a fog of unbelief, I heard the doctor say, “I’d like your husband to come to your next appointment.”
A couple of weeks later, I sat in the doctor’s waiting room while the nurse took Steve aside. “To take a blood sample,” she said.
After pleasantries, the doctor said, “The two of you have a challenge. Your blood doesn’t match. Maybe someday it won’t be a problem, but in 1956, this is serious.”
“Serious? What are you talking about?” we both cried.
“You’ve heard of blue babies I’m sure,” he said.
I remembered when movie star Lana Turner’s “blue” baby almost died before it had a total blood change.
“Could our baby die?” I gasped.
“That’s why we’re looking at your pregnancy. Darlene, you have O negative blood. Steve has AB positive. That means your RH factors are fighting with each other in the baby who’s growing in Darlene’s womb.”
We were stunned. We hadn’t even planned on being pregnant at this point in our infant marriage. We were supposed to be having fun.
Dr. Rotchford explained. “First babies are the easiest. Often you make it through that one with no problem. But we can’t take a chance. Darlene, I want you in my office for blood titers every month for the first four months. Twice a month after January and weekly after April 1. Until your due date of June 3. But don’t plan on making it to term. In fact, having this baby early will give it a better chance.”
Then the doctor dropped the bombshell. “I have to tell you right off, the two of you shouldn’t have a lot of babies. And—definitely—you shouldn’t have them one after the other.”
My God! Didn’t he realize we hadn’t even been married two months? Didn’t he know we were Catholic? Didn’t he know how you made babies?
We were in the middle of our first storm.
Time passed. We lived. We loved.
I got a job—$200 a month. Steve began his Fifth Year—an accelerated program for an Education Degree. And got a part-time job—at Wes’s Phillips gas station at the corner of Boone and Hamilton. (We still had tuition to pay.)
Buying our groceries, I followed my college home economics teacher’s budget for two adults—$15 a week. We feasted on homemade pizza (a box of Chef Boyardee and a half-pound of hamburger—25 cents for the meat). And ate Dinty Moore stew—warmed—right out of the can. One week I splurged on a pork roast—but saved it in the fridge too long. It smelled rotten when I took it out of the plastic. I sobbed—it was supposed to feed us for two nights—and sandwiches.
My folks came to check on us in late October. My mother was not happy over my pregnancy.
“You just got married,” she whined. “What will people say? For heaven’s sake, don’t have it too soon!”
Furious, I thought, Like I can stop what’s already in process?
Steve and I really lucked out with our first neighbors—the McGraths—Clara and Bart. In their mid-forties, we had nothing in common.
They rented the house next door in early September and almost immediately invited us for dinner. Barbecued hamburgers the first night. They were the best we’d ever eaten, and we told them so. Clara and Bart beamed.
Next Bart cooked two-inch-thick pork chops on their outdoor barbecue, and Clara made corn on the cob. I’d never had my fill of that delight before in my life. My mother cooked three cobs of corn, one for my father, one for her, and one for me. That was it. Clara cooked enough for an army that night. (Found out she’d been an Army nurse during WWII.) She kept asking me if I wanted more—I kept accepting.
When we got home, Steve said, “I don’t want to make you feel bad, but do you have any idea how many cobs of corn you ate?”
I looked blank. I’d been too busy eating to count.
“Seven!” he said. “I’ve got to tell you, Darlene, if Clara hadn’t been so sweet about it, I’d have been embarrassed.”
My appetite couldn’t have scared the McGraths off. They soon invited us over for spaghetti and meatballs. Absolutely delicious!
Steve told them about my culinary attempt at Italian food—“Chef Boyardee out of a can. Not a meatball in sight.”
I explained, “That’s what my mother cooked—I have no idea how to make the real thing. In fact I’d never even tasted real Italian spaghetti until Steve took me to Lydia’s in Butte.”
“Would you like me to teach you how to make my Sicilian grandmother’s recipe?” Clara offered.
I jumped at the chance.
“Do you have a big pot?” she asked. “A grater? An electric fry pan?”
I nodded. We’d gotten lots of kitchen gadgets for shower and wedding presents.
Clara wrote out my grocery list. “That’s it, except the cheese. I get a big block of a special Romano at Tito’s once a month. I’ll share enough for your first batch.”
The next Saturday morning Clara arrived at 9 a.m., and the two of us got to work in our dollhouse-sized kitchen. (It was so handy you could stand in the middle of the room, cook at the stove, set the table, and wash dishes in the sink without moving more than a couple of feet in any direction.)
“Open the puree first,” Clara directed. “Next, add the tomato paste. Fill one empty puree can with warm water, swish it around, and add to the mixture. Then peel a clove of garlic and put it—whole—into the sauce in the pan.”
I must say, as I peeled that garlic I was glad my mother wasn’t there. She’d have been horrified. “Only poor people eat garlic!” she told me in no uncertain terms when my home economics teacher in ninth grade cooking class recommended halving a clove of garlic, squeezing it gently, and rubbing it on the entire inside of the salad bowl.
“Never in my house,” my mother said in her I’m-the-boss-and you-better-know-it voice.
Finally, Clara had me put a handful of commercial parmesan cheese in the tomato mixture. “Turn the burner on low and let it cook.
“Now it’s time to make meatballs.”
At Clara’s direction, I got out my biggest Pyrex bowl, the yellow one. She had me put in the two-pound package of hamburger I’d gotten at the IGA grocery store, two slices of grated white bread, and one whole egg.
“Now grate the Romano cheese.”
I almost died as she handed me the round ball. The cheese was green!
Clara saw me flinch—and explained, “Just the rind is green. Cut off a chunk. Grate the white part and put into our mixture.”
