Document text
ORIGINAL MSS. OR FIELD NOTES (CHECK
ONE)
puB. THESE ARE OUR LIVES
TITLE MINNIE CARANFA
WRI LEK SEYMOUR BUCK
DATE July 22,1939 WDS
CHECKER
PP. 12
SOURCES GIVEN
COMMENTS
Date: Ally 22, 1939
Submitted by:
WPA Workers
Consulted
WPA Occupation:
Seymour D. Buck Nemturyport, Mass.
(Mrs.) Minnie Caranfa
13% Merrimac Street
Worker on TPA Household -Aid Project.
Minnie Caranfa planted her feet solidly on the kitchen
linoleum and waved a beefy arm toward the outspread newspaper,
"I don't know what you heard about mei but you might's
well know, if it's anything to do with that junk in the "Libera-
tor," you can just skip it: Mink I'm going to let any old lady
go around calling me a goddam whore and get away with it? What
if she is damned near seventy, she'd ought to know better by
now. The judge found her guilty, too. When he told my lawyer
man 'at I'd ought'v settled things like that outa court, I got
right up and told him something. "Listen, Mister," I said to him,
"what Minnie Caranfa does at 139 Merrimac Street's her business,
and no goddam body else's:
"wow, every week they got to print some goddamthing
in the paper about me and my friends. Hell with them. I got my
home here. I'm trying to fix things nice for me and the boy, and
everybody's got to thinking I'm like a bunch ot these women in
this burg running around alla time. It's not so, see?
"Mebby my friend comes to see me sometimes, so what? I
get lonesome, sitting around alone nights, same's anybody else.
Besides, that's different than around. Don't worry, I get
chances enough. Minnie's only 36, even now. Ghrist, every
salesman comas here seems to think he's gotta date me up. Hell,
I'm watchin' myself, I am. Think, I don't know about them dames
has to quit workint once a week so's to go into Boston to the
free clinics?
"Marry again? Don't make me laugh. I wouldn't get
married again, to the best man ever lived. Look at how it was
with me. I was only seventeen and a half when I got married to
Lawrence. Minute work got slack with him in the shoe shop, and he
found I could keep right on doing housework by the day, it didn't
take him long to get used to sitting around all, day, did it?
"Fifteen years he's been gone, now. He's got a good
job, working down Long Island, someplace. Forty bucks a week,
and every week, I mean. Sends me five bucks a week for the boy.
That's how come I hadda get onto the ERA, using that five bucks
to pay rent with, and when it got sols I couldn't even get a pair
of curtains to do up for two -bits, I hadda get some way of buying
grub for the kid and me.
"S'pose Lawrie sends for the kid to come visit hie" I
asked the Mayor. "I used his money each week for rent, and now
he's got no clothes fit to dress up in. You got to either get me
a job to earn enough to pay rent and food and lights, or by the
Jesus, lemne go work with them other punks on the sewing projeck.
"Ever since then, I been getting my money each week, and
3
Minnie Caranfa's not one to forget who give her the work. Believe
me, if people's really stick up for theirselves they'd get some-
place. Hell, everybody's lost their guts, these days.
"No sense us standing here in the kitchen like this, is
there? I guess you got some questions you want to ask, likely,
anyway. As long as you aint trying to make out I'm something
which I aint, it's O.K. with me.,
"How you like my new ice -box? It's one of the new "GE's"
and its Ace number one. There's a little pla6e under the coil to
keep stuff frozen, Jeez it'll even keep store ice cream hard, and
that's the first time I ever seen anything like that.
"I hadda have it, that's all. With my boy working over
to the Beach, getting home all hours for meals, and with me out
of the house givin' enemas to WPA workers all day, Christ 1 want
my food like it's fit to eat.
"My friend says he's just as glad, anyway, not to have
the ice -man pokin' his head in here alla time, anyway. Aint he a
scream?
"I got the house pretty well fixed up, now, and I sure
hate to have to get laid off. I don't know how I'll make out, if
this vacation business comes through like they say. Christ, why
don't the bastards admit there's so many out of work that WPA as
is don't keep half of 'em busy, 'stead of giving us the bum's
rush just to make room for a lotta guys more, we'll have a god
dam nice chance ever seem' our checks rollin' again, I'll say.
"Telephone? Yeah, that's a laugh,. The Social Worker,
she kinda kicked on that, too, but it's like I told her,
"Jeez, lady, there's guys on WPA got cars, aint there? They all
eptta have them to cart each other back and forth from City Hall
to the Artichoke, how about me? I get little odd jobs, some-
times, this way. A lady calls up, her son's comin' home from
Bar Harbor for the week -end, and would I mind just running up and
giving the place a once-over in a hurry? It's worth dough to me.
"My friend was here that time, and he says, real nice,
"If it makes any difference, ma'am, I'd be glad to see that the
bill's paid regular, so's Minnie can keep it." That made every-
thing all jakey, then.
"What burns people up is because my friend don't live far
from here, anyhow, I aint mentionin' any names, see? I
gotta admit, I'm sorry he's married, but Hell, if his own woman
don't think enough of him to try to do anything about it, why I
gotta worry, huh? Besides, everything's on the up and up, no
dirty stuff at all, see? People can't seem to see that just
bein' with each other, talkin' about things and all, can make a
whole lot of difference how you feel when you get up next day.
"I got a good looking place, here, and I aint ashamed
for anybody to know it. What the Hell, Lawrie's eighteen, now,
and he's all I got. I got to have a decent place for him to go
and bring his friends to, aint I? My friend thought it was too
bad for me to have to go runnin' back and forth between the kitchen
and from room every time I wanted the radio, so he got me one
of them little "Acey-Decey" sets, whatever you call 'em, and
Ii•
5,
got it right out here over the sink, handy, huh? It's nice, so.
Minnie led the way through the dining room, furnished
with a complete dining room set, from sideboard to red -leather
covered chairs. In the front hallway neat curtains hung over the
door, and the hall -tree contained stylish, new womens' coats on
hangars.
Crossing the spotless rug, Minnie indicated a comfort-
able leather rocker near the street window, while she flung her-
self with careless disregard for disposition of her short, tight-
fitting black skirt, on one end of an overstuffed davenport.
"Smoke? NO, thanks, I don't. Or drink," she added a
trifle suspiciously. Smiling, then, she added with a grin, "You
see, I gotta be careful, I gotta watch out, boy. Sometimes me
and my friend, we split a bottle of ale, or something, but I got
to watch myself.
"What I said about not marryin' the best man ever lived
kinda stuck in your crop? Hell, don't mind that: Maybe I'd get
hitched again, IF If they was a man'd be good to me. If held
work, too, like he'd ought to, to support me. Trouble is, there
aint many good men left. One's got to alla time have his way on
you, and then wonder why'n Hell you can't work good next day, or
he's gotta lose his job, and life offIn your earnings. Nertz!
"No, sir. I finally told my husband to up and get to
Hell out, and he did! That was when Lawrie was only four, and
ever since I been trying to fix things nice for me and the boy.
"Christ, look at my husband, what happened to him: Be
married again, but boy, he had a job first, you bet. Then his
wife got "TB" or had it, and died inside three years. I guess
he's been runnin' around on the loose, since, until this summer.
"'Sfunny, you know it? I just happened to tell Lawrie
one week -end, "Why don't you get on the Greyhound, and ride down
to visit with your Pa?" He went down there, and what you think?
"My old man's gone back to Italy, to get him another
wife! Jesus Christ, I says to myself, not tellint Lawrie how
I felt, natural, he's gone and done it again. Wasn't satis-
fied with an American this time, they're too smart for him,
he's gonna get him a young piece from the old country: Then he
can be the big shot, and take her way acrost the ocean to the
U.S.A.! She's getting a break, though, I guess, at that. Not
what Mussoline aint O.K.," Minnie went on cautiously. "1 aint
sayin' a thing about that. All I hear, if it hadn't a been for
him, things 'd be a lot tougher over there than they is now.. Only,
over here in this country, well, look what they done to F.D.
he started out bein' a Mussolini, and the minute the people begun
to get more'n the big shots thought was O.K. they shut down on
him, more every day.
"Born here in Newturyport? Not me, thank God! I aint
no native of this goddam hole. No, I come from Haverhill, I did.
My folks still live up there, but the old man's too old to do any
work, anymore. Ma's sick with puss in her kidneys, and I only
hope she can just live comfortable until it's over. Funny, she's
the one keeps thinking everything'11 be O.K. in this country. My
old man says the hard times we had aint nothin' to what's coming.
"Way he figures things, if they go keeping these guys on
wondering if they're gonna have work alla time, pretty soon, when
they take it away from 'em, the guys'll figure they got a right to
make their own work, and it won't be Boy Scouts, neither.
"I'm trying to fix things up nice here. I got my curtains
from Sears, they're awful nice to trade with. I tried out
Spiegels', but Bell, honest I never seen such stuff, no kidding.
My friend tells me down in the shoe shop they're awful particular
with things from Sears', but if they got something not quite a
"first" but not tough enough for rejects, then it goes sailing
into a bin, for Spiegelst. Swell way to do business, aint it?
"You got to expect to take it on the chin, though, if
you go buying mail-order, anyway. I like to watch the papers, and
when they's a sale, you'll find Minnie right there in the front
row every time. I have to borrow from my friend sometimes, but I
always pay it right back next check. Hell, when you can get your-
self a
22.50 coat for five bucks, why go around looking like Bell?
"'Where'll I be five years from now? Jeez, you tell me:
Way things are, I don't know nothin' about nothin'l As long's I
got my W1DA work regular, I can squeeze by, just about. If that
goes, Minnie's gonna be parked on the City Ball doorsteps when they
open up in the mornings I aint been around this town for nothing,
8
Bell with it I want work, and I got all the time a telephone
to answer, if there is any. That goddam thing don't ring, now,
one week t'the next, 'less it's a wrong number. There aint any
work not in this town. Christ, I can't work in the shoe
shops. The smell of the cement just gets me all through
here." Minnie rubbed pudgy hands across her breasts and &rem
over her protruding abdomen.
"Only thing I know is housework, and thevaint enough of
that, anymore. I only know I'm not going to go hungry, and I'm
not going to wait until I've hocked every goddam piece of
furniture I got before they gotta help me, either. That's old
stuff, boy.
"Lawrie? Oh, he can't work inside. It'd kill_ him. You
see, ever since about ten, he's been sick alla time with asthsftio
It's something wicked, sometimes. Doctor coming in the middle
of the night, and everything. No, he's gotta be outdoors
about all the time. That stuff costs extra too, you know.
Teez, it's a wonder I got two dimes to rub together, my friend
says he don't see how I manage. I watch the pennies," Minnie
stated proudly, "and I'm not one of thesicind to throw my money
around on a good time, like some.
"Worry? Jesus, do II Nights I can't sleep, just lie
there and watch my goddam legs twitch. It's terrible! Next day,
you'll be in somebody's house, and you'll see things so tough it
makes you figure they's others lots worse over than you are.
"The real trouble with everything? Christ, tell me: I
don't read much but the papers, and I gotta admit they're mostly
crap somebody wants to put in, not read. Hell, got eyes,
but I get so sick, mostly, what I see, I just go on minding
my own business. Trouble coming, though, if this WPA business
all goes to Hell.
"You can't make other people understand all the different
kinds there are on it," Minnie stated filuai. "If they'd just
take a goddam good look at everybody, see all the kinds,
old and young, smart and dumb, all banged together it's
some pitcher:
"What with these strikes, now, I'm afraid we got a black
eye, all over. I don't see why it's any fairer for them guys
who are striking to work only half time and get paid's much as
we do, anyway. Who the Hell are they's what I'd like to know.
Aint we all in the same trough? Hell, give us grub enough and
what we sot to have, and let us all push our own way, I say.
"Now, though, those guys in the new goviment are mad!
They figure we're striking against them: Hell, we aint the only
ones. If you're asking me, it's like my friend says, he says,
"Minnie, big business's pullin' the strike, and it's a perma-
nent one, 'slong as you WPA buns hold out.' Aint that swell, now.
"If US Americans'd stick together, instead of letting
10
the goddam Jews swarm all over the place, things might be better,
anyhow. Look at how it is in the movies. You gotta stand up and
listen to the Star Spangled Banner every time you want to see a
show. Hell, I'm no Jesus' Witness, but for Christ' sake, you'd
think we was all aliens or something, and hadda be taught to like
the looks of our own flag, or something. It burns me up, boy.
Them Tews out in Hollywood, look at their names on every goddam
picture Produced By Directed By even the guys that own the
banks they keep their money in all Jews, eirery goddam one of
them:
"Americans left here in these parts just aint got the guts
enough to throw, anynore: This town's different, if you don't
know it already. Shoe shops, run by Jews. Let son e goddam kyke
come along like Fiegenbaum, you know him, "Feel -Your -Bottom"
they call him, let him stick his goddam ugly map up into yours
and feel your behind, or else and the more you let him feel,
the better job you get next week: That's no crap, ask anybody
works in there. They'll all tell you the sane: Sure things
What the Hell you going to do about it? Jobs are there, rotten,
stinking ones, but a job, and them's got 'em are hanging
on goddam tight to ten4 too.
"You think you could buy a pair of "seconds" for yourself?
Like Hell! "Sorry," the forelady'll tell you, "but all our seconds
are sold in case lots." Sure, in then you'll see some dame
come home from Boston raving about the new wine -colored suedes
she got to a Jew place dawn by North Station. Swell stuff, boy:
nJeez, I didn't know I'd been going on so long. It's most
dark out. Well, I guess we can get along for a little yet,
without the light, huh? Like my friend says, "Jeez, Minnie, you
sure hate to waste anything." What the Hell!
"I guess I musta told you damn near everything about my-
self, by now, way I been going along, I wisht all this stuff about
us WM guys could really be writ up and them bastards aint got no
use for us be MADE to read it, if it choked lem! They aint going
to listen to us. Wait'll we're fired, and gotta have charity some
more. Wait'll the Mayor squawks, and then the big shots dawn to
Boston got to raise dough to keep things going by Jesus, before
snow falls them guys in the new gov'ment'll be goddam glad to have
the U.S.A. footin' the bill 'stead of them: They aint gonna have
no thoughts then but how the quickets they can shut us up, you
see.
"Way I'm beginning to look at things is it's every dog for
his own bone, and the one growls the loudest without letting
go, usually keeps it longest! My friend told me that, and it's
right, too, you know it?
"That guy's been an awful good friend to me, just the
same. He's working down to City Hall alla time, and I guess he
pretty nears what's going on with the big shots dawn there. He
don't seem to worry a Hell of a lot, seems to be kind of easy-
going, but then, like I've told him, "'Hell, if I had your job,
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I'd think everything was Aces number One, too, yessirree.
"Gotta be going already? Bell, the evening's young,
yet. Sit dawn. My friend's over to the Beach to the wrestling
match, he won't be barging in till damn near midnight, he
probably won't be in tonight at all," Minnie confided, moving
restlessly on the davenport. "Lite to dance? Oh, well., Ben,
you can't be that way, alla time. Gotta have a little fun or
what the Hell's the use of living at all, huh?
"0,K. well, drop by again, some night, 'when you aint
all hot and bothered about WPA. Hell, we'll get by: It's who
you know not what you know, counts nowadays, and as long's I
aint taking any crap from any of 'em down to City Hall, I guess
I'll still be Minnie Caranfa, hanging on by her shirt straps.
So long."