Sunday, March 22, 2015

Lunch Ladies

My Grandma was a cafeteria lady at my elementary school. Occasionally, I would sleep over at her house on a school night, and she and I would ride to school in the lunch lady carpool. My Grandma never learned how to drive. It was too far for her to walk to the elementary school, so everyday she rode with Mollie, the head cafeteria lady. Mollie lived near Grandma. Mollie wore glasses and had grayish-black hair that she wore straight on top and curly on the sides. She drove a big, boxy car. I believe it was tan, maybe with a dark brown top.
Grandma and I sat in the back on a bench seat. This was in the 1970s, so we didn't worry about seatbelts. I usually sat in Grandma's lap. Vicey, another lunch lady, sat in the front passenger seat; and Mollie's two grown daughters, Glenda and Linda, sat in the back with Grandma and me. They also worked in the cafeteria.
We arrived at school before most of the other teachers and children were awake. Mollie parked the car, and we all piled out. Mollie had a key to the back kitchen entrance. It was quiet except for the hum of the overhead lights. Mollie and Vicey and Glenda and Linda and Grandma got to work. They put on their smocks and hairnets; and Grandma made biscuits, rolling out the dough and cutting it with the little round biscuit cutter. She set the biscuits on the huge metal baking pans and fed the pans into the gaping mouth of the industrial-sized oven. Glenda and Linda set out the little milk cartons, red and white for whole milk, brown and white for chocolate, and sometimes pink and white for strawberry. Vicey sprayed out the sink with a faucet attached to a long winding hose while Mollie scrubbed and peeled potatoes.
I know it must have been noisy in that big school kitchen with pots and pans banging about and water bubbling to a boil and Grandma and Mollie chatting and Glenda and Linda laughing and Vicey commenting every once in a while. I know it must have been noisy; but I only remember the hum of the overhead lights and the faint squeak of their sensible soft-soled shoes as they bustled about making breakfast.

My Grandma
with freckled, floury fingers
that smelled of celery
and perfumed powder
was a cafeteria lady
at my elementary school.
 
She wore
a black hair net
on her red-brown curls
and handed me a carton of milk
everyday;
 
And on the Friday nights
when I slept over
she'd serve
pigs in a blanket,
peanut butter bars,
and salty popcorn in metal bowls;
 
and her hands
were always kneading...
needing
it seemed to me
to shape the dough for hundreds of strangers' children
to shape me.

8 comments:

  1. Memories that fill the senses. The last stanza of the poem is a masterpiece, with the overlapping double meanings.

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  2. Thank you! She worked hard ever single day and taught me how to be strong and honest.

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  3. Lori, this was wonderful. You beautifully created a sense of place. As a child of the seventies, with hard working grandparents, I was with you in that back seat in the early morning. Thanks so much for sharing!

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  4. Lori, this was wonderful. You beautifully created a sense of place. As a child of the seventies, with hard working grandparents, I was with you in that back seat in the early morning. Thanks so much for sharing!

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  5. Thank you for your comments! I have so many rich memories of both sets of grandparents. I enjoy writing about them because my memories are still so vivid even after all these years.

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  6. Lori,
    Thank you for sharing your memories. Your story was so alive as you described the sounds you remembered. Your poem with the story makes it so complete. What a treasure to get to ride with your Grandmother to school.
    Kneading, needing. and she shaped you too.

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  7. Lori,
    Thank you for sharing your memories. Your story was so alive as you described the sounds you remembered. Your poem with the story makes it so complete. What a treasure to get to ride with your Grandmother to school.
    Kneading, needing. and she shaped you too.

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  8. How lucky we were. We didn't realize we were making memories and creating stories. I can still smell the popcorn and see her passing handfuls to grandpa. His bowl never emptied.

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