Welcome Wagon

By Johnny Culver

Mrs. Anderson’s kitchen. .A fall morning many decades ago. Two ladies sit at a table sipping coffee. Mrs. Lizard blathers on.

MRS LIZARD

And the beauty parlor on Spruce Street, the Beauty Barn, what a vulgar name…well you just want to avoid going there at all costs. The new owner, Maxine, smokes like a chimney, and, if those harsh chemicals she uses don’t get you as soon as you walk in the door, that cigarette stench will. Lucille Ball smokes like a chimney, but I’ll bet my new blender she doesn’t smell like an ashtray. I won’t let Constance anywhere near the place

MRS ANDERSON

That’s good to know, Mrs.…

(Looks at card in her hand)

Lizard.

MRS LIZARD

It’s LizaRRRd, dear. My husband is of French descent. And Mrs., Anderson, I am so very glad that that someone, you, finally bought that old Haney place. It has been on the market for years. You’ve done so much with the front lawn, killing all the crabgrass. And the back garden. Old Mrs. Haney never did take care of her vegetable garden. Who knew that maggots were so fond of cherry tomatoes?

MRS ANDERSON

My husband and I enjoy working in the outdoors.

MRS LIZARD

And just what does Mr. Anderson do for a living? It is none of my business, but the Piney Fork Welcome Wagon does like to keep accurate records of such information. And they can rely on me for the most up to date facts.

MRS ANDERSON

Martin is a vice president…for a grocery chain…in Canton…just a few stores…nothing much

MRS LIZARD

Canton? And what is the name of the chain, perhaps I have shopped there. I do visit Canton, you know. Oh my, the big city!

MRS ANDERSON

(Quietly)

The Lucky-Cardinal…

(Changing subject)

This coffee is very good. What brand is it?

MRS LIZARD

(Spitting)

The Lucky-Cardinal! Why that’s one of the biggest grocery stores in Ohio! That is certainly some information to send along to the Welcome Wagon.

MRS ANDERSON

It’s nothing really…tell me more about the Beauty Barn…

MRS LIZARD

Well, I’d like to speak to your husband about something…just last month; I was in one of his stores while visiting Canton. Constance and I had driven up to the hospital there to visit my old baby sitter, Mrs. Betty Hooker. She used to watch my sister and me after school, while my mother was at work at the parachute factory. Betty was just a teenager then, almost sixteen, but she was like family. She’d tell my sister and me stories sing to us, playing her accordion, and make us tea and crackers...she’s about eighty about now.

(Lost in the memories, then snaps back)

Anyway, I had gone to visit her in the hospital in Canton, She had just had two of her fingers removed. Apparently after all those years of playing the accordion, her thumb and middle finger were so busted up, smashed to smithereens, the doctors just had to take em off. She wanted to keep them, though, ,so when Constance and I went into her hospital room, she was sitting up in bed, with her accordion on one side of her bed and a big jar with her thumb and middle finger on the other.

MRS ANDERSON

You wanted to speak to my husband about that?

MRS LIZARD

No! How foolish! Anyway, after I left the hospital, I decided to stop in the Lucky-Cardinal store across from the hospital to see if that had any of the Hamburger Helper I had seen on television. Because I knew that the Lucky-Cardinal carries every product under the sun!

MRS ANDERSON

That’s what Martin says…

MRS LIZARD

Well, I looked through all the varieties of Hamburger Helper. They had Hamburger Helper for chicken with the yellow glove on the package; they had Hamburger Helper for Tuna with the blue glove on the package, but they didn’t carry a single box of the regular Hamburger Helper…with the grey glove on the package. I asked the box boy, but he had not heard of such a variety of Hamburger Helper. I even asked the cashier about the particular item, when I was checking out with my other purchase, a bottle of Milk of Magnesia. Did you know it comes in a lovely blue bottle now?

MRS ANDERSON

I thought it always did…

MRS LIZARD

The last time I saw a bottle, it came in a nice black bottle with a white label. Times have changed! Do you enjoy afternoon television, Mrs. Anderson?

(Oven timer loudly goes off)

That must be my Bundt cake.

(Goes to oven and tried to turn off timer)

Darned oven, on its last legs. Barely even gets hot any more. I hope it doesn’t wake Constance.

MRS ANDERSON

(Over the buzzing of the timer)

Well, I think the soap operas are a little silly these days, the loud music, the bright colors, I liked them better in black in white.

(Timer is turned off)

Don’t you agree?

MRS LIZARD

Well, I do like that new program, The NEW Price is Right. With Bob Barker. All the ladies from the neighborhood get together every afternoon and watch it. Drop whatever they’re doing. At the Beauty Barn. I won’t set foot in that trap. I bet it stinks like a bar, all that cigarette smoke. So I just sit in my living room and watch it. While Constance takes her nap upstairs.

MRS ANDERSON

I’d think it’d be more fun watching it with other ladies…

MRS LIZARD

Well, I make it fun! I sit here, in my chair in the kitchen, and when Johnny Olsen calls out “Com’on down”, I get up and run to my chair in the living room, right in front of the television!

MRS ANDERSON

(Bewildered)

…that sounds fun…

MRS LIZARD

And the prizes they give away! Last month, they had this beautiful range, self cleaning. With a clock radio! A Lady Kenmore. I’d rush out to Sears in a heartbeat to but the color wouldn’t go with the other appliances in my kitchen, or my counter tops.

MRS ANDERSON

(Smug)

I saw the same range. We liked it so much that Martin and I ordered it for our kitchen. It matches everything perfectly. Our other appliances.

MRS LIZARD

(Shocked)

Mrs. Anderson…you have…grey appliances? Grey counter tops? Well! I thought the wife of a vice president would have a little more taste! I may have to report this to the Welcome Wagon!

MRS ANDERSON

Grey? My kitchen appliances and my counter tops are the latest color…Avocado green! We had the entire kitchen redone! How could you think…?

(Thinks)

Mrs. Lizzard, when your television tells you that the following program is brought to you in living color, do you enjoy the program? How new and exciting it is. How bright and-

MRS LIZARD

Well it doesn’t seem all that exciting to me. Seems just like the same old program.

MRS ANDERSON

Mrs.Lizzard, do you have a color television?

MRS LIZARD

A what?

MRS ANDERSON

A color television? Solid State? Color chassis? Zenith?

MRS LIZARD

Oh my heavens no. No need at all. I figure if Constance has to watch regular black and white television in her bedroom, well then I should too.

MRS ANDERSON

(Frustrated)

Then buy your daughter a color television!

MRS LIZARD

My daughter? Mrs. Anderson, have you been visiting the Beauty Barn, inhaling all those chemicals? I don’t have a daughter! Mr.Lizzard and I are childless.

MRS ANDERSON

Well, then who is…

(Dog barks in background)

….Constance?

MRS LIZARD

Oh don’t mind Constance, she’s just barking at the television program. Lassie is her favorite! Now, do you happen to get a …discount…at the Lucky Cardinal?

CURTAIN