Ruthie and I were big fans of the Madeline books by Ludwig Bemelmans. In case you don’t know the books, Madeline is a little orphan girl from Paris who marches with her fellow orphans in two straight lines behind their teacher, Miss Clavel. They travel all over Paris this way. Madeline has many adventures.
Inspired by Madeline’s adventures, Ruthie and I built our version of the city of Paris out of blocks and acted out her stories with twelve clothespin dolls. One day we were still building the Eiffel Tower when our teacher, Mrs. Anderson, clapped her hands three times. “Time to switch places, children,” she instructed. “Everyone gets a turn.”
I saw Harry Sterns and Jackie Rubens eyeing our Eiffel Tower.
“But we’re not finished,” I told Mrs. Anderson.
“Dawn, you and Ruthie join Lydia and Nicole for some dress-up,” Mrs. Anderson said. “It’s time for Harry and Jackie to have a turn at blocks.”
My heart sank. As Ruthie and I walked away from our Paris we knew what would happen next. And it did. Crash. Harry and Jackie had demolished our beautiful Eiffel Tower.
Three days in a row we built our tower. Three days in a row it was demolished by the Destructive Duo.
On the third day, as Paris lay in ruins in the block corner, Ruthie and I were trying to make ourselves feel better at the make-believe trunk. She was transforming herself into a pink princess and I was wearing an old Wonder Woman Halloween costume. As I put on my Wonder Woman power bracelets, I told Ruthie, “We need a secret weapon.” A few minutes later I came up with one. When I explained my idea to the Pink Princess she hesitated for a moment. Then she agreed and we made a plan.
The next day our work on the Eiffel Tower went slower than ever.
When Mrs. Anderson came by to check on us, I held the secret weapon behind my back and smiled at her.
“Well, well,” she said. “You two certainly do like the Eiffel Tower. Has either of you been to Paris?”
We shook our heads no.
“Mrs. Anderson,” I said in my sweetest voice, “could we have story-in-a-circle next?”
“Please,” Ruthie begged. “And read Madeline. She lived in Paris. She loved the Eiffel Tower, just like us.”
“You read stories so beautiful,” I added.
“Well, my goodness,” Mrs. Anderson said, “aren’t you two sweet! I guess we could move storytime up just for today. That way you can show the other children your Eiffel Tower.”
When Mrs. Anderson left us to break up a fight in the puppet center, Ruthie and I exchanged a smile and went back to work building the tower with our secret weapon — glue. By the time Mrs. Anderson clapped her hands three times and announced story-in-a-circle, we’d finished.
I couldn’t believe our luck. Storytime meant the glue had time to dry before the Destructive Duo’s lethal kicks.
When storytime was over, Mrs. Anderson said, “What a shame that Dawn’s and Ruthie’s beautiful tower has to come down. But that’s the way blocks work, isn’t it, children?” She smiled at Ruthie and me. “Would you two like to take it down yourselves?”
Ruthie and I shook our heads no.
“All right then,” Mrs. Anderson said. “Ruthie and Dawn go to the kitchen corner. Who wants to play with the blocks next?”
Jackie and Harry yelled, “Me, me.” In an instant they’d charged over to the block corner, pulled back their right legs, and kicked hard.
“Ow!” Harry yelled.
“Hey!” Jackie exclaimed.
They kicked again. This time the tower fell — in one piece. Everyone, including Mrs. Anderson, looked at Ruthie and me.
Ruthie and I spent the rest of the morning soaking the blocks in water and wiping off the glue. A whole hour playing in water! It didn’t feel like a punishment to me.
Still, Ruthie and I avoided the block corner for the rest of the year.
* * *
Each day when I came home from nursery school, my baby brother would smile and coo for me. I was the first person he ever smiled for. And the first person he walked to without holding on to anything. Jeff’s first word was Da-da. I know Da-da usually means “Daddy,” but for Jeff it meant “Dawn.”
I learned to like having a little brother. It was fun to live with someone who adored me and followed me around. And at that early age Jeff got it into his head that it was his job to entertain me. He’d make silly faces and coo for me. I’d laugh and he’d be happy. He still thinks that he’s supposed to entertain me (and anyone else he’s around). Only now he does it with jokes — usually bad ones. If Jeff Schafer becomes a professional comedian, it’ll be because of me.
All in all I think I’m lucky to have a brother. It taught me at an early age that the sun does not rise and set on me alone, even though my name is Dawn. But I like my name, and I love when my dad calls me Sunshine or hums the song, “You Are the Sunshine of My Life.”
I learned another thing about myself during my early years. I adore the ocean. When I’m old enough to live on my own I will most definitely live by the sea.
My brother Jeff loved our new neighborhood. There were plenty of kids his age, which at that time was three. I was six and didn’t have a lot in common with three-year-olds. To tell the truth, they weren’t that interested in playing with me either.
Don’t get me wrong. I wasn’t an antisocial kid. I made plenty of friends at Vista, my new school. My friends in first grade (they’re still my friends today) were Jill Henderson and Maggie Blume. Our teacher, Mr. Richards, was very laid back and let kids sit wherever they wanted. So Jill, Maggie, and I always sat together. As soon as we learned how to write, we wrote notes to one another. Which is pretty funny because in Mr. Richards’ class you could talk to your friends almost anytime you wanted, so you didn’t have to write notes.
A lot of our secret notes were about my yellow parakeet, Buzz. Buzz was an amazing bird. We let him fly freely around the house. There were two reasons we could do this. One was that Buzz always went back to his cage to do his bathroom business. The second was he would never fly away. He stayed in the house. And if I were there he stayed near me. Maggie and Jill were so fascinated by Buzz that I started exaggerating his feats and even made some up.
I loved playing with Jill and Maggie (I still do). But there was a problem. Neither of them lived near me. I longed for a best friend who lived on my block. I wanted to be able to run over to my friend’s house early on a Saturday morning and say, “What’ll we do today?”
A year went by and there still weren’t any kids my age on my block. Then I noticed a FOR SALE sign on a lawn just a few houses down the street from us. The Holders and their one-year-old twins had moved! Maybe, I thought hopefully, a girl my age will move into that house. Every day after school I’d walk up and down the block a few times to see if someone was looking at that house. If they had a girl my age I was going to tell them it was a nice, quiet street and that they were looking at the prettiest house on the block.
One day I saw a man slap a SOLD sticker on the FOR SALE sign. I ran to him and asked if he’d bought the house and whether he had any kids. “I’m the real estate agent,” he said. “A couple from Oregon bought this place. But I do believe they have a little girl who’s just about your age.”
I skipped all the way home. I couldn’t believe my good luck. I was going to have a friend my own age on my very own block.
Summer vacation had started so I didn’t have much to do that week but wait for her to move in. I located Oregon on my puzzle map of the United States and imagined my new friend traveling all the way down the coast from Oregon to Palo City. At least four times a day I dodged Big Wheels and strollers to walk by the empty house.
On Saturday I finally saw what I’d been waiting for. A moving van was parked in the driveway. I walked toward it trying to look nonchalant. The next thing I noticed was a strange-looking car driving down our block. When I say “strange” I don’t mean strange as in “unfamiliar.” I mean “strange” as in “weird.” The car was a small, ban
ged-up red thing painted all over with brightly colored flowers and white peace symbols. A plastic flower bobbed on the tip of the radio antenna. This bizarre-looking car pulled up in front of the house.
I knelt on one knee and pretended my shoelace was united so it wouldn’t look as if I were watching to see who would get out of the car. A man with a ponytail and a long-haired woman in an ankle-length dress stepped out of the front. “Here we are at last,” the man said to the woman. “Our new home of peace and love.” Peace and love? Were they turning the house into a church?
The girl I’d been waiting for — longing for — finally climbed out of the backseat. She had long blonde hair and wore an ankle-length dress, too. At that time I didn’t know any kids or adults who wore long skirts, unless they wore fancy gowns in a wedding. To me that girl and her mother looked as if they were wearing nightgowns. Especially since they were barefoot.
The woman ran onto the front lawn, flung out her arms and danced in circles. The girl did the same. And then, to my horror, so did the man. As they danced on the lawn I untied my other shoelace and watched.
When the new people stopped dancing they hugged one another. Then the man headed toward the moving van. I don’t think he noticed — or cared — that the moving men were laughing at them. These were definitely the weirdest people I had ever seen outside of characters on television programs. The woman returned to the car. She called out, “Sunshine, help me with the plants.”
I was stunned. This stranger knew my special nickname that only my dad used. And she expected me to help her. I had a spooky feeling as I walked up the driveway toward her. The girl was walking toward the woman, too.
The woman handed the girl a funny-looking plant in an old teapot. “Isn’t this a pretty street, Sunshine?” she asked the girl.
Uh-oh, I thought. Her name is Sunshine, too. I decided on the spot not to tell the new people about my nickname. In fact I decided not to talk to them at all. I was about to make a run for it when Sunshine and her mother saw me and said, “Hi.”
“We’re moving into this house,” the woman added. She had the prettiest smile I’d ever seen. “I’m Betsy Winslow. This is Sunshine Daydream Winslow.”
“But everybody calls me Sunny,” the girl said. “What’s your name?”
“Dawn,” I replied. I pointed vaguely up the block. “I live around here.” (I didn’t want them to know exactly where I lived.)
“We came all the way from Oregon,” Sunny told me.
“I know,” I said without thinking. Before they could ask me how I knew, I added, “Do you need some help?”
“That would be wonderful,” Mrs. Winslow said. “Could you carry this spider plant inside?”
“Spider plant?” I repeated in horror.
Sunny laughed. “It doesn’t have spiders on it,” she said. “It just looks like spiders.” She held out the teapot planter her mother had handed her. I backed away just in case, but I could see what she meant. The leaves were grouped around the stem in a way that looked exactly like spider’s legs.
The spider plants were just the first of the new and different things I saw the weekend the Winslows moved in. For example, instead of a living room couch they put huge pillows on the floor.
“Don’t you need a couch to sit on when you watch TV?” I asked Sunny.
“We don’t have a TV,” she said happily. “TV rots your brain.” She grabbed my hand and gave it a little tug. “Come on,” she said. “We’re having lunch.”
On moving day most people get take-out to eat on the run. But not the Winslows. Mr. Winslow had prepared a sit-down lunch. “Yummy,” Sunny said as we entered the kitchen. “Kelp soup. My favorite.”
“What’s kelp?” I asked.
“Seaweed,” said Sunny. “It’s delicious.”
“I have to go home for lunch,” I mumbled.
As I ran out the back door I heard Mrs. Winslow say, “We thank the earth and sea for this meal.”
I didn’t tell my mother much about the new neighbors. But I thought about them as I ate a grilled cheese sandwich and tomato soup. What I was thinking was that I couldn’t be friends with a girl as strange as Sunshine Daydream Winslow.
The next morning my mother asked me if I was going to invite “that new girl” to play.
“I don’t know,” I answered. “Maybe.”
I watched a rerun of Sesame Street with Jeff. I wondered if Sunny thought Sesame Street rotted people’s brains, too.
My mother came into the living room and turned off the TV. “You two get outside and play. It’s a beautiful day.”
I ambled out front and sat on the step. Jeff’s friend Mark came over with two plastic swords. After a few minutes I decided that playing with the new girl couldn’t be as boring as watching Jeff and Mark chase one another with fake swords.
The Winslows’ kitchen door was open so I walked inside. No one was in the kitchen. I noticed a garden hose connected to the kitchen sink. I followed it up the stairs and into the master bedroom.
Sunny and her parents were squatting around what looked like a huge rubber raft. Sunny saw me first. “Hi,” she said. “We’re setting up Mom and Dad’s waterbed.”
Waterbed? Sunny’s parents had a bed made of water? I’d never heard of such a thing. But Sunny seemed to accept it as a fact of life. I watched the rubber mattress expanding and wondered what it would be like to sleep on it.
“This is boring,” Sunny said. “Wanna help me fix up my room?”
“Sure,” I answered.
I was relieved to see that Sunny had a regular mattress, even if it was on the floor instead of up on a bedframe. Her bedspread was all different colors in a sloppy pattern.
“Isn’t my bedspread pretty?” she said. “My mom and I made it. It’s tie-dyed.”
It didn’t look to me as if it were made of dead ties, but I didn’t say anything.
I helped Sunny tack up a poster next to her window. It was a big white dove on a blue background that said Peace. Then we hung up a huge, hand-painted cardboard rainbow over her bed. Those were the only things in her room so far. A mattress, a poster, and a cardboard rainbow. I looked around the room and asked, “Where are your toys?”
She dragged a moving box over to the mattress. “They’re in here,” she replied. We sat on the bed and unpacked the box. Sunny had a rag doll, a wooden whistle, a wooden train set, and some wooden blocks. I could appreciate the blocks, but I’d outgrown them years earlier. Poor Sunny, I thought, these toys are pathetic.
“Don’t you have a Barbie Doll or anything?” I asked.
“We try not to buy plastic or other synthetics,” she said. “They’re not good for the environment.”
At that point I hadn’t thought much about saving the environment. And I certainly didn’t know what a “synthetic” was. To me it sounded like a disease.
“Can you play with plastic if it’s other people’s toys?” I asked.
“I guess,” she replied. “But I like my toys. Hey, you haven’t met Captain. He’s my most special.” Sunny reached under her pillow and pulled out a mangy-looking, pea green, stuffed animal.
I tried to hide my disgust by asking, “What is it?”
“A crocodile,” she said as she hugged the ratty thing.
Sunny probably could tell I was bored with her toys. “I know what we can do,” she said. “Let’s play with Morse Code.”
“Who’s that?”
She giggled. “Morse Code isn’t a person. It’s a way of communicating, like a secret language. My mom and I use it all the time. Here, I’ll show you.” She picked up two wooden blocks and hit them together several times. She sounded like a drummer who couldn’t find the beat. When she stopped she said, “I just spoke to you in Morse Code.”
“What’d you say?” I asked.
“ ‘Hi, Dawn.’ ”
“It took a long time to say that,” I commented.
“That’s because there’s long and short bangs for every letter,” she said. “I’ll
show you.”
* * *
Sunny opened a notebook and handed me a sheet of paper. On it was a list of the letters of the alphabet. After each letter were dots and dashes. “See,” she said, “you can write in Morse Code, too.” Sunny happily chattered on about Morse Code. I wasn’t even close to being interested, but I had good enough manners to pretend I was paying attention.
Then Sunny went to the door of her room. “Look at the chart,” she said, “and see if you can figure out what I’m saying.” She hit those old blocks against one another again. I tried to follow, but not very hard.
When she finally stopped banging I asked, “What’d you say?”
“You’ll see,” she said. “Just wait. It’ll come through the door.”
While we waited for something to “come through the door” Sunny said, “Don’t feel bad because you didn’t get it. It takes time to learn Morse Code. We’ll practice all summer. Then when school starts we’ll have a secret language.”
I thought, she’s crazy if she thinks I’ll go around school banging blocks together!
Sunny’s mother entered the room then and handed each of us an apple. “Here you are, girls,” she said.
“Tell Dawn how you knew we wanted apples,” Sunny said.
“She asked in Morse Code,” her mother answered matter-of-factly. I have to confess that I was pretty impressed by that. Mrs. Winslow smiled at me and said, “Dawn, your mother just came over to introduce herself. Everyone is so friendly on this block. I already love living here.”
“Thanks,” I said.
When we’d finished eating our apples we went over to my house to play. Sunny looked at all my plastic toys, but she wasn’t any more interested in them than I was in her toys. So I suggested we play outside.
My brother and Mark were still in the front yard with their swords. “They shouldn’t be playing like that,” Sunny said.
I thought she meant because the swords were plastic. But she had another complaint. “Playing with swords is like playing with toy guns,” she said. “It encourages violence. We have to stop them by suggesting a peaceful game.”