From the Improvement Era, December 1938 –

Commonplace Things

By Roberta Platt

It would be a cinch,” I often told myself. “If I only had something to stimulate my ambition and ability!” I could not, for financial reasons, pack my grip and tour the world until I found the desired spot, circumstance, and condition which would ignite the spark of my ability and hand me over to the world a flaming young novice, to become, in a few years, someone’s favorite, well-known author. So I curled up in an old-fashioned armchair, before a big open fireplace, and there, while a drizzling fall rain beat a march time measure on the window-pane, I watched the dying embers slowly cool and crumble to ashes. I’d just have to go on being another commonplace young woman, because I was tied to a commonplace environment. I pulled the robe snugly around my legs and mourned my plight — the flame of my ambition killed by commonplace things.

My thoughts were just leading me into a very disagreeable mood, when they were interrupted by the sound of footsteps on the porch, followed by a quick knock.

Who could it be? I lifted the latch and opened the door. Peering out into the darkness, I could make out what appeared to be a drenched young lady.

“Are you Babs?” she asked, pushing back a soaked felt hat.

“Why, yes, I am.”

“I’m Thressa McDonald. Carrie Mace told me to stop with you. Carrie’s one of my best friends.”

“I’m always glad to know a friend of Carrie’s. Carrie is one of my best friends, too,” I told her, as I helped her off with her luxurious fur coat. “You’d better slip out of those shoes. How did you get so wet?”

“My car stopped down by the bend. It wouldn’t budge; so I just bailed out and footed it.” She laughed, “I’m always doing something like this.”

I soon had her warm and comfortable. She was a very pretty girl, blonde and with laughing gray eyes. I learned that her father was a big banker in New York, and she the only child. She had met Carrie there and the two had been great friends ever since Carrie had escaped from this “hole” and its commonplace surroundings and had gone to New York to live with her wealthy aunt.

“Carrie told me you were one of America’s minor authors.” She spoke from the depths of the arm- chair.

“You mean she mentioned my whim to write,” I corrected.

“Is it just a whim?”

“Well, that’s about all it has amounted to.”

“But — why?”

“Just this,” I waved my hand around the room, “and that out there. There isn’t anything to become poetic or literary about. What I need is something inspiring, if you see what I mean.”

“I do, and I know.” At last someone understood.

It was with this introduction that the conversation came to center on me and my career. The wind had gone down, the rain had ceased and the clock above the fireplace had doled out the hour of two, before we called our conversation to a close.

“I nearly forgot,” Thressa McDonald said as she arose. “Carrie sent you a letter by me. Here it is.” I showed my guest to her room, but I was too excited to go to bed. Tomorrow was nearly here. Tomorrow! The day I had always dreamed about. From now on it would be New York for me! New York, bright lights, dressing for dinners, nights at the opera, and Thressa McDonald, the daughter of New York’s wealthiest banker. She understood and liked me. She be- lieved in me. I danced up and down the length of the room. I would write, write, write! The things I would see and do would be my inspiration and I would write. What would Carrie think about Thressa’s most generous offer? Then I remembered Carrie’s letter. Hastily I tore open the envelope. It began:

Dearest Babs,

I’m homesick tonight, so if I get sentimental just toss me overboard. I don’t know what ails me. Aunt Marg says I’m queer. So queer I am— if Aunt Marg says so.

I’m just sick to come home again. I’ve often wondered if things have changed much. Do the kids still play ball in the vacant lot, and does the old woman still scrape her frying pan?

Funny, Carrie would remember that. I smiled as I thought of the queer little rock image in the cliff across the fields west of the house. When we were kids we had pictured it as an old lady standing in the doorway scraping out scraps from her frying pan to a busy little dog on the steps. I read on:

Gee, Babs, but wouldn’t I like a dollar for every time we’ve waded the creek, pushed our way through those oaks, and climbed the steep old cliff, only to find that the old lady had gone back in her rock house and closed the door behind her. I’ll never forget the time when your disappointment was so great that you dropped that tousled red head of yours in my lap and cried for at least twenty minutes.

Yes, Aunt Marg says I’m queer. She said any twenty-year-old girl who would talk of riding nine miles over a canyon road on a hayrack is a queer person. I wouldn’t argue with her. She wouldn’t understand about the memories this holds for me.

Do you remember, Babs? It was cool in the evenings after the sun had dropped behind the mountains. I shall never forget the times when your dad lifted us on the wagon. He always fixed us a place with a little hay and a quilt. It was as comfortable as an upholstered car seat, wasn’t it? Remember how we would swing our feet over the edge of the rack, singing as we moved along. Oh! that was great fun. We would play with Rover, your dog, as he ran along behind the wagon.

The crickets would be singing, and your dad whistling some old-fashioned song.

Darkness would almost swallow us, then we would drop off to sleep. The next thing we knew we would be home. Home, supper, a warm bath and cool sheets.

There was more to her letter. She asked questions about games of “Run Sheep Run,” and how all the small town romances had ended.

What a fool I’d been. What a blind little fool.

“Aren’t you ever going to bed?” It was Thressa McDonald’s voice coming from the top of the stairs, “We are leaving early in the morning, and I think the modern Emerson and Hawthorne should get a little rest before she goes.”

“I’m not going,” I choked out.

“Not going!”

“Not for a while, Thressa. I have some writing I just have to do.”

“But I thought — ”

“I know, but I’ve changed my mind about this inspiration stuff and I’m going to write a story — a real story. It will be my masterpiece and I’m going to call it ‘Commonplace Things.'”

I can’t remember whether I expected Thressa McDonald to be provoked, disappointed, or just angry, but I do remember that when I climbed the stairs to where she stood, she was smiling an understanding smile.