A Woman On Her Own

A WOMAN ON MY OWN

I went to work in ‘fifty three
At the local Daily News
To prove to Mom that I could be
A woman on my own.
An independent seventeen,
I wrote obits, and wedding notes –
I found it fun to telephone
For quotes to use in articles –
On who went where and what they did.

No casual clothes for working gals in 1953 –
My car hop friends were envious
That I dressed up for work.
I felt that I was all grown up.
Mom was
Unconvinced.



I went to work in ‘fifty five – a summer job
Out of town to prove to Mom
That I was grown
A woman on my own.
We sublet a flat, Leah and Elaine and I.

I worked at a Boston brokerage.
My boss was Mildred Hatch.
I worked with Ginny HaggartyAnd Helen Jack from Dorcester
My age, she was engaged to wed
A Cambridge man; her parents feared
She’d move away from Dorcester. 

I learned the Boston dialect –

A milkshake is a frappe, a spa -

A corner store, where tonic is a coke.

That summer my romance broke up

Those Boston girls - they saw me through –

The helped me laugh, and schemed with me

To get him back. It didn’t work.

When I went home to tell my mom how grown I was

Mom was

Unimpressed.

Then I grew up and had three kids and went to work – a full time job

From 8 to 5, two blocks away. We all came home for lunch.

A secretary at a church - whoever would have thought back then

That typewriters and secretaries would soon be obsolete.

I went to work to subsidize the children’s college years

And give those kids a chance to go

To school in a different town, and maybe get a summer job

Like mine had been. They did.

We moved once more – Move number ten
I went to college once again

Became a City Planner then,

Got “Planning Certified”

Became “Kay B – AICP”

And after working twenty years

Retired, with full benefits –

A woman on her own

With better things to do.

If Mom had lived, I know

She would

Approve.

13 Ways of Looking at a Broken Leg

One
Ouch

Two
Six strong and strapping EMT's
Carry me down the outside steps
Welcome heroes and I owe them
Cookies, Station One and Station Three
When I am whole again.

Three
Two legs casted, sticking out
When they operated, couldn't they
Have done a pedicure?

Four
I am useless, I can't walk
Can't run out and get something,
Can't lean down, pick up something
I have to ask for help.

Five
I have a wheelchair, it's black
And scarey, too, says Blue the cat.
Five other folks came home with me.
That's scarey, too, says Blue.

Six
Two legs casted, sticking out
I can't make corners in our house.
Parking's never been my strength
I've got a lot to learn.

Seven
My chief caregiver's the best
The guy I married can never rest
He picks up this and gets me that
And don't forget to feed the cat
My poor Fred will celebrate
When my two cast legs ain't cast no more!

Eight
Two legs casted, sticking out
One is gray and wears a boot
(Although I'm told it can bear no weight
for another two months from now).
The other's red with matching toes
They are getting in my way.

Nine
Two legs casted, sticking out
Now and then bump into things
They sometimes seem to me
To be no part of me.

Ten
Two legs casted, sticking out
But if you take me knees to head
The rest of me is just the way
It always was, says Fred

Eleven
Inside my two well casted legs
If one could look inside,
Not flesh and bone, but screws and nails
And screens and plates in there.
My doctor is a carpenter.

Twelve
Two cast legs upon the bed
And one is gray, the other red
And each one weights 200 pounds
At least.

Thirteen
I should enjoy my two cast legs
They get me out of lots of stuff
How can I entertain Book Club
Or donate blood, or clean the house
With both my legs encased in casts?