someone else took over Brownies and a few of the other things that Bea used to do. Every time I visited the house with Fred, Harper seemed busy and remarkably well-adjusted, considering the situation.

Then it was June and the pace of things shifted. Harper’s school let out and her schedule loosened up. Fred and I tried to stop by as often as we could, but the last time we went over, Bea seemed tired, Fred detached, and Harper was unusually withdrawn.

We were in the midst of a terrible bout of June gloom, the California phenomenon where the cold marine layer collides with the hot inland air and creates a blanket of thick morning fog, which can last all day. Harper’s spirits, which had been pretty stable, took a sudden turn for the worse. I don’t know whether it was depression or grief or boredom or a mixture of all three, but Bea was starting to worry and so was I. Harper just seemed like she was at loose ends. She would lie limply on the couch in her heavy flannel pajamas, afflicted with a kind of inertia that left her staring out into the emptiness, uninterested in whatever activities we suggested.

At about the same time, Fred got a call from New York regarding his play. This had been a bone of contention with us because he still hadn’t let me read it. He said it was because I wouldn’t like it, but I think he was afraid of my reaction. Whatever. An agent in N.Y. had shown some interest and wanted to meet with him. Fred was cautiously optimistic and we celebrated at dinner the night before he left. He took me to one of our favorite places, Paddy’s Crab Shack. I wore a black chiffon see-through blouse and a sexy, tight A-line skirt. This was our first real date since Lorraine’s death, and we were both thinking that we needed this night.

Fred looked weary and he wasn’t as talkative as usual. It was okay by me. Totally understandable. At least he wasn’t as depressed as he’d been. We both threw back a few and started to relax. He told me he was reading a fantastic, slim little novel by DeLillo called
The Body Artist,
about a woman who lives alone and encounters a strange, ghostlike guy who knows all about her. Weird. He then amused me with the latest dumb bookstore customer story. Several times I had an urge to bring up Bea and Harper, but I caught myself. He always seemed to brush off any of my concerns.

After dinner, Fred took me in his arms and we danced to Johnny Hartman and John Coltrane’s “You Are So Beautiful.” I just love the way he dances. I love the way he feels and smells. He did that thing I really like, brushing up against my ear with his mouth. He still does it for me. That’s all there is to it.

The next morning, I told Fred I would check in with Bea while he was gone. When I called her later that afternoon, she told me that the situation with Harper had deteriorated. Harper had a meltdown the day before when a friend came over to play and she was refusing to go to Bible studies or anywhere else for that matter. She just wanted to sit in Lorraine’s room and watch TV.

Darlene happened to call right afterwards and when I told her what was going on, her response was, “Road trip! I’ll drive.”

At first I thought, well, that’s a dumb idea, but then I remembered it’s what my mother used to do when things got really bad at home. A literary road trip. Why not?

So now we are heading for La Jolla. Often referred to as the best place to live in America, the draw is that it was the home of Theodor Geisel, better known as Dr. Seuss.

We get off the freeway at the tony seaside town of La Jolla. We drive past golf courses, restaurants, and lowkey shops like Cartier and Ralph Lauren until we reach a gas station. Bea and Harper get the key and head for the restroom while I fill up the car and hand Darlene some bios of Dr. Seuss I found on the Internet.

When my mother used to throw out historical facts during our literary trips, my sister and I would zone out. But because this is Dr. Seuss, I’m hoping to pique Harper’s interest.

“Darlene, pick out a few facts for me to tell Harper,” I say as I swipe my credit card.

“Not gonna happen. This is booooring…. Let’s go to Sea World.”

“I am NOT going to Sea World. And you’re wrong. All kids like Dr. Seuss.
The Cat in the Hat, Green Eggs and Ham, The Grinch
.”

“Okay. If you say so.” Darlene starts to paraphrase the articles in a singsong voice. “It says here, Dr. Seuss’s real name was Theodor Geisel and he moved to La Jolla in the early fifties with his first wife. Published forty-four children’s books. Invented the name Dr. Seuss when he published
And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street
. Seuss was his middle name and he just gave himself the doctor title. Uh-oh! Listen to this. Met his second wife, Audrey, eighteen years his junior, when they were both still married to other people. In the wake of their affair, Seuss’s first wife, Helen, committed suicide. Audrey divorced her husband, married Seuss, and sent her two daughters away to boarding school.”
^*

“What?! Where are you reading this?”

“
The New York Times
. You couldn’t make this stuff up. Listen, quotes from the wife, ‘He was very happy without children. I’ve never been very maternal. There were too many other things I wanted to do.’
^†
God, who are these people?”

“This isn’t exactly what I had in mind.”

Harper and Bea appear from the bathroom. Harper’s hair is a windblown mess. She’s wearing a white
The Cat in the Hat
T-shirt that I bought her and a denim skirt with ruffles. Bea has a floppy cotton hat tied under her chin and they are both excited to finally be here.

“Are we almost there?” Harper asks in a thin, expectant voice. Her eyes are wide with anticipation.

Darlene and I look at each other. “Oh yes!” I say with forced enthusiasm.

We drive up to the summit of La Jolla’s Mount Soledad, where a row of twisted and bent eucalyptus trees line the street. The house is a two-story structure surrounding an old observatory tower, which was Seuss’s studio, and there is a picture window that offers a commanding view of the Pacific Ocean. Parked out in front is a 1984 Cadillac with the personalized license plate GRINCH.

As we approach the house, Darlene points her index finger to her head and dramatically pulls an imaginary trigger, the universal sign for blowing your brains out. “Pow!” she mouths as she races past Geisel’s house.

“Dear, could you slow down a little?” Bea asks Darlene. Darlene grudgingly slows down.

I whisper to Darlene to cool it and quickly give Harper my own version of Geisel’s life. What a bust.

Normally, I would have gone into a whole thing. We would have parked a couple blocks away, walked to the house, and talked to a few people in the neighborhood. Then we might have looked up at the room and described what it must have been like to sit at those magnificent windows and write some of the most beloved children’s books of all time. I would have told Harper how Seuss started out as a cartoonist and his first children’s book was an ABC book. How before his books were published, children’s books were dumb little Dick and Jane readers that droned on and on and bored kids to tears. But my heart just wasn’t in it.

Instead I say, “We can’t go in because the widow still lives there.”

“Speaking of wicked witches, can we go to Coronado now?” Darlene asks. Our next stop is the home of L. Frank Baum. Thank god we have something else planned today.

Halfway to Fairyland

“There is no frigate like a book
To take us lands away.”

~
Emily Dickinson (1830–1886)
~

W
e are now speeding across the Coronado Bay Bridge, where, in the distance, the grand old Hotel del Coronado rises up like Oz above the Pacific shore. It’s been said that this flamboyant Victorian monument, with its cupolas, red-shingled turrets, and whimsical architecture, was the inspiration for the Emerald City, and I tell Harper that the author of
The Wizard of Oz
lived in a now-famous house down the street.

As we pull up to the hotel, Harper catches her breath. “Are we going in there?” she whispers with wonder in a hushed, cathedral-like voice.

“Yes,” I answer. “We’re staying here tonight.”

“It’s all planned. Leave it to your Auntie Darlene,” Darlene crows, as if she had anything to do with the hotel.

“My goodness. Doesn’t it look just like a wedding cake, Harper? Dora, my dear, this is too much,” Bea says.

“Oh no, Bea. I’m doing this for me too. I’ve wanted to come here. It’s nice to have company…wait until we get inside…” I say. Harper is now pulling my hand and excitedly running into the formidable, wood-paneled lobby.

I can hear her giggling as Darlene and I check in and the receptionist confirms our connecting rooms. When they ask me if I want a cot for Harper, I say yes.

“Make sure they don’t charge you for the cot,” Darlene adds in a too-loud voice. “These places always try to gyp you on the extra stuff. And don’t give Harper the key to the mini-bar. The Cokes are like ten dollars.”

I ignore her and take the keys to the room. She sneaks a look at the price and says, “The motel across the street is sixty bucks a night and you get breakfast. This is why you never have any money, Dora. You could’ve snowed Harper with a tour of the hotel and then moved over to the Cozee Cottage.”

It’s always such a delight to travel with Darlene. “Cut it out, Darlene. The whole point is to spoil them.”

“Okay. Never mind. This is really nice of you, Dora.”

They are now serving high tea in the Crown Room and I think, why not? I understand that Baum actually designed the crown-shaped chandeliers that drop from the domed sugar-pine ceiling. We sit at a table next to the window and gaze out on gardens bursting with
bougainvillea, hibiscus, and birds-of-paradise. I remember when I first moved out here, I was amazed to see birds-of-paradise growing like weeds next to gas stations—back East they are so expensive and rare.

We go for it and order the whole thing: scones with strawberry preserves and Devon cream, cucumber sandwiches with the crusts cut off, pastries, chocolate-dipped strawberries. There are five different kinds of imported tea, but Harper has her heart set on hot chocolate so we order that as well.

The presentation is lavish and Harper nods earnestly when a waiter asks her if she wants whipped cream. “Yes, please,” she says, her mouth open, eyes bright, as he leans over her shoulder and spoons out mounds and mounds into the white porcelain cup. He leaves the steaming sterling silver pot on the table next to several three-tiered silver servers laden with sweets.

It is twilight now, the darkness encroaches on our little tea party, and the warmth from the room, the tea, and the company wash over me. I watch Harper demurely reach for a tart and then eat it ever so slowly, one bite at a time.

“My goodness, how fancy,” beams Bea. “This is like a dream.”

“It sure is,” Darlene says, helping herself to some of the child’s whipped cream. “What do you think of all this, kiddo?”

“It’s really good,” Harper says self-consciously.

“Tomorrow we’ll go on a little field trip, see the house
of the man who wrote
The Wizard of Oz,
” I tell Harper, pulling some research out of my purse.

“Put it back, Dora. Don’t ruin this! I don’t want to know anything about him. I loved that movie,” Darlene hisses.

“Geez. Relax. Baum loved children. He was a good guy.”

“Well, I don’t know what other junk you might dig up and, frankly, I’d rather not hear it,” Darlene says as she motions for the waiter to come over.

The waiter appears instantaneously and Darlene says, “Any chance of a little high-octane stuff for the tea? It’s five o’clock somewhere.” She looks at her watch with a flowery gesture of surprise. “Oh my! It’s five o’clock here!”

The waiter, a twenty-two-year-old college student stuffed into formal attire, smiles, and is clearly getting a kick out of her.

Darlene flashes a flirtatious grin. “Just look at these fellows.” She points to a group of middle-aged businessmen at the next table. “I’m sure they’re dying for a little hooch. Aren’t you, guys?” They seem more than agreeable. My lucky night.

Bea and Harper are watching in amazement. Harper’s hand flies to her face, covering her mouth, hiding her smile, like kids do when they’re hearing something they’re not supposed to, and I quickly decide it’s time to reel Darlene in before this goes any further.

“Okay. Time to check out our rooms,” I say with gusto. We head upstairs, passing an antique caged elevator in the
middle of the lobby, which is manned by an old-fashioned uniformed operator in a pillbox hat. Harper is thrilled. “Grandma, can we ride in that?”

“We’re on the fourth floor and that old thing only goes to the second. Let’s just take the regular one,” says Darlene.

“Oh no. It’ll be fun. Let’s take this one,” I say.

“You’re such a pushover, Dora,” Darlene whispers fondly. “I can tell what kind of mother YOU’RE going to be. Your kids will get away with anything.”

Our connecting rooms have large balconies fronting the white sand beach. Bea and Harper are staying in one room and Darlene and I share the other. We unpack and settle in for the night. Darlene is very busy in the bathrooms collecting all the amenities: soap, shampoo, conditioner, body lotion, shower caps, and she even throws the candle in her bag. I tell her to at least leave some soap for the shower. And if she swipes the robe, it’ll cost us a hundred bucks. She breezes past me and flashes a heads-up sign. Then she switches on the satellite radio and turns to a rock station. Black Eyed Peas are playing “Let’s Get It Started” and she proceeds to talk about the latest film she saw—something the critics call a religious-horror-satanic spectacle, which I concluded was a terrible movie.

Around eight, she wanders into Bea and Harper’s room and I hear the two of them laughing and carrying on as though they were best friends. The conversation gets around to Bea’s Harper Lady days and Darlene flips out.

“You are such an amazing woman, Bea,” Darlene gushes, loopy and endearing all at once. If Darlene likes
you she’ll hang on your every word, in a guileless, completely sincere way. Suddenly, Darlene jumps up and yells, “Bea, it’s starting!” What a coincidence that some campy nighttime soap is “can’t miss TV” for both of them. Darlene flops on Bea’s bed and the two of them become thoroughly engrossed.

That’s when I hear a light knock on the connecting door. Harper is standing there in her pjs and terrycloth hotel slippers that are much too large for her thin bare feet. She is holding her blanket in one hand and a toothbrush in the other. “Can I come in?” she asks tentatively.

I lay her blanket on the bed and give her a big hug. Her body is warm and slight and her wet hair smells like Bea’s castile shampoo.

“Of course,” I say with a smile.

“Bea says that I can only stay for a little while because I might bother you.”

“No, I want you to stay,” I say, closing my book of short stories and laying it on the bedside table.

She smiles and jumps on the bed, slipping under the covers next to me. The hotel sheets are bright white and heavily starched. They feel cool, crisp, and luxurious.

“This bed is nice,” says Harper, pulling the fluffy down comforter right up to her chin.

“Shall I tell you a story?” I ask. She nods and cuddles closer.

“Hmm,” I say, stalling, mentally sorting through all the old stories I read as a child.

“Once upon a time—”

“Not scary,” she interrupts.

“Okay,” I say. “Once upon a time—”

“And not sad…”

“Okay,” I say again, smiling. “Not scary. Not sad. Got it.”

Harper sighs and I feel her body relax.

I tell Harper the story of
The Water Babies
by Charles Kingsley. I remember most of it but change it around, especially the part about the poor little chimney sweep who was beaten by his master. I’m pretty sure she’s never heard it before because you can’t even find the book anymore. It’s probably because it’s too old-fashioned and the language is difficult.

Harper loved the part about the Irish fairy godmother who changed children into water babies and how they swam around in an ideal world where the sun was never too hot and the frost was never too cold and they had nothing to do but enjoy themselves and look at all the pretty things.

After that, I tell her the short version of
The Borrowers
. She hasn’t seen the movie, thank goodness, so all the charm and mystery of things just disappearing are fresh and new to her.

But then something happens. I’m describing to her how things you love are never really lost, they are just borrowed by magical fairies, when suddenly, I see tears rolling down her cheeks. Her shoulders are heaving up and down as she buries her head in the pillow.

“I miss my mommy,” she cries.

Oh god. How stupid I am for telling her that story. I pull Harper up in my arms and set her on my lap on the
edge of the bed. She leans her warm moist cheek on my shoulder, still sobbing, and I pat her back and stroke her hair.

“Gee, Harper. Such a lot of troubles for a little girl, and you are so brave and wonderful.”

“Why can’t my mommy come back from heaven? Maybe the angels just borrowed her for a little while and they’ll bring her back to Grandma and me and then we’ll all be together again.”

“Harper, baby, your mommy will come back in your memories and in your heart. All your life she’ll be with you. I know it doesn’t feel like that now, but it will happen.” I wonder if what I’m saying is making her feel better. She’s quiet for a while as I rock her back and forth. If this gets any worse, I’m calling Bea.

“Do you want to tell me something about your mother? Something you remember?” I ask.

Her brow furrows. “Grandma and I would sometimes wait for Mommy to come home and we’d be so worried. When she came home, even though it was really late, we’d have picnics on the rug in front of the TV and eat jelly sandwiches with popcorn.”

“Sounds like fun.”

Harper smiles. “Yes. And then she’d tell me stories about her boyfriend and how we were all going to take a trip someplace soon.”

“I bet she was really looking forward to that.”

“And then she’d let me put on her eye shadow and lipstick and we’d dance to teenage music.”

They could have been sisters, poor kid. Harper gets
back into bed, I rub her back, and she falls asleep almost immediately.

In the movie version of
The Wizard of Oz,
Dorothy’s adventure is just a dream. In Baum’s book, Oz really exists, a magical land over the rainbow, where a child can escape all of her problems and sorrows. So now she sleeps. Frank Baum believed in the power of fairy tales, in the power of a child’s imagination to heal and comfort. To pull them out of dark places and carry them to a distant land. I hope she’s halfway to fairyland.