Stay true to you and don't be afraid to stand out: Maryellen's story

"Ten!” Maryellen Larkin exclaimed happily. “On my birthday, I’ll be ten.” Maryellen and her friends were walking home from school on a sunny April afternoon. Exuberantly, Maryellen sprang ahead of the other girls and then spun around to face them. “My birthday is Saturday, May seventh, which is coming soon, in just three weeks and a little bit.” Maryellen skipped backward, bouncing on her toes. “Oh boy! I’ve been waiting to be ten my whole life.”

“Me, too,” said her friends, Karen King, Karen Stohlman, and Angela Terlizzi.

“What kind of party are you going to have, Ellie?” asked Karen King, getting down to serious business.

“Bowling?”

“No, I did that last year,” said Maryellen. “And the year before that, miniature golf, and the year before that, a beach party. I want to do something new, something that no one’s ever done before.”

“I know!” said Karen Stohlman. “You could have your party at the drive-in movie!”

“And eat cake and ice cream in the car?” said Maryellen. “And open presents in the car? That won’t work.”

“How about a Davy Crockett party? We’ll wear our coonskin caps,” said Karen King. Davy Crockett was everyone’s favorite television show. It was about an American hero, Davy Crockett, who lived in the wild mountains of Tennessee in the eighteen hundreds. All the kids had hats with long fur tails like the one Davy Crockett wore. Maryellen even had “Daisy Crockett” underwear with a female version of Davy on it. “Maybe your mom could make your birthday cake in the shape of a coonskin cap,” Karen King continued. “And we could all sing the TV show theme song.” Karen sang out loud and clear: “Davy, Davy Crockett, king of the wild frontier!”

“No,” said Angela. “We’ll sing, ‘Ellie, Ellie Larkin, queen of Day-to-na Beach!’”

This struck all four girls as hilariously funny, and they laughed hard until Karen King brought them down to earth by asking, “Speaking of Davy, will you invite Davy Fenstermacher to your party this year? You have every other year.”

“That was back when we were friends,” said Maryellen. Davy Fenstermacher lived next door to the Larkins. He and Maryellen used to be best friends. They’d ride their bikes to school together, eat lunch together, and play together after school and on weekends. But they’d had a falling-out back at the beginning of the school year, and their friendship still was not repaired. Davy never even spoke to Maryellen anymore.

“Davy wouldn’t come to my party if I asked him, now,” she said. “He’s too busy being best friends with Wayne.”

“Wayne the Pain,” said Karen Stohlman.

Maryellen said briskly, “Ten is too old to have boys at your birthday party anyway. You don’t have boys again until you’re teenagers in high school, and the boys are your boyfriends, and you play records and dance, sort of like a sock hop only at your house.”

The girls were silent for a moment. They knew what a sock hop was: It was a dance where you took off your shoes and danced in your socks so that you wouldn’t scuff up the floor. They were trying to imagine even wanting to do such a thing as dance with a boy, especially one like Wayne, who, they felt certain, would only be more Wayne-ish and pain-ish in high school than he was now.

“Joan told me about high school parties,” Maryellen added. “That’s how I know.”

“Ah!” said the girls. They were in awe of Joan, Maryellen’s eldest sister, who was eighteen. They respected Joan as their highest authority on fashion, romance, and being grown-up. After all, Joan was engaged to her boyfriend, Jerry, who had been a sailor in the Korean War and was now in college. Joan and Jerry were already planning their wedding, which was to take place at the end of the summer. Maryellen was thrilled, because she was going to be a bridesmaid.

Suddenly, she stopped short. “Oh!” she gasped. “I’ve just had a brilliant idea.”

“What?” cried Angela, Karen, and Karen. “What’s your idea? Tell us!”

Maryellen held up her hands, palms straight, to stop her friends from talking. “What if,” she began dramatically, “I have a movie-star birthday party and everyone comes dressed as her favorite movie star? I’ll be Debbie Reynolds and wear my bridesmaid dress.”

“Oh, I love that idea!” said Karen King.

“A movie-star party!” said Karen Stohlman. “Neato! No one has ever done that before!”

The girls started naming all the most glamorous movie stars of 1955.

“I’ll be Audrey Hepburn,” said Angela.

“Dibs on Grace Kelly,” said Karen Stohlman.

“I can’t decide if I want to be Elizabeth Taylor or Marilyn Monroe,” sighed Karen King. “Or maybe I’ll be a television star like Lucille Ball from I Love Lucy.”

“Scooter could come as Rin Tin Tin or Lassie,” joked Maryellen. “I’ll be J. Fred Muggs, the chimpanzee!” She loped along the sidewalk, swinging her arms as if she were the famous television star chimpanzee.

The girls laughed themselves breathless, and then Maryellen said, “Now I’m even more excited about my birthday!”

“Me, too,” said Karen Stohlman. “I can’t wait to see your bridesmaid dress. I bet it’s gorgeous. What does it look like?”

“Well,” said Maryellen. “It will be gorgeous, when it’s finished. Mom’s making it.”

“Oh,” said the girls. They hesitated for a teeny, tiny second. “Good.”

Maryellen knew what her friends were thinking, because she was thinking the same thing, too. They’d all had unfortunate experiences with their mothers making dresses as part of do-it-yourself crazes. Maryellen knew that her friends were too polite to say so, but dresses made by mothers did not always turn out very well.

Angela was first to think of something optimistic to say. “Since your mom is making it, your dress will fit you perfectly,” she said.

Maryellen grinned gratefully. “I certainly hope so,” she said. “Or else the movie star I’ll look like at my birthday party will be the scarecrow from The Wizard of Oz!”

---

“Ellie, honey, stand still,” said Mrs. Larkin.

Maryellen held her breath. She was standing on a chair while Mom, kneeling and frowning with concentration, was pinning the tissue-paper dress pattern onto her to see where it would need to be taken in. Maryellen was as skinny as a flagpole, so Mom was using lots of pins. Maryellen noticed that Mom also seemed to be sighing a lot. Even Maryellen’s energetic imagination had to strain to imagine how a dress would emerge from the tissue-paper pattern. Pinned together, the paper pieces looked about as shapely as Scooter, the Larkins’ pudgy dachshund. Maybe it had been a mistake to beg Mom to make her bridesmaid dress first. Mom was also going to make bridesmaid dresses for Carolyn, Maryellen’s next oldest sister, who was fourteen, and Beverly, who was seven. Maybe, thought Maryellen, I should have waited until Mom knew what she was doing, sewing-wise. Ah, well, too late now! At least she hadn’t told Mom yet that she was counting on having her dress finished by her birthday so that she could wear it to her movie-star birthday party. Adding the pressure of a deadline that was only a few weeks away would put Mom right over the top with nervousness, she could tell.

Mrs. Larkin sighed again, sounding harassed. Joan, the bride-to-be, looked up from the book that she was reading and said gently, “Mom? You don’t have to do this, you know. I’d be just as happy with ready-made bridesmaid dresses bought off the rack from O’Neal’s.”

“No, no, no,” said Mrs. Larkin. She sat back on her heels and dabbed her sweaty forehead with the back of her wrist. “No, I’m determined to make the dresses. Your dad and I were married during the Depression, and so I didn’t have any bridesmaids at my wedding, and I was married in a suit—a borrowed suit at that! I want to do for you everything that I missed out on, Joanie.”

“Jerry and I don’t need a big fuss,” said Joan. “Just a small wedding is fine with us.”

“Nonsense,” said Mrs. Larkin. “A girl’s wedding day is the most important day in her life! Your father and I want yours to be perfect in every detail: your cake, your flowers, your veil . . .”

Maryellen piped up, “Your hair, your shoes . . .”

“Jerry and I have talked about getting married outdoors, in a garden or a park,” said Joan. “So I’ll probably wear flats. We don’t want to be all stiff and uncomfortable.”

“But I was hoping Jerry would wear his dresswhites Navy uniform!” said Mom.

“That’s so formal,” said Joan. “We want to be relaxed.”

“Joan!” said Mom. “Flats? A park? This is your wedding, not a wienie roast. Honestly, sometimes I think I’m more excited about your marriage than you are.” Mom took a pin and—jab!—used it to pin the paper pattern for the collar onto Maryellen’s shoulder.

Maryellen suspected that the collar was backward. But she stayed quiet while Joan said, “Oh, no, no. I’m excited about the marriage. I’m thrilled to be marrying Jerry. But to me, marriage is one thing and the wedding is another. The marriage is forever and the wedding is only one day. And don’t get me wrong; I’m grateful for all that you’re doing. Jerry and I want our wedding to be beautiful, just not stuffy and fussy and such a big deal.”

“It’s not stuffy or fussy to do things correctly,” said Mom. “I am determined that you and Jerry will have a proper wedding. For heaven’s sake, you’re such a bookworm that if I left it up to you, you’d probably get married on the steps of the public library.”

“And carry books for a bouquet,” joked Maryellen.

“Well, I do love books almost as much as I love Jerry,” Joan said, smiling. “But I promise I won’t get married at the library, Mom. I promise you can have my wedding your way.”

Mom smiled, too. “So you’re giving me permission to go full speed ahead?”

“Aye, aye, captain,” said Joan with a laugh.

Maryellen was glad to see Mom laugh as well— even though laughing distracted her so that she pinned the paper pattern for the sash on backward, too.

The next day at school, Maryellen’s fourth-grade teacher, Mrs. Humphrey, wrote on the blackboard:

Today is Tuesday, April 12, 1955.

“Wayne Philpott,” said Mrs. Humphrey without turning around, “if you shoot that rubber band at Maryellen, you and I will be having lunch together the rest of the week.”

Davy snatched the rubber band away from Wayne and put it in his desk, and Maryellen crossed her eyes and stuck out her tongue at Wayne over her shoulder. Sometimes she was glad that Mrs. Humphrey seemed to have eyes in the back of her head!

“Boys and girls,” said Mrs. Humphrey, facing the class. “Give me your attention, please. Today we’re going to go to a special assembly for the whole school in the auditorium.”

Everyone wiggled and whispered, and Wayne hooted, “Yahoo!”

“I know that my fourth-graders will act like ladies and gentlemen,” said Mrs. Humphrey.

Everyone looked at Wayne, who batted his eyelashes, folded his hands on his desk, and smiled innocently.

“Line up, please,” said Mrs. Humphrey.

All the students jumped up from their desks. Wayne tried to trip Maryellen on her way to the girls’ line. Luckily, she heard someone—maybe it was Davy—murmur “Watch it!” just in the nick of time, so she hopped over Wayne’s foot.

“Quiet in the hallway, please,” said Mrs. Humphrey.

As Maryellen and her classmates filed into the auditorium, she saw the principal, Mr. Carey, up front fiddling with the dials on the television set. Mr. Carey’s eyeglasses were pushed up on his forehead. He was squinting at the dials, and moving the rabbit-ears antenna to get a clear picture on the television screen. It seemed to be a news program. The screen was too little and too far away for Maryellen or any other student to see, really. Mr. Carey had the volume turned up very loud, which only added to the cacophony in the noisy auditorium as students chatted, squeaked their seats, shuffled their feet, and called and waved to their friends in other classes.

Mr. Carey flicked the lights on and off for quiet, and then held his pointer finger up to his lips. “Shhh!” he shushed. Finally, he just bellowed, “QUIET!”

As everyone hushed, Angela whispered to Maryellen, “Do you think we’re here to get good news or bad news?”

“Good news,” said Maryellen, who always liked to hope for the best.

“Ten years ago today, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt died,” said the TV newscaster. “Roosevelt could not walk, because he had had polio, a terrible disease that has killed many people, especially children. Three years ago, in 1952, a polio epidemic affected over fifty thousand people in the United States, and killed nearly three thousand. But today, Dr. Jonas Salk, at the University of Pittsburgh, announced that he has found a safe and effective vaccine to prevent polio. The whole world is grateful to Dr. Salk, and to the more than one hundred million Americans who contributed money to research for polio prevention. And now, the task before us is to raise public awareness and to raise money to produce and distribute the vaccine.”

The TV newscaster went on, but no one heard the rest of the announcement, because the auditorium exploded with cheers. The students jumped up and down and clapped and whistled while the teachers hugged one another and cried happy tears. A way to prevent polio was very good news indeed. Outside, Maryellen heard church bells ringing and sirens going off in celebration.

She felt someone poke her in the back. It was Davy. He grinned and raised his eyebrows. Then he turned away without saying anything, but that didn’t matter. Maryellen knew that Davy’s grin was a tiny, silent, split-second celebration just between the two of them. Davy was letting her know that he realized how the news about the polio vaccine meant even more to her than it did to most people, because when she was younger, she had had polio. She was all better now. Really, the only reminder was that one leg was a tiny bit weaker than the other, and her lungs were extra sensitive to cold.

But Maryellen remembered very well how much polio had hurt. Sometimes in her dreams she had polio again, and the heavy, dark, frightened feeling of being lost in pain and worry came back. With all her heart, she was glad that now, due to Dr. Salk, no one else—neither her friends, nor her sisters or brothers, nor children she’d never met—would ever have to know that terrible feeling. And she was glad that even though Davy didn’t seem to want to be her friend anymore, he understood how she felt.

“Well, I can’t say that I’m looking forward to getting a shot,” said Karen Stohlman as the girls filed out of the auditorium. “I hate shots.” She turned to Maryellen and said, “You’re a lucky duck, Ellie. You won’t have to get a shot because you already had polio.”

Maryellen didn’t exactly think she was a lucky duck. First of all, she wasn’t lucky at all to have had a terrible illness like polio. Second, she actually felt sort of left out because she wouldn’t be getting a shot like everybody else. She wanted to be part of something important and historic, something that was going to change the world for the better.

“I won’t be getting a shot, either,” said Carol Turner, another girl in their class. “My mother says vaccinations are dangerous.” Carol shivered. “You know, when you get a vaccination, they’re putting a dead virus in you.”

“Eww!” said Karen King. “I don’t want anybody to put viruses in me, dead or alive. Now I’m scared to get a shot!”

“Are you kidding?” Maryellen asked in horrified disbelief. “Finally there’s a shot to protect you from a really terrible disease, a disease that can cripple you or even kill you, and you’re afraid to get it?”

Carol Turner shrugged. “I bet a lot of people think the vaccine is dangerous like my mom does, so they won’t get a shot.”

“But—but—” Maryellen sputtered, stunned speechless with outrage. Just then, she had a brainstorm. She stopped still right in the middle of the hallway and announced to her friends, “I’ve decided about my birthday party.”

“It’s a movie-star party, right?” said Karen Stohlman.

“No,” said Maryellen. A movie-star party seemed self-indulgent and frivolous now. She had thought of a way that her birthday could Do Something Important. “We’re going to put on a show. And the point of the show will be to encourage people to get a polio shot. We’ll charge ten cents admission, and send the money to the March of Dimes to help pay for the polio vaccine for poor children.”

Angela hopped and clapped her hands in glee. “And I thought the movie-star idea was good!” she said. “A show is much better!”

Maryellen agreed. She was excited, pleased, and proud that she had thought of a way to help Dr. Salk fight polio. And she felt certain that she could figure out a way to wear her bridesmaid dress in her show, too.