Snow

Chicago, Illinois

Winter, 1940

His sisser was big.

Mitchell burrowed under the down‑filled blanket. He lay at that extremely comfortable place where he was not quite awake and yet not quite asleep.

When he lifted his head from beneath the warmth, he felt cold air on his sleep‑flushed face. His eyes opened, then closed again.

He had to make sissy bad, but he liked it then because then his sisser got big and it got hard and he liked it then because when he held it, it felt so nice.

So warm! So comfortable! So nice!

Lying snug and warm, holding himself, he knew he should get out of bed and make sissy but it felt so nice.

His eyes opened then closed again.

He is by the toilet, looking down, aiming at the circle of water. Now! His full bladder loosened…

“No!” Awakened with a start, realizing where he was. I’m in bed! he thought. I almost made siss in bed! And though he did not want to leave the warmth, he knew, Gotta go, that if he didn’t get up then, right then, he’d have an accident, and Mitchell knew he was too big and too old to have an accident.

Cold air replacing the warm blanket, lowering his feet over the side of the bed, he shuffled them about the floor in a futile effort to find his house slippers that were so carelessly kicked off the evening before. Can’t wait no more! Forcing his bare feet onto the frigid floor, holding his still-rigid penis that had poked through the fly of his pajamas, remembering not to run, he hurried from the bedroom, through the kitchen and hallway, and into the bathroom. A muted square of gray light came from the air-well window and, far from enough to see by, he reached to turn the light on, but remembering how the light hurt his eyes at night, changed his mind. Standing in front of the toilet, aiming down, not noticing that the toilet seat was down, Uh-oh, his stream of urine hit the ring and splattered over his feet onto the floor. Correcting his aim, he heard the reassuring sound of water tinkling into the water.

Shivering, Mitchell stood with wet feet for what seemed a long time, until his bladder was empty and his penis had shrunken back to its little boy’s nub.

Giving himself one final shake, he flushed the toilet, then, taking his father’s towel off the bar on the door, wiped his feet, the toilet seat and the floor, then re‑folded the towel and put it back on the bar.

As heat from the coal‑fed furnace in the basement four stories below began to rise, the cold, cast‑iron radiator rattled as it expanded, and as the apartment began to heat, the slight hiss of escaping steam could be heard coming from the radiator’s safety valve.

Back in the warmth of his bed, listening to the sounds of winter, Mitchell closed his eyes.

Suddenly remembering, bolting up, he rushed to the window and lifted the shade, but the window was covered with a thick, uneven coating of milky white frost. Holding his mouth an inch from the frozen glass, feeling the radiating cold, he exhaled his warm breath onto the opaque surface. A dime‑sized spot melted; a nickel, a quarter, a half‑dollar. He looked through the clear, transparent circle and took a sharp intake of breath. “Snow!” The wind had blown high drifts against the building across the alley and, even as he looked, his peephole became speckled with melting white flakes. “Oh, boy!” he said aloud, thinking, Today’s Saturday! Ain’t no school today and I got all day to play in the snow! Oh-boy-oh-boy-oh-boy!

Standing barefooted on the cold floor, the soles of his feet began to feel as though they were burning. Reluctantly turning from the window, forgetting the Kaplins. Forgetting, as most usual, his parent’s constant admonishments about running across the floor… About, “Mitchell!” his mother would always say, “You’re making those poor people downstairs crazy!”—especially at 5:45 a.m. Running back to bed, he made a full forward leap, landing head first on the pillow then pulled the blanket to his chin. By angling his body, he was able to see the spot on the window, but condensation had already caused a thin membrane of frost to coat it.

The boy’s eyes closed.

The gray shadows on the ceiling and walls begin to lighten.

His eyes opened. Remembering, he was back at the window. The spot had frosted over and steam from the radiator had caused a formation of an additional thickness of ice. Putting his hand flush against the window, wincing at the burning sensation as the pads of his fingers and the soft flesh of his palm absorbed the cold, the boy melted a hand‑shaped opening and looked through the palm‑print. Everything was covered with snow! Mitchell’s world, as much of his world as he could see, was clean and white. Heavy flakes of snow were still falling, and there was a three-inch-high drift of snow on the window ledge.

Unable to contain his excitement a moment longer…

Below, on the second floor, sleeping in the largest of three bedrooms, the middle bedroom, waking with the rapid thudding of the boy’s feet, Mrs. Kaplin glanced at the ceiling, muttered, “Momzer!” [bastard] and pulled the pillow over her head.

Mitchell ran from his bedroom at the rear of the apartment, past the back door, past his parent’s proudest possession—an electric refrigerator. He ran through the kitchen, past the pantry, through the hall, past the air‑well, middle bedroom, and toilet, through the dining room, past the front door, and through the front room to the smallest of the three bedrooms, the current—by decree of Walter Lipensky—bedroom of his parents. The bedroom that was, because Walter liked to sleep, the farthest away from the early morning noise of the “god-damned janitor!” The bedroom that was the farthest away from the noise of the hub of his home: the kitchen. And last but not least, as far away as possible from the noise of his six-year-old son.

Standing just outside the open door, speaking softly, “Ma‑me.” Whispering, so he thought. “It snowed last night an’ it’s still snowin’ now an’ I wanna go outside! Ma‑me! Wake up, Ma‑me!”

Lifting her head from the pillow, looking at the Baby Ben alarm clock on the dresser through half‑open eyes. “Mitchell, it’s not even seven,” Myra Lipensky whispered. “It’s too early! Go back to bed!”

“Mommy, I went back to bed before, an’ I can’t sleep no more, an’ I wanna go outside. Please, Mommy, get up!”

“Mitchell, shhh! You’ll wake your father!”

The boy looked at the back of his father’s head.

A sound sleeper, facing the wall with the blanket pulled to his ears, settling lower on the pillow, “What time’s it,” Walter muttered.

Mitchell waited a few moments, then, hearing nothing else from his father, whispered, “But, Mommy, I can’t sleep no more.”

Sighing, “Okay, Mitchie. I might just as well get up.”

Slipping from under the blanket, Myra pulled the flannel nightgown down from around her hips and buttocks. Standing, she ran her fingers through her hair, stretched, sat on the bed and, reaching down, started to put her house slippers on.

Feeling the motion of the bed, turning from the wall, Walter looked at his wife’s back, then at his son. “Mitchell, didn’t you hear your mother?” Glancing at the clock, “It’s not even seven!” he said angrily. Walter Lipensky had been awoken, and if there was one thing that always made Walter angry, it was being awoken when he didn’t have to be awake. “Myra, it’s too early! Come back to bed!”

“No, it’s okay, Walt. You know once I’m up, I’m up. You go back to sleep. I’ll fix him some breakfast and get him dressed. I’ll be back after he’s outside.”

“You ought to send him back to bed, Myra. You really spoil that kid!” Fluffing his pillow, Walter turned back to the wall. “You really do, you know.”

Myra Lipensky was a tall, beautiful, heavy‑set woman in her late‑twenties. She had straight, dark brown hair that came to a widow’s peak, gray eyes, a straight nose and a small mouth. Her son’s face was definitely a combination of both his parents, and his hair, widow’s peak, and mouth were noticeable contributions of his mother’s.

Myra had gained a considerable amount of weight during her pregnancy because her doctor believed that women were better off, during a pregnancy, if they added weight and Myra had been told, within limits, to eat what she wanted, and, “Of course it’s okay to drink malted milk!” Myra’s favorite drink was malted milk, the thick, solid kind that supported the weight of a spoon. Prone to easy weight gain normally, Myra had always watched her diet—more or less, but she did take the doctor at his word, and six years later was still unable to shed a good part of the weight that she’d gained during her pregnancy.

An extremely handsome man, Walter Lipensky had dark brown eyes and straight black hair. Six feet tall, dark complected and solidly built, though intelligent, Walter was frustrated because working as a salesman at his father’s manufacturing company he had no outlet for his creative energy.

A confirmed bachelor, Walter was twenty‑seven when he and Myra first met. Although he’d thought himself too set in his ways to ever marry, Walter and Myra fell in love and, within four months of their first meeting, married.

First-generation Americans, the roots of both families went to Russia, but that was where the similarity ended. Myra’s father, Morris, was a carpenter, whereas Walter’s mother and father were both scholars.

Walter was obstinate and opinionated, and this frequently led to bitter, extremely vocal arguments between him and his wife. In addition, though he did love his wife and son, Walter had trouble showing affection; consequently, Myra’s family, while they did like Walter, felt he was unaffectionate and distant.

Mitchell had a round face, a button of a nose, large green eyes and long lashes. He was a beautiful child and people would often stop his mother as she would wheel the buggy, and as he grew older, when they would walk together, “Shayner punnum!” [beautiful face] they would say, pinching a cheek or ruffling his hair.

Large for his age, Mitchell had unlimited energy and would rarely sit still for more than a few seconds at a time, and he never walked when he could run, which had converted the downstairs neighbors into constantly complaining enemies.

“Mitchell, walk! Stop running!” his mother would shout as he’d jump off a chair in the kitchen or the bed in his bedroom and run across the linoleum-covered floor of the kitchen and hallway and out the back door, slamming it shut behind him. “You’re driving the poor Kaplins crazy! Stop running!”

Bang! Bang! Bang! would come the sharp sound of a broomstick pounding the ceiling of the apartment below.

“It’s a wonder she hasn’t poked that damned stick through the floor by now. Please, Mitchell,” his mother would implore, “stop running!”

When they would pass each other in the hall, or outside, or at Abe’s Delicatessen or Sam’s Grocery, Mrs. Lipensky, out of guilt, would always smile at Mrs. Kaplin and say, “Hello, Mrs. Kaplin. So, how’s by you? Mr. Kaplin, he’s feeling okay?”

“Hurrumph!” would come the icy reply, and Mrs. Kaplin would turn her back on Mrs. Lipensky and stalk away.

Now, in all truth, Mrs. Lipensky really did feel bad that these innocent downstairs neighbors had to be subjected to the merciless pounding of her son’s feet across the carpetless floors of the kitchen, hall and two back bedrooms, But, she thought, Jesus! Can’t they see I’m doing everything in my power to make him stop? Can’t they see that? What the hell am I supposed to do with the kid? Lock him in a closet? Chain him to a bed?

Whenever the embarrassment of Mrs. Kaplin’s snubs became too much, things begin to fall. A bed frame dropped with a thud. A chair fell with a clatter. “My God, that twelve-quart pot just jumped out of my hands! Can you imagine that?” Mrs. Lipensky would say as, Bang, Bang, Bang, would come the pounding of the broomstick on the ceiling below. Occasionally, a smile twitching at the corners of her mouth, Mrs. Lipensky would imagine the Kaplin’s pock‑marked ceiling.

When deserved, Myra would spank her son. Walter had never spanked the boy, but Mitchell was somewhat afraid of his father and would try, whenever possible, to stay out of his way.

“Hi, Joe!” Squatting, looking through the lower portion of one of the kitchen windows where the heat of the radiator had melted the frost, Mitchell knocked on the glass and waved to the janitor, who glanced up, but because of the snow was running more than an hour behind schedule, although, even if he were on time, Joe would ignore the boy’s greeting, just as he did then.

In this neighborhood, garbage was usually collected at a pre‑dawn hour, which was why the back bedroom, though it might be larger than the front bedroom, usually housed the kids rather than their parents. Those unfortunate enough to sleep in the rear bedrooms were awakened seven days a week, summer and winter, by the garbage collection ritual when the janitor—who was also the plumber, painter, gardener and electrician, whom for some reason usually seemed to be of German descent, which may have accounted for the general neatness of the buildings—clumped up the stairs in heavy‑soled work shoes. In winter, if it had snowed, the sound of a metal shovel scraping snow off the stairs preceded the ritual. Then Joe or Karl, Heinz or Fritz, would tramp up the stairs with a huge, steel collection can slung across his back. The can would be dropped onto the porch with a thud and the smaller can would be slammed into the larger can with a resounding, off‑key, cymbal-like clang that would jar even the soundest sleeper out of the soundest sleep.

Janitors, so it would seem, were given the contractual right, so the tenants thought, to make whatever noise was needed to be sure that if they were not awake everyone should be awake, and no amount of pleading with Joe or Karl, Heinz or Fritz, or the unseen god-like landlord would lessen the din.

With bad, though, often comes some good, and few rear bedroom tenants were ever late for work or school, and in future years “Reveille” would literally be as music to their ears in comparison to the noise made by the collision of the garbage can into the collection can.

Coming from the bathroom, Myra looked out the window, too. “Yup! It sure snowed all right. What’d you want for breakfast, Kiddo?”

Thinking a moment, “Oatmeal.”

“With warm honey?”

“Yup!”

“Okay. Go get washed and brush your teeth, and put your long-johns on, okay?”

“Okay.”

He began to run, but catching him by the seat of his pajamas, “Mitchell,” she said sternly, waving a finger in front of his face, “walk! Don’t run! It’s much too early to wake the Kaplins! Do you understand me?”

Nodding, walking on tiptoes, Mitchell looked at his mother over his shoulder.

“That’s a boy.” Myra put her finger to her pursed lips. “Shhh!”

The boy loved both parents, but felt closer to his mother. All of his life, sometimes hiding in his bed or the closet, he’d listened to the arguments of his parents through closed doors and, in all instances, though he had no idea why they argued, Mitchell always mentally sided with his mother.

Deciding to try to “make,” wearing only his long underwear, by the time he returned to the kitchen there was a glass of orange juice, a glass of milk, and a steaming bowl of oatmeal with warm honey puddling the circumference of the bowl with a chunk of melting butter in a depression in the middle. Anxious to be outside, dropping onto the chair, lifting a spoonful of oatmeal to his mouth he stuffed it in, then pursing his lips he drew air inward to cool the heat of the molten oatmeal.

“Mitchell, slow down! The snow’s not going anywhere!”

His mouth stuffed full of oatmeal, a thin line of it dribbled down his chin as, swallowing with a loud gulp, he took two more spoonfuls then pushed away from the table.

“Oh no, young man! You just sit there and finish eating!”

“Aw, gee whiz!”

Smiling at his serious expression, “Don’t you go gee‑whizzing me, young man! You finish your breakfast!”

“Mitchell,” squirming, as she’d help him dress, “stand still!” A flannel shirt buttoned to the neck was stuffed between the long underwear and a pair of corduroy pants. Two pair of heavy woolen socks were pulled over the cuffs of the corduroys. Leggings, a sweater, shoes, galoshes with four metal buckles, a wool scarf, his coat, an Ace cap pulled over his ears and woolen gloves on his hands…

“Uh‑oh… Mommy.”

Uh-oh? With apprehension, “Yes, Mitchell?”

“Mommy, I gotta make.”

“You’ve got to make! Now? What do you have to make, Mitchell?”

“Poopie. I made before but gotta again.”

Like a movie running in reverse: off came the gloves, hat, coat, scarf, sweater, so the leggings could be lowered. Off came the shirt, so he could unbutton and lower the long underwear. Down came the leggings and corduroy pants that bunched up over the galoshes.

“Okay, Mitchell,” Myra sighed. “Go make poopie.”

Taking small, shuffling steps, dragging the leggings and pants, the boy went from the kitchen to the bathroom. Unbuttoning the underwear, dropping it too his knees, sitting on the toilet, he put his chin into his cupped hands and, turning red in the face, strained… but nothing happened. He lifted and buttoned the underwear, pulled the pants and leggings up and went back to his mother, whose patience was beginning to wear just a little thin.

“Come on, Mitchell, let’s get you dressed and out of here.”

Outside, at last!