My sister and I get our new Schwinns!
My garage in Oakland was full. Surrounding my car, every shelf, corner, wall and all available floor space were optimally employed. I had furniture, paintings, bedding, rugs, books, a giant roasting pan, yogurt maker and fondue pot, rakes and brooms and ropes, records, speakers and a receiver, a cooler, an art easel, primer, motor oil, tennis rackets and a badminton set, complete with intact plastic birdies.
Even ceiling real estate was taken. For decades my Schwinn, the one I got in the 5th grade, hung from a hoist. My parents, now both gone, had brought it to California for me when they left the Chicago suburbs, where I had grown up, to retire in the Bay Area.
The one-speed bike was black, had foot brakes, and on the right handlebar was a metal thumb ringer with an American flag decal. My dad enameled in white my initials just below the seat to distinguish it from my sister’s identical bike, and the town’s bike license sticker was still intact. I still have the scar from the time I fell and the kickstand dug a deep, angled gash in my shin.
Lake Michigan was a few blocks from our house, and it was on this very bike that nearly every summer afternoon I rode with my sister down the humid leafy streets past the elegant Tudor homes to the beach -- transistor radio, Bain de Soleil and beach towels crammed in our baskets, and giant inflated inner tubes hanging from the handle bars.
During the long afternoons we bobbed in the waves, occasionally splashing the lake’s cool water on the black rubber as the sun’s heat was absorbed, burning your skin if you shifted positions. But there my bike hung now – rusting, flat-tired and near-immobile – like some hovering ghost.
Lazy afternoons
My parents also saved my Girl Scout camp sleeping bag for me, which had been purchased at Marshall Field downtown. Dad had it dry cleaned, and after I got it I stuffed it on a shelf in the back of the garage next to the dusty boxes of Christmas ornaments and the tree stand. The bag was rolled up and tied into its dark green cotton cover.
Every so often, I would pull it out and brush it off, untie the drawstring, open metal snaps and unzip it. I loved the inside: pale green flannel printed with ducks and loons and marshy grass, imagery typical of cabins or camping in Wisconsin’s Northwoods.
From the Store for Men -- The Sportsmen’s Floor – Marshall Field
Each time I pushed my hand deep into the soft bag I recalled vividly details of my summers at Camp Timberloft. Four metal cots were on a wooden plank floor under the heavy canvas tent. There were cicadas in the afternoons and fireflies at night. We drank bug juice. We sang in harmony “White Coral Bells” and “Down Yonder Green Valley” and “Swinging Along the Open Road.” At the lake, we canoed, swam and did Senior Life Saving, and we girls giggled about practicing the Cross Chest Carry on our no-longer-adolescent female counselors. Of all my stuff, my parents thought to save my sleeping bag, such a loving thing to do.
Karen, Martha, me and Peggy at Camp Timberloft, summer after 6th grade, picture taken with my Brownie camera
I found this on YouTube — these gals nailed the harmony on this Girl Scout camp classic!
*****
In another dark recess of my garage was the red luggage set my mother had given me. The two suitcases were faux leather, with red, white and blue striping encircling the top, and a rolling combination lock near the latches. Mom used the set when our family drove to Ft. Lauderdale to visit Grandma and Grandpa, when we went to Disneyland, and later when my parents packed up and moved to California. Her luggage tag with our old Chicago ‘burbs address was still on the smaller suitcase.
What I did on my summer vacation
I had taken the big case to Tahiti where I went scuba diving in my thirties, to Paris when I was in my forties, and to Tuscany when I was in my fifties. The quilted satiny lining was robin’s egg blue and had zippered pockets along the sides, and it was there I stuffed my jewelry and belts and scarves, and where Mom decades before had put her jewelry and belts and scarves. We lost her to cancer when I was 31, a traumatic event. When I eventually upgraded to wheeled suitcases, hers were out-placed to the garage – they might come in handy for storage later. Or what if I move and use them to pack clothes, as Mom had done?
And then there were my parents’ matching night stand lamps. Vaguely neoclassical, they were 18” elongated white ceramic obelisks with a gold laurel leaf design and silk lampshades. Mr. Mowat, the decorator at Marshall Field, had picked them out to complement both the gold and white wallpaper and the French Provincial bedroom set from Field’s.
Furniture just delivered to my parents’ bedroom, Marshall Field & Co. tag on the white night stand at left
Studying the lamps now, I couldn’t decide if they were sixties-ugly or sixties-cool, but since they were in pristine condition into the garage they went, each covered with a black Hefty trash bag. I might need more lighting someday. Or what if Millennials discover Faux Neoclassical, and they become trendy again?
*****
My rattan dining table and chairs were also an important part of my life. In graduate school in Berkeley I had lived in a communal house. We were an eclectic bunch: three of the guys were first- year residents in psychiatry at Herrick Hospital; another housemate was getting her Master’s in education; and another, a hot and very heterosexual guy, taught jazz dance while preparing for the LSATs. I was getting my MBA. We threw huge parties with live bands, and got high on tequila, pot, cocaine and an occasional Quaalude (not at the same time).
We each contributed furniture, and for 150 dollars I bought from a friend’s dad a rattan table with two leaves and four matching chairs. The set had originally come from Sloan’s in San Francisco – one of the last great furniture stores, closed many years now – and it was well made and elegant. I covered the chair seats with red paisley fabric to match the drapes I made for the kitchen. We had many a spaghetti dinner while drinking cheap Chianti, and profound-at-the-time conversations around that table.
When I left Cal, the table and chairs followed me to my various residences in the East Bay, and for each new kitchen I covered the seats with different material to match the décor. In their most recent incarnation, the seats were pale green polka dot chenille.
Sloan’s style
Last year, however, seduced by the mid-century modern fad, I bought a table and chairs with sleek lines and chrome for the kitchen. But I couldn’t part with the happy, tropical-inspired rattan so it was merely banished to the garage. I might get tired of my Mad Men modern look. Or, what if some new home in the future has a sun room, the set would be perfect!
*****
One day, my neighbor Mike wandered into my garage after I’d pulled the car out. He appeared shocked at what must have looked like a drunken furniture warehouse. The rattan table was upside down on large moving boxes, with three chairs crowded inside the table legs, and the fourth balancing on the three, the entire pyramid assembly towering up to and nearly touching the garage rafters. The luggage and lamps and more were piled up on a walnut desk. Bags and boxes and containers blocked access to the populated shelves.
It was the suspended Schwinn that caught Mike’s attention. “How cool!” he said. “Why don’t you use that bike – it’s a classic. You should get it cleaned up.” That made imminent sense: the bike would come in handy for neighborhood errands. And besides, who still rides the Schwinn they got when they were ten?
This was just the impetus I needed. I could clear some space on the floor for the bike by moving a few things around, and I could even free myself from some other stored stuff. So what to jettison? I would be brave, get rid of the table and chairs for sure, and even the lamps and luggage and sleeping bag.
*****
That weekend I walked the Schwinn six blocks down to Hank and Frank Bicycles for an upgrade. The bike was more than twice the age of the guy at the counter, and he appreciated the old Schwinn. The first step was to find tires to fit, and he had to search several online catalogs. He explained he would de-rust, clean and tighten up the chain, make sure the brakes worked, and generally polish up the black metal. “But don’t touch my flag decal, license tag or initials,” I admonished him.
I picked out a pink wicker basket – not like the original metal basket but of the general era – and a sturdy bike lock. And no way would I wear a helmet when I rode this classic. Two weeks and 208 dollars later, I pedaled home down the sidewalk as clusters of cyclists sporting for tight cropped bike leggings and matching windswept, multicolored helmets shot by in the bike lane a few feet from me.
My Schwinn reborn
The sound of summer
The table and chairs could go now. I posted an announcement on NextDoor.com: “Free, gently-used rattan table, leaf and chairs. On sidewalk at corner of Clifton and College Ave.” I wrastled them out of the garage and up the street to the corner. The set would no doubt go to some nice young family who couldn’t afford a dining table.
The luggage set and the lamps, which I finally decided were sixties-tacky, went to the Oakland Children’s Hospital second-hand store down the street. On the “free” pile outside the store, I gently placed my sleeping bag. Some child might need a blanket. I felt liberated, generous, enlightened that night. Not accepting money and not knowing the recipients was a Zen thing, or like scattering ashes to the ocean.
*****
The next morning, Sunday, I went outside to see if the table and chairs were gone, and they were, but I was vaguely unsettled. Had I done the right thing? Maybe I shouldn’t have given away my vintage rattan.
Now I was overwhelmed with regret. I loved that set. I loved the chenille polka dots. And it had come from Sloan’s! No furniture these days is so well made with such detail; I would never again find anything with similar quality and charm. Or what if some guy had picked it up just to resell it on EBay?
And why had I given away my treasured marsh-and-duck-lined sleeping bag that my parents had so thoughtfully kept for me all those years? Now I despaired; I had made another huge mistake. Maybe someone hadn’t taken it yet. Filled with melancholy, I rushed over to the second-hand store – no luck, the free pile was no more, everything was gone.
Then the anguished thought: what if some mumbling, odoriferous person had taken it, and the bag was now stained with sweat, soaked in pee and filthy. My sleeping bag didn’t deserve that fate.
Maybe I could find my table. Back home, I logged onto NextDoor and wondered how to do this. Obviously I couldn’t ask for the table and chairs back, but maybe the person who took the set might give it back to me if they ever needed to get rid of it. But how could I approach this without embarrassing myself, and at the same time coax them to reply to my query? I posted: “Rattan Table and Chairs – would the person who got it Saturday night please contact me, a detail to share.” No one replied, and I mourned.
*****
A week later on Facebook I ran across a picture of Emma Watson. Behind her was a wall, a mirror and an elegant console table with – wait for it – a matched set of white and gold, tall obelisk lamps. Damn. Mine were retro and sophisticated after all!
The next morning I was back at the store. The lamps were still there, displayed in a prominent location and tagged “Vintage Lamps. $35 each.” That was it. I had to have them back. I explained my plight to the nice volunteer lady at the counter, who undoubtedly had heard this before and said, “Of course dear, take them.”
And there were my red suitcases! I grabbed the smaller one, the one with Mom’s tag on it, on the way out. At least I could make up for the loss of my table in some small way.
Shortly after that, I traveled to Madison, Wisconsin to visit friends, where I stayed in a charming hotel decorated Wisconsin-Northwoods-vacation style. The chandelier in the lobby was a huge upside down canoe with varying sizes and types of light bulbs suspended from it. Wooden tennis rackets were crisscrossed on a paneled wall.
And there I made my peace: the lobby drapes had loons, ducks and marshes on them, just like my Girl Scout camp sleeping bag. Inexplicably, just seeing and touching the curtains released my anguish. And I knew I could go back to Wisconsin any time to see my loons and lakes, they’d always be there.
In the lobby of The Graduate Hotel, Madison
*****
As for the Schwinn, I haven’t ridden it. It’s parked in the back of the garage next to Mom’s red suitcase and the white lamps in their black Hefty bags. I know Mike is disappointed.
But I did ring the handlebar bell once, and I swear I heard waves breaking, kids laughing and cicadas singing.
