2.28 Gaggle of Girlfriends 1957

1957 • San Jose ~ Things were bad between Betty and Mom. My sister wanted to do what she wanted to do, and Mom couldn’t control her.  Betty moved out in her senior year and took over Claudia and Bobby’s San Jose apartment when Bobby was transferred from Moffett Field to a naval air station in Hawaii. Dad paid $50 a month child support for each of us, and he gave Betty hers directly; it paid her rent. The only thing Mom contributed was to Betty’s agony, coming over on a regular basis threatening to put her in a convent (her favorite threat) or in Juvenile Hall (her second favorite). You weren’t supposed to be able to live on your own if you were a minor, so my sister bit her tongue and kept her mouth shut.

Her gaggle of girlfriends thought it so grown-up that she had her own pad. Now they had a place to smoke Kents and drink Cokes without being bothered. Most of her Willow High friends had been together since grammar school: Carol, Lynne, Karen, Maureen, Judy, and Joy. Joy was the goodwill ambassador of the crowd and was the one who brought Betty into their circle. Some of them had sisters near my age too, but younger sisters were accessories they avoided.

Willow Glen High School, 1956

Betty Clemens

1957 • San Jose and Whittier ~ When Betty graduated from Willow Glen High School in June 1957, Mom went to the ceremony. She had also gone to the trouble to make my sister’s graduation outfit, even after the ungrateful way Betty acted when Mom made her a whole new Easter week wardrobe a couple of months before. Betty refused to wear them because they were homemade. Mom spent the week before Betty’s graduation working on her dress, staying up late, working the foot treadle on her Singer, making sure the zipper was perfect, adjusting the seams, hand stitching the hem. Betty wore it but didn’t even thank her; she ignored Mom. When Mom went to hug her after the ceremony Betty didn’t speak to her; she never wanted to speak to her again.

My sister left directly after graduation to stay with Carleen in Whittier. She had received an art scholarship at a college in San Jose, so she swallowed her pride and asked Mother if she could move back home for her first year. She’d discovered how hard it was to support herself when she was going to high school and knew she wouldn’t be able to make it through college. Mom said no, then told her that she and I were leaving for Hawaii in the next couple of weeks to live near Claudia. Mom was moving away and hadn’t bothered to tell Betty. It wasn’t the first time.

Betty stayed in southern California, lived with Carleen for a while (like most of us), gave up going to college, and got a job at the mall. That’s where she met Tony who was working at Kinney Shoes. She went in on her lunch break to buy a purse and fell in love instead.

to be continued…

© 2018. Catherine Sevenau.
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