Chapter Four, Part One: Bored to Death at Met Life

Harry and I goofing off in our apartment on Castro, 1955


As instructed, I reported to Personnel promptly at eight. The Rosalind Russell look-alike phoned Laura to come get me. I had been assigned to her department, but in a different section. Laura was tall, with short, dark, curly hair and a beautiful Roman nose. We rode the elevator to the eighth floor. When we got off, I told her I thought the elevator operator was eyeing me. “He does that to all the new girls, but don’t worry, he’s not like the guy at the toy store.” She led the way to a row of desks divided from other rows by floor-to-ceiling filing cabinets. As we approached Katie, our supervisor, she put down her compact and lipstick and stood up behind her desk. A sinking, lead-ball feeling, like on my first day of kindergarten, weighed down my stomach.

Katie was tall, stately, with bleached blond hair. She wore a bright Kelly-green suit with a colorful flowered blouse. Her face was matted with pancake makeup; her lips, heavily lipsticked a shiny red. “So you’re Laura’s friend. She told me you went to school together. I’m sure you’ll like it here." Katie smiled, "Come, dear, I’ll show you where you’ll sit.” Laura went off to her section and I followed Katie to an empty desk near an aisle. “Here’s where you’ll be. Lizzie, here,” she said, indicating a girl at the next desk, “will train you.”

Lizzie! I knew her vaguely from high school! The lead ball in my gut seemed to get heavier. Lizzie was shy, quiet, and sweet. She wore glasses, had limp, straight brown hair with bangs, and large teeth. Why didn’t Laura tell me she worked here, too? Suddenly, I wanted to bolt. Lizzie had run around with a group of similar friends. She had been in a few of my classes, so I used to say “hi” to her in the hallways. I felt deflated. I had been in drama class, had parts in school plays; I’d been a cheerleader, a student body officer, and a teen model. I didn’t belong here with these women and girls whose heads were bent over their desks, poring over file drawers. This is a big mistake. Lizzie gave me a toothy smile, “Oh, you’re coming to work here! How wonderful!” she said, eyes sparkling. I took a deep breath and decided to stay.

My job, Lizzie explained, like everyone else’s in the department, was to work with a section of the alphabet, assigned by Rhonda, Katie’s assistant. I took one look at Rhonda and thought - - if she can be Katie’s assistant, I can do anything. Rhonda’s hair sat on top of her head like a ball of steel wool that had been pulled apart in all directions. Her features were scrunched together and her mouth twisted upwards. She wore very thick-lensed, clear plastic-rimmed glasses, which made her tiny, close-together brown eyes even tinier. I could deal with her face because she could do little about it, short of undergoing extensive plastic surgery. What bothered me, besides her hair, were her clothes. I mean, she could have done something about her clothes. It didn’t matter that she wore a simple skirt and cotton blouse, but for as long as I worked there, she showed up every day in the same outfit. And, from day one, her blouse and skirt looked as though she had dredged them up from the bottom of her ironing basket. Didn’t this woman have an iron? I happened to say something about this to Lizzie, who confided that Rhonda was married and had three kids. So, I guessed, with a full-time job, a husband, and three kids, Rhonda plain didn’t have time to iron.

I came to think it was kind of hip (the word for "cool" back in the day) not to give a damn about what you wore, what you looked like and never comb your hair. Lizzie also told me Rhonda had an IQ of 160, way beyond Mensa! Rhonda basically ran the department. Katie seemed to just sit at her desk, call her hubby on the phone, and apply more makeup and fresh lipstick at the same time. She’d been married for several years, Lizzie said, but was sad because for whatever reason they couldn't have kids.

Lizzie took me to the file cabinets whose drawers were filled with cards bearing an insured's policy information, and explained my duties from beginning to end:
Rhonda would assign me a section; I would go to the file cabinets and pull out long drawers, like library catalogue drawers, and fill out a slip, signing my name. I would then put the slip in the space left by the drawer, and take the drawer back to my desk. Then with rubber “fingers” slipped over my fingers, I would flip through the cards, looking for policies whose renewal premiums were due in a couple of months, and turn them on their sides, by expiration date, so they’d stick up out of the drawer. When I finished, I would fill out a green rec (request) card for every expiration card, remove the card from its drawer, and slip the rec card in its place. I would then carry the stacks of file cards to a designated area and someone from the billing department would pick them up and give them to the typing pool to type invoices. The billing people would then return the cards to us along with stacks of invoices.

The next to the last thing I had to do was to check the invoices against the cards for misspelled names, wrong premiums, or dates. Invoices with mistakes, along with the card, had to be returned to the billing department for correction. File cards, Lizzie warned, were often overlooked during the “flipping” stage and invoice mistakes were frequently missed. Rhonda, the ultimate bean counter, kept track of all our errors (missed cards and mistakes on invoices) and a note was made to our personnel file; Katie would be notified and would reprimanded us. Three reprimands and you were put on six months probation. Three more and you were fired. The last thing I did was refile the cards back in the drawers. Automation couldn’t come soon enough.

Needless to say, it was very boring work. We found ways to amuse ourselves. Laura and I jotted down insureds’ weird names and read them to each other on breaks: Scott Free, Colin Puffy, Arman Elbo, Julian Hunkapillar, Shaliksta Rakestraw, Rollo Beany, Ima Horney, and so on. We were desperate. Donna, a pouty (and potty-mouth), co-worker with long, shiny, black hair, and large brown eyes that sometimes looked sad, would bring in the Examiner every morning and we’d read Herb Caen’s column (Caen wrote for the Examiner from 1950-’58, then went back to the Chronicle). One morning, she read this to me:

A Cable Car had stopped in the middle of California Street near St. Mary’s Park and Chinatown. The conductor was kneeling in the street next to it, peering into the slot that ran the cable between the tracks. An ancient Chinese man hobbled over, bent down beside the conductor, and, heads together, they peered into the slot. The Chinese man said, “Wassa mala, s’ling bloke?”*

We fell out of our chairs, laughing. Katie pulled her lipstick tube away from her mouth and glared. Rhonda came around from her desk and sparks seemed to fly out of her hair. We froze. For the rest of the day, whenever we looked at each other, we’d rush to the bathroom, repeat what the Chinese man said, and crack up. I quashed boredom also by sketching caricatures of everyone in the department, which I hung over my desk on a string tied between my in-and-out baskets. My co-workers loved them and people from other departments clamored to have their caricatures done. I didn't dare touch Katie, and Rhonda was a walking caricature. Why mess up a good thing? Katie put the kibosh on my sketches saying they made the department look "unprofessional."


Coming up: Chapter Four, Part 2:

We are imprisoned due to Work Comp rules. Great subsidized lunches! Donna and I and Red Blanchard and the worm song; I improve my office skills at night and lose a husband. Met Life integrates its black cafeteria workers into its office staff. It's Meet Mr. North Day at the Met!(Company president.)


*I'm thankful Caen died before the stringent PC climate kicked in. I doubt he could've gotten away with this today.

Chapter Three, Part 3: The End of Toy Story.

Harry and I at the 1953
Mission High prom.

During my stint at the toy store, Harry and I got engaged. He had red hair and freckles, a type of guy I tended to avoid, but he was charismatic and it didn’t hurt that he looked a little like Robert Redford. Still, I vowed I’d never have his kids. What if they had red hair and freckles - - and looked like me? He had graduated the year before and was going to City College. His plans were to transfer to Hastings Law. I had this noble idea to work and put him through school till I decided what I wanted to do; then when he became an attorney, it would be his turn. So, I'd keep the toy store job for a while.

One day, I had to take the freight elevator because Patty was puffing her way up the stairs. Dan had just loaded some boxes on it.
“Hi, kid,” he said, “Ya got a boyfriend?”
“Yes, we’re getting married.” We were between floors.
“Are you a virgin?
“None of your business.”
He pushed the red stop button. The elevator jerked to a halt, making a grinding, metallic noise; I fell against him. Before I regained my balance, he’d reached under my skirt. I jumped away,pressed the green button, quickly moved behind some boxes, and when the elevator stopped on the landing, I leaped out. He snickered as he drew shut the heavy iron gate. Josephine saw my face,
“What happened?”
"Dan. . . "
“Oh, that guy," she said, "Up to his old tricks again. Every new girl gets it.”
“I’m going to tell Norman.”
“Honey, men stick together,” Barbara chimed in, “It’s always our fault, you know.” She did a kind of Gypsy Rose Lee move, batting her eyes, “The way we look, the way we dress, the way we smell . . . .”
“Avoid him like the plague,” Jody said, lowering her Coke, “or he’ll try it again.” Nevermore, I swore, so I suffered Patty’s labored ascent up the stairs rather than get on the elevator with that old lech.

Over a weekend, Harry and I went to Reno and got married. Dad had moved to an apartment on Oak, so we stayed at the Grove Street walk-up. One Friday night, he took me to a City College dance. Former high school girl friends greeted me enthusiastically and asked me if I’d gone to Berkeley. I told them I was married had a sales job at a toy store; their eyes went blank; their faces froze, and when they moved away, it felt as though they walked right through me. I told Harry about it when we got home.
"That that’s the way it is in college, hon," he said, " - - very cliquey, and girls that get married are just out, period."
"My reasons for not wanting to go in the first place." He shrugged.

One day, I really had to pee; Patty was lumbering up the stairs. I couldn’t wait. I had to use the freight elevator. Dan let me on. I held a stack of cartons between us. He slid the door closed and glanced at my left hand. “Is your back sore?” he said. He must have guessed by my blank expression that I had no idea what he was talking about. A corner of his upper lip curled. “From all that--y’know.” He pushed his fist through the air rapidly and laughed as the elevator stopped on the mezzanine. I got off; bile rose in my throat. I ran to the bathroom and slammed the door. Not only did I haveto find work in a healthier environment but also a job that paid more so I could start saving money. Laura, a school friend, was a file clerk at Metropolitan Life. We'd sit over a pot of coffee and crack up over my toy store anecdotes, but when I mentioned the elevator incident, she insisted I quit and apply at Met Life.

I called the toy store the morning after payday and told Patty to tell Robert and Norman I quit, and hung up before she could transfer me to them. I rode a trolley bus down Market, got off, walked up Stockton, and climbed the stairs built into the Stockton Tunnel, which runs underneath Bush and California, up to Met Life. The building takes up an entire city block and is now the site of the ritzy, Ritz-Carlton Hotel. I found the Personnel Department, filled out an application, was interviewed by a pompadoured, wanna-be Rosalind Russell, who hired me on the spot.
“You won’t leave us and go to college will you?” she said, “Or get married and start having babies? We lose a lot of girls that way.”
“Well, I am married,” I said, pointing to the “x” I’d scribbled in the box next to “Married,” “but my husband’s going to college. One of us has to work.”
“Oh, so you’re putting him through school? Then when he’s through it’s your turn. So we’ll have you for at least four years, won’t we? Report to me tomorrow at eight, dear."

Months later, Harry and I moved into a three-room apartment on Castro and 14th Street. He had dropped out of City and was now an underwriter at Home Insurance, a property and casualty company. After dinner, while I did the dishes, he sat at the kitchen table and read aloud from a liability code manual, cracking himself up. Yes, I would work hard, save my money and go to college. The last place I wanted to end up was at an insurance company where employees thought the text in a manual was as hilarious as a Phyllis Diller rant - - but would life insurance be any different?

Next: Chapter 4, Part One, Met Life:
The Good: I meet another school friend, make new friends; cheap, excellent, subsidized lunches; boring work leads to play; the company store; Met Life integrates; coffee breaks; Eisenhower lowers taxes, my paycheck increases; Harry joins the Army. I meet another man and quit. The Bad: Another horny elevator operator; our heavily made up boss chats on the phone, applies more makeup, and chews us out; her perennially rumpled, frizzy-haired, nearsighted Mensa-material girl does it all; we can’t leave the building; the boeedom; some friends quit or are fired. The Ugly: Depressing, worse-than-school, work environment; rows of desks, aisles of file cabinets; the noise; the perennially rumpled, frizzy-haired, nearsighted Mensa-material girl; Harry has an affair.

Chapter Three, Part 2, TOY STORY

I made very little money at this job and often, close to payday, I didn’t have carfare, so I sometimes walked to work from Grove and Divisadero to New Montgomery and Market and back, at the end of the day, passing the elegant Palace Hotel on the corner, a jewel in the middle of trashy lower Market. Sometimes on a break, I’d meander through its lobby, use the marble bathroom with its individual louvered-door stalls; stop at the entrance to the dreamlike Garden Court restaurant and imagine myself having lunch there. One late afternoon, a couple of days before we got our checks, a woman came rushing in to the store. She and I were in the back while the others were busy with customers in the front. Robert and Norman were out. I wished she were a fairy godmother who’d say, “Oh, would you like to go to the Garden Court for lunch?” Dream on. She pulled a doll, still in its box, from the shelf, slapped a ten in my hand, “This ought to take care of it.” She turned and made for the back door. “Don’t bother with the change,” she said, over her shoulder, slipping away before I could stop her. What change? The doll was nine-ninety-five. The ten wouldn’t cover it; I’d have to make up the tax out of my own pocket. I crumpled the bill in my hand, hurried up the stairs to the bathroom, took off my shoe, and slipped the ten inside till I could sneak it into my purse on break. That night, I couldn’t sleep; I called in sick the next day. I felt so sure Norman or Robert would find out. I waited for the phone to ring or the police to show up. An opportunity like that never came up again, yet I questioned whether I would have taken it if it did.

At lunch break, we tried not to let Patty get ahead of us on the two flights of narrow, worn, wooden stairs that hugged the wall. There was no banister. One misstep and you could crash-land on the stocked shelves below, probably breaking lots of toys you’d have to pay for, not to mention a few bones, unless you were well-cushioned Patty. The time it took her to ascend cut into our forty-five minutes. Our break room was a windowless, fart-smelling rabbit hole that the men wouldn’t be caught dead in. It was painted a dirty apple green, a cheap and abundant war surplus paint that landlords slapped on the walls of their low-rent apartments or rooms, hence its name: Landlord Green. There was a refrigerator in the room that Patty was supposed to clean out weekly, which she did until Barbara found her box of Blum’s pastries missing. She railed at Patty, made her cry. Patty swore her innocence, saying that if she wasn’t trusted, she’d no longer clean it out; it went unused; no one dared open it. A lumpy, soiled, beige upholstered couch sat against the wall next to a sink; mismatched chairs stood in the middle at various angles around a chipped Formica table, strewn with crime, and movie magazines, and overflowing ashtrays. A tiny cubicle on the mezzanine landing, halfway up the stairs, festered the acrid-smelling “unisex” toilet. The first time I used it, I came out choking. “Next time, light up before you go in there,” Barbara suggested.

Balding, gnarled Ol’ (probably forty) Dan, the stock man’s horn-rimmed glasses perched on his hook-nose. Dan wore striped work shirts made of ticking fabric, and black Big Bens. He filled the wholesale orders and ran the freight elevator to haul down big items for customers from the floors above, where the stock was stored. Sometimes, if Patty was on the stairs and one of us had to use the bathroom, Dan would take us up. Otherwise, the elevator was off limits. We tried to convince him to let Patty ride. He said he’d have to clear it with Robert. I wasn’t there long enough to find out if he ever did.

Glenn, the outside/inside salesman, seemed an affable guy with wavy, grayish-brown hair; he looked like an accountant in his rimless glasses, white shirts, dark slacks, and striped ties. But Josephine told me that she had heard he’d served time for armed robbery and was a cousin of the bosses. In the lunch room, Patty let slip that Glenn was having an affair with Barbara.
“One morning, I saw them drive to work in the same car,” she said, picking egg salad from the corners of her mouth, “but they came in at different times. When I stay late, I see them leave together and soon’s they’re outside, I seen him put his arm around her waist.” Josephine refuted her, saying,
"No, it’s Norman. Glenn isn’t sexy. Barbara wouldn’t be turned on by Glenn.”
“But he has history,” Patty insisted, “Now, that’s sexy!”

Norman and Robert took care of business in an office on the mezzanine. We never went there unless asked; then you knew you were in trouble. I stayed out of Robert’s way and did my job. Sometimes, when business was slow on the floor, I watched Glenn write alphabetical code - - a certain combination of letters - - along with the numerical retail prices on the tags attached to items. The code was kept in a little black book. It was a mystery to me so one day I asked Norman what the letters meant. He explained that they represented wholesale prices. This system, he said, made it easier to enter wholesale orders that made up a large percentage of sales, into the books. Only Glenn and the bosses knew what it was. I thought I had figured it out. Early one morning,a new shipment came in, so - - enterprising me - - I stocked the shelves and wrote the wholesale code and the retail prices on tags. I felt pleased that I was helping Glenn and that Norman and Robert would be impressed and I’d get a raise. An hour into the day, Glenn huffed over to me,
“What the hell did you do?” he yelled, “Me, Norman, and Robert are the only ones who know the code. We change it all the time so naïve, smarty-pants little girls like you can’t figure it out!”
Later, Robert leaned over the mezzanine railing and hollered for me to come up to the office. This was it. I was going to get canned. He waited till I got inside the door then stood an inch away. He’d been drinking.
“Leave the fucking wholesale codes up to Glenn, goddammit!” he fumed, spitting in my face, “One more trick like that and you are out!” Norman calmed him down,
“Hey, Bob, the kid’s got a lot of gumption. She wants to learn the business. Leave her alone.” He opened the office door, smiled, ushered me out, closed it after me. I heard a muffled argument as I made my way down the stairs, heart pounding with every step. From then on, whenever I saw Robert coming, I’d high-tail it to the lunch room or hide in an aisle till I was sure he’d left the store. Jody, Josephine, and Barbara were amazed at what I’d done.
“I never had the guts to try figure out codes, let alone mark up stuff,” Jody said, “What made you do it?”
“No one told me not to, I didn’t know it was against the rules,” I told her, “I thought I was helping Glenn.” The only one who appreciated what I did was Norman.
“Look, doll,” he said, looking into my eyes with a fatherly gaze, “next time, you should clear it with me first before you take it upon yourself to do something you’re not sure of.” He smiled and clapped his hand on my shoulder a couple of times. “Now, go find someone to wait on.”

Chapter 3, TOY STORY, Part 3, continues:
I get married. Ol’ Dan, the stock man, makes a pass. I quit by phone and get a job at Met Life. So begins my so-called career in the insurance industry, about which I once shocked a co-worker: I told her I thought insurance was a business for men who couldn’t make it in organized crime.

Chapter Three TOY STORY

I had graduated from high school and was still living with Dad, in a third floor, share-the bath walk-up, on Grove off Divisadero. I not only wanted something better, I wanted to have my own place where Harry, my boyfriend, and I could be alone. I wanted independence. Work was the only means. Though I had majored in college prep, I hadn’t made up my mind about going. College meant I’d still have to live with Dad, or work part time and share an apartment; I never liked the idea of living with people not related to me. I didn’t want to rush or even join a sorority because of the practice of initiations, discrimination, and black-balling, nor did I want to live in a dorm.

When I was in school, Dad kept badgering me to take secretarial courses: shorthand, typing, dictaphone operation. “I flunked typing, Dad,” I whined, “I’m an artist, a creative person, I don’t want to be a secretary, beholden to a boss.”
“In other words,” he said, “a snob.”
“Do you want me to put up with bosses’ tantrums,” I countered, “shop for their wives or girlfriends, or both, on my lunch breaks; stay after work typing letters or forms, and tolerate my boss’s sexual come-ons, laughing them off, just to keep my damn job?”

Once out of school, I scanned the Help Wanted section of the Classifieds. I spotted an ad for a salesgirl in a toy store. What could be more fun! The next morning, in my hat and high-heels, I took a streetcar down Market to California Notion and Toy, a wholesale-retail outlet on Market between New Montgomery and Second Street. From Third Street east, which included Second and New Montgomery, Market Street was lined with one or two storey buildings catering mostly to soldiers and sailors on leave, or discharged now that the Korean war had allegedly ended (The Armistice lasted until November 1954). There were pawn shops, luggage outlets advertising cheap locker storage fees, hole-in-the wall stores selling cut-rate clothing, cigars and newspapers; dark, smelly bars from which bump-and-grind music pumped loudly from open doors, and greasy spoon restaurants stinking of overcooked hamburger and burned onions, upstairs were cheap hotels, and rooms, and pool halls (a description that fits Market Street west from 5th, today). Winos from the waterfront dives and other down-and-outers traipsed this area. Back then, few ventured below Third, unless you worked in the financial district, which was a couple blocks north of Market, bordered by Bush and California, Montgomery and Sansome. The toy store was tucked in the middle of the block on Market.

Norman S--, who co-owned the business with his brother, Robert, interviewed me. He was short, wiry, and as cool as a snake in hibernation. He wore expensive grey sharkskin or Italian silk suits, with ties of a modest pattern, white shirts. His hair was silver gray, receding, patterned like Ezio Pinza’s. I told Norman that I knew how to punch a cash register and that I’d worked at the Emporium part-time in high-school, so I had some sales experience. He asked me why I didn’t work full-time there. The Emporium wasn’t hiring, I explained, which was true. (I didn’t tell him about Ronson. If he called to check, I would feel bad if Ken Tilles found out I’d lied and wasn’t in college.) Norman said he would call me during the week. He called the next day and told me to start on Wednesday. Now, I could figure out what to do with my life while saving money. So, in a year’s time, I went from posh Stockton and Post, and modeling at the Emporium, to the sleaziest part of Market Street. But I wanted a job. I liked working in sales at the Emporium; engaging with customers except in the women’s half-size clothing department. I felt I'd enjoy this job.

My first day, Norman introduced me to Robert, who was boss when Norman was out of town getting new accounts - - two unlikely guys you would never think of as brothers. Robert reminded me of a Broderick Crawford character. He was big, bald with a bulbous nose; he wore owlish glasses with thick, black rims, and cheap, Robert Hall suits, or loud sports coats and slacks, and ties that made you want to scream. And his clothes were always wrinkled. He blustered around, shouting and complaining, thick lips twisting around words, saliva spraying from his mouth. You didn’t want to be near him when he was angry, which was most of the time. Norman spoke softly, never shouted, never got angry. He was kind. Smiled in a Cheshire Cat manner, like he knew his brother was a jerk. He encouraged me to learn the stock--both toys and notions. (I found out about notions at the Emporium. See previous chapter.) “During slow hours,” Norman said, “go up and down the aisles memorizing prices and where every item is shelved, so when a customer comes in, you can help him [sic: BPC era] efficiently and show him you know what you’re doing.”

As a salesgirl at a toy store, I didn’t have to lie to customers anymore; you helped people pick out items based on whom they were buying for. The place was filled with happy things: dolls, games, models, stuffed animals, baby rattles and toys for infants and toddlers, real sports equipment for kids, and toy musical instruments. The store was narrow and long. A back door opened on to an alley and parking lot, the First Street Transbay Terminal was a half-block away. Robert opened the doors at seven-thirty - - an odd time - - earlier than other stores. He wanted to take advantage of stockbrokers and insurance people who he felt would want to buy something on their way to work rather than when rushing to get home, unless they had secretaries who’d shop for them on their lunch hour. Robert was delusional. Neither Norman nor the others clued me in. These financial district folks used the store as a short cut from the Terminal and the parking lot, to the financial district. Ninety-nine percent. were men - - tall grim-faced men, wearing shiny, black shoes, white, button down shirts, dark three-piece suits, and Fedoras. They’d hustle in through the back door, push their way down the aisle - - padded shoulders and briefcases bashing against the stock, knocking things from shelves - - and fly out the front door. My first week, I would stop each one, smile and say, “May I help you?” They looked down their long noses and all but elbowed me aside. Yet, I had this dream: a rich CEO would see me on his way through the store and fall in love with me. We’d marry and live in a mansion in Sea Cliff or Saint Francis Woods. (Decades later, I learned that the feet of rich corporate heads never touch the street; to them, the idea of using a store as a short cut to get to work is beyond their imagination.) The other salesgirls called them “Back Door Men,” laughing as they clued me in on that term’s other meaning. After a while, I ignored these blustering, short-sighted drones, shuddering at the thought of what my life would really be like if I were to marry one. For the hour or so that the BDM blasted through the back door and rushed down the aisle like the bulls in Pamplona, I busied myself in another aisle.

One morning, I felt a hand grip my shoulder as I was rearranging some Effenbee dolls one aisle away from the bull-run corridor. I turned. It was Robert. “Please, help this gentleman!” he spat through clenched teeth. He apologized to the man, explaining that I was “still wet behind the ears.” This Back Door Man was in a hurry to buy something for his eight-year old daughter. Anxious to get out of there, he bought the first thing I showed him: a baby doll, a new-born, complete with bottle and layette. He grabbed it off the counter as soon as it was wrapped, and barged out the door. One afternoon, a tall, distinguished looking dark haired man, in a charcoal gray suit, asked my help in buying something for his son, a boy of twelve. He picked out a model tank. I pulled it off the shelf for him to look at. He took it in one hand and only then did I notice his other hand, hanging limply by his side. It was smooth and shiny, a sickly pale grayish-yellow; a prosthetic, made - - but failing - - to resemble, a normal hand. It was the first time I’d ever seen one. I tried not to betray my shock, yet I couldn't help stepping back and drawing in my breath.

Again, I lucked out with not having to deal with a cash register. We had a cashier, Patty, a hugely obese woman who sat at the register, behind the front counter all day, like the caterpillar sitting on a leaf, puffing a hookah, in Alice in Wonderland, or Jabba the Hutt, in Star Wars. There were three of us besides Patty: Jody, a petite short-haired, hard-nosed blonde, who, several weeks after I had quit, was arrested for check fraud (she once met me for lunch, out on bail, and wanted to borrow money. I had none. Dad had moved out, so I was living on peanut butter and crackers and walking home from work. Still, I wouldn't have given her any). Josephine was an older Italian woman, heavily made up with hair dyed coal black. She was married to a man she whined constantly about, complaining that he listened to opera on headphones all the time, ignoring her. She bought Chanel No. 5 at lunchtime one day, and later, in the break room, she whispered to me that she wanted to show me a secret. She stood up, hiked her skirt above the tops of her stockings, fastened with garters, revealing fat, milk-white thighs. I muttered something, then blurted that I had to be back on the floor before Robert started yelling.
“Oh, honey, I just wanted to demonstrate where is the best place to wear perfume,” she dabbed some on her inner thighs with fingers tipped with red-lacquered nails, “It’s here, darling,” she said, dropping her skirt and flouncing off. The next day, she was in a better mood. There was Barbara, a blowzy bleached blonde, who wore purple and red low-cut cocktail dresses to work, like she had come in from nights out, without bothering to go home first, lots of perfume, cheap jewelry, and heavy makeup. She, too, was married. She sneered sarcastically about sex, how boring it was, doing it with the same guy all the time. I wondered if when Harry and I got married, would I come to feel the same.


Toy Story: Part 2 (Continued.) Gossip - - who’s cheating on whom? Our rank workplace environment. The break room. I'm the victim of Robert's wrath trying to crack the wholesale code and almost get the ax.

Chapter Two: A Taste of Fame

The Emporium High School Fashion Board: Our leader, Karin Johnson in dark outfit, top row center. Me, second row, second from right wearing a pendant. Lee Meriwether pokes her head between Susan Evans and Jacquie Hughes in the third row from the bottom.*

My next job was handed to me. After working as a counter girl and shipping clerk during the summer with Ken Tilles at Ronson, I started my senior year at Mission High. One day, early into the term, Miss O'Neill, the Dean of Girls - - a tiny, pinch-faced woman who wore severe colorless suits - - stopped me on my way to class and led me into her office. I thought I was in trouble, but I couldn't think for what. She gestured to the hot seat in front of her desk, then stared at me through rimless glasses for a long time before she spoke. I tried not to fidget. Patting her brownish-gray perm, she said,

"I received a call the other day from a woman who heads the 'teen fashion board at The Emporium. She asked me to give her the name of a senior girl who had excellent academic records, was engaged in school activities, held a student-body office, and had been selected for some honor since her sophomore year. We, your teachers, myself, and others in administration, went through several names. Only a couple of you fit all categories." She looked down at a paper on her desk, adjusted her glasses and read out loud, "You are an A student, in school plays, were voted Girl of the Month as a sophomore, and this year you're a cheer leader and vice-president of the student body." She looked up, "A consensus was reached that you should be the school's representative."

I could't believe it. "Oh, thank you, Miss O'Neill - -"

" - - I'll be honest dear," she leaned forward, "I held out because - -" she hemmed and hawed - -"because I don't think your living situation - -"

" - -My what?"

"Let me finish, dear. I brought up the fact that you live alone with your father in a rather undesirable neighborhood and didn't think that is a healthy environment . . ."

She kept talking; I couldn't hear her; my ears were ringing. I felt nauseous. I got up to leave.

"Congratulations, dear," she said, "Someone from the board will call you with the particulars."

I mumbled "Thanks," and fled.

At home that afternoon, Karin Johnson, the head of the fashion board, called to welcome and congratulate me. "We meet this Saturday at 9AM in the conference room next to the Personnel department," she added. A few days later, Miss Marichini, my Spanish teacher, held me after class. "We all think it's wonderful what you've achieved . . ," she said, "We had no idea . . . most of us know that gifted students like yourself need not come from the stereotyped ideal American family . . ." She seemed as though she wanted to say more, but just touched my shoulder and said, "Congratulations. Good luck." Her words were like a balm to those of the Dean's. She confirmed what I knew: most faculty at Mission were open-minded. They had to be. Its students were Latino, African-American, Samoan, Caucasian (Italian, Irish, Greek, etc.), Asian, Indian, and others from the diverse Mission District of mainly working class families.

Nineteen of us "white" girls from Bay Area public and Catholic high schools (Looking back, I am positive none other than "white" girls were given a thought, regardless of their achievements) met every Saturday morning in a glorified dressing room. The head of the Board was Karin Johnson, a sweet, dark-haired, petite woman who treated us like sisters. Her side-kick was Sandy Rosenfeld, a tall, slender man with slightly crossed eyes, behind dark rimmed glasses. Besides being a buyer, Sandy ran our fashion shows, picked out the clothes we modeled, and threw hissy-fits when something was slightly “off,” like a belt not fastened right. I hung out mainly with a small blond, Jacquie Hughes, from Lowell, who had an English accent, and Lee Meriwether from Washington High, a very friendly, tall, willowy, brunette. We reported to Personnel for actual sales training which included an apptitude test: "What makes moth holes? Multiple choice: eggs, larvae, or moths?" Convincing someone to buy was "How to make a customer walk the plank." We passed and were awarded badges proclaiming us official Board members. Mostly, we were primped and pampered, and given free stuff; one day it was "Fire and Ice" lipsticks from the visiting "Revlon Lady." Another perk was a Christmas brunch at Karin's place on Telegraph Hill near Julius' Castle. We attended a lecture on "fads and fashions throughout the US" given by a rep from Seventeen Magazine and former Emporium employee. According to Karin, she was impressed by by our "charm and graciousness;" later, she sent us all silver charms.

Some of us modeled at the Set the Stage, back to school show at the Emporium (now defunct) in Stonestown. Actors Roddy McDowell (a favorite) and Sally Forrest made an appearance, but left before we got a chance to meet them. When not sashaying down the runway under the Emporium's famous glass Dome (which was left intact when the building was remodeled in 2008 as a four-story shopping mecca with a Bloomingdale's and a multi-screen movie theatre), or in Stonestown, or going on field trips, we worked Saturdays as salesgirls in different departments, and, as my mother did at Mier and Frank's in Portland, we wrote up sales slips and brought them to a cashier, relieving me of the stress of dealing with a cash register and making change.

There was a Notions Department. They no longer exist. The so-called drugstore chains are now just monster Notions Departments. We all dreaded being sent to Notions. Notions were things that wouldn't fit anywhere else: sewing supplies, "sensitive" linens (meaning women's specialty underwear, known now as "incontinent briefs"); some braces and trusses not carried in stores specializing in medical corsets and other corrective, elastic undergarments, and prosthetic devices; femine hygiene products, etc. Today, an entire medical supply industry has sprung up adjunct to hospitals; retail stores carrying everything from crutches, canes, pressure socks to electric mobile scooters for our fast-growing older, infirm population, the war-wounded and disabled, and people suffering from obesity, diabetes, high-blood pressure and other ailments that can be diet controlled. I digress.

The Plus Size Department (now simply called “Women’s) was not one of my favorites, either. There, we had been instructed to tell customers how great they looked in the outfits they tried on, no matter what. In other words - - lie. Tell zoftig women how beautiful they were in tent-like print dresses or two-piece outfits that bulged here or sagged there. So I was relieved when my next assignment was in Haberdashery (from the word "haberdasher" meaning "a dealer in men's furnishings"). Who uses that word any more? Now it's the Men's Department. I was there for two consecutive Saturdays.

My first Saturday, a handsome, blond, Don Johnson-type (in his Miami Vice days) salesman (an equivalent, back then would've been Tab Hunter [whose name my dad said meant "inept typist"]when he co-starred with Natalie Wood in, "The Burning Hills"), whom I couldn't help but notice, left his station behind the counter at Dress Shirts and sauntered over to mine (wallets, belts, leather accessories). He smelled nice and was impeccably dressed, of course - - a job requirement (we girls had to wear white blouses, black skirts and black heels or flats. During Christmas we rebelled and wore RED. Karin was chastised soundly by Personnel). "How do you like working at the Big E?" blond man asked. We checked each other out the rest of that day. The second Saturday, he told me he lived up on Twin Peaks, had a fantastic view of the City, the Bay and the East Bay hills, "especially at night with all the lights and a moon . . . ." He slyly slipped me his address and phone number, written on a strip of register tape, and invited me up to his apartment after work. "Danger" signs flashed in my brain. I knew where this was headed. From then on, I went out of my way to avoid Haberdashery.

One of the girls on the board acted like a prima donna; she was a holdover from the previous year to assist Karin for a couple of weeks in transitioning us from mere schoolkids to models. She deigned to tolerate our presence. Granted she was beautiful, resembled Marilyn Monroe a bit. We were all a little envious when she landed a swimsuit modeling job for the women's sports outlet, Koret of California. Still, we congratulated her, but she barely acknowledged it. A month or so later, she stormed in, "I was sabotaged! Look what they did to me! They cut off my legs!" and practically shoved into Karin's face the Koret catalogue in which her swimsuit shot appeared. She stormed out leaving the catalogue on a chair. We grabbed it. The photo pictured her in a blue, one-piece suit, in profile, to mid-thigh. She was looking up into a blue sky, her arms raised, blond hair tousled casually. We couldn't understand why she was so angry. Karin wondered how she would have reacted if they'd cut off her head. She told us that next time she came in we should take a good look at her legs. She had no ankles. We felt better. But not much. Later in the year, we all got a chance to model Gantner bathing suits. My taste of fame came the day I bought a sweater (with an employee discount) at the Stonestown Emporium and the salesgirl gushed, "Oh, I know you! You're a model!"

When our membership ended in June, 1953, Karin and a small staff published an in-house journal of our year, calling it "Ship's Log: H. S. Board." It detailed holiday and scholastic events we were involved in, and a mother and daughter luncheon (I was glad that my mother happened to be visiting from Portland that week so I could take her). The log included field trips to clothing manufacturers, newspaper publishers, and a wire-photo service. The journal ended with a hypothetical look into our futures a year later: I was a private drama coach for Jacquie Hughes; Lee Meriwether ended up in Paris as a model for Schiaparelli. Both prophecies sort of worked out. Though not a drama coach, I am involved in theatre as an actor, movement theatre artist, and playwright; also, from 1995 to 2003, I had been a print-ad model and appeared in a film. Lee very well could have become a model, but rather followed her dream of becoming a successful, famous, actor. She went on to become Miss America and was the female lead in the TV series, “Barnaby Jones,” played Catwoman in the 1996 "Batman." She has been in several films and has returned and continues to return often, to her alma mater, City College of San Francisco, to perform and recently played the lead in the college's production of O’Neil’s “Long Day’s Journey Into Night.”

In up-coming Chapter Three, after graduation, I decide against college, want to make money to get my own place, but don't want to work at the Emporium. I end up in a wholesale/retail toy store on lower Market St. After being spoiled by Ken Tilles on Union Square and tasting the fame of modeling, the primping, pampering at the H. S. Board, I discover a seamier side of life.

*You can't help but notice that there are no mixed-race, blacks, or Asians among us. The board,if it existed today, would certainly look a lot different.

Chapter One: Spoiled (Continued) Final Installment.

I didn’t want to get fired. I was making money. And spending it. I shopped at ritzy stores on Union Square if only to buy a pair of nylons at I Magnin’s, rather than walk down to The Emporium on Market. I liked feeling rich, forget for a while that I lived in a third-floor walk-up, share-the-bath apartment on Grove off Divisadero with my Dad. One day, a big, raw-boned girl, with straight, light brown hair, wearing a flowery dress, flounced in sans lighter. She gave me a huge smile and asked for Mr. Tilles. She had an appointment. I sent her on back. The next day, Ken called me into his office. He was going to fire me for screwing up again. I'd had maybe one cash imbalance in over a week. I decided to come clean. I would let him do all the talking then I’d tell him. He motioned me to a chair.

“Look, sweetheart, I’m afraid . . .” was how he began. “ . . . I have to take you off the counter.” I tightened my lips and nodded. “You are not working out. I like you, you’re a cute kid, and I know you’re saving for college.” I cringed, inwardly.

“I understand, Mr. Tilles,” I heard myself stammer, “I haven’t been - -”

“Let me finish, please?” he said, sitting on the edge of his desk, “So I’m putting you in Shipping and Receiving. You’ll give Linda a hand,” he spoke fast, “I think you’ll work out well there. I’ve hired a new counter girl. She’s starting tomorrow. So when you come in, report to Linda.” He nodded, went behind his desk, “Oh,” he added as he sat down, “you’ll get the same pay.”

“Thank you, Mr. Tilles, thank you.” I’d just been demoted from counter-girl to shipping clerk. I held my arms tight to my sides, hoping to stop the sweat I felt streaming down my ribs from pooling on the floor when I stood up to leave. My skirt stuck to the back of my legs. I reached behind me and pulled it free. I knew he was watching. I didn’t care. I still had a job.

Beth, the new hire for counter-girl ended up being that tall, raw-boned girl, with a penchant for flowery dresses. She gave me her big sugary smile when I passed the counter the next day and pushed through the door in the partition. Shipping and Receiving was off to the side of Ken’s office and the repair area.

Linda turned out to be a gravelly-voiced, mannish-woman with straight brown hair down to her shoulders. She reminded me of my junior-high PE teacher. She gave me a limp, but clean, jacket. “Hey, I know they’re ugly, but it’ll keep your duds clean. On the plus side, hon, you can wear flats. We can smoke back here, too.”

(Rules forbade John and Pete from lighting up while they worked, but they could smoke in the back. On breaks they sat on the sills of huge windows of opaque, pebbled glass, which you opened by pulling on heavy chains, overlooking a narrow alley. Ironically, we all used book matches. Pete told me they didn’t own a Ronson. “Nah,” he explained, “we mess with ‘em all day, don’t want to see ‘em if we don’t have to.” Smoking was not allowed at the counter, except for customers who puffed on cigarettes and blew smoke in my face. I thought nothing of it. This was the ‘50s; everyone smoked. My crutch was Pall Mall; but “Winston Tastes Good Like a Cigarette Should,” and doctors all agreed that Camels were the best.)

Linda explained my duties as I slipped into my jacket: “People mail in lighters for repairs. The crew fixes ‘em and we ship ‘em out. And we get supplies and store ‘em up on those shelves. Piece a cake.” She snapped her fingers. During a break, I pulled Philip Wylie’s novel, The Disappearance, out of my bag; Linda told me she’d read it. I knew we’d get along fine. Later, she demonstrated how to package lighters so they wouldn’t get damaged in the mail, how to label stuff, and use the postage meter. Along the wall were rolls of heavy brown paper and on the shelves below, cardboard that folded into boxes, with stiff flaps that cut my fingers when I overlapped them. (Holding up her bandaged fingers, Linda showed me a cabinet stocked with first aid supplies.) Heavy metal containers that looked like giant scotch tape dispensers held big rolls of brown paper tape, with glue on one side. A brush, wet from a water well in the container that we had to keep filled, brushed the gluey side of the paper as we pulled it out to the desired length, ripped it off and slapped it onto a package. This took some skill. At first I got tangled up in the wet, sticky brown tape that smelled like stale urine. We weighed the packages then Linda showed me how to use the postage meter. She gave me the onerous job of hauling the heavy machine to the post office two blocks away to get reset. Still, I could relax, smoke, and sit on the wrapping counter and talk when work was slow. Linda blabbed about John one day, during a break.

“He looks at you like a wounded animal,” she said. “You like him, don’t you?”

“Well . . . . he just seems like he’s in pain all the time, weak, too. I feel sorry for him.”

“His wife just had a baby,” she said, “Huh! Where do you suppose his career as a Ronson lighter repairman will take him?”

“I didn’t think about that,” I said, thinking I wanted to do something for him, make him happy, but what? “He’s twice my age," I added, "I never imagined myself involved with a married man. Older men intimidate me, anyway. Like I said, I just feel sorry for him.”

“Watch it, hon. It’s easy to mistake feeling sorry for something else. Look at Pete and Louise,” she gestured to the work station, “They are perfectly happy. They pride themselves in their work, 'n' feel awful when a lighter's returned with the same problem. John’s are never returned. I’d hate to seem him when one is sent back.”

“He’ll probably break down and cry, get tears all over the work station, everything gets rusty.”

We started laughing and couldn’t stop. I glanced at Mr. Tilles’s office and saw him raise his black, bushy head and frown.

One Saturday, I had to work overtime with him to catch up on the billing. Patty, the billing clerk, was out sick. Ken gave me a bunch of bills to type invoices for. I struggled all morning to finish maybe three. Passing by, on the way out of his office, he laughed, looking at me over his half-glasses.

“You’re really burning up that typewriter, aren’t you?” I felt my face heat up.

“I didn’t apply for the job of typist in the billing department,” I said into the keys. I stopped short of telling him I had flunked typing last semester with a final score of minus six correct words a minute. The lowest score in the class. My friends couldn’t believe it. How was it possible to get a minus score? Ken gave up and handed me a stack of stuff to file, instead. That I could do. He sat down and typed invoices himself - - thick brown fingers, sprouting black hair, stabbing at the keys.

Beth didn't work out. Sales went down; repeat customers kept asking for the “cute little brunette.” Ken put me back behind the counter. He admonished me to count change carefully, pay more attention, and stop flirting with the customers. My liking for him grew, along with my guilt.

I told my fourth lie the last week of August. I gave notice, explaining to Ken I decided, after all, to go to City College when I was really only going into my senior year of high school. He and the others gave me this huge “Good Luck in College” card, which they all had signed. I felt like crying and almost ratted on myself, but got a grip, figuring they’d never find out. Now and then, throughout the school term, I would brazenly drop in on Ken and the rest of the crew after class, dragging out my sham, telling them all about my “college” courses. When Ken Tilles’s jazz quartet played at the Stonestown Mall, I’d be there. Years later, I read that he’d become a bail-bondsman; his name appeared often in Herb Caen’s column. Decades passed. I heard he had died and tons of people attended his funeral. He spoiled me. I thought all bosses would be like Ken Tilles. I was wrong.

Next: Chapter Two - - A Taste of Fame.

In my senior year, I am recruited by The Emporium as a “fashion representative” from Mission High, where I model clothes at in-house fashion shows and do part-time sales on Saturdays. Lee Meriwether, former Miss America and a well-known actress, is selected to represent Washington High.

Chapter One: Spoiled (continues).

Mr. Tilles introduced me to the repair crew when they came in a little before nine: John, the gaunt blond; Pete, an older man with half-glasses; and Louise, a grandmotherly woman with a short, gray-brown perm, who wore upswept, blue plastic-framed bi-focals. After welcoming me into the fold - - so to speak - - they filed through the partition door and I took my place behind the counter. Soon, men began walking in with pocket lighters for servicing or repair. When women came in, they lugged department store shopping bags, saying, "My husband (brother, uncle, boyfriend, etc.) wanted me to bring this in." Their bags were weighed down with heavy table model lighters: the Crown, Regal, or Queen Ann, the ship, animal, and naked lady - - like the Standing Nude pictured here - - or gold plated, sterling-silver plate, marble, crystal, or ceramic. (See them at: http://transporter.tripod.com or, Google "Ronson.") My main job was to sell the lighters in the display case or talk people into buying one from the dog-eared catalogue, resting on the counter. “Oh, you can order this model and it will be shipped to you in a week - - or two at the most!” I enthused. I loved feeling the heft and slippery metallic coolness of a chrome, silver, or gold-plated pocket lighter against my palm when I slid it out of its box to show a customer. But few bought new ones.

An aspect of my job that Mr. Tilles never mentioned at my interview was that he expected me to diagnose lighter malfunctions at the counter though I was not to attempt to fix them (I did learn to pull out wicks with tweezers). What did I know? No one in my immediate family owned a Ronson. My Aunt Dorothy, my father’s sister, had a Queen Ann model that never worked. But she refused to let me take it in to get fixed. She said it reminded her of her ex-husband, my Uncle Bill, who ran away with her best friend.

John and the others showed me how to detect problems: “This one needs a new flint, see?” “This - - a new flint wheel, feel how smooth it is?” “There’s a new flint in there, but it doesn’t spark - - the guy flooded it. Too much fluid.” When people brought in their lighters (some arrived in the mail), I made out a repair slip with my diagnosis and passed the lighter and the slip, in a heavy ochre-colored paper bag, to the crew through the doggie-door cut into the partition behind me (for a table model I would Scotch tape the repair slip and job bag to it and lug it through the people door myself). Wearing their limp, grimy, gray smocks, sitting at a long, wooden counter behind the partition, they tested and repaired lighters. All day. Little bins of Ronson parts sat in front of them: serrated wheels and flint holders, tiny plungers, screws, and springs; along with flints, wicks, and cotton to pack inside the case to absorb Ronsonol, Ronson's trade-mark lighter fluid. The crew's blackened, stained fingers smelled of it. The entire area reeked of the stuff, which after a while, I got used to. Piles of work envelopes threatened to avalanche from the counter to the floor. When John or one of the others repaired a lighter, they jingled a little bell and slid the lighter in its bag through the door, and I rang up the cost they jotted down on the slip, on the cash register.

Ken Tilles was waiting for me one morning, after I'd been there a week. “Uh, sweetheart,” he said, as I put my coat and purse away, “I see that your cash was off last night by twenty dollars - - in the customer’s favor.” I didn’t say anything. “Do you know what I mean? It means that we lost money, honey. Ronson is supposed to make money. The customer is not supposed to make money off us!” I said I was sorry. “You have to be more careful when you count your change back, understand?” I felt my face burn and just knew it was bright red, sure the repair crew heard every word. I made an effort. Still, I sometimes was confused when I didn’t get the exact change.

When no one came in I hung out behind the display case, leaned on the counter, leafed through the catalogue, and picked out gorgeous models for myself, sensing The Iron Monster’s presence over my shoulder. I wasn’t used to standing all day in high heels. By afternoon, my feet hurt. So I sat on a tall stool I found tucked out of sight next to the register. One day, Mr. Tilles saw me. His thick, black brows drew together above his nose. “Hey, doll, look, I don’t want customers seeing you loafing.” “Oh, okay,” I said, kicking off my heels and standing at the counter in my stocking feet. He shook his head and disappeared through the people door. On the days he was out, I sat on the stool. But this wasn’t the only thing that caused his brows to meet. It seemed no matter how hard I tried, I still had problems balancing the cash at the end of the day. I began to sense a cold blade on the back of my neck.

Chapter One: "Spoiled" continues: Smoking rules, I develop a crush. A woman comes in sans lighter to see Mr. Tilles; she has an appointment. I think nothing of it.