In 1919, when I was five years old, I got whooping cough and almost died. I remember my mother sleeping with me every night. We lived in–well, we called it an English basement. Now they’d call it a garden apartment. And my mother used to go to the window in the pitch dark and lift up the window to take the milk in, and the milkman would say, “How is she today?”
She’d always say, “When I have no money, I’ll go to the poorhouse.” And that’s what she did.
So Aunt Nell said, “Well, Maude, take it back and get what you want.”
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Aunt Nell was a cook. She worked the night shift at Effinger’s Restaurant in the Loop. I have a picture of her standing behind the counter. I remember her singing “Baa, Baa, Black Sheep” to me. That was her favorite song.
She used to come visit us in the morning on the way home from work. She would sit at the table with her hat on. My mother would say, “Nell, take your hat off.”
Then ma told me the story about Aunt Nell’s children, and I was just devastated. I couldn’t believe that this woman I loved so much had given her children away.
I had another Aunt Nell, Aunt Nell Havern on my mother’s side. She was sort of a fancy lady. Aunt Nell Hennessy was the exact opposite.
