Grant High School - Memoirs Yearbook (Portland, OR)

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Citrus Powder and hurried away to conquer and subdue two huge baskets of rebellious clothes, dreaming the meanwhile to he a great lady. Some day, when her high school and college education was complete, she would put down the soap and grasp a pen, and she would become a great lady. People would nod and nudge as she passed in the street and would respectfully whisper, “There goes,” nod and whisper, “There goes Johanna Holt.” No! “There goes Johanna Vivian Darnell”—no “There goes V. Johanna Fairfax!” And all unmindful of her fame and renown she would smile sweetly to them and modestly step into her high-powered car and in low tones direct “To the studio, Janies.” Then with a subdued purring the luxurious car would whirl her away from the admiring throng. With this, V. Johanna Fairfax gathered together the bath towels, and like a true general mercilessness sent them after the defeated and retreating troupe of sheets and pillow cases into the steaming suds. She would be more- than a great lady; she would be kind, and noble, without hope of reward. She would take thousands of dollars that her popular books had earned for her and send David to school. Of course David would at once become an internationally known surgeon. There would come a day, perhaps, when he would kiss her band and say, “God bless you; you made me what I am today.” Then she would reveal to him her hidden love—whereupon two very sympathetic tears dropped lightly into the wash tub. A low, cautious little whistle recalled the dreamer. Hurriedly wiping her eyes, and still more hurriedly dumping the remaining rebels into “soap lake,” the future authoress ran to meet the great doctor. They stole a hurried visit to the neighboring drug store, away from the disapproving eyes of Mother Krum, to dream over syrupy soda glasses of things to be. Things to be grow dim when things that are go wrong. Months, and months, and months of endless dishes, of scrubbing, of baking and cleaning, finally robbed the little maker of fancies of her villains, her queens, her troupe of rebelling clothes. The brave gentlemen were merely knives to be washed and polished and put away. The weekly washing brought no military triumph to the tired little general as she hung tbem listlessly on the clothes line in the early bleak morning hours. Tired feet and aching back did not inspire ambition for school, and little by little Johanna began to dream of things more real. Fame was too dearly bought. Far sweeter now she imagined the long, lazy days at home, spent in reading in her snug little room. It would be easier to make believe with mother, who fancied away all cares. It was easier to imagine hard work than to do it. Slowly but surely V. Johanna Fairfax’s coach and six changed back to pumpkin and rats, until at last one day she packed her books and baggage. Over the last delicious soda she tearfully begged David to carry on, and then a weary little dreamer went home. Johanna hung her damp dish towel over the dish pan and rolled down her sleeves. “If I were to go to the North Pole,” she sighed, “I should never run away from dishes. I was born under a dishy star.” Mrs. Holt smiled. “Then, Johanna dear, all the stars are dishy,

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U. 8. Grant MEMOIRS Page 9 .............................inilllMIIIMIIIIIIIIIIIIIMMIMIHMIlinilllltlllllllHIIIIIIIIIHintMIIIIMIIHIimMlllllimillllMIIIIIIIIIHIIIIIIIIMIIIHIIIIIIMIIinillllllhlMIH.. The Great Lady “flJ'OR the knives are brave gentlemen, and the forks are gracious ladies, and the spoons—they are babies. All of them must be carefully tucked away in their purple velvet bed in the buffet drawer.” This done—Johanna returned to the kitchen. The plates are just people, the pots are black villains, but the glasses—they are queens, beautiful queens of Crystal Kingdom.” Their highnesses were gently scrubbed in the foamy bubbles of a plebian dish pan. “Johanna, you will not forget the roaster now?” called Mrs. Krum sharply from another room, inferring lest her piercing order might not reach the ears of her little high school maid. She thumped into the kitchen to see if all was as all should be. “Oh, yes, Mrs. Krum ; I fed that villain Citrus Powder and scalded him until he turned from his black ways to a brighter one—that I did.” “You tire me, Johanna, with such silly talk about a roaster as if it were a person.” “But, Mrs. Krum, a roaster is a very wicked creature, getting itself all mussed up like this; and mother said that it was a noble thing to bring it back to beautiful cleanliness again. Why, mother said that a shining kettle sings sweeter than a greasy one, and that brightly polished glasses wouldn’t even nod good morning to the smeary ones, and—.” “Goodness, Johanna, enough! I should think that your high school lessons would take some of this nonsense out of your head, but I guess it’s in your blood! Not that I would say anything against your mother, but if she would dream and make believe less she would be a whole lot better off. Honestly now, I think she should keep you home to help her on the farm—she a widow, and working you out in the city for a little more book learning in High School! That won’t help you none to keep house with when you’re married once. I never had any High School, and I am satisfied with myself.” “When papa said to me, ‘Mamma, I need our boy, David in the store; lie’s had enough learning; I didn’t interfere with any dream about his learnin’ a lot of book learnin’. David was awful upset, but he’ll get over it, and he’s a real help in the store now.” “But David might have become a great doctor like he hoped to do if you had let him go on. “Tush—more dreams! Why papa is paying him sixty-five dollars a month now, and his board free. If he’d of kept up in school it would have took him years to earn even his board yet. It’s a good thing he didn’t have a dreaming mamma like yours, Johanna, letting you dream to be a great lady and working your young years away with school books. Well, don’t forget the roaster, and mind to soak the washing. If you get up at five you can have it out before school, yes, Johanna?” Mrs. Krum, casting one more regal glance over her large, dingy kitchen, nodded in approval and thumped out. The little dreamer whisked and polished her dream queens to a delightful glitter and stood them in a proud row on the shelf, with no smeary ones among them to be snubbed and despised ! Then came a last angry tug at the villainous roaster, who begrudgingly turned over his mighty new leaf to lead a clean life. Thereupon she snatched her

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U. S. Grant MEMOIRS Page 11 for dishes are the common light for womankind.” “Well, I’ve been brought up in a dish pan,” remonstrated her daughter, “but somehow, some way, 1 am going to break away from it all.” “Great ladies who write fine books never have to do dishes,” her mother reminded her. “It is six months now since you left school. You talk only of what you would like to do, but you do nothing!” “Dishes, mother! I do lots of dishes!” “They are only means to an end; be careful lest the means becomes the end. I have done many of them in my life, too. But when my hands were red and sore, and when I was more tired than I thought I could bear, I laughed because I had my dreams of you, Johanna dear—that some day you should be a great lady. Now I can laugh no more, and I am tired because my dreams are done.” Johanna swallowed tightly, but she answered, “I can’t mums. I can’t go back to it. It’s too hard. I can’t work my way through school. I just can’t! If you could be with me, it would be different. Mrs. Krum is so different—always telling me I’m silly to imagine about things and always heaping more and more work on me. Why, it was terrible the way she worked me! David writes they can't keep a girl now since I left. He writes he’s been going to night school since then, too, and that some day real soon lie’s going away to school.” “Some day,” answered Mrs. Holt, “he may become a great doctor and you? Will you become a great lady some day?” “It won’t make any difference. He’d never think of me then, anyway.” “No, perhaps he wouldn't of a quitter, but surely he would remember the famous Johanna Holt who had earned her own success.” “He never would,” retorted Johanna. “Why he—.” A low cau-itous whistle interrupted her. Amazed! Delighted! The little drudge flew to meet the young storekeeper and they talked together a long while, of many things. “For the knives are brave gentlemen and the forks are gracious ladies,” Johanna sang gaily as she tucked them away. David had gone to college to be a great doctor. Great doctors love only great ladies, so Johanna had come back to Mrs. Krum, to school, and to dreams. Once again she told herself the world would know V. Johanna Fairfax, or would it be V. Johanna Krum? And blushing most furiously, she fiercely polished the queens of Crystal Kingdom. —Astrid Erickson. English Folks You see a beautiful girl walking down the street. She is singular and you are nominative. You walk across to her, changing to verbal. Then it becomes dative. If she is not objective, you become plural and you walk home together. Her mother is accusative, and you become imperative. You talk of the future, she changes to objective. You kiss her, and she becomes masculine. Her father becomes present. Things are tense, and you become a past participle. —Virginia Warnock.