Short Stories by PJ

Wondrous to me are those worn tales of romance with clear-cut adventures for the knight. The knight is brave and good. His task is immediate, to deliver a fair damsel, also of good repute. The evil adversary is a dragon that has never done anybody any good. Then I was a little girl, I questioned neither the motives of the knight nor the true plight of the maiden fair. The dragon was loathsome, and I wished for his death righteously. Was I pitiless? Nowadays I don't think chivalry is dead so much as suspect. The knight and the damsel and the dragon are plotting together somehow and constitute a hazard for me, Leah Vogler, the gentle reader. But I tend to exaggerate and have some propensity for the facetious. Worse, I dabble in fiction. My imagination can lend to such occupations as the 20th Century offers the anachronistic trappings of romance. In the welfare office where I worked there were such days when I fancied I moved among knights and ladies, employed by the County to rescue damsels in distress. In truth, a few of the hapless were fair, but many were toothless, and, I fear, imprudent. And there showed forth that old dragon, Allofus or Humanity, a thing not only of pride and ignorance and distress but also of compassion and knowledge and health. When it feeds upon itself, that dragon is hideous. Lo, the damsel is a part of that dragon and those knights and ladies are a part of it, and you and I, we, are part of that dragon.

Once upon a time when I, despairing, drew near the end of my career as a welfare worker, I met a young man named Edwin Morris. A tall, fair haired youth, he was new in our office and for the purposes of his personnel IBM card, a Trainee, or Squire. My wont was to have little contact with the training units. There were two of them--five workers and a training supervisor to each--and they were located to one side and the rear of the big room where our desks were all crowded together. If I am not mistaken, the social-worker population of our district at that time was well over a hundred souls. When a new training unit was announced each of us fatigued workers was given the opportunity to forward a case or two for training purposes. With my blessings, I'd sent off a particularly weighty one. It was a tale of two volumes, and I surmised my file drawer would pull out the more easily without it. One of the few remaining children on the case was about to be released from the tuberculosis sanatorium, and, shortly after I dispatched the weighty volumes to the training unit, I received a communication from the medical social worker at the hospital co-ordinating efforts to assure the boy of a special diet upon his release. It was my Washington case, the mother of which had first applied for aid early in 1950. At that time she had given birth to twins by a man whose name was Charles. She didn't know whether Charles was his surname or his given name. From these inauspicious beginnings her predicament had mushroomed. I inherited her records with those of ninety others in File 119X in 1962. As of 1964 I considered her affairs hopeless.

That name of hers, Martha Washington.... It is difficult for a new worker to associate all the names that can cluster about one case. I explained to Edwin Morris that Martha Smith was his client's maiden name. She had named her first child, born out of wedlock, with, but her next two children, also illegitimate, had been given the surname of their father, Jackson. In 1944, while pregnant with his second child, Martha had married a Mr. Washington in Texas. In 1950, after disengaging herself from Mr. W. and coming to California, she gave birth to the Charles twins. I concluded my brief exposition on names with the surnames of the latter babies, Chandler and Story. I refrained from digression to miscarriages and other obstetrical matters. As I recited, Mr. Morris, a man in his early twenties, looked at me as if I had concocted some improbable tale to test his credulity.

I said, more in defense of my own integrity than in deference to his innocence, "You'll get used to it." I elaborated, "Imagine that you are a knight. The damsel you'll assist is no lady, and you'll find the dragon to have a fixed look about his eyes. No mind. Think upon your accouterment. You have that file cabinet, this desk, a telephone. And... what happened to your pen?"

It was a blue, ball-point Lindy but a good third of the brittle plastic case was gone, and I noted tooth marks on what remained. Mr. Morris said, "This was what came with the desk. I'm told the trainee who sat here before me chewed this pen while she read cases. I'm not accepting such a story, of course." He looked at the pen critically, "I've been promised a new one."

"Oh," I assured him, "the county will issue you another pen. It will take a while. Taxpayers must be considered, you understand. And there is a store room in this office wherein lies a form to cover each and every exigency of life from acknowledgment of paternity and requisition of a layette to an authorization for cremation at county expense. When you get your new pen, all you will be required to do is to fill in names and dates. Look out for neatness. Then you dictate a brief social history into the little machine you'll find in the booth over there and your recommendation as to where casework should begin, such as revivify the dragon so that it can finish off the damsel. You follow me? It's a good idea by the way not to get involved." I turned his attention to the communication concerning Horace Charles, born in 1950, whose well being depended on a special high-protein diet. "Also," I explained, "it's necessary that Mrs. Washington take Horace to the clinic for medication once a week. The county allows her one dollar a month for transportation and bus fare is $1.76 round trip. But urge her to take him. Any questions?"

I think he began to see that I cared, or at one time had cared. He wanted to know why I'd given Martha Washington away, so to speak, why hadn't I kept her for myself.

And I explained why, in all seriousness. "This is a simple case, Mr. Morris. An ideal one for a new worker. Eligibility is fairly straight-forward. This woman has few resources insofar as I can ascertain There is little likelihood of case movement. Mrs. Washington will continue to receive aid for her children until the last one is eighteen or drops out of school at sixteen. Then she'll be carried on another program. Rehabilitation efforts appear unwarranted. She has innumerable health problems. Plus," I smiled, "motivation to become independent is not foreseen. And there you are. A simple case. I've spent almost two years with her. I hope the case history reflects in good faith my analysis of her problems. I like for my recording to show some depth. And maybe I'm wrong. Maybe what Martha Washington needs is a new point of view. These training supervisors are highly resourceful, You people don't have the case load that we have. And you're so terribly bright eyed. Maybe all Martha Washington and her almost forty years of wretchedness needs is hope. I can't give her much of that."

He grinned. "Allright. All right. But I won't get used to it, as you predict. Not for a while, anyway. I'll look at the case. My supervisor says I must get the affirmation signed right away. Where does Martha live?"

"One of the housing projects. That big one off First Street."

"A housing project? I've never been inside one. Martha Washington, huh? Negro?"

I nodded. "Negro. Born in Mississippi. She doesn't have as much as a fourth grade education. Lived in a rural area. She manages to sign her name to an affirmation, but you'll read it to her, I hope."

Suddenly there was a burst of laughter from the desk behind us. Edwin Morris dropped his pen. It was a sound I'd grown accustomed to: Mrs. Lee's shattering laugh. That laugh was something to be heard across the office, as if it sought out the ears of every worker. It was a laugh with more of merriment and pity than that of a department store Santa Claus. Mrs. Lee was the training supervisor, one of the best in the county, to whom Mr. Morris had been assigned. I number myself among the graduates of her unique schooling. Periodically her laughter would ring across the office, in testimony of one of the horrors that were our stock in trade, of those horrors that dissolve in the ridiculous. Seemingly, compassion at the breaking point was released. Her tremendous bosom rose and fell like some engine at work and the next moment she was all business She evolved a plan in the face of any crisis: such was her sanity. And Mr. Morris wanted to know, "So where's Mrs. Lee from?"

He wanted to know her origins because Mrs. Lee was colored like Martha Washington. "Heaven?" was my first guess. "Hell?" my second. "No, she's from a southern state. Georgia, I think. She took her master's in social work in California, I know. But I think she already had degrees in political science and linguistics. She translates anything, you know. Her translations of contemporary German poetry have been published. Her imagery is much admired." I looked at her, her great bust rising below her smooth, spacious brow. "She knows where to check out bail bonds, the price of second-hand bunk beds and how much the Salvation Army charges for reconditioned mattresses. Ask her how to prepare a tasty dish of rice, beans and chicken backs, if you want to know. Or ask her about the economic development of any country in Latin America, if you will. She'll tell you." I stopped myself shortly. I know I digress. "In summary, a hundred more such as Mrs. Lee in this agency, and we'll begin to understand the problem. She's got you reading, I see. And all her old favorites."

All the time we talked Edwin Morris had sat behind a semi-circle of pamphlets--those gems of contemporary literature that constitute the reading of an apprentice welfare worker--expositions of venereal disease, epilepsy, planned parenthood, vocational rehabilitation, nutrition and mental health. Spare time is well spent with a good dictionary of medical terminology. And there are social work journals explicating clinical procedure. But welfare practice is a far cry from the clinical work of private agencies. We referred our clients to other agencies for the clinical. Eligibility for public welfare is a matter of financial need, and our dealings were primarily in dollars and cents. As workers our sole preparation consisted of a college degree and a willingness to learn. We held degrees in music and homemaking and psychology. A good many like myself and Mr. Morris had majored in English literature at college. I told him before I left, as if in afterthought, "Call me if I can help. My name is Leah Vogler."

After our first encounter it was our former academic interests as much as Martha Washington that brought Edwin Morris and myself together occasionally for coffee or sack lunches. And we discovered that we were both needy in our ways. I'm not going to attempt the whys of my entry into the field of public welfare after my gears of training as an English teacher and at a time when I knew my duty lay in my home where I had husband and children. Admittedly, my working was an unvoiced cry for help. Now I am back home again. I do some teaching. As for Edwin Morris, almost fifteen years my junior, it was his confidence that he had been engaged to marry. The young lady had broken her promises to him and married an engineering graduate who had an offer of immediate employment in the missile industry. Edwin was left with doubts not only about his career but also himself as a man. Consequently, he discontinued inquiries concerning graduate work in English. Upon receiving his B. A., he accepted employment with the county. What other employer takes a chance on English majors? We had traded, thus, our masterpieces of prose and poetry for file cabinets of human misery, documented and dated, and a handful of pamphlets printed at government expense. Both of us had written in college. We spoke in low voices of our prizes for poetry and our efforts in fiction. We exorcized our sensitivity. Edwin Morris shared with me some knowledge of the stories he had contrived: in his stories had figured beautiful and lovely heroines who spoke elliptically with tremulous voices. Like myself he considered fiction from the standpoint of an art form. I explained that he'd find a captive audience for his literary efforts in the office dictation machine transcribers. I reviewed those circumspect rules for composition pertaining to dictation of case records.

At one time we had a worker, a man in his early fifties and a retired Army officer, who became so caught up in the misfortunes of his clients that his routine absent-father letter read something like this:

Dear Joe:
    Recently I visited your sweet wife Hortencia and your two adorable boys, Fernando and Ricardo. How long has it been since you have seen your children? What active Rascals they are! Fernando can write his name now, and little Ricardo recently swallowed some roach poison and was treated at the emergency hospital. What things Hortencia told me of her relationship with you! I know that she has put on a few too many pounds and that her housekeeping would not take prizes, but, Joe, you shouldn't have struck her in the mouth. There is a big gap now right where the two front teeth....

Instead of an acceptable:

Dear Mr. Ramirez:
    Your children Ricardo and Fernando continue to receive Aid to Families with Dependant Children assistance in the home of their mother, Hortencia. At this time it is necessary that we determine their eligibility for continued receipt of benefits from this agency. It is our policy....

Or an occasional case history would, if the supervisor were on guard, get sent back for retyping because its contents would include this kind of descriptive passage:

When a proper entry would have been:

Any worker can, under certain provocation, lapse into a kind of dictation that becomes prejudicial to viewing situations objectively. If a worker, for instance, has rigid notions of cleanliness, he is liable to report:

Whereas a little clear thinking might remove subjective evaluation from his prose:

Too, some workers see fraud everywhere and with no closer scrutiny of information might put down:

Obviously, the way to record impressions is to cite specifics and to avoid generalization and the drawing of conclusions:

Any worker with a penchant for fiction was suspect.

So far as I remember, Martha Washington's case was a model account of her history in the county. Seldom had the client displayed emotion. It was her impassivity that held her together, I suppose. Perhaps she was somewhat retarded. But I had my impressions of the case and Mr. Morris his and in reviewing the events it was as if our two ways of looking at them made a double exposure. The first case entry occurred in 1950.

So the first pages of the case went; as of 1964 there were over a hundred pages. In 1950 there seemed little question of eligibility and the case went to an approved worker at about the same time the twins came home from the hospital and were added to the budget. At first, the case demanded frequent contacts and referrals for its medical problems. One of the twins was particularly subject to respiratory ailments. Roger's seizures were diagnosed as epilepsy. Interviews disclosed that the little boy had been subjected to frequent beatings by Mr. Washington and apparently had sustained brain damage. As the case moved on through the years Roger's problems multiplied. There were conferences with guidance people at the school at first. I believe his first arrest was when he was about thirteen or in 1954. There was suspicion of some type of addiction at that time. After that there was first probation, then detention, parole, other arrests, other incarcerations. I never met Roger. He had been sent by the state for narcotics rehabilitation shortly before I assumed responsibility. In the early years of the case Martha lived in a series of drab hotel rooms not far from the Civic Center. During that time there was only one worker with whom she established a relationship of some confidence. It's then that Mrs. W. worked extensively with school authorities concerning Roger's behavior problems and expressed interest in a referral to the Child Guidance Clinic. She verbalized a desire to attend adult education classes and learn to read. But the worker with whom she established rapport left the agency. The case received little attention between one annual affirmation and the next. Martha had a stillborn at General Hospital in 1954. She named as the father of Angel, a Mr. Chandler, a man who was an absent father on another case in the office. Since the baby needed no aid by the time the agency was alerted, Martha's eligibility remained uninterrupted. She was suspected of inducing an abortion in 1955. A worker who was with the agency for six months in 1955 dictated primly that Mrs. W. had made a request to her for information concerning birth control and been told to improve her morals.

Mr. Morris told me once, in reviewing his decision to work for the county, that he had felt social work would give him a chance to see life in strata obscured by his background. His father, an accountant, was deeply opposed to public welfare, and his mother's one opinion was that a woman should be in the home when her children returned from school. The years with books Edwin regarded as no substitute for contacts with people. He seemed accepting of people as they are. The dilemma of Martha Washington I considered as good a place as any to start to learn about that side of life that is vaguely held in euphuistic apprehensions: "the other side of the tracks," "the lower sort of people," or "the less fortunate." And I was toward the end of my service with the agency. I had encountered at least two hundred recipient mothers, every one different from the other, every one seeing the circumstances of need differently. All of those cases for me to learn about life.... I understand, alas, why the helped need helpers, but some paradox emerges. Why do the helpers need the helped? Why?

Early in 1956 Roger's probation officer reported to the Bureau that Mrs. W. had a frequent male visitor. The case was referred to the Special Investigator who then conducted early morning surveillances in order to inspect the home if a man appeared to be on the premises The investigator's report comprised a five-page appendix to the case. On a Sunday morning at dawn, in essence, a Mr. Belveder Story was discovered under a small couch in the living room. He was nude. Mrs. Washington appeared pregnant. The resultant disclosures revealed that Mr. Story had indeed been living in the home for several months. Mrs. W. was charged with fraud and contributions for the support of the family were requested from Mr. Story, who was employed by the city. He assumed some responsibility and stayed on in the home to father another child. The last two living children born to Mrs. W. were the children of Mr. Story, Albert born in 1956 and Dwight, in 1957. Mrs. W. had severe obstetrical problems with Dwight. He was taken by Caesarean and apparently the difficult birth accounted for his suffering from cerebral palsy. Mr. Story, who had begun to show signs of a disposition ill suited to domesticity, could not bear to look at Dwight. He begged Mrs. W. to have the child placed, but she clung to the crippled boy fiercely. Finally it was Mr. Story who left the home, not without committing dental atrocities upon Mrs. W's person. He still contributed a few dollars to the support of the two boys, through the Court Trustee. He refused to visit the children, though. Before the birth of Albert and Dwight Mrs. W. reported a kidney ailment and menstrual problems. She was seen often at General's Urology and GYN clinics. After the birth of Dwight, Mrs. W.'s health appeared poor and, following severe hemhorraging and near loss of life, a hysterectomy was performed on her in 1958.

It was a curious experience to read the case through the comings and goings of numerous social workers, at least fifteen, many of whom would re-explore the social background. Her recital of happenings, thus, and their many recordings became ballad-like in tone, one of those endless, lugubrious narratives with the words changing and varying even though the monotony of the tribulations remains.

Mr. Morris was a gentle person brought up like myself to believe that individuals have a certain responsibility for their actions and that truth and justice are relevant to the organization of society. I noted that his courtesy was so ingrained that he would put on his suit coat and straighten his tie before entering our suffocating reception room to bid the most scabrous client to an interview. He was quiet spoken and his diction perfect. His favorite poet was John Donne. He read the history of Martha Washington from its first to last page where I had left off and transferred her. Next he reviewed all documentation attached to the case in a separate volume. By the time her story reached the hands of Mr. Morris, Martha was five times a grandmother. Roger Jackson was yet in the rehabilitation facilities. Of the twins, Horace was hospitalized for treatment of tuberculosis and at the point of release and Leonardo had been briefly detained by juvenile authorities for alleged vandalism. Albert exhibited learning problems. Little Dwight was making good progress at the special school for children with cerebral palsy. In fact, Dwight displayed good mental ability, but he required so much of Mrs. W's time when in the home that employment training for her had never been discussed. Her work seemed cut out for her. Four of the grandchildren belonged to Ellen who was not yet twenty and had bad kidneys. There was some doubt that Ellen could survive another pregnancy, and Mrs. W. had Ellen's children, all aided by the county, often. She told me proudly once that Sally was taking those "pills." I know Sally was never aided even though her husband had not always supported. Sally was graduated from high school and had held jobs in various laundries. Her high school grades were below average, but recently she returned to night school to take course work in office methods. Mr. Morris confided that, if the case hadn't bespoken Sally and her pills, he would have written a letter of petition in humble style to the chairman of the English Department at his alma mater, a letter declaring immutably his willingness to anatomize Donne.

It was my opinion that, for a young and single male disappointed in love, Mr. Morris took the W. case well in stride. He even, with his good reading skills, found time for some research on various female disorders. I complimented him on his perspicacity. Mrs. Lee thoroughly reviewed him on points of eligibility--income, property, deprivation, residence and compliance with rehabilitation planning. One day off he went to the housing project. I saw him put all the forms pertinent to the affirmation into the plastic briefcase the county issued and take with him a clipboard on which were snapped the mileage forms. I had the idea that everything would go well for him, that he would neatly record the mileage in triplicate for his wheezing Chevrolet and perhaps from his ingenuous viewpoint give some new insight to further planning and casework for Martha W. "Good-by, Leah," he called across the parking lot. I waved to him.

When he arrived back at the office, he complained that the case history had in no way prepared him for Martha. He said several things before he got to the gist of his argument. He looked at me as if for confirmation. "She's a person. She's a real person."

I agreed, "Yes, she is."

"She's so good with the little boy, what's his name? The C. P.? She went to see Leonardo when he was in Juvenile Hall."

"Yes, she's never neglected her children."

"And I thought she seemed afraid of me. She mumbles, you know. She wouldn't look me in the eye. And she could barely sign her name. She can't read the forms she's signing."

I let him continue.

"And now I have to walk into that narrow dictation booth and affirm her continued eligibility for agency assistance. I feel as if...." He was staring into space.

With the chewed ball-point pen I awarded the accolade. "I dub you Knight of the County, Sir Edwin." He didn't respond one way or the other. I asked, "Do you want a story with some symbols? O, Knight of the County, will it be a fair lady you ride out to save? Will you seek Sangreal?"

He joined me in my humor. "There it is now," he began; "it all evolves. Martha...the name signifying some dilemma of national significance. Wait till transcribing hears this. You know that she offered me coffee? There is my symbol, a darkened china cup, slightly chipped but washed clean, so clean. It is not Martha Washington who has signed her affirmation papers. I have affirmed Martha. I have acknowledged that she exists. I lift the cup to my lips at once in affirmation and communion. By God, that's not bad."

I pointed out, "You said your heroines were gifted with tremulous voices always. Martha mumbles."

He waved aside my protest. I could see his mind at work on the cup symbolism.

His supervisor's fantasy-wracking laugh brought us back to the realities of our employment. Mrs. Lee was evidently reacting to a phone call she had terminated. She laughed so hard that I feared her strained seams might at last give up captive flesh. Then she shook her head and started rummaging through the drawer where she kept her best resources. She didn't explain what the call concerned. Some human need, we assumed legal aid, contraception, police protection, TV repair. Who cared enough to ask?

Mr. Morris regarded his supervisor. And he turned back to me. "I'm not going to dictate. I can't."

I admonished him. "Our Director wouldn't like to hear you say that. You know...King Arthur."

"Listen," he muttered, "you're a comedienne. I'm going back to Mrs. Lee's desk. She's been like a mother to me. I'm going to cry."

A week later the county issued him a new pen. Shortly before I left the agency, Edwin Morris completed his training. Mrs. Lee spoke very favorably of his work.

Short Stories by PJ