Bubba

William (Bubba), my mother referred to his family as "scrubby Dutch". When I asked her about this once, she said that German (Dutch) women in Philadelphia, where I was born, would scrub the stoops to their houses. Very clean and orderly was the point.. Not rich, just whole and solid.
I envied Bubba's life.
He lived directly across the street from Thomas Jefferson Elementary School...a real plus because of the playground.
He had an older sister, Marsha, a chubby little blonde, who blushed over anything and everything... even me.
And his homelife. That was the big thing I wanted...but would never have.
His dad was always there in the evening...day after day, week after week. Always doing something with Bubba...like building a crystal radio... letting Bubba help when he worked on the car. Stuff.
His mom stayed at home...all the time. She was forever across the street at the school...helping Mrs. Kieth, my 4th and 5th grade teacher, put on the Fall Festival...help in the library. Stuff.
I had none of that...and I wanted it really bad. Probably a lot of kids did. When I watched TV, I would see families like this and wonder what it would be like to break into the TV to be a part of it all. So many times.
I don't know who came up with the idea that we needed electric fans in our classrooms. ...a magical vision that brought so many of us together...together in ways that made this one of the best
periods of my childhood.
The need was obvious...kids in classrooms with their sweaty arms sticking to their writing tablets and textbooks, clothes and hair damp. Misery. But there was no money for electric fans in the Irish Channel.
That's where the vision came in.... A paper drive!
We were told that the rag man (a pioneer recycle!) would come around to the school each Wednesday morning. That meant scouring the neighborhood between Tchopitulous Street and Magazine for old newpapers, phone books, whatever...
What made the whole thing fly was competition...fierce competition.
Each class was given area along the fence that surrounded the school. On Wednesday mornings there were heaps....mountains of paper along that fence. And these were weighed and tallied. Reports were filed. Why, because the winning class would be given money to spend on something for their classroom.
Wednesday morning meant bringing in paper, sure...but guarding it was tricky. And then someone noticed that magazines weighed more than newspaper...hmmm...
It was magic. Kids in my class united.... John (Peanut), Hennessy.the cousins Gary and Wayne, Bruce,
me.... Bubba's yard became our headquarters, his dad's garage our storage....and everyday I got to see Marsha blush. Good times.
Everyday, we would go door to door....houses, businesses, anyplace. We told people about the fans...
They called it the Irish Channel, but there were Germans, Italians, French...and they all saved paper for
our fans. They understood New Orleans heat and humidity.
Peanut's daddy drove an old Cadillac hearse...and sometimes it rolled into Bubba's yard full of paper.
Like the hearse, we never knew where he got it all.
And after the collecting,there was some kind of ball involved in some kind of game until it got dark, and then I went home to something a lot different than Bubba's yard.
This was all with kids who just wanted a fan, bragging rights at school, and something special for their
classroom if.... And we did.
It took two years, but every class at Thomas Jefferson Elementary School got a fan. And the kids in our class won...in so many ways from this effort.
We voted to buy a microscope with the contest money. We looked at EVERYTHING under it. Hair, blood, insect wings....you name it.
It was magic. Bubba's parents were magic too. People in just the right place at just the right time to give some of us a vision of wholeness. Clean.