In God we trust_ all others pay cash - Jean Shepherd [34]
The next afternoon a large unmarked delivery truck stopped in front of the house. Two workmen unloaded a square, sealed, waist-high cardboard carton, which was lugged into the kitchen. They left and drove off. Somehow an air of foreboding surrounded their stealthy, unexplained operation.
The Old Man, his face flushed with excitement, fumbling in supercharged haste to lay bare his hard-won symbol of Victory, struggled to open the carton. A billowing mushroom of ground excelsior surged up and out. In he plunged. And there it was.
The yellow kitchen light bulb illumined the scene starkly and yet with a touch of glowing promise. Tenderly he lifted from its nest of fragrant straw the only thing he had ever won in his life. We stood silent and in awe at the sheer shimmering, unexpected beauty of the “Major Award.”
Before us in the heavy, fragrant air of our cabbage-scented kitchen stood a life-size lady’s leg, in true blushing-pink flesh tones and wearing a modish black patent leather pump with spike heel. When I say life-size I am referring to a rather large lady who obviously had dined well and had matured nicely. It was a well filled-out leg!
It was so realistic that for a brief instant we thought that we had received in the mail the work of an artist of the type that was very active at that period—the Trunk Murderer. For some reason this spectacular form of self-expression has declined, but in those days something in the air caused many a parson’s daughter to hack up her boyfriend into small segments which were then shipped separately to people chosen at random from the phone book. Upon being apprehended and tried, she was almost always aquitted, whereupon she accepted numerous offers to appear in Vaudeville as a featured headliner, recalling her days as a Trunk Murderer complete with props and a dramatized stage version of the deed.
For a split instant it seemed as though our humble family had made the headlines.
My mother was the first to recover.
“What is it?”
“A … leg,” my father incisively shot back.
It was indeed a leg, more of a leg in fact than any leg any of us had ever seen!
“But … what is it?”
“Well, it’s a leg. Like a statue, I guess.”
“A statue?”
Our family had never owned a statue. A statue was always considered to be a lady wearing a wreath and concrete robes, holding aloft a torch in one hand and a book in the other. This was the only kind of statue outside of generals sitting on horses that we had ever heard about. They all had names like VICTORY or PEACE. And if this was a statue, it could only have one name:
WHOOPEE!
My mother was trying to get herself between the “statue” and the kids.
“Isn’t it time for bed?”
“Holy Smokes, would you look at that!”
My father was warming up.
“Holy Smokes, would you look at that? Do you know what this is?”
My mother did not answer, just silently edged herself between my kid brother and the magnificent limb.
“Would you believe it, it’s a LAMP!”
It was indeed a lamp, a lamp in its own way a Definitive lamp. A master stroke of the lightoliers’ art. It was without question the most magnificent lamp that we had ever seen.
This was the age of spindly, artificially antiqued, teetery brass contrivances called “bridge lamps.” These were usually of the school of design known as WPA Neo-Romanticism, a school noted for its heavy use of brass flower petals and mottled parchment shades depicting fauns and dryads inscribed in dark browns and greens. The light bulbs themselves were often formed to emulate a twisted, spiraled candle flame of a peculiar yellow-orange tint. These bulbs were unique in that they contrived somehow to make a room even dimmer when they were turned on. My mother was especially proud of her matched