The All-Girl Filling Station's Last Reunion

  At Christmas during her senior year at SMU, she had come home a complete nervous wreck and sick as a dog. And then two weeks later, when she had informed her parents that she was going to marry Earle Poole, Jr., from Selma, Lenore had thrown a complete fit.

  The Pooles were a perfectly nice family. Earle’s father was a doctor. But unfortunately, all the Poole men had big ears that stuck out a little on the side. “If you don’t care about me, think of your future,” Lenore had cried, waving her handkerchief in the air. “Those ears may be fine on a boy, but dear Lord in heaven, Sookie, think of those ears on a girl! You can’t hide a thing like that. I’ve waited all my life to have granddaughters to dress up and to have their portraits painted, and I certainly don’t want the Poole ears in the picture!”

  Lenore had then flung herself onto the sofa sobbing. “I don’t understand you. With your family background, you could have anybody you wanted. I sold my soul to get you into Kappa, so you would only meet the very nicest boys from the finest families, and this is how you reward me? By marrying Earle Poole, Jr.? Some dental student with big ears? Someone you went to grammar school with? Oh, why did your father and I bother to spend all that money on your debut and college? When I think of all those contacts wasted, oh, I just can’t bear it. I feel like getting Granddaddy Simmons’s sword off the wall right now and just falling on it.”

  It was usually at this point that Sookie had always given in to her, but probably because she was sick and still had a high fever, for the first time in her life, Sookie had stood her ground.

  “Mother, I know you don’t want to hear this, but I couldn’t have married any boy I wanted. Don’t you think I tried to find someone you would approve of? I dated everybody that asked me out. I had six dates in one day. Do you know how hard it is to be perky six times a day? I’m not pretty like you, Mother. The boys didn’t fall all over me like they did you. I can’t do it anymore. Earle loves me just the way I am, and no, we are not perfect. He has big ears, and I’m not smart or beautiful, and if you can’t bear it, I’ll go and get the sword, and you can do what you want with it. But I am going to marry Earle Poole, Jr.”

  Lenore had been so stunned at her daughter’s sudden strength that she stared at her for a moment. Then she sat up and said, “Well, I can see that you are becoming more like your father every day.” She sniffed a wounded little sniff. “This stubborn streak is certainly not from my side of the family. And if you refuse to listen to reason, there’s nothing more I can do, but when you give birth to Howdy Doody, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  She had married Earle, but she had never heard the end of it. After Dee Dee, their first girl, was born, as Sookie was being taken back to her room, she had heard Lenore from all the way down the hall, standing at the hospital nursery window and wailing at the top of her lungs, “Oh, my God, Alton, she has the Poole ears! I knew it! I just knew it!” Unfortunately, the Pooles, who were in the waiting area around the corner, had heard Lenore as well. After that, family holidays were never pleasant.

  When she told her mother she was expecting again, Lenore’s reaction had been less than enthusiastic. “Oh, no,” she sighed. “Well, let’s just hope and pray it’s a boy.”

  Eight months later, as Sookie was being rolled down the hall, exhausted and groggy from delivering not just one, but two more, baby girls, Lenore had come up alongside the gurney and whispered to her, “Mother doesn’t want you to worry. I’ve checked into it, and my friend Pearl Jeff knows the very best plastic surgeon in New Orleans. She says it’s a simple little procedure, and who’s to know the difference?” My God … if Earle had not stepped in and stopped it, she might have let Lenore push her children into plastic surgery!

  AS FOR EARLE, HE had loved Sookie all through grammar school, and they had dated a little in high school, but he knew her mother had higher hopes for Sookie’s future than him. So when Sookie had gone off to SMU, he had more or less given up.

  But that Christmas in 1966, when he heard she was home for Christmas and was sick in bed, he screwed up his courage and went over to see her. Lenore had come to her door and begrudgingly let him in. “You can only stay for a short while, Earle, she needs her rest.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  Sookie had been propped up in bed, dozing on and off all day, when she thought she heard a knock on her door. A second later, there stood Earle Poole, Jr., wearing a blue suit and holding a bouquet of flowers and a box of candy. He said, “Hi, Sookie. I heard you were home, and I just wanted to say hello.” The minute she saw him, Sookie suddenly burst into tears. He looked so goofy standing there in that bow tie and that bad haircut. She had always liked Earle, but it wasn’t until that moment that she began to love him.

  POINT CLEAR, ALABAMA

  FRIDAY, JUNE 10, 2005

  THE NEXT MORNING, WHILE SOOKIE WAS FEEDING PEEK-A-BOO, THE phone rang, and Sookie almost jumped out of her skin. She looked to see if it was Lenore calling. If it was, she would not pick up, but she saw that it was Ce Ce calling from her honeymoon at Callaway Gardens in Pine Mountain, Georgia.

  “Hi, sweetheart,” she said as cheerfully as she could possibly manage.

  “Hi, Mother, how are you?”

  “Oh, just fine, honey.”

  “I just called to let you know that we got here safe and sound, and we are just loving it. How’s Dad?”

  “Just wonderful.”

  “Is Peek-a-Boo giving you any trouble?”

  “No, not at all. She’s right here, honey, having her breakfast, and we’re having a good time.”

  “Oh, great. Well, I love you. Tell Dad hey.”

  “Okay, darling. We love you. Have fun, and we’ll see you when you get home.”

  After she hung up, she realized that at some point, she was going to have to tell the children that their grandmother was not really their grandmother. But it certainly wasn’t the kind of thing you would tell someone on their honeymoon.

  That afternoon, she took her binoculars upstairs and waited until she saw Lenore heading out to the end of the pier with her tea cart to have her usual five o’clock cocktails with her Sunset Club friends. Sookie then called Lenore’s nurse, Angel, and told her that she had just come down with a terrible flu that the doctor said was highly contagious and could be fatal to older people, and he had advised her not to get anywhere near her mother for at least two weeks. She felt terrible about lying to Angel, but at this point, she didn’t care if she ever saw or talked to Lenore again.

  Just seeing Lenore from a distance was upsetting. All she really wanted to do was go downstairs and pull out a bottle of vodka and drink the entire thing. She thought about it, and it was very tempting, but she also had a big fear of becoming completely unruly and disgracing her husband and children in public. Unfortunately, she had always had a tendency to fall apart under stress and do something stupid. At her coming-out party, she had been so nervous, she had way too much to drink, and at the formal dinner afterward, she wound up flipping ice cream across the table with a spoon and had hit a good friend of her mother’s in the back of the head. That same night, she had stepped on an olive and had skidded across the dance floor and wound up under someone’s table.

  And it wasn’t just alcohol. In college, she had been heartbroken when some boy didn’t ask her to the big fraternity party, and she had eaten two dozen Krispy Kreme doughnuts she had pilfered from the Kappa house kitchen pantry. Her roommate had come back from a date and found her passed out in the bed with a half-eaten jelly doughnut still stuck in her hair.

  And she had always been accident prone. Coming down the aisle at her own wedding she had somehow managed to trip over her wedding veil, and she was the only person she knew who had broken a leg falling off a merry-go-round that was standing still at the time. Why Lenore ever thought she could become a ballerina was still a mystery to her.

  As Sookie sat in her bed petting Peek-a-Boo, something suddenly occurred to her. All those years of feeling bad about herself, and it might not
even be her fault! Polish people might not even be good dancers.

  EARLE HAD BEEN ALMOST as surprised at the news as Sookie was, but driving to work that next day, he suddenly remembered a conversation he had once had with Sookie’s father. And thinking back now, he wondered if Mr. Krackenberry had been trying to tell him in a roundabout way that Sookie was adopted.

  That night, Earle and his future father-in-law had just escaped the huge engagement party given for them at the country club and had gone out to the back patio overlooking the golf course to have a smoke.

  As they stood there listening to the crickets, Mr. Krackenberry, a tall distinguished-looking man, had felt sorry for the boy. He could tell that Earle was scared to death of Lenore, but to his credit, Earle had hung in there, even after Lenore had thrown such a fit and continued to stare at his ears.

  After a long moment, Mr. Krackenberry had cleared his throat and said, “Earle.”

  “Yes, sir?”

  “You and Sookie are about to take a mighty big step. However, before you do, there’s something about her that you should know.”

  “About Sookie?”

  “Yes … and it could make a difference about how you feel.”

  Earle took a deep breath and faced him. “With all due respect, sir, I know her mother doesn’t approve of me, but there’s nothing you could tell me about Sookie that would make me change my mind. I love her, and I intend to marry her.”

  “I’m glad to hear it, son … but … how can I put this? You’ve heard the old saying, ‘If you want to know what your wife will be like in twenty years, just look at the mother’?”

  “Yes, sir. I’ve heard that … but I still love her. Oh, no offense, sir.”

  “No, none taken. And I assume you’re aware that my wife has a brother and sister at Pleasant Hill and the family history.”

  “Yes, sir. Sookie told me.”

  “Ah … and so, naturally, you might have some concerns about Sookie and any future children. But, if I were you … I wouldn’t worry about it.”

  “Oh, I don’t. Why?”

  “Do you trust me, son?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And do I have your word as a gentleman that this conversation will never be repeated to anyone—especially to Sookie’s mother?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Well, then … don’t ask how I know, but I give you my word. Sookie is not a thing like her mother, or any of the Simmonses, for that matter. Do you understand?”

  “Yes, sir. I think so. Oh … wow … well, that’s a relief.”

  “Yes, I thought it would be.”

  “Oh, no offense, sir.”

  He laughed. “Again, none taken. I realize that Lenore may seem a little odd to you now and then, but I’ll tell you, son … to me, she’s still the most beautiful girl in the world. I haven’t had a dull moment since the day I met her.”

  At that very moment, Lenore had whisked out on the porch in a tizzy, scarves flying behind her, and called out, “Alton … where are you? Oh, there you are. I need you. We have a tragedy. I just dropped my good ring in the punch. I just pray no one’s swallowed it. It was Great-Grandmother’s! Hurry!” Mr. Krackenberry looked at Earle and said, “See what I mean?” and started rolling up his sleeves as he followed Lenore back inside.

  It’s funny, but somehow, after that conversation, Earle had not worried about Sookie, nor had he ever really questioned what Mr. Krackenberry knew. But now he understood what the man had been trying to tell him.

  THAT NIGHT, WHEN EARLE came home, he told Sookie about the conversation he’d had with her father at their engagement party.

  Sookie was surprised. “Why didn’t you tell me this before?”

  “Well, honey … to tell you the truth … I just forgot.”

  “You forgot? Earle, do you have any idea how many sleepless nights I’ve spent wondering if I was going to wind up at Pleasant Hill?”

  “No.”

  “No … you didn’t! Because I didn’t want to worry you. And now I find out you were never worried in the first place. I even wrote you and the children a good-bye letter with instructions, and now you say, ‘I forgot?’ ”

  “Well, honey, I also gave your father my word as a gentleman not to say anything. And he didn’t tell me why you were not like Lenore.”

  “But why didn’t Daddy ever tell me?”

  “I guess he thought it would be better for you not to know.”

  “I wonder if Buck knows I’m adopted. I wonder if he knew all along and didn’t tell me—”

  “Oh, I would doubt it, honey …”

  Now Sookie was even more shook up. What else did she not know that nobody had ever told her?

  It was all so strange, and none of it made any sense. Buck was clearly related to Lenore, and yet, growing up, Lenore had always looked at him like he was something that had just dropped out of a tree. Whenever he would run through the house, she would exclaim, “Who is that odd creature that just ran through my living room with filthy feet? Surely, it can’t be related to me!” Lenore had always paid much more attention to her than she had to Buck. And Sookie had always felt somewhat guilty about it. She had even asked Buck if he didn’t resent her because of it, and he had said, “Are you kidding me? I’m just glad she has you to push around and not me.” But why had she pushed her so hard? Was it because she was a girl? Lenore always said, “Men are necessary up to a point, but women are the natural leaders in society and in the home.” Or was Lenore trying to make her into something she was not? Had Lenore almost wrecked Sookie’s life just so she would look good?

  Sookie realized she shouldn’t be upset with Earle about not telling her about the conversation with her father. He thought he was doing the right thing at the time, and she could see he just felt terrible about it. But she was still confused about what she should do now, or if she should do anything at all.

  WINK’S PHILLIPS 66

  1937

  BESIDES WINK JURDABRALINSKI, THE SIX-FOOT BLOND DREAMBOAT who filled your tank and cleaned your windshields, there was another reason Wink’s Phillips 66 had more than its share of female customers. Clean restrooms! Momma had been ahead of the national mind-set on that score.

  At the beginning, the care and maintenance of the station was mostly a male-dominated affair and as a result, most filling station restrooms were poorly maintained. The sinks and toilets were rarely cleaned, and the floors were usually filthy. As one horrified woman said upon leaving one in Deer Park, Michigan, “You could grow a garden in the dirt on the floor in there!” Women rarely felt safe using one and did so only in emergencies.

  But at Wink’s Phillips 66, Momma always insisted that both the men’s and women’s restrooms were kept as clean as the bathrooms inside her home. All four girls took turns making sure there was a fresh cake of white soap on the basin and a clean white towel, and that each customer that walked in would be greeted with gleaming white sinks and toilets and a white tile floor that had just been scrubbed with Lysol. A germ would not stand a chance at Wink’s. All day long, you would see one of the Jurdabralinski girls scurrying to and from the house with a pail and scrub brush and a towel over her arm. Naturally, there were squabbles about whose turn it was to clean, but it was always done. Wink and Poppa and the other mechanics were never allowed to use the customers’ bathrooms. “I don’t want you and your greasy hands getting everything all dirty,” Momma said.

  As more and more women and girls were starting to drive cars, the gas companies finally caught up and started to compete with one another for female customers. A well-known nurse and nationally known health lecturer, Matilda Passmore, had said, “What better way to lure them into the stations than offering them a clean bathroom?” Texaco formed the White Patrol and maintained a fleet of White Patrol Chevrolets that carried trained cleanliness inspectors around the country looking for dirt in every corner. Texaco station owners hoped to pass inspection and win a White Cross of Cleanliness award and be allowed to add to thei
r sign the words REGISTERED RESTROOMS. Soon, another company started sending out a group known as the Sparkle Patrol. And Phillips Petroleum Company, not to be outdone, came up with its own cleanliness campaign and hired a crew of attractive young registered nurses known as Highway Hostesses, dressed in light blue uniforms, white shoes and stockings, and a smart military-styled hat. Phillips executives hoped the Highway Hostesses would promote goodwill for the company by their “courteous manner, pleasing personality, and willingness to aid anyone in distress.” They also gave directions, suggested restaurants and hotels, and found time to discuss infant hygiene with traveling mothers.

  The hostesses started roaming the highways and byways in large cream-colored sedans with dark green fenders and the Phillips 66 logo on the door. Their job was to make sure each Phillips 66 bathroom lived up to the standards of Certified Restrooms. Unfortunately for the filling station owners, they picked stations for inspection at random, so you never knew when one might show up, a further incentive to “keep ’em clean” at all times.

  WINK SAW IT FIRST. And as the huge cream-colored sedan with the dark green fenders quietly drove up and turned into the station, it might as well have been a shark. Wink felt the hair on the back of his head stand up. He blinked to make sure he was not seeing things, but no—it was real all right, and it looked exactly like the photograph in the Phillips 66 magazine. He walked over and asked, “May I help you, miss?”

  The woman with a long, pointy nose said, “Yes, young man, I’d like to speak with the owner. Tell him that Registered Nurse Dorothy Frakes is here for restroom inspection.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said and ran in the back and got Poppa.

  Gertrude May, who happened to be looking out the window of the second floor, saw it next. “Oh, geez,” she said and started running downstairs to get her twin sister, Tula June, and Momma.