If Life Is a Bowl of Cherries, What Am I Doing in the Pits? by Erma Bombeck Read Free Book Online Page B

suck your thumb. And clever cookbooks came out to combat the crisis. (Cook Cheap cost $12.95.)
    Overnight, butchers became the darlings of the cocktail party, replacing doctors. I hated myself for it, but I found myself playing the game like the rest of the homemakers.
    “How's your rump today, Fred,” I asked my butcher one day after he called my number.
    He looked around cautiously. “You've been a good customer of mine for two years, Erma. Nursed our baby back to health after the flu epidemic and loaned me the money to get my store started. A man doesn't forget things like that. [I smiled.] I can arrange financing on a sirloin tip at 6 percent on the unpaid balance for thirty-six months.”
    “See you at our house Saturday night?” I smiled.
    “You bet,” he waved.
    I had no shame whatsoever. “Well, if it isn't Fred Sawsil. I hate to bring this up at a social gathering, Fred, but I was wondering if you would prescribe something for a tough round steak. The meat thermometer registers normal and I've already given it two tablespoons of meat tenderizer.”
    He looked up tiredly. “Take two aspirins and call me in the morning,” he said. “Now if you'll excuse me, I have to get back to Mrs. Beeman. She has a sty in the eye of her round.”
    I stood there in a daze. Somehow, it did me a world of good just to touch the hand of the man who had touched a standing rib....
    Standing at the meat counter day after day was depressing. I found myself looking over cuts of meat that I used to think belonged in bottles at Harvard.
    “What is that?” I asked Fred one day. “In the corner of the meat case?”
    “Tongue. “
    “Whose?”
    “It was an anonymous donor,” he said dryly. “This is tripe,” he said, holding up a carton.
    “I'll say,” I said weakly.
    “Have you never tried pig's feet?”
    “No, you never know where they've been.”
    “Chicken?”
    “I'll pretend I didn't hear that.”
    I motioned to Fred to come closer, “Listen, Fred, do you remember that rump roast you financed last week? Well, when you trimmed a little of the fat off it went into deep shock and...”
    “I don't make house calls,” he said stiffly.
    “So, why don't you drop over to the house tomorrow,” I said, “and I'll have a few people in and....”
    On Wednesdays I play golf," he said.
     
    Have a good day....
     
    I wanted to boycott coffee when it went to four dollars a pound. I really did, but basically I'm weak and cannot endure pain.
    I knew I was paying more for three pounds of coffee than I paid for a winter coat when I was first married, but I couldn't help myself.
    You cannot imagine the pressure I got from the women in the neighborhood. One morning, I practically ran to the coffee klatsch at Lois's house.
    Just inside the door, Lois said, “Want a cup?”
    She put an empty cup in my hand.
    “Where's the coffee?” I asked.
    “I never promised you coffee.”
    “That's not funny, Lois. Do you have any idea what I would give for a cup of coffee? I'd sell my children.”
    “Wouldn't we all.”
    “I'd sell my body.”
    “Braggart.”
    “Lois, I'd sell my bowling trophy.”
    “Will you get hold of yourself? We've got to stand firm together or there's no telling how high the price of coffee will go.”
    “Look,” I said regaining my composure, “I never thought I'd admit this to anyone, but I am older than the rest of you and I lived through the Great Caffeine Drought of 1942 during the war.”
    “I never heard of it,” said Lois.
    “And I hope you never do,” I said. “I saw my mother in the morning without a cup of coffee once and it's the closest to death I ever want to come. She toasted and buttered her hand and put it on my sister's plate. She bumped into a footstool with her head. She felt a draft and it was her eyelashes blinking. When she thought no one was looking, she put her head in the coffee canister and inhaled. My father caught her trying to shave her tongue. It was awful.”
    “It must