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Sunday journal

A downpayment on her self-worth

By LINDA GUGGINO HUMPHERS
Published August 21, 2005

	[Photo courtesy of Linda Guggino Humphers]
	Louise Marks, in a rare respite from her daily 10-hour workdays at Webb’s City, dances the jitterbug in 1936.

It was 1936, and Louise - my mother - had just dropped out of St. Petersburg High School to earn 10 cents an hour, 10 hours a day, seven days a week at Webb's City.

She sold postcards for a penny apiece, and Old Man Webb, who watched over the store from an office suspended over the selling floor, set her sales quota at $100 a day. He also required all his girls to wear high heels and never be seen sitting down - not even at lunch.

On her one short break each day, she'd hurry up the street, hoping to find an empty spot on one of the green benches that lined Central Avenue. She just wanted to rest her feet for a few minutes while she ate her lunch, a tomato swiped on her way to work. Because money was so tight, she usually walked the 2 miles to and from Webb's, taking the streetcar only on rainy days.

Lack of money ruled her life, or it had until she'd left school, where she'd sat miserably in the back of her classes wearing her one and only dress, needing eyeglasses to pull blurs into shapes, her stomach rumbling. At school she was surrounded by well-dressed, fun-loving kids from Snell Isle who hadn't felt the pangs of the Depression, and one day she just decided enough was enough.

As bad as Old Man Webb was, at least she had a job, and her evenings were free for dancing. There was no embarrassment on the dance floor. That's where she reigned, where her thin frame and wild red hair, at school a label of penury, transformed into elegance.

While she kept herself afloat with thoughts of dancing, she couldn't shake her anger at her father for placing her in this dire strait, for gambling away the good earnings he made in his electrical contracting business, for cheating on her mother, for the countless moves because there was no rent money, for beating her brother senseless, for not putting food on the table, for her sister Anne's determined studying by candlelight because the electrician couldn't even provide electricity for his own family.

Oh, he had his good points, of course, chief among them the charm that allowed him to get away with so much. He was smart and funny and a great companion, especially while fishing, and despite all his failings, despite her resentment, she didn't hate him.

And then she saw him.

Daddy. Big man around town. Buy everybody a round. Gamble with Babe Ruth. Play the dogs. Spend all night at the Elks Club. Big deal. There he was, all dressed up, woman in a tight blue dress on his arm, heading into the restaurant right across from where she sat. Louise looked at her stolen tomato, half gone now. Her stomach was still rumbling, her heart now echoing it.

She crossed the street and strode into the restaurant, spotted Daddy and walked up to his table. The waitress was still standing by him, two menus in her hands, laughing at Daddy's quips.

Louise said, "Daddy."

He looked around and turned beet red.

"Give me $5."

Without a word, without looking at his daughter, he reached into his pocket, pulled out a wad and peeled off a five.

She took it. Then she plopped the half-eaten tomato on the table and for a second they both watched the juices and seeds run into the white cloth. She wiped her hand on his shoulder and said, "I think it's time you ate what I eat for lunch every day."

And she walked out, wondering what in the world she'd do with so much money, and thinking she should have asked for $50.

-- Linda Humphers lives in Clearwater.

[Last modified August 18, 2005, 11:42:03]