Magyar News, 1994. szeptember-1995. augusztus (5. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1995-01-01 / 5. szám
THE SUNDAY BEFORE By Margie C. Mingrone Life’s Sunday performance had been ritual for many years when I was a little girl in the early 1960’s. Getting up early was always a chore on that day. It was time to get ready for church. My mom was always up at the first hint of sunrise. Sounds of silverware beating up a pancake, french toast, or an omelette mixture emanated from the kitchen followed by the irresistible aroma of her cooking. She’d then call grandma, “Megy templomba? Megy templomba?” (Are you going to church?) She’d ask in Hungarian. Grandma knew only a few English words, but her children were expected to learn the Hungarian language as they grew up. This was not so in our household. Mother would always say that we were American first. The fact is that I’m the product of a 1940’s mixed marriage—a marriage surely destined for doom between a Hungarian and an Italian. Hungarians have tobe the cleanest people on this earth. On those early Sunday mornings you would find my mother with her csutak (washcloth—the only Hungarian word utilized in our household) quickly and efficiently carrying out her daily morning chores. It was also her job to wake us up. Even with all these distractions, why was it always so particularly difficult to get up on those Sundays. And why was daddy allowed to keep snoring undisturbed and be excused from church. Perhaps if I had taken the time to count how many hours he was at work in his large Italian supermarket, it may have given me an undeniable answer. Still, unwillingly, I would get ready. The ride to our church, The First Hungarian United Church of Christ, in Bridgeport was only ten minutes long, yet the morning was only beginning. A long hour of enduring pain was spent at church service. However there were many years we would spend singing in the junior choir. Miss Egry, our choir director, spent countless hours trying to organize the children’s choir and then allowing each of us to sing a solo. I can’t tell you how much I loved the sheer tension of anticipating the excitement nor the exhilarating feeling of performing that weekly solo. And then to be rewarded at Christmas time with a silver dollar from the Women’s Guild. It was a personal goal back then to make it to the senior choir. After all, they got to hold real candles at the Christmas Eve service while the junior choir flickered flashlights onto the church ceiling. My mother always made sure that we never missed a Christmas Eve service. On an unbearably cold and snowy Christmas Eve we even took a bus to church. After church service came another hour of Sunday school. Every room was packed with at least 10-12 children. The goal was to have perfect attendance. If achieved, you 4 were awarded with a pin each year. Bibles were distributed after third grade and confirmation meant that now you could sample wine during church service. After Sunday School was the Hungarian service. Reverend Nagy would entertain, at that time, about eighty or so of our direct Hungarian descendants. These are the people we need to be proud of as they were the pioneers of the twentieth century. And I am proud to say that my grandmother was one of them. Before leaving Church School I would quickly run upstairs to see her. Respect, coated with a hug and a kiss, was all that she needed. Always happy to greet me with her little frail, humped over body, those warm, wrinkled hands embracing mine and a smile that transformed into broken English and Hungarian words. She’d chuckle at me and marvel at how much I’d grown since just the week before. Then with a twinkle in her soft luminescent eyes and a squeeze of my hands in hers, I’d be off. I never had the pleasure and honor to meet my grandfather, but together they must have been extraordinary people. They had accomplished so much for their bravery and determination. They immigrated here when Frank Szabó was sixteen and Agnes Molnár was nineteen from Tiszakanyár in Szabolcs county. He worked in the coal mines of Pennsylvania and she worked in the Warner’s factory in Bridgeport. They met in the U.S. and were married in 1910 at our Pine Street church. When he came to Bridgeport, he worked in a rolling mill at Heppenstahl’s and then at Stanley Works. After first living on Wordin Avenue, they built a house on Princeton Street in the Black Rock area. From there they moved to a 24-acre farm in Easton in 1925 because grandpa loved the country life. Unfortunately , grandma didn ’ t—too dirty, too much work, and just plain inconvenient. What with the sixth and final child bom on the farm and economic times getting tougher, they traded the farm two years later for a five family house on Bostwick Avenue. This is the house I remember grandma living in. If she didn’t make it to church on Sunday, we could always count on the fact that we’d see her after church. Entering into a long hallway where she lived on the first floor, I can remember the hard echoing of our shoes as we walked to her door at the end. As she opened it, outpoured the warm, thick smell of Hungarian cooking. I had always felt that my own mother’s stuffed cabbage was excellent, but grandma’s was perfection. She always insisted that I have buttered bread. Of course! How could I refuse? After all, that had been one of the reasons I loved to come. Zeisler’s fresh rye bread smothered with sweet deli butter that she kept in a green glass-covered container on the far side of the kitchen table. As usual, she was always busy making or sewing something. As I checked it out, I noticed her bed was always a sea of drying Hungarian soup noodles. Had she counted them she would know that I stole a handful or two and ate them raw. Being fully satisfied with tasting the finest in Hungarian cuisine, we would be off— but not before grandma would hand mom some potholders she had just sewn. All in all I had still never quite made up my mind back then of what the church and God meant to me, but I do know that the best part of Sundays was yet to come, that is, if we didn’t have to visit grandma at her house. Being oh! so careful not to step on any sidewalk cracks, after church I would walk to my aunt’s house two blocks away. There my mom would be waiting. People seemed tobe friendlier back then. Anyone that I passed always said “hello,” or a pleasant “good morning.” Walking by a small white church on Maplewood and Howard Avenues, I could still hear the faint echoes of a small congregation singing a familiar Christian hymn. Carefully I would balance myself around the perimeter of the little stone fence that encircled the church and embraced its members inside. My aunt lived in an old row house on Poplar Street. It was small and cozy and a definite wonder of how three daughters could grow up with such little room. Wagsy, their dog, always greeted me warmly. She knew I would manage to get her a milkbone or two to devour in exchange for a few wellrehearsed tricks. Eagerly I awaited my aunt’s request for me to do the Sunday errands. These delicious errands consisted of going down to the corner store to pick up a dozen hard rolls, a jelly donut or two, the Sunday Bridgeport Post and the New York Times. The orders were always the same each week. With a little extra change from mom for candy, I was on my merry way. The grocery store was small, but it had the bare essentials. The wooden floor creaked as you entered as if to notify Bill, the owner, to come and greet you. I never knew his last name, but his kind faecal ways knew my order—hard rolls and jelly donuts— and they always tasted so squishy fresh. My next stop was to Pearl’s variety store which was just across the street on Maplewood Avenue. I wasn’t all that interested in the greeting cards, magazines, or even small toys. So many indecisive moments were spent pondering over penny candy through the grossly finger printed glass display. She must have been a patient women because these were important weekly decisions for me. “Ready?” she’d ask while opening up a small brown paper bag to fill with my special requests: Let’s see...2 wax lips, 3 wax tongues, 2 wax mustaches, a box of
