a few potatoes

My mother used to send me to Bob's Produce Market once in a while when she was cooking supper. She'd tell me to go buy her a few potatoes. Why couldn't she just say, "Suzanne, go buy me 6 large potatoes," or "7 medium ones." Something specific. Not just a few.

I was only 11 years old. I didn't know! I'd beg her to tell me,

"Mama, how many is that anyway?"

But that's all she'd say. A few. So I'd hop on my big blue bike and ride the 3 blocks to dear old Bob's.

I loved how the produce market smelled. Apples, carrots, potatoes, pomegranates--we called them Indian Apples--and cantaloupes and corn. It smelled fresh, sweet and good for you, but as good as it smelled, I didn't like going in there. Bob was about 60 years old and not a friendly guy. I don't think he liked kids in his store.

I don't think he liked kids. Period.

When I opened the door to go inside, the little bells on the door handle jingled. There were never any other customers in there. Maybe he was unfriendly to everyone. He sat at the back of the one room market in his chair and never said a word to me. When I got about halfway into the store, he slowly stood up and moseyed a few steps toward me--still not speaking. I got all nervous and spoke because he wouldn't.

"My mom wants a few potatoes."

He stopped dead in his tracks and then he just looked at me.

Now what? Was I supposed to get a paper sack and pick them out myself? I didn't know. He still didn't say anything to me so I spoke again just to break the silence.

"Just a few."

That's when he figured out that I was waiting for him to pick them out for me. He moved silently over to the unwashed white potatoes and started placing them in the paper bag. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Five potatoes. Six. Seven. Eight. Nine. Nine medium potatoes. A few? Then he walked slowly over to the hanging scale and placed the bag carefully into the pan to weigh them. I now wonder just how much all the dirt on those potatoes weighed.

"55 cents."

I handed him the money, folded the top of the bag down and hurried out of the store. There was no "Thank you." No, "Come again." No, "Kiss my foot."

Silence.

I was so glad to be out of there I could have shouted. The good smell of the store was just not worth the misery of doing business with silent, old Bob.

I wrapped the top of the bag over the handlebar and placed my hand over it to get my treasures home because there was no basket on my bike. Off I went. That's when it started to sprinkle rain. I'd only gone one block, just up from Frankie Polito's house, when my bag started getting weak from the water. I hoped it would let me get home before it disintegrated.

It didn't.

One potato fell out. Two fell out. They all fell out. I had dirty, little potatoes all over the ground, and a soggy mess of a holey paper bag wrapped around my handlebar. It couldn't get any worse.

Then it really started raining.

The thought never entered my mind to simply leave them there and go home. I was too responsible to do that. I needed those potatoes. Mama needed those potatoes. Besides, she would kill me if I left them there and I surely couldn't hold them with one hand. There were too many of them.

Now what was I going to do? I was stuck.

So I arm wrestled with muddy potatoes in the rain. I put a couple in the crook of my arm, one under my arm, I held one in my hand and shoved two under my chin...I had potatoes everywhere. Then I tried to ride my bicycle. What a fiasco! I'd go 2 feet and drop 2 potatoes. At that rate I'd never get home.

Then I heard my name.

"Suz-ay-anne!"

My Aunt Polly was visiting us from Tennessee and Mama had sent her to look for me because I'd been gone so long.

"My bag broke. I can't get the potatoes home!"

"Well, let's see what we can do."

She tried carrying them, but it seems a few potatoes is too many for anyone to carry without a bag. Rain was still coming down. We were too far from the store to go back for another bag and still 2 blocks from home. We were soaked and now both of us don't know what to do. That's when I had a brainstorm. The light bulb came on. It was an epiphany.

I was wearing a yellow, flowered sunsuit. Remember those? One piece play suits with string ties at the shoulders? Elastic at the waist and at each leg? Why not put the potatoes in my sunsuit? Drop the muddy little suckers down the front and back of my top. I'd sit down and ride my bike home so they wouldn't fall out the legs and we could at least get them home to Mama.

Desperate times called for desperate measures.

Aunt Polly hesitated for a split second but she knew there was no other solution, and finally gave in. As I sat on my bicycle seat, she loaded me up, front and back with wet, dirty potatoes. We both laughed at the sight of my lumpy, muddy rain soaked sunsuit. She told me to go ahead and ride and she'd catch up with me, but I rode slowly so she wouldn't have to walk home in the rain alone. I wasn't going to leave her. She had rescued me. We were filthy and soaked to the bone by the time went the 2 remaining blocks home.

We crashed triumphantly and noisily through the back door, laughing loudly at the ridiculousness of the whole mess. We were ecstatic. We had succeeded. We had scaled the mountain. We had overcome our adversity. We had brought home the bacon...er, potatoes!

As Aunt Polly unloaded my dirty sunsuit of its cargo at the kitchen table, we spilled out our whole sordid story for Mama. She listened calmly like a disinterested bystander and then matter-of-factly said,

"Well, why'd you get so many? I told you just a few.