Life — May 19, 1921 — page 8: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Family Life in America By ROBERT C. BENCHLEY She had always hated her. Stringy hair, Mabel had. Dank, stringy hair. Grandma Twilly thought how it would look hanging at an Indian's belt. But all that she did was to place her tongue against her two front tceth and make a noise like the bath-room faucet with it. The naturalistic literature of this country has reached such a state that no family of characters is considered true to life which does not include at least two hypochondriacs, one sadist, and one old man who spills food down the front of his vest. If this school progresses, the following is what we may expect ss in our national literature in a year or so. PART 1. HE living-room in the Twilly’s house was so damp that thick, soppy moss grew all over the walls. It dripped on the picture of Grandfather Twilly that hung over the melodeon, making streaks down the dirty glass like sweat on the old man's face. It was a mean face. Grandfather Twilly had been a mean man and had little spots of soup on the lapel of his coat. All his children were mean and had soup spots on their clothes. Grandma Twilly sat in the rocker over by the window, and as she rocked the chair snap- ped. It sounded like Grandma Twilly’s knees snapping as they did whenever she stooped over to pull the wings off a fly. She was a mean old thing. Her knuckles were grimy and she chewed crumbs that she found in the bottom of her reticule. You would have hated her. She hated herself. Most of all she hated Grandfather Twilly. “I certainly hope you're frying good,” she muttered as she looked up at his picture. ee “Hasn't the undertaker come yet, Ma?" asked young_ Wilbur Twilly petulantly. She was boiling water on the oil- heater and every now and again would spill a little of the steaming liquid on the baby who was playing on the floor. She hated the baby because it looked like her father. The hot water raised little white blisters on the baby’s red neck, and Mabel Twilly felt short, sharp twinges of pleasure at the sight. had had.for four months. LOCAL GossIP ISS MEHITABEL BILLINGS, over to Rock Hill, tends to keepin’ up the literary end fer most uv the folks; writes some picces herself an’ reads poetry an’ sech. Wall, Si Hooker met her last week as she wuz headin’ fer the valley. She told Si she was com- munin’ with Nature. “List,” sez she, “to the drowsy stirrin’s uv Spring gittin’ out to deck hill an’ dale.” Si listed, but all he could hear wuz the drowsy stirrin’s uv Nat Beam, his hired man, gittin’ out the harrow over to the Bailey place. She went off kinder dancin’ hippity- hop, an’ yellin’ “Welcome Spring, Welcome Spring.” Si watched her till she went inter the swamp. Wall, yestiddy, word come that Doc Butterworth sez Hitty’s gut the worst case o’ quinsy on record; can't speak out loud. She gut her feet wet somehow, he sez. Delirious, too. When Si heard uv it, he give out as his opinion thet prob'ly she wan't delirious at all. He let on, kinder braggin’, thet he an’ Hitty hed discussed Na- ture, Spring, list’nin’ an’ so on, an’ he reckons Doc But- terworth don't understand her. Now’t she’s laid up, Si ‘lows he'll hev to do the Spring Greetin’. Sez he can't do no skippin’, ercount the rheumatiz, but he’s goin’ to Jet out a hoot or two uv welcome, hopin’ to keep the frost offen his termatoes. (To be continued in our next) It was the only pleasure she Wilbur Twilly was reading the paper by the oil lamp. Wil- bur had watery blue cyes and cigar ashes all over his knees The third and fourth buttons of his vest were undone. It was too hideous, He was sickeningly conscious of his family seated in chairs about him. His mother, chew- ing crumbs. His wife, Mabel with her stringy hair, reading His sister Bernice, with pro- jecting front teeth, who st thinking of the man who came every day to take away the waste paper. Bernice was wondering how long it would be before her family would discover that she had been mar- ried to this man for three years. How Wilbur hated them all! It didn’t seem as if he could stand it any longer. He wanted to scream and stick pins into every one of them and then rush out to see the girl who worked in his office snapping rubber bands. He hated her too, but she wore side combs. PART 2. The street was covered with slimy mud. It oozed out from under Bernice’s rubbers in un- pleasant bubbles until it seemed to her as if she must kill her- self. Hot air coming out from a steam laundry. Hot, stifling air. Bern‘ce didn’t work in the laundry, but she wished that she did so that the hot air would kill her. She wanted to be stifled. She needed torture to be happy. She also needed a good swift clout on the side of the face. \ drunken man lurched out from a doorway and flung his arms about her. It was only her husband. She loved her “Why don’t you kill yourself, Ma?” she continued. “You're only in the way here. It's just because you're a mean old woman and want to make trouble for us that you hang on.” Grandma Twilly shot a dirty look at her daughter-in-law. husband. She loved him so much that, as she pushed him away and into the gutter, she stuck her little finger into his eye. She also untied his necktie. It was a bow necktie, with white, dirty spots on it, and was wet with gin. It didn’t seem as if Bernice could stand it any longer. All the repressions of nine comicbooks.com