how my aversion to sewed prunes led to a love of the brooklyn dodgers and brought me closer to my "big shot" dad...
IN THE FALL OF THE YEAR THE WAR ENDED...
IN 1945, ON THE RADIO THEY WERE TALKING about starvation in Japan and Europe. My mother used this information whenever she served stewed prunes for breakfast. What do you mean, they make you gag? she would ask me. Don't you know they're starving in Europe? Yes, we both know that they're starving, my dad would answer, but it doesn't look like we're doing much better here in Denver, Bertha. And in order to down the prunes, I conjured up pictures from the concentration camps, whispering words "Buchenwald" and "Auschwitz," I imagined emaciated men in striped pajamas walk through the front door of our house, all of them barefoot, their eyes were dots in black holes, their arms like dowels; and I'd say to myself, You have it good, Dick, you have food to eat, you are not fatherless, motherless, you are not a starving Jew, and they would probably enjoy stewed prunes. Almost always, that didn't seem to help.
By that time, the rationing of shoes had ended, then of meat, and finally of butter; and I was still eating stewed prunes. Once a week, I would haul my 9 year-old body down Colfax Avenue, my head bent against the biting winter wind in order to buy 2 loaves of fresh bread for my family in a bakery next to the Bluebird movie house; and if needed, and mine were worn to a stub, I then would walk down to a stationary store to buy myself number 2 Eberhard Faber pencils to draw cartoons with.
It was nearing Christmas, I was walking home late in the afternoon, and saw a burly man with a blackened face. He was delivering coal. I then saw another man arrive with a turkey. I asked my Dad who the men were and was told by my Father, lodge brothers. What lodge brothers? They are members of the Masonic Lodge, Son, he answered. Well, if they give you turkey and coal, what do you give them in return? I asked. Loyalty, he said. They have just elected me president, and we are having a party to celebrate.
In my mind, my Dad was now a big shot; and in the spring of 1946, a few weeks after I had become a Cub Scout, I realized what a big shot could do, when my Father informed my Mother that he never wanted to eat another prune ever again; and the very next morning, Mom made pancakes-and-eggs and I never saw a single prune on my breakfast plate from that day forward.
Not only had my prayers been answered, I also discovered one of my Dad's passions. I would understand later that baseball was what he thought truly made him an American, that the sports pages were as crucial to him as the Constitution. and that he loved the game of baseball almost as much as he loved my Mother. He also loved the Brooklyn Dodgers and his love of the Dodgers brought me closer to my Dad. Dad respected Leo Durocher, who was the manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers throughout the war, and Eddie Stanky, the grizzled little second baseman. And now that the war was over and here they were coming back to the baseball fields. Dodger war veterans were joining the players who were Dodgers through the war years: Pete Reiser and Pee Wee Reese and Carl Furillo and hundreds of others, and we would listen to Red Barber broadcast their games and announcing other names like: Augie Galan and Ducky Medwick and Dixie Walker.
The Dodgers started winning from opening day, and we could hear Red Barber, who made the games live in our heads with a gorgeous reality. Both The Denver Post and Rocky Mountain News covered the Dodgers in encyclopedic detail and even carried long reports on the Dodger farm teams in Montreal and St. Paul. And we learned that in 1946 up in Montreal, the Dodgers had one spectacular rookie. He was tearing up the league. His name was John Roosevelt Robinson. He was a negro.
You can't have a nigger on a major league team, a neighbor of ours said.
He can hit, my Dad replied. He can run. He can steal bases. Who cares if he's colored?
He'll never make it, the neighbor said.
I'll bet you 100 dollars that he will.
My Dad won the bet.
Then one evening the following spring, my Father came home from work with a great smile on his face. How would you to go to a Dodger game? he said. They are playing an exhibition game against the Cardinals at the Denver Bears Stadium. That Sunday, the two of us, in his old Chevrolet, parked on a street next to the stadium, and then watched thousands of people walking into the ballpark. And there it was: green and verdant and more beautiful than any place I had ever seen. And I was there with my Dad. And they were there too. I had only seen pictures of them in The Rocky Mountain News or The Denver Post. Down on the field, the Dodgers were taking batting practice. Here was Furillo. That was Pee Wee Reese, slapping balls into center field. And running through the grass, Pistol Pete Reiser.
What do you think? my Dad asked.
I love it, I whispered.
I loved him, as well...
..He was the biggest and best "Big Shot" that any boy could ever have...
...And on top of that, he was my Dad...
...And I was there with my Father on the best day of my entire life...
By that time, the rationing of shoes had ended, then of meat, and finally of butter; and I was still eating stewed prunes. Once a week, I would haul my 9 year-old body down Colfax Avenue, my head bent against the biting winter wind in order to buy 2 loaves of fresh bread for my family in a bakery next to the Bluebird movie house; and if needed, and mine were worn to a stub, I then would walk down to a stationary store to buy myself number 2 Eberhard Faber pencils to draw cartoons with.
It was nearing Christmas, I was walking home late in the afternoon, and saw a burly man with a blackened face. He was delivering coal. I then saw another man arrive with a turkey. I asked my Dad who the men were and was told by my Father, lodge brothers. What lodge brothers? They are members of the Masonic Lodge, Son, he answered. Well, if they give you turkey and coal, what do you give them in return? I asked. Loyalty, he said. They have just elected me president, and we are having a party to celebrate.
In my mind, my Dad was now a big shot; and in the spring of 1946, a few weeks after I had become a Cub Scout, I realized what a big shot could do, when my Father informed my Mother that he never wanted to eat another prune ever again; and the very next morning, Mom made pancakes-and-eggs and I never saw a single prune on my breakfast plate from that day forward.
Not only had my prayers been answered, I also discovered one of my Dad's passions. I would understand later that baseball was what he thought truly made him an American, that the sports pages were as crucial to him as the Constitution. and that he loved the game of baseball almost as much as he loved my Mother. He also loved the Brooklyn Dodgers and his love of the Dodgers brought me closer to my Dad. Dad respected Leo Durocher, who was the manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers throughout the war, and Eddie Stanky, the grizzled little second baseman. And now that the war was over and here they were coming back to the baseball fields. Dodger war veterans were joining the players who were Dodgers through the war years: Pete Reiser and Pee Wee Reese and Carl Furillo and hundreds of others, and we would listen to Red Barber broadcast their games and announcing other names like: Augie Galan and Ducky Medwick and Dixie Walker.
The Dodgers started winning from opening day, and we could hear Red Barber, who made the games live in our heads with a gorgeous reality. Both The Denver Post and Rocky Mountain News covered the Dodgers in encyclopedic detail and even carried long reports on the Dodger farm teams in Montreal and St. Paul. And we learned that in 1946 up in Montreal, the Dodgers had one spectacular rookie. He was tearing up the league. His name was John Roosevelt Robinson. He was a negro.
You can't have a nigger on a major league team, a neighbor of ours said.
He can hit, my Dad replied. He can run. He can steal bases. Who cares if he's colored?
He'll never make it, the neighbor said.
I'll bet you 100 dollars that he will.
My Dad won the bet.
Then one evening the following spring, my Father came home from work with a great smile on his face. How would you to go to a Dodger game? he said. They are playing an exhibition game against the Cardinals at the Denver Bears Stadium. That Sunday, the two of us, in his old Chevrolet, parked on a street next to the stadium, and then watched thousands of people walking into the ballpark. And there it was: green and verdant and more beautiful than any place I had ever seen. And I was there with my Dad. And they were there too. I had only seen pictures of them in The Rocky Mountain News or The Denver Post. Down on the field, the Dodgers were taking batting practice. Here was Furillo. That was Pee Wee Reese, slapping balls into center field. And running through the grass, Pistol Pete Reiser.
What do you think? my Dad asked.
I love it, I whispered.
I loved him, as well...
..He was the biggest and best "Big Shot" that any boy could ever have...
...And on top of that, he was my Dad...
...And I was there with my Father on the best day of my entire life...
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