Lucky Cricket
I have been thinking of my mom of late (Barbara Fallon Humphrey 1928-2021) and likely because of a prior blog where I discussed my predilection for trashy novels. Mom would be appalled as she was a huge reader, but only read “important” books. It took me a good portion of my adult life to realize I really didn’t have to ONLY read serious books – and reading trashy novels is my version of binge watching a tv series, or eating a whole bag of potato chips. Not necessarily harmful and a good distraction when life gets a tad too intense.
I recalled two sterling silver bookmarks were among the family heirlooms, and I went to hunt them down. I don’t think I ever knew their history, but somehow ended up with them. After some elbow grease, it turns out one has my father’s maternal Grandmother’s initials (MLB = Margaret LeBoutillier 1874-1903) with a charming cricket in raised design. (Is anyone else annoyed that the cricket is facing one way and the initials the other?!) I suspect this was in The Box my parents had of family papers and memorabilia but migrated – as crickets are wont to do – to my bedside table. Thankfully he is a very quiet cricket, as compared to those that set up house in our basement.
The other was a bit more surprising. It has my mom’s initials BFH so post 1955, after her marriage to my father. Oddly though, the marking on the back says “S. Kirk and Son” which is an old sterling designer from the 1800s. I am guessing mom found it antiquing as she was often poking about at thrift, consignment and antique stores. Anyone guessing where my training came from?! I have memories of scouring The Rose Door and Darien Thrift Shop with her as a child, and on a recent trip back to Darien it turns out the thrift store is still in the same old house on the main street.
I suspect Mom treated herself to the bookmark and had it engraved. It is also possible my mom appropriated an unengraved silver piece from the family heirlooms and had it marked for herself. I remember she found a Tiffany’s gold stickpin with large cabochon sapphire in the box of heirlooms, and had a jeweler in Pittsburg fashion a ring out of it. Sadly, the value of the Tiffany’s piece is long gone, and while the ring was worn by my mom, I suspect the jeweler kept the gold marked stickpin as it was likely valuable. Mom really had no sense of sentimentality – and while I can be irked by her behavior, it really is a product of her childhood practicality.
My mother’s childhood was not an easy one. She was raised with her younger sister during the Great Depression in Chicago by a single mother. My grandmother Freda Hermes Fallon (1898-1961) had no high school education, and was abandoned by her bigamist husband (there’s a sad tale) to raise her 2 children alone. She got a job through the machinations of a brother who was a judge, and she taught sewing in a Chicago school. During the 1930s, they lived with her older sister, Aunt Frances and her family. Mom had wonderful stories of Aunt Frances, and was close to her older cousins, but she had to work from a young age, and put herself through college in Chicago. Her marriage to my father in 1955 changed her means significantly, though Mom was never able to change her frugal habits.
While my paternal great grandmother’s life story was tragic, my mother’s was one with a happy ending. She and my father were married over 50 years, traveled the world, raised 7 children, and volunteered in many ways to improve other’s lives. So really, the cricket book mark should have been Mom’s as she was one lucky lady. And I suspect Mom too would have insisted the initials and the cricket go in the same direction!