People have always intrigued me, so one day I decided to interview for history the most colorful woman I’ve ever known. Doris Baynes is a mixture of native-American Indian and Irish-American descent. She originated from the hill people of West Virginia and has been housekeeper for my mother in South Florida and for me both in South Florida and upstate New York. Her story begins at the time of the Great Depression--a time when few "Hill" people broke away from their environment.

The bonding of family ties is a concept instilled in my brothers and myself by my mother, Molly Lee. In 1969 Doris Baynes became a part of our close knit family when my eccentric mother hired Doris as a cook simply because her hobby of fishing meshed with Molly’s own. As time flew by they became like sisters growing ever closer until my mother’s death. After that Doris became my family, helping me bring up my son and running my home until she could no longer work. I thought of her as a second mother, leaning on her good advice when life’s struggles became impossible to handle alone. She was as much a part of what I have known as family as any blood relative. Family is to me those who go far out to develop a lasting love between them and those with whom they are connected.

I sat at the glass table on my back lawn letting the sun's warm rays fill me with energy that first day when Doris agreed to putting her "life on paper." A notebook of blank pages lay adjacent to the fresh cup of coffee before me. The clock in the house chimed 4 PM. With a bounce that gave her a youthful appearance Doris Baynes strode across the lawn to join me, a beer can in her hand. I waved.

"Hi, there, Doris, just the gal I've been looking for. As I said the other day, these lives of yours fascinate me. Your mother's a Seminole Indian and your father is an Appalachian mountaineer with an Irish background. You say you're hill people. Hill people never leave the hills, do they? And don't they look at schooling as a dirty word? That's what I remember from my brief stay among the hill people in Tennessee ten years ago. "

"Well, Meg! I is jest simple folk ... like noone who don't gots money. You want me to spill my whole story on you? It ain't much really. Pa ... he twar a tough one. His granpappy's Irish blood flowed through his veins. It jumbled with his country upbringin, pullin up quite a temper when seasoned with a swig of shine. He know’d what a penny meant. I'd hear about it every time I'd ask for somethin.

"'Like, what's this bout hard times? Chile, you don't know nothin. Gal, you get out of there and earn your keep. There's a depression goin on and I ain't runnin no welfare in this house.

"That's what I heard when I twar wee and poor and skinny. Late at night, when howlin dawgs and hootin owls twar all that stirred, I'd deliver that moonshine for Pa, pullin my wagon behind me. Pa collected for the shine way back in the mines where no one seed his dealin’s. When I asked for somethin for my hard work Pa would answer with, 'Pay? Don't I feed you them taters and beans every day? That's pay enough!'

"Mama couldn't help me none when Pa's Irish temper boiled up. It twar my lot to wander those streets alone until my brother grew old enough to help. Even with my brother at my side, the fright of strange people and lonely streets at night didn't cease.

"Me and my brother had one crazy woman in town. We called her 'Scurvy Bertha.' Oh, Gawd, we twar scared when we had to take a jar of whiskey to her house. We twar told to put the shine under the porch steps. There twar watch dogs at that there place. 'If them dogs is out,' Pa said, 'You all wait till the mizzus puts them in.'

"One night we arrives late and don't wait for that old Scurvy Bertha woman. We went up to that house and the dogs come arunnin and barkin at us. That's when we set it down and run. Left the gates open and the dogs after us, goin up the valley jest amakin tracks.

"The deliveries and wagon lay by the fence, forgotten. Bertha's old man, Grisly Bo, arrives home, spectin to be greeted by his dogs. Instead he finds old Bertha at the gate screamin, a smashed bottle at her feet. My red wagon lay on the side of the road jest outside that gate ... a sign of who those culprits twar.

"That old Bo went straight away to my pappy. Pa picked up a switch from dah ground and whupped us good. So, to git even with those crazy people, me and my girlfriend, Marie, that lived near to Bo and Bertha, we went back up behind their house in them woods. We got us some rocks and throwed them down and hit that house. Gawd, Bo and Bertha came out jest a raisin hell. They couldn't speak good English. Don't know what kind of people they twar."

Doris was in need of another beer and hurried off to replenish our nourishment. On her return I readied myself for more tales. "What can you tell me of your mother's teachings, Doris? Being an Indian you must have had ways different from how Caucasians brought up their children."

"Twarn't so different really, maybe she jest seed the important thangs different. My mama taught us younguns the Seminole way of honorin your man and fightin for what you believe in. There twar this girl in my class name of Sadie what jest needed a fight. We didn't know each other well. We jest jump rope together once in a while. One day she come up to me jest itchin to get one on.

" ‘I goin to beat your butt after school.’

"I looks up at her dumbfounded. ‘Whatcha want to do such a thang for?’

" ‘Cause you bad. Your Pappy make that funny water what makes my Daddy crazy. You be bringin it to him. I seed you the other night. Someone gotta teach you a lesson.’

"Now I twarn’t bad. I had to deliver Pa's wares or he'd of tarred me good. This twar what Mama meant by honorin your man. Pa might not do good but he twar my Pa. I twar ready for that fight.

"Someone told teacher we twar gettin it on after school. Teacher didn't want us to fight ‘cause she didn't believe in it. She come out with me that day, never lettin on she know’d. Seein all the kids there waitin, she walk me home. Eyes blazin, I tells her I know’d the way, but she jest takes my hand and walks. All them kids follow jest ashoutin, ‘got the teacher to walk you home, Yeller Belly.’

"Well, I could of cared less what that teacher did and she did it every day with them kids right behind. It twar them kids’ jabber that got my ire up. Come Friday, they followed me home and Mama she told that teacher our ways of learnin to fight for ourselves--not bein pampered and all. That teacher left in a big hurry. Late in the day I twar sittin on the window seat watchin the snowflakes fallin. Here come that ole Sadie goin to the country store beyond my home. She twar all alone carrin a big long stick--coward. Mama yelled at me to go beat that gal's butt ‘fore she beat mine. Told me to take my pick.

"By the time that gal got to me there twar a crowd congregatin. I took that stick right away from her and handed it to a big boy nearby. Then I laid right in on her butt. She got scars all over her. They stuck on her to this day. Her folks gonna sue Pa but he ain't got nothin for them to sue for. That gal never picked a fight again."

"With both Indian culture and mountain culture in your upbringing, didn't other children find you a bit strange?"

"Naw, not really." Doris tipped her head to get that last drop of beer out of her can. "Maybe we twar more into familyin but lotsa kids had differnt cultures.

"My Pa may not be much to honor but my Mama twar and I honored her word. She did good thangs for me and my friends. My girl friend, Marie, twar Italian and I jest love all the food them people ate. Bein twelve years ole I had to jest try out all the mischief me and Marie might discover. We stoned the mean people's house jest for fun for instance. Mama twar always helpin us out of our troubles, pertectin us all over the place. One time I spent the night at Marie's. They had only the wine room for her to sleep in, there twar so many chillins to house.

"That night it twar a mistake, them puttin us in that room. Kegs and barrels of wine with little faucets set on blocks everywhere. We sampled all round that room. We got so drunk we didn't know whether we twar acomin or goin. We giggled all night with her folks screamin, 'You all shut up now. Shut up!' We went to use the bathroom. Someone twar always in there, so we went out on the porch which hung, supported by stilts, five feet over a hill the house twar built on. I lost my balance and know’d I twar afallin. I caught myself with my hands and hung on the porch railin jest aswingin in the air. Her Pa come ascreamin but he got me back up to safe groundin.

"Them people didn't say nothin about our condition, they jest set us off to school next mornin like natural. Feelin jest awful, we stopped off at my house for some of Mama's comfort ‘fore school. Mama twar good. She seed our need for comfortin and kept us warm to get over our misery all day. Marie’s folks never know'd we missed school that day."

A week later I looked up to see an eager look on her face. Doris pushed the notebook in my direction.

"You ain't touched that notebook for some time, chile. Authoring's some kind of job. You jest work when the feelin grabs you? Well, the feelin's grabbed me so let's get on with my story. I ain't got much cleanin to do today."

"Okay, Doris, I'm curious about the time you left your family to join Ringling Brothers Circus. I remember many times dreaming about running off to join a circus. You actually did it."

"Around thirteen I got tired of abuse from the townsfolk, my pappy hollerin and dodgin the revenuer. A carny come down to the fairgrounds. It twar some performers from the Ringling Brothers circus down in Florida. Me and Mama went down to see the show. I twar talkin to the people. My eye caught a sign on the gate, 'we need a cashier to sell tickets.'

"I walked up to the door of the office and said, 'Well I sure would like a job. How much you payin?'

"They told me $30 a week. I took that job, stayin with them till they up and took off to Florida. They like how I always come up with the exact change. They said I twar good and honest."

"That there depression had chillun and big folks alike left hungry. Boy, howdy! Well, them carny folks seemed to have food jest aflowin. I twarn’t hungry none there.

"Folks back in the hills twar jest glad if their younguns had somewheres to get fed. If someone would feed the chilluns, the chilluns could stay with those people. No law enforcement people’d stop them from goin neither--not during the depression days. My Mama let me follow them circus people all the way to Florida where I growed up the rest of the way. A clown named Mark Williams, known to all the chilluns as ‘Uncle Mark,’ wanted in the worst way to bring up a chile, so he took me under his wing. There I learned many new habits. When I got to that there circus, I looked me up a bath. My mama had always taught me a good clean body held a clean mind, and a clean mind I had. There twarn’t no shower to be had. I asked round. A kid born and growed up there laughed at me. ‘A carny bath you be lookin for.’

" 'A carny bath, what's that?'

"That boy pointed to the elephants. 'Stand out there and let them shoot it on you. Consider you had a bath.'

"I jest stared at those big critters. What twar they goin to shoot on me? Now, I twarn’t afraid to get undressed around no boys or nothin so I jest pulled my clothes right off. But those elephants I twarn’t so sure ‘bout them. I inched my way up there. Then it happened. Those elephants’ trunks came after me--like hoses they twar. Water came from everywhere. (That’s jest the way the chilluns, anyway, bathed in the circus.) I twar soaked. Gawd that twar some experience, them boys jest alaughin away."

"What did you do in the circus? How long did you stay? Gosh, did you ever go home again? You must have missed your mother. She was so good to you."

"I worked up a pretty fine trapeze act that people jest flocked in to see. I believe my most embarrassin moment happened, though, workin that circus. I twar little and skinny. I twarn’t sure of bein likeable. Little embarrassments twar real big to me then. One of the ladies what makes the costumes made me this little thang that jest snaps. I wore a little G-strap thang under it cause I felt naked without it.

"Here I twar flyin in the air. All the boys and girls gathered around jest a watchin me when off come that costume. It unsnapped and hit the ground. Them kids they laughed and clapped, pointin at my butt--my naked butt. I tried coverin up with my little hand--no good. I jest sat down there in the middle of the circle of kids.

"The lady what made my outfit come runnin through the crowd. She helped me up and took me to her tent. I twarn’t so sure I wanted to perform after that but that nice lady promised me a secure outfit by mornin. Next day at practice them kids twar ready for a new embarrassment but that lady kept her word."

"Didn't you miss your Mama taking care of you?"

"Sure I missed Mama but I seed her lots when we traveled her way to perform. She and my brother come down to Florida visitin once. We had a flood then.

"After one performance, the town we twar in give us a farewell party. It twar rainin somethin fierce. Cause my brother twar still wee Mama didn't go to the party. That party twar in a funeral parlor, the only place what could hold everyone.

"At one point I went lookin for the bathroom beyond the casket room. The caskets twar open. Eveywhere I looked carny people twar in them all passed out. It twar quite a sight, them laid out like dead. I had nightmares for weeks.

"I forgot about the bathroom deal and the party. I jest hightailed it back to the campgrounds, takin my girlfriend with me. The nightmare twarn’t over then either. The rains had flooded the camp right up into the trailers. Mama and my baby brother twar floatin right out the door on the bed. Mama--she don't know how to swim and she twar one scared Mama. I look at Mama all scared there. Then I look around for help. The water twar up to our shoulders. Though I knowed Mama could stand in that water, she had it in her mind she'd drown for sure if she got off that floatin bed. I turned to look for some help. It twar black dark and I could see nothin, not even the tents. Then out of that dark I seed figures. Some of the carny folks had followed me home and when they seed what happened they come to help.

"They carried Mama and my brother to dry ground on their backs, Mama jest a slidin all over the one what carried her. She twarn’t no bigger than a mite, and jest ascreamin she twar gonna drown.

"Come daylight a poor old greasy woman from town come atotin a big urn of coffee and some paper cups. ’You show people sure needs this. I knowed you cold.’

"We really did appreciate that woman that mornin, grease and all."

"I twar a looker in those days, my red hair flowin in the breeze and my blue eyes just dancin with excitement. Uncle Mark got nervous and run all the boys off. ‘Cause I twar young and foolish, he'd just tell them, 'Get, get, get.'

"He twar savin me for one fellow he liked named Joe. Uncle Mark chased the others so hard he paid no attention to what me and that fellow he twar set on did. But when one tall skinny fellow took an interest in me, Uncle Mark paid a whole lot of attention. We called that skinny fellow, Appleknocker, sproutin up to the tree tops causin us to believe his head would knock the apples right off the trees. Old Appleknocker'd talk to me for long periods. One time Uncle Mark caught that po’ boy with a hand on my knee. Uncle Mark jest throwed the food outah the fryin pan what he was cookin in and took off runnin, chased him shakin that fire hot pan right through the Midway, into the woods, past the creek, right into a mud puddle where he left him set. Poor skinny Appleknocker, more mud then person, come hobblin back to find a filled up elephant. That elephant pushed out his snout and sprayed while we all stood there shoutin and clappin, watchin Appleknocker all muddy and embarrassed and now sloppy wet.

"Uncle Mark's fellow Joe worked on gettin my attention, too, till he finally got me pregnant when I twar but nineteen. I married him. We left the show. I jest couldn't raise kids right while performin on the show circuit. The war to beat all wars, that number two big one come up and Joe went in the air force. I followed him around to the different air bases until he went off to the real fightin.

"Doris, you're so independent. You wanted to fulfill your own dreams. How is it you let Joe take over the limelight and you sat in the background keeping house?"

"Eventually my husband went to fightin the Nazis and I twar left to support my younguns alone at that war-chilled McDill Army Base in Tampa. I had two chilluns by then--a boy and a baby girl. When Joe come back, somethin twar the matter with him. He done snapped over there in that war. He kept talkin about dope and women; all that crazy sort of stuff. When I called Joe’s CO, the MP’s put Joe in the VA hospital. But Joe walked out of that hospital right away like and disappeared. I never seed him from that day to this. One day the Feds sent me a letter saying they twar tellin me in their opinion he twar legally dead.

"Now I twar really poor and the best thang to do twar to take my son to his grandma's for her to bring him up. There he'd get his schoolin, settled in one place, not travelin around. Besides, she’d love him like she did me. I twar in a state of panic. I jest dropped him off where I knowd he’d be took care of and run back to Florida where I found a job waitressin at The Clewiston Inn restaurant. Mama and Papa adopted my son, Morris, and changed his name to Morris Blum. It would be years before I would be involved in my boy’s life again. And he’d be all growed up and havin a life of his own. But my baby girl, not yet of school age, stayed right by my side."

"Doris, why did you leave the Clewiston Inn?"

"I wanted the 'good life.’ I had worked at that inn around twelve years. My little girl, Ann, twar up there in high school by then. She twar on her own pretty much so we jest moved on. My simple ways interested the customers what come to my tables. I twar honest and good and I got lots of job offers over the years. I may not got book learnin but my travelin got me a good education of the important thangs in life. I give Ann a right mannerly upbringin. I jest know’d some other chile could use that.

"I put an ad in the paper, Would like a job as a companion or governess. I had more dirty calls than you would ever know’d. The last person that called twar a woman; a ligit call. That lady, Judy Maddocks--wife of Judge Maddocks–come out to talk with me. She come all the way from Palm Beach where they had them buggery places and all them fancy ways. And her husband twar an important attorney in Palm Beach. Boy, howdy, I twar scared. Judy wanted me to care for her three younguns and they twar wee. Scared and all, I took that job on a month's trial.

"At the end of the month Judy said, ‘We're so happy with you, we hope you're happy, too.’"

"I am," I said.

"‘Does that mean you will stay as our governess?’

"I stayed but livin in all that finery twar strange to me. I twar real scared cause this family twar so grand and had good learnin. Everythin smelled as sparklin clean as it looked. At first I dared not touch nothin. Eatin all that fine food set my tummy jest a rollin around. And speakin to those people--boy did that feel awkward. The cook, however, took me under her wing and taught me the ropes, jest how to handle situations. Besides my new employers twar patient with me not knowin nothin. They didn't trouble me with taboos I didn't understand. I soon learned to relax and not be afraid bein in all that wealth."

"Didn’t you find it hard to adjust? What about the beers you enjoy? Surely your employers didn't let you drink on the job?"

"The Maddocks twar good to me. They didn't mind my takin my beers durin my restin time neither. When the Mizzus come back from shoppin, there'd be a sack of beers. She'd set it on the steps goin to the nursery. At first I jest ignored those beers. I don't know who took them. The cook, Connie, liked her whiskey but she don't take to drinkin alone neither. She'd come up to the nursery now and again on our breaks with her whiskey. We become good friends over those breaks but we watched our booze, cause she had to make the folks dinner."

"Did you ever have just a little more to drink than you should on these afternoon breaks?"

"Lawd, chile, I do remember one Halloween. Connie and me twar makin a cobweb pie for the chilluns--sweet tater pie with a cobweb of cream cheese, sour cream, and sugar that weaved a web round the top. That pie called for a squirt of whiskey. Well, we paid so much attention to the celebratin we didn't think bout what we twar doin. We squirted and sipped and squirted some more. When that pie come outa the oven pipin hot it jest smelled of whiskey. We paid no attention--whiskey's good for what ails you.

"I give those younguns their pie and they gobbled up every last crumb. When the Maddocks come home, the chilluns twar up in the nursery jest agigglin away. Judy, she heard them and give me an anxious look and glanced at her time piece. 'Doris, you don't have the kids in bed yet? They'll be no use at school tomorrow.'

" 'Sure thang,’ I says. ‘I'll get them to sleep right away now, Missus,' I said, as I raced them chillin up those stairs and into bed. Those younguns jest full of candy and junk with Halloween and all.

"When I come back down, I watched Mr. Maddock sniff the air suspicious like but the whiskey twar almost gone by then. They never mentioned nothin more and the chillun made it to school the next day none the worse for wear. I sure begun thinkin bout that cake with the whiskey I give those chillun. What twar good for me jes warn’t right for the younguns.

"Since the job didn't require me to teach their chilluns an education, my not knowin much didn't cause no problems. All I remember teachin them was how to pee outside. We went up off State Road 7, next to the Glades; me, the cook, and the three younguns. The cook wanted some fresh greens from up there. The chilluns decided to take a leak. We pulled up a little side road and got out. I said, 'Squat right there.'

"The little girl sat on the ground. I told her, 'Don't sit, squat down.'

"'But, nurse, I don't know how.'

"I squatted right down and showed her."

My interest piqued at the thought of Doris’s perspective on a life I knew well--mine.

"I stayed with Judy and her chillun until they didn't need me to care for them no longer. I know’d this was what I wanted to do for ever. The Maddocks treated me so good I jest know’d there had to be more people for me like them. My Ann, my little girl, had got married and I was all alone. My boy had grown strong under Mama’s care in the West Virginny hills. Somehow though that boy had developed a mean streak a mile long. We’d see him now and then when we’d visit Mama but he don’t want nothin to do with familyin other than with Mama.

"It was back in 1969 when I know’d it twar time to move on again. I was 55 years old, but I could clean house like the best of them and my country cookin twar tasty as anyone’s. An advertisement in the Palm Beach paper for a cook caught my eye. I told my daughter I was goin to look into that. 'It's one of them buggery lookin places before the road winds back to the ocean, down south of them snooty people’s playground, called the Bath and Tennis Club. I been over there lookin.’ The house twar as long and big as a castle, long like a train, made of dark wood what disappears into forest thickets as dark as it looked itself. It set up there on a hill that stretched into a lawn the size of a football field, come right down to the road whar the only thang stoppin it twar a hedge of pine with an arch spread over the walkway leadin to the road that divided the lawn from the forest thickets beyond. ‘If I don't come back, you better come huntin for me.' That’s what I told my Ann girl.

"I drove in the first driveway, the north one--there twar two with an orchard between, the south one for the guests and north one for the rest of us, like help and delivery people. The north one led past two small cheery houses before comin up to that big old buggery one. I clutched my heart with my hand, nearly tearin it out. Oh, Gawd, what goblin will come out after me now, I thought. I knocked and hollered at the screen door. Pretty soon Molly Lee, your mama, come along to that door, a smile as big as you please, beamin on her face.

"Molly Blossom Lee was from one of them original Palm Beach families, but she didn't go for no high-fallutin attitudes. She understood how it was with the poor.

"She took me into the house through the back door. I begun sizin it up. There twar a laundry room right off that back porch and a teensy dining room right next to it, for me alone, and with my very own fireplace where a yard worker left a bundle of wood almost every day in the winter. Oh this was luxury. And that kitchen--it twar three rooms, one for all the dishes and washin them, a little one where a man come each day to polish the family’s and guests’ shoes, and one big one for cookin in and cleanin the pots and pans. I thought I twar in a hotel. There twar a whole section of bedrooms over the kitchen, jest for the help--me.

"Now the front of the house had a huge dining room, seatin twelve or more folks with a fireplace at the kitchen’s end and the front hall between it and the sittin room. Alongside of the sittin room twar an office and a chillun’s playroom wrappin round behind the back of that sittin room. To the east, lookin out over the ocean, twar an open porch with screened in areas at each end. The porch off the dinin room had a glass table for eight hungry mouths. I jest know’d I’d be cleanin the ocean salt off it every day even when no one ate there. The one off the playroom chilluns once played in the fresh air. Now it jest set there no furniture, a broke down hobby horse, the only reminder of childhood pleasures. To the west twar a long screened-in porch where the family often chatted or watched the chilluns playin ball on the lawn.

"Upstairs I come to six bedrooms lined along a long hallway. Three of the bedrooms had their own baths while the other three shared one at the far end of the hall. On the east side guests, on nice nights, could sleep on two sleepin porches connectin to four of the bedrooms that looked out over the ocean. The house twar much cheerier inside than outside and I felt comfortable here from the start."

"Doris, your friendship with Molly washes away the barrier between the poor and the rich, the worker and the boss. What made you feel so comfortable with her compared to your relationship with Judy Maddocks? You remained strictly an employee with Judy."

"Bein now married to a local fisherman, Molly learned to adjust to leadin a simple life. I understood well her ways. She twar always a lady but no fancy foods come to her table. No fancy clothes covered her body neither. Molly mostly wore shorts and old faded shirts. Pretty dresses and furry coats set in that closet of hers, but she only wore them when she welcomed uppity Palm Beach company or went to them fancy business meetin’s. I fitted right in from the minute we had that first chat.

"I simply said, 'Now about this cookin job. I do jest plain cookin. I can burl eggs, cook up a pot of greens, make a good ole pork roast tasty as you please, and fix wonderful samiches. Now listen, I been workin for this other family. They got them a colored cook. Boy, howdy, I can't cook nothin like that. I don't know nothin about them fancy dishes.'

"'That's all right,’ said Molly. ‘We don't eat a lot of fancy food here. We eat plain. My husband doesn't eat breakfast, but on days when Mr. Lee isn’t out fishing, he likes his eggs and grits for lunch after he works in the yard with the hired hands. Now on Thursdays you'll have to cook my mother's meals as her cook is off.'

"All right. Just what was it like for you living with my mother Molly Lee?"

"Molly quickly began to teach me the rich people's ways. And when she had nothin for me to do she'd volunteer me out to others. I jest smiled and said to myself this’d be another ‘Molly’ lesson. One time she volunteered me to care for the Duke and Duchess of Windsor from England yet. They stayed at your grandma’s cottage for a week or so while your grandma’s sister, Congresswoman Frances Bolton, twar away. They twar friends of hers, you know’d, and your mama twar real nervous havin them around. Meg, you remember who they twar. She twar Wally Simpson? It twar the greatest love affair of the century--Wally and the Duke, Edward twar his name.

"Molly left instructions includin a list of the couple’s activities. It twar an easy task until them people changed their mind one day and come home for dinner when they twarn’t suppose to. Them people told me not to go to no trouble, jest feed them whatever I'd do for Molly. I did, too.

"I fixed them a grilled cheese samich and some hot tomater soup, straight out of the can, Campbell’s best. Well, when I come back, that soup twar gone but them samiches set there still. I thought them samiches twar bad. I asked them if the samiches twarn’t cooked to their likin.

"They said 'Oh-h no, we didn't know it twar proper to eat them with soup.'

"I let them know it twar right in America to eat your soup with your samich.

"'Ah-h,' they said and they wanted to know how to make that tasty samich.

"I ain't had my dinner so I showed them while makin it. That man told his wife, 'Ah, Wally, even you should be able to cook that.' And she twarn't even insulted.

"One time back in 1971 Molly walked in lookin poorly. I asked her did she work too hard that day.

"She jest looks at me and said, 'Doris, I need some orange juice.'

"Now I know’d what that meant, so I go there with some juice and get her back on her feet. When that orange juice done its job and Molly twar a feelin better she said to me, 'My new Cadillac's become a permanent part of the back of your car.'

"'What do you mean, Mizzus? How can your car be a part of my car?'

"'Well,' said Molly, 'I kind of misjudged as I came up that damn hill. Oh, Doris, I'm going to get it fixed. It won't be noticeable.' She give me a check and it twar new again, even a new year model.

"Thangs twar real good after that until Mr. Lee died. It twar April Fools Day, 1972 and a cruel joke he played on us, leavin Molly and me to fend for ourselves. Your mother twar fifty-seven years old then. When we twar settin in the quiet of that big empty house, Molly confided in me.

"'You know, Doris, I never lived alone in my life. There was always a husband, children, my mother, or a nanny there. I can live alone now, but you'll move in any time if I get lonely, won't you?'

"She never asked but she twar needin me and I moved right back home with her."

"What about that marriage you got into after Mom died back in ‘78?"

"Let's see. This one year I took my vacation at the end of May. When I come home Molly twar gone away; gone away dead--the house all locked up and sealed. A piece of paper hung on the door sayin I'd get rested if I opened the door. Rested, why? I checked with Molly's legal advisors. They told me there twar somethin suspicious about her death, that it might be a bad lot of insulin. The police closed everythin up till the result of her blood came back. And I got to get a new place to work too. I hung up that phone and stared at it in disbelief for most of the day. Then I picked myself up and went out alookin again. For a couple of years I did a lot of movin from job to job. I missed my Molly--even our fights.

"I lost my friend. I lost my mind. I figgered to hell with the world, I'll get married. That's the only reason I did that. I know’d that man for thirty years and I know’d how stingy he twar. I know’d I shouldn't have. He didn't like to buy food even. I moved right in. Managed to get my name on that place. I told the realtor, 'You put my name on that house too. I been livin there a year now.' Then I went back and set down.

"He says, 'Are you Mrs. Morris Baynes? Are you legally married to Mr. Baynes?'

"'Yep, Morris it is but it’s such a fussy name. You gots a better one for us to call him? We from the West Virginny hills you know’d.'

"‘Anyways he put my name on that there deed.’ I looks at Morris. His face done turned downright purple. Everyday after that I lived with, 'You in for it now. You got your name on my house but I’ll rightly show you yet. '

I shook my head and took my drink in my hand. "Poor Doris, you always learn your lessons the hard way, but I remember you left that man."

"One day bout two years after your mama died I wanted out of that mess I'd got into. I called you hopin you might got an answer. You told me your husband had left you all alone with a little boy. I loved you, Meg, as one of my chilluns and you needed me.

"I jest packed me and Morris up and took us to your farm in New York. Morris, he thought he twar goin to be livin in luxury, bein waited on hand and foot. He never spected to help with handiwork round the house. By Christmas he twar leavin for Florida and me stayin right there in New York. Your youngun Andy needin schoolin right where he twar."

How true, I thought. Poor little guy. The courts had found Andy abandoned as a three year old in a house in South Miami. When the authorities discovered the parents had mental disorders that permanently hospitalized them, they placed Andy up for adoption. Unable to have children of our own and me facing forty years of age, my husband and I turned to adoption. According to the agency a baby was out of the question, so we accepted gratefully this cute little tow-head as our own. Andy needed the stability our lives were to give him over those next five years. When Ted left me alone, however, I couldn’t keep my child in a stable atmosphere. Doris arrived, an angel to rescue us from this dilemma.

Doris gave me an understanding nod. "I told you I'd stay on at the farm and care for Andy. At first you said 'no.' But I insisted and that big lawyer of yours twar there. He told me I'd be a big help. I jest let that old Morris go."

I stood up and put my arm around Doris. We had both needed lessons in picking husbands. Doris had picked a mate because his presence made the load she was destined to handle more manageable. My choices came out of loneliness and a self-image that declared "you cannot find someone better than this." Natural attraction, love, and a strong self-image just didn’t fit Doris’s and my belief in ourselves. Doris laughed and hugged me back till I thought she'd never let go.

"You stood by me always," I said. "There Andy was trying to spread his wings and fly in all directions at once. Poor thing! Then I took off to Philadelphia and hospitalized myself. My mother had died in June, followed a month later by an accident to my horse trainer who had been crushed by one of my horses--a ‘school’ horse. It left the young woman basically a vegetable. Shortly thereafter I walked in on my husband, Ted, in the arms of another woman. Three traumas too close together. Once I had committed myself, though, the doctors refused to let me go for two years, and Andy suffered by not having a mother around."

Doris raised an eyebrow. "And how about that bizarre artist you took up with."

It was enchanting the way Doris incorporated her own language with certain words from that of my mother’s cultured language such as ‘bizarre.’ And bizarre my artist companion, Chris, was with all the stereotypical idiosyncrasies of an overbearing, self-centered, overly sensitive artist.

I smiled at her. "Look how hard you worked trying to bring up Andy and keep my house for me during those two years."

"While you twar up in that hospital Andy become more and more stubborn. He jest wouldn't get up and go get his schoolin. He'd con me into lettin him get away with all kinds of mischief.

"'You can't make me go to school. You're not my mother,' he'd tell me.

"'I know I'm not, I'm not trying to be you mama, but you get you bad ass out of that bed. You goin to school.'

"He'd go out that door and go where he thought I wouldn't seed him. There he’d sit, bury himself right down in the snow. He'd set there till that little bottom twar a blisterin red with cold. Then he'd come a sneakin back in. When he’d look around for me he’d catch me alaughin at his foolishness. His face would get tomater red as he exploded with, ‘You got no call to be laughin at me.’ But I really did. His anger and his actions that brought it on twar so funny I’d laugh all the more.

"But then there twar times when he'd go to school with mischief on his mind. He'd be acomin home late and miss his bus. He'd call me, 'Uh, Doris, will you come after me? I missed the bus.'

"'I'd tell him, 'there's another bus, you know.'

"'No, Doris, they cut that one out,' he'd answer me. But I had the goods on him. I called the school and they told me that second school bus twar not cut out. I waited and waited. The bus come and go. No Andy! Dark was asettin in when I gets in my car and drives off toward that there school. Along about halfway there here he comes, head hangin low, draggin his feet. I pulls up alongside of him, and opens the door. ‘No, thanks, Doris. I jest as soon walk home,’ he’d say as he slid on the ice to the ground. Boom! I’d pick him up, drop him on the seat, and drive home in dead silence.

"When I come to you, Andy twar a trim little fellow but he twar all the time shovelin food in his mouth. It seemed to fill the hole from losin his parents and then you up and divorcin. Boy, howdy, all the time he twar at the fridgedaire lookin for more, especially when he twar nervous or feelin insecure. One time I bought a fruit cake. I give him a little slice. Now I told him, 'Every night you can have one little slice.'

"'Okay, Doris, whatever you say; jest one slice.'

"Way down durin the night I hears the steps asqueakin. I opens my door and follows that squeak. No lights on, but I sees somethin from the kitchen; a little light. Andy has the fridgedaire door open; settin flat on his butt, with nothin but a pair a shorts; has that Gawl darn cake, jest a stuffin it in his face. I let out one big yap and he’s about takin the fridgedaire door off gettin out of there makin ninety."

"Andy jest got more and more unmanageable. You decided we had to put him in a boardin school when, the year after you done left that old hospital, you closed down the farm."

I shook my head to jar the cobwebs out of my mind then reflected on my decision to sell the farm. How I wished I had done that right in the beginning. Andy and I would have been back home in my precious Palm Beach, Florida. Safe among friends in familiar spaces. There I was in Philadelphia, however, and Andy happily growing in upstate New York. Happily? Well, that is debatable. His rebellious acts, no matter how amusing, showed cause for concern. By age eleven he showed signs that caused the counselors at school to advise me to send Andy to boarding school, to let him spread his wings a little. And then there was Doris--what to do with her if the farm sells. I liked the idea of bringing her to Philadelphia to stay with me as we had been like a family since the day she walked through the back door of Mom’s home. I had decided I would test her ability to handle the big city for a few weeks that summer.

Come summer Doris and her mother came for their visit while Andy spent two weeks on the show horse circuit. I soon realized Doris could not fit into life in a big city. My memory jogged to an evening that a fire down the street brought a crowd out onto the street in front of my Philadelphia apartment. Doris loved a crowd. As noise outside aroused my curiosity, I glanced out the bedroom window. I stared in shock at Doris Baynes. Dressed in a long flannel nightshirt and unlaced tennis shoes, curlers sticking out of her hair, Doris directed the firemen’s activities while hanging onto every word of their hair-raising tales. Shocked at her dress and behavior I threw open the window and called her back.

As we sat there on the couch, the TV sputtering white noise to our conversation, Doris’s voice brought my attention back to today’s world. "I seed your late mama, Molly Blossom Lee, in you that night. I ain't never seed such carrying on. Them people twar tellin me fires and crime goes on every night there in the big city. I sure don’t know bout livin there. I be scared to an inch of my life with all that carrying on. Besides, all them there stairs in your apartment buildin’d be the death of me."

"Doris, I got scared, too. All I had between me and facing the world alone was that hare-brained artist of mine. And Philly had no warm little communities to nestle into, only cold wintry slippery concrete streets and people just as icy. I wanted to go home to a safe familiar place. That's when I called you up--my guardian angel."

My mind wandered as I took a sip of coffee. Doris had been there with encouragement when, on my wedding day, I sat waiting with wonderment over the great step of marriage. Doris came running when that marriage dissolved, and she stayed to keep my little boy safe when the doctors advised I seek intensive counseling in a hospital away from home. She helped me find Wilson-Munson Academy for Andy when local schooling did not work to his best interest. Finally as I returned to my roots she came with me to care for me. She really was my family today.

She nodded. "After twelve years up north, you and me, we come back home to Florida. I settled you back into your beloved Palm Beach County world, but at sixty-six I had got too old to continue doin all that cleanin and all. I interviewed a new maid to help out. Then I went back to whar the circus people twar in Gibsonton. There I bought me a trailer on a little piece of land swallowed up by acre upon acre of other tin trailers with sad lonely retired circus folk lazily waiting their life’s end. Uncle Mark, the clown that bring’d me up, lived next door but it twarn’t the same. He twar cranky and old. All the others twar dead or gone. A whole new crowd done moved in. A year or so later I sold that there trailer and come right back to you. Now I needed you--your friendship and companionship. I fit in with you, not with my past."

I smiled. "You're right. We've grown to love living a full rich life in a simple manner." We finished our meal in silence.

Doris and I remained in close contact, even after July 1997 when her family realized she needed professional supervisional care. In the nursing home she found companionship with a gentleman there and the empty hole of loneliness was temporarily filled once again. Then in September of 2001, at age 76, Doris hurried off to fill that hole by joining her beloved Molly Blossom Lee in heaven. She had a family once more–for best or worst