Navy blue coats with sailor collars … I got one every spring from the time I was 3 until I reached 12. After the holidays, the coat was used only for “dressy” wear. I wore it until my wrist bones — plus one inch above — showed from the sleeves and the hemline was up around my hips. I breathed a sigh of relief when the weather turned cold, calling for something heavier. Usually a navy blue pea coat, nautical style. I never knew why. Neither of my parents could swim.
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Straw rollers … The de rigueur headwear to go with the NBCWSC (see above). The hats were always too big (Where’d everybody go?) or too small (How do I get my eyelids unstuck?) I never wore my roller more than once. It disappeared after the holidays, never to be seen again.
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Cigar boxes … Warm weather signaled a return to the Brooklyn streets. Let the games begin! Jacks, marbles, soda bottle caps, baseball cards. Each collection required a separate storage place. The wooden cigar box was the answer. But they weren’t easy to come by — unless you knew an adult who smoked cigars. That ruled out 90 percent of the fathers and most of the mothers in the neighborhood. My salvation was Uncle Louie. Thanks to him, I had lots of hard cardboard boxes with nice pictures of Dutch guys in big black hats and lace collars.
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Handball … Forget about robins and crocuses. We city kids didn’t know from them. The real harbinger of spring came with the sprucing up of handball courts at the local schoolyard. I couldn’t wait to get out there with my new “Spauldeen” (spelled Spaulding.) I loved playing, even though I was terrible at it. Took me three weeks to toughen up my serving hand after the winter hiatus. Oh the pain — but who cared? Years later, I saw a professional handball game on TV. They wore gloves on one hand. Aha!
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And there were potsy games on the sidewalk, flipping hazel nuts for pennies, wooden crates on skate wheels, new shoes, short-sleeved middy blouses at assembly time and ankle socks instead of knee-highs. Longer days meant more time to play.
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And off in the distance, there was the sound of bells. Oh joy unconfined. The ice cream man was on his way.
Copyright2016 HARRIET POSNAK LESSER
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Harriet Posnak Lesser is an award-winning journalist and social satirist whose articles have appeared in Long Island’s The South Shore Record and Nassau Herald, The New York Times, Cracked Magazine and others.