A Girl from Yamhill by Beverly Cleary Page A

loving me, I took it home to show Mother, who placed it in my Baby Book along with the record of my first tooth and first words. My first love letter is still there.
    Acknowledged love was not the only change in my life. Mother found a piano teacher on the next street, and I began to take lessons, thumping away at scales and “The Happy Farmer” while Evelyn, an older girl who lived across the street, played rapid, accurate scales and “Rustle of Spring,” probably counting out each note, on her baby grand piano. I felt hitting the right note should be enough without having to count at the same time.
    After school, Mother would say, “Now I am going to have you practice,” phrasing I deeply resented. Even more, I resented her sitting beside me, supervising my practice. However, music lessons had one advantage. Because I was so wretched over school music that I could not eat breakfast on music day, Mother arranged with the principal to let me take my piano lessons during music period. This kept me lackadaisically thumping.
    When Grandmother Bunn came to visit, she listened to the frilly, trilly “Rustle of Spring” floating from across the street and offered me fifty dollars to learn to play it.
    â€œNo, thank you,” I said politely, refusing to compromise my integrity.
    That year a new girl appeared in the fifth grade, a girl who lived in the next block and who passed our house on the way to school. For the first time, I found a best friend.
    Her name was Mary Dell. She had a sister seven or eight years old and parents who were younger than mine. Her father worked for a paint company. Mary Dell’s mother seemed happy and carefree, often with a paintbrush in her hand, painting woodwork or kitchen cabinets. Once she even painted a pair of shoes. The family also kept a pet dog, a lively wire-haired terrier named Winnie. A dog in the house! On the farm we had two working dogs and a stray terrier that hung around, but none of them was ever allowed in the house.
    Sometimes I spent the night with Mary Dell, and if my parents went to a party with friends from Yamhill who had moved to Portland, Mary Dell stayed with me. We did this until my parents gave up their modest social life. Long waitsfor streetcars at night spoiled their pleasure, and the serving of bootleg liquor at some parties disgusted Mother, who now felt she could no longer return hospitality.
    I continued to spend the night with Mary Dell, whose mother did something I found surprising. She kissed her daughters. This filled me with longing.
    I confronted Mother and informed her, “Some mothers kiss their little girls.”
    Mother laughed, pulled me to her, and gave me a hug and a kiss—a sweet, isolated moment. It was never repeated. I often look back on that kiss and wonder why Mother never felt she could kiss me again. She and my father often hugged each other, and my father was affectionate toward me.
    One rainy day, Mother agreed that I could invite Mary Dell to our house to play. When I telephoned my invitation, I overheard Mary Dell speaking to her mother. “Beverly wants me to come over.”
    â€œDo you want to go?” her mother asked.
    â€œNot especially,” was Mary Dell’s answer.
    Shocked, I spoke into the telephone. “I heard what you said.” I hung up, went to my room, closed the door, and cried. I cried because I understood Mary Dell’s answer to her mother. My house was always cold and drab compared to Mary Dell’s house; Mother was always tired andnervous. Why should Mary Dell want to come to my house? I understood perfectly, which made my distress even more difficult to bear.
    The next morning on the way to school, I told Mary Dell, “I’m mad at you for what you said yesterday.”
    â€œWhat can I do to make up?” she asked.
    Somehow I had not expected this reasonable answer.
    â€œGet down on your knees and say you’re sorry,” I said.
    To my