Betty Grable
by Nick Basile
There are times when the many elements of nature conspire to produce a natural wonder.
It was December of 1947. Simone, Sam to everyone but Esther Manti, was getting ready to receive his first load of Christmas trees. He had spent the previous day clearing his mason materials yard, of the trash and debris that accumulate when men who work out-of-doors don't have the time to clean up as they go from one ache-producing chore to another.
Trucks back in, sand by the yard is shoveled onto dump trucks. Bricks, ten-at-a-time, are stacked across the rear of the truckbed and stones, fifty and sixty pounds apiece, are thrown from the ground over the bricks into the cushioning sand and finally 94-pound sacks of cement and 74-pound sacks of mortar are piled along the top of the bricks to complete the load.
Men who do this stultifying work have little time to stop between loads to clean and tidy up after a bag of cement has broken or a pallet has been emptied or a brick or stone has fallen astray. Hot day after hot day these things are kicked aside, stacked out of the way in corners and the dust raised from early spring to late autumn falls indiscriminately on these piles and hides them. Until, in early winter the weather forces the masons to retire from the workplace.
Then, without customer interruption, the yardmen begin to reclaim the space they have sloughed off to convenience so that the green firs and pines brought down from Nova Scotia in big 14-wheel trailer-trucks will have room to be displayed.
And this is how Sam and his partner, their sons, drivers and yardmen make a living. Humping heavies all year long and then in the numbing cold days and nights before Christmas, gathered around a few fifty gallon drums orange with heat to warm their overworked hands and overmuscled backs, display and sell these green symbols of a holy, happy holiday.
The trees are stacked on the trucks in bundles, the heavier bundles to the bottom. But,in truth,there seems to be little difference in the weight of the bundles to those unloading the trucks. It's the length of each bundle
that establishes the effort needed to move it.
A bundle of small trees is easily hoisted by one man and put upright against a fence ready to be opened and displayed. Big trees, in bundles of one or two are cumbersome and need two men to move them.
Once each tree is displayed, it awaits its customer. Everyone smiles and everyone is happy when the bargain is struck. Even though the tag says $2.00, each customer knows he can purchase the tree for $1.00. And most times the game is settled at $1.75, maybe $1.50.
After all the men who bear the ice and cold of December to sell Christmas trees do so to continue to earn paychecks during a time when stones, bricks and sand are frozen and nature is saying, "there's no money here boys."
The sale of trees brings the last money of the year. On good years there is enough to afford a good Christmas table and a bright New Year's eve party. There's enough money to give the old lady a few extra dollars for the kids, for toys and for mama herself.
And so with all this riding on a bunch of trees, Sam's men were diligent in setting up their display. Gertz's window did not get more attention than did these trees.
Once the bundles were opened the short trees went to one corner, the tall, skinny trees to another, the full trees had a spot and the big trees, which generally ended up on the altar at St. Monica's were put right up front.
They had the big prices, maybe $15, maybe $20. But no one believed anyone would pay that kind of money for a cut tree. No ordinary home could fit those trees and Sam knew it. The church would get the trees, and Our Lady of Mount Carmel would be expected to return the favor if a Manti came as a supplicant.
The trees that would be sold were priced from a dollar to $3.50. A few were even $5.00. And when a customer began looking at the $5.00 tree, everyone helped to make the sale.
"Geez, look at that tree, its beautiful."
"Hey lady, that tree is first class."
"Mistuh, that tree is gonna look great in your livin' room."
But this year something extraordinary came off the truck. A bundle with one tree --just short of seven-feet. The right size for everyone. Grown to perfection! Each row of branches exquisitely distanced from the next. No odd spaces along the trunk. Each branch stepped so that if a line were to be drawn from one tip to the next, it would scribe a natural A-frame from the bottommost branch to the tippity top.
This, Sam's men said, was the Betty Grable of Christmas trees.
And so it was decreed that a big space, right in the middle of all the trees, would be cleared and a small platform would be built and Betty Grable would be displayed on the platform -- and a price tag, a big
price tag of $10.00, would be hung from one of her graceful branches.
Betty made all the men proud. No other yard could have so beautiful a tree to offer.
Sam noticed the men's reaction to the tree. His partner noticed. And they joined the men as they turned their lovely tree into a star. No pep talks were needed to keep the men focused on sales. This one gift of nature
transformed a few slightly taciturn workmen into gifted, garrulous salesmen.
Each new customer was the potential buyer of Betty. But that big price tag was a big stumbling block. The other trees may not have been as full or as pretty as Betty Grable, but they were good-looking too, and, at one buck versus ten, a heck-of-a-lot cheaper.
The weekend before Christmas came and went; cold and raw. Sunday there was rain and snow. The temperature hovered at 20 degrees. Daylight began to slip into nightfall.
No one paid any mind to the tri-color Plymouth coupe that came into the yard. Customers were everywhere. The two occupants got out into the cold rain, buttoned their blue uniform tunics up to the neck, slid the blue hats over their heads, hitched their trousers and started toward the "office," a small wooden shack with a coal stove designed to get around the New York Telephone Company's rule of only installing business phones in permanent facilities.
They had to pass Betty to get to the office. One of the two, the younger one, stopped. He looked Betty over. He touched it, sliding his hand between its branches causing most of the snow to fall to the ground. Betty's
branches, freed from the weight of the snow, swirled and fluffed up in the wind.
"This is mine," he said loudly to no one in particular but to all within hearing.
"Don't let nobody touch it."
And then the two turned toward the office and went in. They were out within a half-hour. Both came toward Betty, drying their lips with the back of their hand and stopped, it seemed, to inspect their booty. Looking at the tree, the younger one turned to meet the stealthy glances of the yardmen:
"Nobody touches this." he yelled. "This is mine."
No one returned his stare. No one went close to Betty. The yardmen drifted off. Some late-day bargainers couldn't find anyone to buy a tree from. Sam and his partner were the only ones selling, wrapping, working.
On Wednesday the heavens opened and the snow fell. A record they say. In 24 hours New York City got 25 inches. Sam and his partner got to the yard at 6 in the morning dark. The men were huddled around the fire. Two had been there through the night, the other two were just coming on. Sam called them into the office and his partner, forcing a jovial air, passed the whiskey bottle and through a Cheshire smile spoke of the good tree season, and how he and Sam were giving them the biggest Christmas bonus ever, He also told them that it looked like the weather wasn't going to be so good, so he would lay them off today and they could get up to Suphtin Boulevard and sign up for unemployment now, before the holiday. They could use the truck to ride up there.
Carmine brought in a dozen containers of coffee and a dozen buttered roles from his deli, cater-corner on Liberty Avenue. The coffee, the whiskey and the heat seem to thaw out the office. The two windows glazed over and it was 9 o'clock and 5-inches of fallen snow before the men could bundle themselves up for the ride to Suphtin Boulevard.
As they piled out of the shack they all saw that the wind and snowfall had joined forces to knock Betty off its pedestal. No one had purchased the tree and now it lay in a heap, each landing snowflake helping to hide its beauty.
No one had claimed Betty. No one paid the big price. By Friday morning Betty appeared as a bump in the
snow.
© 2000 Nick Basile
Nirvana
by Nick Basile
Having accepted as true real estate advertisements extolling the good life to be had in country living (and in search of breeding room), my wife and I left our two-family attached brick home in Canarsie for the open spaces of East Meadow in 1964.
We left behind parents, friends and our favorite submarine race watching-post on Jamaica Bay for a brand new, "custom built" high ranch, celebrated schools and Jones Beach. We've never looked back.
We spent three years in our new home. We added to and subtracted from the architect's vision of our house. I became a steady customer of the local lumber yards, hardware stores and plumbing supply houses. My wife and children found and visited every state and local park east of Belmont Raceway. We were busy coping with a strange reading curriculum and cutting bluestone to form coping on our stone walls.
Then an accident forced us to look for a new house. One close to the Long Island Railroad. We found it in Garden City. Right across from the railroad. A lovely old house with plenty of character and in need of a whole lifetime of renovation.
Between replacing, repainting and repairing we found time to listen to our resident family of cardinals, watch the rabbits scamper in and out of the azalea bushes and keep an eye out for the strange critter that occasionally sought out our corner for rest and rehabilitation.
We planted trees, flowers and vegetables. The trees grew tall and full, each year the flowers wiggle their way up through the frozen ground and display themselves for our enjoyment . The food crop, however, has been meager. A few zucchini, a tomato or two, some rucola and parsley. The thumb is not quite green enough.
There was boys and girls scouting, soccer and lacrosse. We made early morning practice, we made late evening classes. We coached, we went to teacher's meetings. We watched the children grow, graduate and leave. Two went further east and two heeded Horace Greely's advice.
Now we walk the boardwalk at Jones beach together. Especially in the winter when the wind fleeces our body of warmth and invigorates us at the same time. We travel west -- to New York -- for theater, music and museums. And we travel east for the same things.
We visit and await visits from our children and grandchildren, we putter in the garden and we drill and hammer away at our old house.
And we still make the 12 something to work. |
