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said: 'All right. Finish that galley, but then you must come back to bed.
We'll stop at Rostock on the way home and mail the proofs to Ms
Marmelle.'
TWO -f ?I- The Editor My life as a rowdy
New York tomboy ended on a cloudy October day in 1955, when, at the age of
eleven, I was painfully transformed into a self-taught intellectual.
An unruly gang of six youngsters were playing a noisy game of stickball in
a three-walled, brick-lined cul-de-sac in the Bronx. A version of
baseball, this is a game that uses a broom handle as a bat to hit a
spaldeen, a pink rubber ball named after the Spaulding Company, which made
them, and when a well-hit ball ricochets off the walls, the game can
become a real test of skill. As always, I expected to be chosen first
when the teams were made up because I was spectacular not only at bat but
also in the field, for then I was constantly on the move and the batter
couldn't tell where I was going to wind up. This meant I was always ready
to dash full speed toward what looked likea sure hit, leap high in the
air, and snare it with my extended right hand. Older people watching nie
some- times cried: 'The lady Joe DiMaggio!' I liked the last part of
that name, but not the lady bit. My aspirations did not lie in that
direction. Whenever a game was about to start I said a little prayer:
'Please, God, let me be chosen today,' because if I was, my day was
made-or even my week. In the early days the boys had not wanted me in
their game and said so: 'This is a man's game. Girls keep out.' But
one day they were short one player; a red-headed Irish boy of twelve, Earl
O'Fallon, insisted that I be allowed to play, 114 and to
prove his conviction that I would contribute to the game, When I excelled,
the other boys whispered that he was a
jingle that he took pleasure in chanting in a
high-pitched voice whenever I came to bat:
soft on me, and a viperish boy no one liked made up 'Shirl,
Shirl, the goofy girl! No one loves her but a stoop named Earl.'
And if I popped up an easy fly for the other team to catch, its members
would join the poet in the chanting to tease O'Fallon and me. I have
always believed that O'Fallon wanted to ignore the teasing, for I knew he
liked me, but the viperish boy had another taunt that Earl could not
ignore: 'Why should a good Catholic boy be sweet on a Jewish girl?' When
others asked the same question he could find no answer, and one day he
startled me by snapping: 'You shouldn't be out here playing with the
boys,' and he refused to choose me for his team. in fact, he told the
other boys: 'I never liked her.' But because I was so good, the other
boys did choose me for their team. One day when Earl was at bat during a
crucial game, he gave his broom handle a mighty swing that drove the
spaldeen toward the far brick wall. This was exactly the kind of ball I
often caught with a spectacular flourish, but even as I ran with great
strides toward the spot in the wall where the ball would come, I remember
telling myself: 'Don't catch it. He will really love you if you don't
catch it.' But the rhythm in my running was so irresistible that I loped
over, leaped high in the air, and snagged it with my right hand.
instead of cheers I heard 'Shirl, Shirl, the goofy girl', and
I was so confused that I ran toward O'Fallon to tell him:
'Sorry I robbed you of a sure homer,' but this irritated him doubly, and
when I reached out to shake hands as a gesture
of friendship, all he could hear was the chanting of his
opponents - 'Nobody loves her but a stoop named Earl' - and he lashed out
with both hands, caught me just below the neck and pushed me heavily
against the very wall where I had leaped to catch his hit. Losing my
footing, I stumbled, flew backward against the rough brick and saved
myself at the last moment only by throwing out my right arm to absorb the
impact. in that awkward moment of smacking into the wall, I heard
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something snap and I fell to the pavement, my arm broken, while the
viperish boy continued to chant: 'Shirt, Shirt, the goofy girl.' What
hurt most was that O'Fallon did not come either to help me or to
apologize, while my own teammates, afraid of being held responsible for my
accident, fled the scene. Left alone, I headed home, cradling in my left
hand my limp right arm. In this wounded way, with no tears showing, I
climbed the steps to our second-floor tenement home and told my mother:
'Mom, I think something happened to my arm.' And I played no more
stickball. if I had to break my arm, I did it at an appropriate time,
for during my convalescence I came to realize that I could not continue my
tomboy. ways and associate with the rowdy boys; I had to remain indoors,
and this projected me unwillingly into the world of books, an area I had
not explored before. My tastes were simple, those of a girl of seven
or eight. I still found pleasure in fairy tales and the childish
novelettes of adventure. I rejected as 'icky' any story in which girls
showed a sentimental interest in boys, but when I explored books written
specifically for boys, some strong intuition told me that I was heading in
the wrong direction. It was then, as I became twelve with my broken
arm, that I accepted the fact that I was a girl and grew hungry to read
about girls like myself. In this discovery I was assisted by my uncle
Judah, a tailor who loved books, for he recognized the alteration in me:
116 .'The library's filled with elegant books for a girl like
you and when I asked: 'What kind?' he brought me, charged t his own
lending card, Anne of Green Gables: 'You read this a your age, Shirt,
you'll never forget it.' 'I don't like you to call me Shirt.' 'I'm
sorry - I won't call you that again. But it is a goo book, Shirley.'
When I took it from him I hefted it and said: 'It's hea and it looks long.
I don't think I'd like it.' It was only with difficulty that he
restrained himself fro slapping me, but he did growl: 'You're not wise
enougf Shirley, to make a judgment like that - based on nothinj Read
the book, you'll like it.' I laughed. 'You sound just like Mom. "Eat it,
you'll lik it.. I 'Well, you do like it, don't you?' 'When
it tastes good, yes.' 'This book will taste very good.' With the
opening of that book, leaning it against m broken right arm as I turned
the pages with my left hand, entered a new world, one that I found
increasingly wonder ful. I could visualize myself as this winsome Canadia
orphan, which led me to go to an atlas to see just wher Canada was; I
also studied the map to determine wher Heidi and Hans Brinker lived, and
in this way my physica world expanded at the same speed as my emotional
one Without knowing it, I was growing to love books. My horizons
widened in all directions when one after noon Uncle Judah* took me to the
public library and showe me the almost endless shelves of books for
children, but m tastes had now matured to the point where I gravitate
naturally to the section labelled YOUNG TEENS, and ther for
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