Well, I guess Face Book has its uses. When I was at Harper & Row (now Harper-Collins) in the early 1970s, I was editorial assistant to Virginia Hilu. She was a self-made woman with a passion for big literature and published very serious non fiction books. While I was with her, she was trying to segue into novels. Virginia was married to a fellow who had once worked with my husband, Jay, in the tech writing field. It was a small world.

She had two sons, Brandon, at that time about 13, and Dalton, around 7 or 8. One day she comes in and asks me would I, please, pretty please, help her out because she had an important meeting to go to and had promised Brandon that she would take him to see Mary Poppins, then showing at Radio City Music Hall. So, being the ever helpful editorial assistant that I was, and also not knowing how to get out of it without creating other problems, I said I would. Off Brandon and I went to Radio City. I delivered him back to Virginia at the office several hours later.


The following day, I went in and she had Dalton, the younger, with her, a kid with large, soulful eyes, whose expectations were, they seemed to say, rarely met. Dalton wanted to see Mary Poppins too. Sob. Virginia said I could take him to Radio City, buy his ticket, plop him down and she would pick him up. Not so fast, said the theatre manager … no kid gets in here at that age without an adult. I got into a phone booth (remember those?) and called Virginia at the office and explained things and she said, oh, dear, oh dear, could you, would you ????? So I stayed with Dalton, who at that moment, was standing next to me, looking up with those sad, sad eyes, daring not to hope he could see this movie.

I spent the time ignoring the story, and looking at the backgrounds as a diversion. I brought Dalton back to Virginia and escorted him into her office, saying, wearily, “Just these two, right Virginia? You don’t have anymore, do you?”

Anyway, I thought of these kids this morning and got on Face Book and looked up Dalton (Brandon, too, but the bio for this one was so definitely not the boy I knew, that I sent no message). Dalton, however, was a possible and I messaged him, “Did I take you to see Mary Poppins at Radio City Music Hall when you were about 7 or 8 when I was working for your mother at Harper & Row?”

And he messaged back, “Oh my God, yes you did. I am on my cell phone … more later.”
So I am delighted to be in touch with him to see what sort of fellow he turned out to be.

Maybe we can even meet at some point,

As you can see, I like to tickle the past.

xx, Teal